Shards of a Broken Sun [Megaten/Shugo Chara/Exalted]

Lulu is an unusual character, if seen in Shugo Chara terms. Anime-only, though her skillset and story arc were written by Peach-Pit, so I consider her an honorary manga character; but while everyone else (more or less; Amu, Ikuto and Utau all break that mold a little) is dependent on Charas to do much of anything, Lulu—right from the start—pretty much doesn't use hers.

She's got one. Nana exists, and acts as a friend and sounding board to Lulu, but Nana... remember, I've mentioned that Charas act like idealized, would-be selves?

Nana doesn't. She's a lot more like a shadow, in fact; she's a part of Lulu that definitely already exists, but which Lulu suppresses, and which popped out through the chara system somehow. More specifically, Nana is an 'unelegant', redheaded girl who speaks with a Kansai accent; all things that Lulu wants to pretend she isn't. What saves her is that Lulu doesn't genuinely reject her; she accepts the existence of those impulses, even while she suppresses them..

Lulu in a chara transformation with Nana is a sight to behold. 😅

Beyond that, as you might be able to guess from her name, Lulu is genuine nobility. For as much as that means in the modern day; her grandmother is a landed french noble (...to the degree of owning a mansion, at least), Lulu herself is just rich. This plays well with her hobby of setting gems, then giving them out as psionic amplifiers.

I'll expand on that.

= = =

Lulu is Amu's age. Slightly older, but in the same grade in school. She's introduced to the story as a new "employee" of Easter's, so part of the antagonist group; a colleague of Utau's, in a sense, and she did demonstrate a slight rivalry with her. Lulu wants to be liked, which in this case means she wants to be seen to do well in her 'job'.

But I'm using 'job' in scare quotes, because... Lulu's a child. Unlike Utau, she wasn't forced into the position. It's not clear why she has it in the first place, and I wouldn't say she does a good job at it. She doesn't really follow orders, she certainly doesn't need the money... my best guess is, she's there as a (very gently handled) lab rat, while simultaneously letting her do her own thing. And if she sort of accidentally manages to attract the Embryo a couple of times, that's got more to do with who she is than with any properly deliberate action.

She's an enchanter, pretty much. She takes those gems, somehow turning them into psionic amplifiers that take whatever their wearer's genuine dream is, and forcibly turns it into reality. In a broken way, most of the time—for example, someone who dreams of being a magician will absolutely get 'magical powers', but however it functions, it also erodes the user's sanity. They end up ignoring all else, up to and including elements such as "don't turn your audience into what appears to be chocolate statues".

It takes Amu a good few months to get across to her that no, maybe that's not actually a good way to actualize someone's dream. For most of that time Lulu genuinely believes she's doing them favours, and to be honest? Given that Amu has a habit of disabling her gemstones, that temporary burst of (often nonsensical as hell, but still) ability leaves traces that might actually be good for them. A number of Lulu's victims end up with a renewed belief in said dream.

...she's also half French, and Ikuto and Utau's father was French. This all looks a bit like a knock-off Chara system, accomplishing much the same goal, just in a much shorter timeframe, less patiently—and less safely, to be sure—which definitely makes you wonder.

Lulu is thirteen, by now. She's still a child. While it's possible to think she came up with all of this herself...

...anyway, unlike Amu, Utau and Ikuto, I never got the impression that Lulu really caught on to the meaningfulness of what she was doing. To her, none of her actions were something with possible consequences. She also never actually noticed Easter's darker actions, or the broken dreams that Amu had to heal (in any big way), or...

She's only seen the brighter side of psionics, and she's still very much the optimist, but that doesn't mean she isn't important.