TV-Series
Description
Alphar Alshaya, whose name is also spelled Alphard Alshua, is the primary antagonist of the anime Canaan. She is the leader of a terrorist organization known as Snake and serves as the arch-enemy of the series' protagonist, Canaan. Before she took the name Alphard, she was a nameless girl from the Middle East, possibly the daughter of a politician from Afghanistan. After her parents were killed in a political conflict, she was rescued and placed under the tutelage of a military officer named Siam, who trained orphaned girls to become elite assassins. Siam gave her the name Canaan, believing she would become a sign of the Promised Land. She saw Siam as a father figure and trained relentlessly to meet his expectations, becoming capable of high-level missions and showing no remorse in eliminating targets from a very young age.
As an adult, Alphard has olive skin, cold grey eyes, and shoulder-length black hair which she typically wears in a ponytail. She usually dresses in a black tube top, a dark purple trench coat, and black pants. On her left arm, she bears a serpent tattoo, a reward given to her by Siam when he declared he had nothing left to teach her. After achieving the peak of human ability, she returned to a world where the only things she knew were hate and killing. At some point, she abandoned the name Canaan and chose the name Alphard Alshua for herself. She eventually took control of the Snake organization, with a woman named Liang Qi serving as her lieutenant.
Alphard typically displays a cold, calm, and collected demeanor, often wearing an emotionless expression or a cruel smirk. She shows no remorse for her actions, which includes killing her mentor Siam without mercy. She considers emotions to be obstacles and believes that hate makes a person a poor soldier, claiming that her own freedom from being manipulated by feelings is the source of her strength over Canaan. She has no interest in love and generally disregards her allies, though she is sometimes curious about the motivations behind the emotions of others. Despite her claims of being emotionless, her entire existence is driven by a deep, underlying fear and guilt over having killed Siam. She is constantly haunted by his ghost, seeing remnants of him everywhere she turns and replaying his death in her mind. In an effort to silence this memory and escape her guilt, she becomes obsessed with Canaan, who was Siam's other student. Alphard seeks to prove that hatred is the ultimate power by trying to corrupt Canaan and pull her into the same darkness. She believes that defeating Canaan will finally extinguish the ghost of Siam that follows her.
Alphard is a central figure in the story's conflict, operating behind the scenes of the Flower Garden Project, a joint program with the CIA to study the deadly Ua virus. While she expresses disgust for the experiments themselves, she has no objection to claiming the resulting data. Her primary role is as the formidable obstacle that Canaan must overcome. Their shared history as fellow students of Siam, his death at Alphard's hands, and her subsequent taunting of Canaan form the emotional core of their rivalry. She is responsible for orchestrating many of the events that threaten Canaan and her friend, Maria Osawa. Throughout the story, she has multiple opportunities to kill Canaan but chooses not to, instead playing mind games and testing her former sister-figure to push her deeper into hatred. Her relationship with her lieutenant, Liang Qi, is largely one-sided; while Liang is desperately devoted to her, calling her "sister," Alphard remains cold and dismissive of her affections.
Alphard is described by Siam as being at the peak of human ability, though not superhuman. She is an extraordinarily skilled assassin and soldier. Her combat abilities are immense, allowing her to perform acrobatic maneuvers with ease and defeat even skilled fighters like Canaan in hand-to-hand combat. Her fighting style involves brutal, vicious attack patterns designed to keep her opponent off-balance and leave no room for error. Her primary firearm is an FN Five-seveN USG 5.7mm pistol, and she also carries knives for close-quarters combat. She also possesses a deep knowledge of the Ua virus and the "Borners" it creates, able to assess a person's stage of infection at a glance.
