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Spoiler Alert: This article/section contains details about future plot lines described in the light novels, not covered in the anime. Do not proceed unless you want to be spoiled. |
| “ | “Un, I bet you’ve already noticed it, but Spirits are humans that received Sephira Crystals. ──No, I’ve distributed my power to them, that statement would be more accurate? Originally, the word Spirit only referred to me, the First Spirit.” | ” |
—Mio Takamiya, to Kurumi Tokisaki | ||
| Mio Takamiya | |
|---|---|
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| Profile | |
| Kanji | 崇宮澪 |
| Romaji | Takamiya Mio |
| Age | 30 (Deceased) |
| Gender | Female |
| Species | Spirit |
| Hair Color | Pale Blue |
| Eye Color | Blue |
| Nicknames |
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| Personal Status | |
| Relatives |
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| Media | |
| Novel Debut | Volume 4 (Mentioned) Volume 14 (Flashback) Volume 16 (Actual Appearance) |
| Portrayal | |
Mio Takamiya (崇宮澪, Takamiya Mio?) is a mysterious person connected to both Shido and Mana's past. She is also known as the Spirit of Origin (始原の精霊, Shigen no Seirei?), due to her existence being the source for the appearance of other Spirits.
Summary
The First Spirit was the first Spirit to ever make an appearance on Earth. 30 years before the beginning of the events in Date A Live, she was summoned into the world by Sir Isaac Ray Pelham Westcott, Ellen Mira Mathers, and Elliot Baldwin Woodman through unknown means. However, her summoning also caused the first spacequake in history at some point of the frontier between China and Mongolia, killing over 150 million people and starting a chain of similar disasters around the world that would last approximately six months.
For much of the series, Kurumi Tokisaki has been chasing after Nia Honjou because of the information she has about the First Spirit. When the two finally crossed paths during Nia Creation, Kurumi requested information about when the First Spirit appeared, why she appeared, and her power, which Nia gave using her Angel, <Rasiel>.
Personality
When she first appeared in this world, Mio had the mentality of an infant. However, through various exposure to different forms of media, she quickly gains self-awareness and intellect at an astonishing rate. Her relationship with Shinji also gave her key insight into the concept of love. However, after Shinji was shot by Westcott, Mio's personality changes into becoming extremely goal driven and to some extent ruthless, being willing to sacrifice countless humans to purify the Sephira Crystals if it meant achieving her wish to impart her powers onto Shinji.
However, her morality hasn't completely faded away. She willingly saved Kurumi despite being a complete stranger at the time and offered a sincere apology to Kurumi after revealing the truth about Spirits to her.
Additionally, by the time she partnered up with Kurumi to hunt Spirits, Mio's demeanor was described as very melancholic, always having a wistful expression on her face.
Appearance
As Mana's memories were starting to flash to her like a camera shutter, she briefly managed to catch a glimpse of Mio's appearance, describing her as a girl with long hair. However, due to Mio's ability to transform, her appearance is never set in stone. At times, she appears to be a woman in her late 20s, while in other times she can assume a form resembling that of a young girl in her teenage years.
In the present day, Mio often disguised herself in an elaborate mosaic in order to distribute the Sephira more efficiently. In her Astral Dress, she wears a beautifully elaborate dress with flower ornaments around her bosom and in her hair. Her Astral Dress is described to exude a radiance similar to the Northern Lights. Behind her, there is a distorted halo embedded with ten stars. Each time Mio reclaims one of the Sephira Crystals, a corresponding star would glow in the same color as the recaptured crystal.
History
Background
The First Spirit was born when Sir Isaac Ray Pelham Westcott, Elliot Baldwin Woodman, and Ellen Mira Mathers used the <Spirit Formula> to gather all of the world's mana in a single location. However, her birth also caused the first spacequake to happen, which destroyed a huge part of Eurasia. After her birth, the First Spirit continuously fluctuated between reality and another dimension that was created as a result of her birth. Because of this, smaller spacequakes would happen every time she appeared in the world, which would ravage the world a few months after her birth.
However, one day after causing a spacequake, she was approached by a boy named Shinji Takamiya, who gave the naked girl his jacket and decided to bring her home with him. Upon arriving in his room, however, Shinji's sister, Mana, entered and immediately demanded an explanation as to why her brother was with a half-naked girl. Shinji tried to explain the situation, but just then the First Spirit sneezed. Mana was about to leave her room to get her some clothes, only for her to use her powers to make her own clothes by copying Mana's school uniform. While living with Shinji and Mana, the First Spirit quickly started to gain knowledge of the real world by reading books, following the radio and watching tv and cassettes. As a result, her vocabulary quickly rose from the level of a baby to be able to perfectly speak Japanese. Shinji decided to give her the name Mio Takamiya, after the day he met her; the 30th. Upon receiving this name, Mio was so overjoyed that she cried.
