Himiko

Queen Himiko (卑弥呼, Himiko), is both a fictional character and antagonist of the Uncharted Raider series created by Amy Hennig and Toby Gard. She was the first and last absolute monarch of the ancient Japanese island nation and kingdom of Yamatai.

She was the very main focus and object of devotion to Father Mathias and her worshippers, a violent cult of people known as the Solarii Brotherhood, whom she was manipulating to do her bidding. She was the focus of the series of documents known as the Ancient Scrolls.

After killing Mathias, Lara stabs her with a torch, destroying and before her soul could be transferred into Sam. However, Queen Himiko poured a small piece of her soul into Sam before her destruction, where she attempts to return to Yamatai and reclaim her throne.

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 * —Queen Himiko.

Appearance & Biography

 * Voice Actor: Arden Cho (English), Naoya Uchida (Japanese), Not Known (Arabic), Not Known (Basque), Not Known (Brazilian), Not Known (Cantonese), Not Known (Catalan), Not Known (Chinese), Not Known (Croatian), Not Known (Danish), Not Known (Dutch), Not Known (Finnish), Not Known (Filipino), Not Known (French), Not Known (Galician), Not Known (German), Not Known (Greek), Not Known (Hebrew), Not Known (Hong Kong), Not Known (Hungarian), Not Known (Indonesian), Not Known (Italian), Not Known (Korean), Not Known (Mandarin), Not Known (Norwegian), Not Known (Polish), Not Known (Portuguese), Not Known (Romanian), Not Known (Russian), Not Known (Serbian), Not Known (Spanish), Not Known (Swedish), Not Known (Tagalog), Not Known (Thai), Not Known (Valencian), Not Known (Ukrainian), Not Known (Brazilian Portuguese), Not Known (Canadian French), Not Known (European Spanish), Not Known (European Portuguese), Not Known (Latin American Spanish), Not Known (Latin Spanish), Not Known (Spain-Spanish)

Appearance

 * Hair Color: White
 * Skin Color: Not Known
 * Eye Color: Gray
 * Age: Not Known
 * Birthday: Not Known
 * Height: Not Known
 * Weight: Not Known

Powers

 * Witchcraft: She has been described by legend to be highly skilled at witchcraft. However, in her new vessel, Sam, she may have some of her mystical power, but not all of it, due to lesser control over the new body.
 * Essence Transference Ritual: Through her soul transference ritual, Himiko had learned to bind her own soul to other bodies, effectively allowing her to start a new life in a new body.
 * It was revealed in issue 9 of the arc Choice and Sacrifice that Himiko had the souls of the Priestesses she would inhabit removed with the Wei Mirror, which would allow her to take full control of them.
 * Possession: She has managed to attach a part of her soul into Sam's body. She does have some mystic power, but now its very minimal. While she is influencing Sam's actions, when her influence is much stronger than normal, a very minor amount of her mystical power shows up and her eyes blacken as a result.
 * Pyrokinesis: She also possessed pyrokinesis, which was seen when she caused icy mountains to have fire. Legends also describes her producing fire.
 * Atmokinesis: She has powerful atmokinesis. She uses the weather and lighting to slay her targets. She even caused huge storms around Yamatai, despite her being trapped in a decayed body. Her storms were so powerful that no one could leave the island.
 * Telepathy: She may have minor telepathic power, as Mathias stated that he is mentally connected to her.
 * Cursing: She was able to curse her Stormguard, turning them into undead warriors, with improved physical prowess. She even cursed the island of Yamatai, so that no one can leave, unless they die or she dies. However, when she dies the curse is lifted, thereby showcasing that the curse on the Stormguard and the Island is tied to her existence.
 * Omnipresence: Himiko appears to be aware of everything that happens on and around the island, making it very easy for her to destroy any vessel coming too close or attempting to flee.
 * Superhuman Strength: While possessing Sam, she has displayed a certain degree of superhuman strength. Despite Sam's petite build she was able to toss full grown and well built men and even kill a nurse with ease.

Abilities

 * Intimidation: A combination of her ruthlessness and supernatural powers made everyone fear her.
 * Leadership: She has led Yamatai for a significant amount of years before being trapped in a decaying body.

Past
She is described as the beautiful, yet inscrutable, enigmatic, ruthless Sun Queen who ruled Yamatai thousands of years ago with the support of her Stormguard. She surrounded herself with a cadre of priestesses, known as the Priestesses of the Sun. No men attended to her, except for the general of the Stormguard. She was believed to be able to communicate with the spirit world and to control the elements. She was worshiped by some of her subjects of the island. Her subjects were not unhappy; under her rule, agricultural production was consistently high, and thus no one went hungry, her taxes were reasonable, and her Stormguard fiercely protected the nation from any foreign threats. Her life ostensibly spanned 72 years, from c.170 AD to c.248 AD. However, Himiko was actually the only monarch to ever rule Yamatai, and her lifespan actually lasted hundreds of years.

