Lapin

Lapin
Japanese Name	ラピヌ

Lapin (ラピヌ, Rapinu) is an antagonist in Puella Magi Tart Magica: The Legend of "Jeanne d'Arc" alongside her sisters Corbeau and Minou.

General info

Physical features

• Eye colour: Pink
• Hair colour: Light Pink

Other

• Soul gem: Oval around the neck
• Weapon: Scythe and floating rabbit-shaped discs
• Witch form: Name unknown
• Wish:I want my mother (Isabeau) to return to how she was.
• Japanese pronoun:
• Known relatives: Corbeau and Minou (younger sisters)

Story

Backstory

Warning, this section contains spoilers.

As a young girl, Lapin was chosen alongside her sisters Minou and Corbeau to be among the first magical girls Isabeau contracted due to their closely interwoven fates. Isabeau grew to become like a mother to the three girls she took in. However, {{spoiler|she eventually turned into a witch and was poised to kill the three girls, of whom only Corbeau had as yet contracted to become a magical girl. This lead to Lapin making her wish for her mother to “return to how she was.” Since the transformation from magical girl to witch is irreversible, her wish lead to Isabeau’s witch mind inhabiting the now empty husk of her former physical body. Isabeau was no longer mindless and now retained her original powers that were granted to her from her own wish. Even so, she still retained her witch’s ambition to destroy all of France.

During Tart Magica

Lapin first appeared in Chapter 5, standing with Corbeau and Minou as they finish slaughtering the soldiers of Orleans, a stronghold that held four thousand soldiers. She jeers and taunts the last of the injured soldiers as Corbeau threatens him and Minou cuts off their retreat with her cat-o-nine tails. She’s later seen singing and walking along the edge of the outermost walls of the city as she kicks the dismembered limbs of the dead soldiers off into the distance. Minou appears with Flèche and relays orders from their mother, informing Lapin that she and herself are to return for a short time and to leave Corbeau along with Fleche to handle Tart, who is about to arrive at Orleans. Despite being upset that Corbeau “get(s) all the fun!”, she complies with orders and returns home through Minou’s portal. Back at the castle later that evening, Lapin is seen having a bath along with her two sisters and is overjoyed at the possibility of fighting Tart and her friends herself. Several months later at the city of Patay, Minou, Corbeau and Lapin stand at the head of the English forces as Lapin relishes the idea of ‘playing’ with the French forces opposing them. Before Minou can say anything, Lapin had already began her attack on Tart, Riz, Melissa, and Elisa. Unfortunately, the four magical girls are able to deflect most of Lapin’s initial attacks, hitting her with their weapons several times and causing Lapin’s soul gem to darken. Her soul gem transforms into a grief seed and hatches Lapin’s witch form. After transforming, Lapin activates her ability to possess any and all weapons in her vicinity, including that of her English allies (with the exception of Tart and Elisa as their weapons have magical abilities imparted on them by Pernelle. She telepathically causes them to fly at her enemies and damaging them. She even forms a towering sword-like shape composed of the weapons she’s amassed and drops it at the opposing magical girls. Tart is able to deflect this massive attack on her friends even as Lapin activates her secondary ability: the ability to cause magical girls to lose their magical girl state temporarily. As Lapin in her witch form continues to battle the magical girls, Corbeau takes this opportunity to continue her fight with Riz earlier. Elisa and Tart attempt to coordinate a surprise attack on Lapin, but the eyes on her cape have the same ability as her rabbit eyes and they both revert to normal girls temporarily. Despite this, the two girls are eventually able to distract Lapin and successfully defeat her with Elisa’s rifle-turned-canon. However, her defeat only causes her to revert back into a magical girl, owing to the nature of her wish and the abilities it granted her. Minou retreats with an unconscious Lapin into one of her portals as Corbeau unleashes her Danse Macabre. After Corbeau’s subsequent defeat at the hands of Tart, Minou finishes Corbeau off in the woods and tells Lapin that it was Tart that killed their sister. A considerable time later, Minou has summoned an army of magical girls and subsequently transformed them into witches all of whom are poised to kill Tart and her friends. Minou has also summoned Lapin to this battlefield where she informs her of her chance to take revenge for the loss of their sister. Lapin is enraged and more than eager to tear them limb from limb. She begins by summoning her rabbit-shaped discs and impeding their magical girl transformations. Despite this, Riz is easily able to dodge her attacks and slashes at her rabbit-shaped discs as Lapin is not used to combat the way her sister Corbeau was. When Riz informs Lapin that it was in fact Minou who killed her sister, this causes Lapin to snap with rage and abandon all thinking. Riz aims to shatter Lapin’s soul gem in order to prevent her from transforming into her witch form, but the news she received and the subsequent despair it caused her has instead only accelerated the impurities of Lapin’s soul gem. It is too late, as Lapin quickly becomes a witch continues her attacks on the girls. The magical girls coordinate their attacks and unleash Melissa’s ultimate destructive move on Lapin. But it is not enough and Lapin reemerges from the bottom of the crater formed by the explosion, now human and her soul gem cleansed. Minou then causes a portal to appear beneath Elisa and Melissa and transports them to a different part of the castle in which they are battling. Tart and Riz are left to fend for themselves against not only Lapin’s witch form, but the army of witches that are left from earlier. Tart and Riz begin to grow weary from the fighting and the amount of magic they’ve spent, causing Riz to charge her soul gem’s power and throw a dagger at Lapin’s feet. Shadows emerge from the dagger and wrap themselves around Lapin, effectively immobilizing her. As Tart calls out to her, Riz summons her ultimate attack, ‘’Gates of Hell’’. A large marble doorway comes up from the ground, skeletons adorning its framework. As the Gates of Hell begin to crack open, shadowy hands reach out from inside each of them grabbing at a different part of Lapin. She cries out for them to let go of her but they continue to hold on relentlessly as more hands reach out from the gate and grab at the witches in the area and pull them into the dark void that lurks behind the doors. Lapin continues to strain at the shadowy hands, crying out that nothing Riz does will make a difference since she'll keep coming back over and over again, returning to normal only for her to kill Riz no matter how many times it takes her. Riz acknowledges this, and informs her that she will be joining Lapin inside the black void of the gates to prevent her from escaping as the doors can only be opened from the outside. As Riz walks into the gate, Lapin is pulled into the darkness with her and the doors snap shut behind them, effectively ending Lapin’s life.