In the final confrontation on a train, Alphard confronts Canaan. She stabs Maria to push Canaan over the edge, but the wound is not fatal. During the fight, Canaan comes to terms with Siam's death and masters her abilities, finally defeating Alphard. As Alphard hangs from the side of the train, Canaan tries to save her, but Alphard refuses. In a final act to sever her connection to her past and the "curse of the snake," she draws her gun and shoots her own left arm, the one bearing Siam's tattoo, until it is severed, causing her to fall to what was believed to be her death. However, she survives the fall, and in a post-credits scene, she is seen at an airport, now missing her left arm, before disappearing.
As an adult, Alphard has olive skin, cold grey eyes, and shoulder-length black hair which she typically wears in a ponytail. She usually dresses in a black tube top, a dark purple trench coat, and black pants. On her left arm, she bears a serpent tattoo, a reward given to her by Siam when he declared he had nothing left to teach her. After achieving the peak of human ability, she returned to a world where the only things she knew were hate and killing. At some point, she abandoned the name Canaan and chose the name Alphard Alshua for herself. She eventually took control of the Snake organization, with a woman named Liang Qi serving as her lieutenant.
Alphard typically displays a cold, calm, and collected demeanor, often wearing an emotionless expression or a cruel smirk. She shows no remorse for her actions, which includes killing her mentor Siam without mercy. She considers emotions to be obstacles and believes that hate makes a person a poor soldier, claiming that her own freedom from being manipulated by feelings is the source of her strength over Canaan. She has no interest in love and generally disregards her allies, though she is sometimes curious about the motivations behind the emotions of others. Despite her claims of being emotionless, her entire existence is driven by a deep, underlying fear and guilt over having killed Siam. She is constantly haunted by his ghost, seeing remnants of him everywhere she turns and replaying his death in her mind. In an effort to silence this memory and escape her guilt, she becomes obsessed with Canaan, who was Siam's other student. Alphard seeks to prove that hatred is the ultimate power by trying to corrupt Canaan and pull her into the same darkness. She believes that defeating Canaan will finally extinguish the ghost of Siam that follows her.
Alphard is a central figure in the story's conflict, operating behind the scenes of the Flower Garden Project, a joint program with the CIA to study the deadly Ua virus. While she expresses disgust for the experiments themselves, she has no objection to claiming the resulting data. Her primary role is as the formidable obstacle that Canaan must overcome. Their shared history as fellow students of Siam, his death at Alphard's hands, and her subsequent taunting of Canaan form the emotional core of their rivalry. She is responsible for orchestrating many of the events that threaten Canaan and her friend, Maria Osawa. Throughout the story, she has multiple opportunities to kill Canaan but chooses not to, instead playing mind games and testing her former sister-figure to push her deeper into hatred. Her relationship with her lieutenant, Liang Qi, is largely one-sided; while Liang is desperately devoted to her, calling her "sister," Alphard remains cold and dismissive of her affections.
Alphard is described by Siam as being at the peak of human ability, though not superhuman. She is an extraordinarily skilled assassin and soldier. Her combat abilities are immense, allowing her to perform acrobatic maneuvers with ease and defeat even skilled fighters like Canaan in hand-to-hand combat. Her fighting style involves brutal, vicious attack patterns designed to keep her opponent off-balance and leave no room for error. Her primary firearm is an FN Five-seveN USG 5.7mm pistol, and she also carries knives for close-quarters combat. She also possesses a deep knowledge of the Ua virus and the "Borners" it creates, able to assess a person's stage of infection at a glance.
In the final confrontation on a train, Alphard confronts Canaan. She stabs Maria to push Canaan over the edge, but the wound is not fatal. During the fight, Canaan comes to terms with Siam's death and masters her abilities, finally defeating Alphard. As Alphard hangs from the side of the train, Canaan tries to save her, but Alphard refuses. In a final act to sever her connection to her past and the "curse of the snake," she draws her gun and shoots her own left arm, the one bearing Siam's tattoo, until it is severed, causing her to fall to what was believed to be her death. However, she survives the fall, and in a post-credits scene, she is seen at an airport, now missing her left arm, before disappearing.