One time, Shinji took Mio around town and told her about everything that caught her attention. They went to an arcade where Shinji won her a bear plushy in a crane game. This is also where Shinji told her about the feeling of 'like', causing Mio to boldly state that she liked him. Over time, their relationship continued to grow. Mio once walked in on Shinji practicing on asking her out on a date, to which she bluntly replied yes. Around this time, Mana and Mio had also become close friends. One time, Mio visited Shinji school to deliver an item he had forgotten, with her beauty causing a huge uproar among Shinji's classmates. For their date, Shinji took Mio on a boat trip. There, Mio once again expressed her love for Shinji.
At some point, however, DEM discovered Mio's location, forcing her to go on the run with Shinji. While running, Woodman appeared before them and blocked their path. However, he allowed them to pass after asking Mio if she is happy being with Shinji and she told him that she is. Despite this, however, they were soon confronted by Westcott, who revealed that he had abducted Mana but was willing to trade her for Mio. Shinji tried to run with Mio but was shot in the chest by Westcott using a gun. This, however, caused Mio's powers to manifest in an act of rage, allowing her to escape with Shinji. After successfully getting away, she used her powers to heal Shinji's wounds. However, no matter what she did, he wouldn't regain consciousness. This caused Mio to cry, finally realizing how much Shinji meant to her.
After thinking for a long time, Mio finally managed to come up with a plan to save Shinji. She then kissed him, causing him to turn into light and be absorbed into her. Her plan was to recreate Shinji by nurturing him in her womb before giving birth to him. Her plan was to entrust him with her power so that he could become her eternal lover. Since the body of a normal human is frail to accept all her power at once, Mio only gave Shinji the power to take in the Spirit's power. Then, she divided her power, planting them like seeds into young girls in order for Shinji to gradually take their powers one by one. However, humans were not compatible with the Qlipha Crystals she created, causing them to turn into monsters and go berserk. Therefore, Mio decided to reverse their properties, turning them into Sephira Crystals to make them more compatible. To do so, Mio continuously had the Qlipha Crystals bond with humans, turn them into monsters and finally kill them in order to slowly purify them. Around this time, Mio successfully gave birth to Shinji and left him to be adopted by the Itsuka family.
At some point, one of the monsters she created attacked a young Kurumi Tokisaki, though she managed to save her. Mio passed herself off as an "ally of justice" and explained that the monster just now was a Spirit, but left out their origins. She then offered her a power like hers to help fight them. Kurumi accepted and she gave her the purified Sephira Crystal containing Zafkiel. Afterwards, Mio and Kurumi became partners and started hunting down Spirits, though the latter remained ignorant to their origins. One day, however, after killing a Spirit, Kurumi took her leave and left Mio with the usual task of cleaning up the body. However, Kurumi returned moments later to invite Mio over to her friend Sawa's place. This caused Mio to be caught in the act of removing the Qlipha Crystal from the body of the Spirit, who was revealed to be none other than Sawa. This revelation caused Kurumi to start transforming into her Inverse Form. However, much to Mio's surprise, Kurumi stopped her transformation by using her fourth bullet to reverse time and return to a moment before she started feeling overwhelmed by despair.
Mio then told Kurumi about her identity as the First Spirit and her plan to purify the Qlipha Crystals into Sephira Crystals by using humans as sacrifices. However, Mio hesitated when asked about her motives. She apologizes and states that she had no ill will towards Kurumi, but she cannot stop until she had entrusted her power to those chosen among humanity. Afterwards, she thanks Kurumi for all of the work she has done so far and tells her to get some rest before causing Kurumi to blackout, erasing all of Kurumi's memories except for the knowledge of how to use her Angel.
Powers & Abilities
Spirit Form
Weapons: Flower, Tree, Seed
Unlike the other Spirits, Mio possesses not just one but three Angels. Her Angels allow her to warp reality to her whim, making various characters comment that the level of her power is akin to a God.
Ain Soph Aur (万象聖堂 (アイン・ソフ・オウル), Banshō Seidō lit. Sanctuary of All Things In Creation) A flower containing a silhouette of Mayuri at the center of the petals. Following the command to bloom, the flower constantly emits particles of light that instantly kills everyone that comes in contact with it, except for those protected by an Astral Dress or a strong enough <Territory>.
- Henet [蕾砲 (ヘネツ )]: Summons a small palm size flower bud that releases a concentrated energy beam of particles from Ain Soph Aur. Anything that comes in contact with the energy beam will instantly die regardless of any defense.