Powers

Lapin has the ability to turn back into a human after she turns into a witch. While in magical girl form, she uses a handheld scythe as her weapon and can summon rabbit-shaped discs that float about her. When the discs flash, magical girls lose their ability to remain in magical form for a limited time.

While in witch form, Lapin is able to summon all weapons in the vicinity to her side and is able to manipulate them at will, for example creating a wall of shields or raining various weapons down on her enemies. Her eyes can cause any magical girl to lose her ability to remain in magical girl form as well as the eyes on her cape.

Observations

• Lapin is the eldest of the three sisters despite her childish personality and physical looks and is very fond of her younger sisters.
• However, she may in fact be the most powerful as her ability to transform to and from her witch form makes her incredibly difficult to defeat.
• While in witch form, she is able to speak in coherent french with an elaborate font. This is in contrast to other witches, many of whom do not speak and when they do it is in Runes.
• Her favorite sister may be Corbeau, as she often asks her to scrub her down during baths and has no problem hugging and burying her face in her sisters' chest when she hugs them.

Trivia

• Lapine's live2D model in Magia Record lacks the soul gem on her chest, even though her profile image and battle sprite has it included.

Etymology

• Lapin is the French word for "rabbit".

Gallery

Manga pages

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  Lapin's character bio from Tart Magica volume 4 (also featuring Minou)

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  Colour page from volume 3, showing the villainous magical girls unmasked (Left to right: Minou, Corbeau, and Lapin)

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  Volume 4 colour insert

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  Minou, Lapin and Corbeau as children

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  Lapin's attack

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  Lapin battles Riz

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  Witch form

Magia Record

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• Lapine in Magia Record.jpg
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• Lapine battle sprite.jpg

  Battle sprite

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  Her magia attack Lapin á cent yeux

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