The secret behind her apparent immortality was a dark and sinister ritual. As she grew elderly, she would choose one of her priestesses as her successor. The priestess, who was given the title of Daughter of the Sun, would be trained in languages, warfare, and all of the other necessary skills of a monarch. This was considered an unparalleled honor among the people. At a time of her choosing, Himiko would conduct a ceremony which would transfer her power to the priestess, making her the new Sun Queen. But the reality was very different. In a secret ritual, Himiko actually transferred her soul, not her power, into the young woman, destroying the priestess' soul and permanently taking over her body. In this way, she continued her life and rule. No one apart from the General of her Stormguard knew the true nature of the "succession", since he alone was tasked with escorting the priestess to the Chamber of the Sun, where Himiko waited alone to perform the ritual.

Trapped in a Decaying Body
Himiko performed this practice countless times, effectively becoming immortal through the de facto periodic murder of one of her priestesses and the taking over of the young woman's body as her own. Finally however, it ended when, at some point during the Kamakura period (c. 1185-1333 CE), one chosen Daughter of the Sun, a priestess named Hoshi, discovered the truth. Horrified and realizing Himiko's evil, she resolved to end her life, which would deny Himiko her chosen body, thus foiling her plan and saving future priestesses from suffering the same fate. Using the Stormguard General's stolen dagger, she committed suicide on the verge of the transference.

The corruption of the ritual left Himiko trapped in her decaying body, unable to die, yet not alive. Her rage at this manifested in a curse on the entire island, destroying the nation and its citizens. Her Stormguard became undead Oni, fiercely protecting her decaying form for all eternity. Furthermore, the curse also caused unnatural weather to cover the island, such as clear skies in one area and snow in another. Most sinister of all, Himiko's consciousness manifested itself in constantly stormy weather surrounding the island. These storms were unnatural, driven by her rage and consciousness, and would actually vary in intensity, to deliberately cause any and all ships and aircraft that ventured near the island to be wrecked or crash on it. Any survivors were kept from leaving by the same storms, which would either kill them or force them to abandon their attempts to leave. The only way to break the curse was one of two things: either complete the ritual to transfer Himiko's soul to a new, worthy vessel or destroy her current, decaying one.

Appearance of Mathias
In 1982, a group of mercenaries arrived on the island when their aircraft crashed after being ensnared by Himiko's storms. They tried numerous times to escape, however all attempts failed. Their leader, Mathias, sensed the malevolent presence in the storms. He did not join the men in their final escape attempt, instead watching on the shore as they were all killed, leaving him alone.

Wanting to unlock the power behind the storms, he searched the island for clues, discovering pieces of the truth, while avoiding any other survivors that came to the island and ruthlessly dispatching any of them who got in his way. But he soon found that he needed help. He therefore began recruiting other survivors to his cause, forming them into a band of cultists devoted to the twisted worship of the Sun Queen, though with no intent to share what true power he may discover. Thus was formed the Solarii Brotherhood. His first recruit was a man named Nikolai, who thought that Mathias was insane but left him to it to save his own skin, he wrote the Confessions of Solarii.

Believing the Sun Queen was guiding him, he directed the cult's efforts toward finding a suitable young woman, that would allow the completion of Himiko's ritual and finally allow his escape, calling such a female "The Key".

Etymology

 * Himiko (Pimeko or Pimiko) means “sun child” or “sun priestess” in archaic Japanese.

Notes & Trivia

 * While she does not appear physically until the very end of the first part, Himiko is the main antagonist of the game. She is responsible for everyone being trapped on Yamatai, as such, the Solarii are just as much victims as the crew of the Endurance.
 * Throughout the first part, Mathias claims that Himiko speaks through him and that he is her loyal servant.
 * The Sun Queen's inspiration is Himiko, the shaman queen of Yamataikoku in ancient Wa (Japan). She occupied herself with magic and sorcery, bewitching the people. Though mature in age, she remained unmarried. She had a younger brother who assisted her in ruling the country. After she became the ruler, there were few who saw her. She had one thousand women as attendants, but only one man, similar to Himiko in the game who was only attended by her priestesses and her Stormguard general.
 * Himiko was also possibly inspired by the Sun Goddess Amaterasu, who, in Japanese mythology, is the ancestor of the entire Imperial family. Lara mentions Amaterasu to Doctor Whitman early in the game.
 * During the comic arc Choice and Sacrifice Lara encounters a benevolent spirit who informs Lara that Himiko is poisoning Sam's soul. The spirit in question, who communicated to Lara by possessing a young woman by the name of Greta, referred to Himiko as an ancient and evil spirit.