Ain Soph ( 輪廻楽園 (アイン・ソフ), Rinne Rakuen lit. Samsara of Paradise) A huge tower decorated with flowers and branches that pierces the sky and reshapes the surrounding landscape, giving it a monochrome, chessboard-like appearance. Within this area of effect, Mio can freely manipulate the laws of reality. She also states that the <Territory> was originally derived from this ability.
- Anaph [枝剣 (アナフ)]: Manifests a branch of Ain Soph to serve as a sharpened blade.
Ain (アイン) An Angel of the void without a physical form. Described as Mio's trump card, it instantly illuminates the entire world with light before erasing whomever or whatever she desires from reality.
Astral Dress: TBA
Mio is by far the most powerful Spirit in the series, easily defeating all the other Spirits in their limited-release Astral Dresses as well as an entire armada of Wizards and airships by herself. In fact, when Nia told Kurumi about her powers, even she had to admit that she alone will never be able to kill her.
Being the originator of all the other Spirits, Mio has shown abilities that are strikingly similar to theirs. Similar to Origami, she can fire lasers of shining light and even control their direction and teleport. Similar to Kurumi, she can even create an exact clone of herself that serves to help break down tasks. Finally, she has shown to have the Spirits' common ability of flight and to create an Astral Dress. Her Astral Dress is so strong that Tohka was only able to piece it when she drew from the powers of all the other Spirits, including Mio herself.
Mio also has some abilities that seem to be wholly unique to herself. She can heal another person's injuries through her spiritual power. Conversely, she has also applied this ability to herself, instantly recovering from the damage received from Tohka with a wave of her hand. However, her ability to heal only works on alleviating injuries sustained. Similar to Kurumi's Fourth Bullet Dalet, lives that have already been lost cannot be restored.
Mio was even able to divide her own power between ten Qlipha Crystals, which she later purified into Sephira Crystals, and bestow them onto those she had chosen within humanity. As the source of the power for every other Spirit, Mio hold a degree of authority in regulating the distribution of power between each Spirit. For example, she was able to stop Tohka from fully taking her powers back from Shido. From the opposite end of the spectrum, she has also been able to empower all ten Spirits, granting them access to their full Astral Dress despite their powers still being sealed within Shido.
However, perhaps Mio's most unique ability is to resurrect a person by impregnating herself with them. By kissing a deceased individual Mio can absorb that person into herself and place them in her womb. Afterwards she can give birth, effectively reviving the deceased person as a newborn infant. While undergoing this process, Mio is also able to grant the person she is reviving certain powers.
Aside from all of her abilities as a Spirit, Mio has also displayed an otherworldly level of intelligence. While her vocabulary was initially at the level of an infant, she was able to learn how to fluently speak Japanese in an unbelievably short amount of time through exposure to various forms of media.
Sephira Crystals
Mio, as the origin of the Sephira Crystals, has shown to be handing out at least two Sephira Crystals over the timeline of the series. She claims that she cannot stop until her power is evenly distributed among those she has chosen among humanity in order to purify and refine the Sephira Crystals.
- Camael - Sawa Yamauchi
- Zafkiel - Kurumi Tokisaki
Media
- Light Novel
- Appearances:
- Volume 16-19
- Volume 14 (Flashback)
- Mentioned:
- Volume 4, 7, 12-16
- Appearances:
Quotes
- (To Shido Itsuka) “----Mio. That's… my name....Un. I’m happy, very happy...I love you. Let's always be together.” [2]
- (To Kurumi Tokisaki) “——Pleased to make your acquaintance, Kurumi. I am Takamiya Mio, also known as…… an ally of Justice.” [3]
- (To herself) "——I'll never let you go. I'll absolutely won't make a mistake anymore. So......please wait——Shin." [4]
Trivia
- So far, the strongest spacequake was summoned by the First Spirit. No spacequake ever since has come close to causing the same destruction.
- The Japanese character for zero (零) can be derived from Mio's given name (澪).
- Whenever Mio's name is mentioned by Shido or Mana, her name is written in katakana (ミオ) instead of kanji (澪).
- The name of her angels Ain (אין), Ain Soph (אין סוף), and Ain Soph Aur (אין סוף אור), mean "Nothing", "Infinity" and "Infinite Light" respectively
- The name Mio was given to her by Shido, who named her after the 30th, the day where they first met. The katakana mi (ミ) is a phonetic stand-in for three and the katakana o (オ) symbolizes ∅, which can mean either empty set or zero.
- According to the Afterword of Volume 18, Mio's Astral Dress is based off the concept of a maternity dress.