La Croix

"...Madness? I object to that."

La Croix, formerly known as Shirome Artiste, is Promestein’s right-hand and the elder sister of Chrome. She serves as a member of the Seekers of Truth.

Past
La Croix was once Shirome Artiste, part of a family which had served the Monster Lords for generations. They specialised in Necromancy and Spiritualism, using their skills to amuse the monster lords.

One day, Shirome had bought a new and dangerous drug, but had yet to label it before Chrome came home. Shirome warned her to be careful but Chrome didn't listen. Shirome noted Chrome's good mood and deduced that the chemical that Chrome would need to use in her experiment looked identical to Shirome's new drug. If Chrome were to use the wrong chemical by accident, it would cause a massive explosion. Shirome ran to the laboratory only to find Chrome pouring the new drug into her flesh culture. She ran to Chrome and covered her body with her own just as the explosion occurred, knocking them both unconscious. Shirome managed to protect Chrome from the brunt of the explosion, but her own body was blown in half.

While most monsters would have accepted that they were going to die, Shirome did not. She used her necromancy skills on herself and successfully turned herself into a zombie. La Croix left Chrome before she woke up, so she wouldn't know if she was dead or potentially still alive.

After leaving, she set down in the Haunted Mansion and turned it into her laboratory. Outside of her techniques, her thoughts and emotions began to vanish. At that rate, she would indeed become a walking corpse, so Shirome set out to find if she could bring an undead body back to life. In the process, she killed countless humans and monsters trying to locate the answer to that. This included assassinating several legendary monsters and remaking them into zombies, then exhibiting them before Alice XV. This caused Alice XV to banish her. Due to her actions, Shirome eventually realised she was no longer herself. She lost her guilty conscious, and Shirome became La Croix - one who would do anything to achieve her goal, no matter the consequences.

At some point, La Croix was recruited into the Seekers of Truth.

Drain Lab 1
La Croix, along with the other Seekers of Truth, greets Promestein after her loss against Luka and Alice. Promestein is glad to see her fellow Seekers and recounts the events of what happened in the lab underneath Remina. La Croix is dismayed to learn that Black Alice is now aware of the White Rabbit drug.

Promestein changes the subject to the Seekers of Truth. Each of them is a member of a different race: angel, monster, human, and machine. She asks what it is they all have in common. La Croix wishes to master the dark arts and find the truth. Promestein declares that they all have in common a desire for the truth. After declaring that, she asks La Croix not to let anyone near the sealing device, but La Croix has already assigned the Cirque du Croix to guard it.

Haunted Manor
La Croix enters while Luka and Alice talk with Chrome in the Haunted Manor. She interjects just as they talk about why Shirome went mad, claiming that there is no need to classify such things into sanity and insanity for a Seeker of Truth. She then takes off her Plague Doctor jacket and announces herself as La Croix, Promestein's right hand, and a Seeker of Truth. Chrome recognises her as Shirome but La Croix responds that Shirome is no more.

Chrome asks why she would come here, and La Croix explains that she is only here to dispose of Chrome's pathetic creations. Luka asks La Croix if she has sided with Ilias, and La Croix states that she doesn't care for the intention of her patron. If she is allowed to seek the truth, she doesn't care what their intentions are.

La Croix states that she isn't authorised to dispose of the three just yet, but she can show them her Cirque du Croix: six legendary monsters whom La Croix had assassinated and raised her zombies. The final member of the Cirque du Croix is La Croix's greatest achievement, and her newest creation, whom she wanted to show to Alice the 16th personally: Alice XV. La Croix is gleeful at being the only person in existence ever to create a zombie out of a Monster Lord, even as the others are upset.

La Croix orders her creations back into their coffins, as she hasn't been ordered to eliminate Luka just yet. She merely showed them to anger Alice at seeing her mother. La Croix wants them to attack her so she can collect their corpses and turn Luka and Alice into zombies.

La Croix leaves the mansion, all while Luka is holding Alice back.

Drain Lab 2
La Croix visits the Drain Lab again, meeting with Promestein and Laplace. They hear reports from Tsukuyomi and Amphisbaena. La Croix isn't concerned, as all of the current damage is fixable and the plan can still proceed as normal, though Laplace disagrees. Promestein changes the subject to Black Alice. La Croix mentions that they will also need to keep an eye on Black Alice's troop movements, which Promestein agrees with.

Drain Lab 3
Laplace questions La Croix if she is satisfied with her existence. La Croix responds that she never bothered to think about it too much. The very definition of existence is unclear. She asks Laplace if her AI is malfunctioning, as that is a strange question for Laplace's logical self. Laplace admits that while something may be malfunctioning, but she has witnessed a great many illogical things recently. La Croix doesn't specialise in the AI area, but she heard from Promestein that her A.I is similar to that of a human's thoughts. It would be logical to assume that illogical thoughts would appear sooner or later.

Laplace asks why Promestein gave her the ability to think freely. La Croix believes Laplace is complaining that she isn't autonomous, which Laplace is. She thinks of pointless things, like the meaning of existence, while that isn't related to her mission in any way. La Croix agrees that granting thought processing to something designed to simply designed to extract semen is odd.

Laplace had asked Promestein about this but received no answer. La Croix thinks Promestein has a passion for humanity. However, she still doesn't know why she would give Laplace freedom of thought. She surmises that it was so Promestein could understand humans better. La Croix advises Laplace not to think about it too much. Promestein has her reasons for such things. La Croix is too busy with her other duties to take into consideration the meaning of existence, and it is the same for both Laplace and Lucia.

Laplace questions if Lucia is satisfied with her existence instead, but La Croix states she doesn't care about such things. Laplace notices that La Croix is afraid of losing something. She loses normal emotions one piece at a time. La Croix replies that doesn't have anything to do with Laplace. But she is afraid of not being herself anymore one day, and ceasing to have a personality. Laplace questions what exactly that 'self' is.

La Croix loses her patience, not wanting to talk about philosophy with a soulless machine. She asks Laplace to return to her regular duties, but Laplace replies that she has been performing them throughout their conversation. La Croix sees that her concern was unnecessary and returns to her lab.

The Mansion
The final time La Croix is encountered is in the mansion, hidden within the Forest of Spirits.

La Croix greets Luka when he arrives in the last room of the mansion. She had expected Luka to come here first. Chrome and Alice are still lost within the labyrinth. The purpose of the trap was to separate the three, so they would have their own 'private showing'. She has Luka fight Queen Harpy and Fernandez, then Titania and Queen Scylla, then Roza and Queen Lamia take their place. These aren't enough to beat Luka, but La Croix releases her greatest zombie, Alice XV. She notes that this wasn't the original plan (which was to have Alice fight her mother), but this will also make an exciting performance: Hero vs. Monster Lord.

When the 15th has sustained enough damage, Alice enters the room and attacks her mother, causing both of them to fall through a hole in the floor.

Of course, La Croix finds the whole thing amusing, angering Luka. La Croix notices Luka is still present and forces the Cirque du Croix to attack him all at once. She then starts to head downstairs to watch Alice and the 15th fight each other. Luka is angered even more by this and easily cuts down three of the Cirque, telling La Croix that her zombies have no soul or will - she had taken away the things which made them powerful. La Croix commands the other three to attack him all at once.

Before Luka can engage them, Chrome enters. La Croix asks why she came here, and Chrome asks if her sister Shirome will ever come back. La Croix tells her the same thing she told her last time, "Shirome is dead. I am La Croix." Chrome is sad to hear this and states that it is her duty as a member of the Artiste family to kill anyone outside of their family who use their techniques. La Croix asks Chrome if she can do that. Chrome asks Luka to leave the remaining three Cirque du Croix to her. Chrome unveils her creations from a coffin: Frederica, Spi, and Rit.

Luka then challenges La Croix. She asks Luka if he believes he can beat her perfected self. Luka gives her a lecture on how she is mad and fights her. When Luka takes her health down to half, La Croix looks to where Chrome is fighting and can't believe that her creations are struggling against Chrome's. After being defeated, La Croix falls back, and her bandages tear open to reveal her lack of an abdomen.

Chrome asks La Croix how she survived the accident and she explains what happened. La Croix questions if she is still Shirome and asks Chrome to kill her. Chrome starts crying, but La Croix asks her not to hesitate as she's already dead.

Chrome performs the spell, still crying. Shirome thanks her and her body turns into dust.

Monsterpedia Entry
"A talented monster that was the most skilled practitioner of the Artiste family techniques. Great things were expected of her, especially in the field of necromancy. But in an accident, she turned herself into a zombie after being critically injured protecting her sister. After that, her necromantic research intensified, even going so far as to assassinate famous monsters. Due to her egregious actions, the Monster Lord banished her. On the run, she was eventually recruited by Promestein who was impressed by La Croix's knowledge of biology, surpassing even her own.

''A great deal of energy is needed to maintain her undead form, requiring many men be sacrificed for their semen. As her life grew on, her research turned into an obsession with reclaiming a true, living flesh and blood body."''

Attacks
Necrophase: Normal attack.

Necroreim: Normal attack

Necrofaun: Normal attack.

Necrohold: Triggers bind status and leads to La Croix's Mod on the next turn. Requires Struggling with Gnome to escape.

La Croix's Mod: Binded attack that leads to a one-hit KO via instant follow-up. Follows Necrohold.

* Non-requestable technique

Battle Overview
Sylph and Undine won't do much to evade, so Gnome will not only help stave off damage, but escape her bind Necrohold otherwise a one-hit KO La Croix's Mod will occur. The rest is otherwise straightforward.

If Luka falls, La Croix rapes him using her modified vagina until the point of his death.

Evaluation
"Having a subordinate like that... Promestein, this isn't over yet... Ah, excuse me. Don't worry about that... Sylph and Undine don't have much effect on evasion. Since her restraint moves are also a threat, you should use Gnome here. Since you won't be able to avoid any damage, you should save some SP for healing at all times. Now go, oh brave Luka. Destroy that horrible necromancer, and bring calm back."

Trivia

 * La Croix is French for The Cross, a symbol of Christianity. This may be a reference to her raising of the dead.
 * Her costume is a reference to the plague doctors from the Renaissance era. The doctors would wear the cloak, hat, and gloves to protect themselves from infected people. They also stuffed the bird mask's beak with herbs to ventilate the air and protect themselves from breathing the plague.
 * La Croix's original name, Shirome, is a play on her sister's; in Japanese 'Chrome' is pronounced "Kurome". "Kuro" means black and "Shiro" means white, which also describes the sisters' respective hair and clothing colours.
 * La Croix shares her battle theme with Giganto Weapon and Laplace.
 * According to Torotoro's blog, the Artiste's family Resurection skill can increase a subject's physical abilities to 130%~150% but in exchange for the reduction of it's magical ones.