Universal Will

The Universal Will, also translated as the Merciless Apocalypse, is a mysterious entity originating from the Backyard. It's directly responsible for the Dawn of Revival and the creation and actions of the Valentines (who refer to it as their "Mother") and indirectly responsible for the Crusades, the actions of the Conclave and the Post-War Administration Bureau after the Crusades, as well as the actions of Asuka R. Kreutz in opposition to it, making it the ultimate evil of the Guilty Gear universe. Its current form is the former Sanctus Maximus Populi Ariels.

Story

Some time in the late 20th century, the man who would become known as The Original discovered and accessed the Backyard. During his studies, he created an information organism whose directive to ensure eternal happiness for humans without harming them. But the Original made a critical error in not defining humans, with his creation pondering over it before reaching the conclusion that humans possess a "soul" and thus must have free will and choice. But it then realizes that humanity is gradually discarding their free will due to the natural state of human advancement and bringing humans eternal happiness would only help the process along. This conundrum allowed the entity to conclude that real humans don't yet exist, circumventing it’s programming by seeing the current "human” race as "redundancies" that must be exterminated to make way for true humans of its own making. The entity would later be christened as the Universal Will.

In 1999, the Universal Will made its first move in manifesting in electronic devices worldwide to broadcast a message: "In a matter of days, humanity will crumble." Several days later, all electronic devices ceased functioning and multiple natural disasters bombarded civilization in an event known as the Dawn of Revival, leading to worldwide societal collapse until The Original and his disciples introduced magic to the world. At some point after this, The Original disappeared, re-entering the Backyard in an attempt to stop the Universal Will once and for all. His fate is currently unknown.

The Universal Will launched a second attack in the year 2074, simultaneously attempting to manifest inside and seize control of a newly-activated Justice, as well as manifesting in the people of Japan, triggering a reaction that transformed them into antimatter Gears. Seeing the coming end of the world right before his eyes, Asuka R. Kreutz seized control of Justice himself and fired her Gamma Ray at Japan, reducing the island nation to a deep crater in the ocean. Both the contact with the Universal Will and her actions psychologically scarred Justice and drove her berserk as she took control of all Gears and declaring war on humanity, marking the beginning of the Crusades.

At some point between 2175 and 2187, the Universal Will approached Bedman in the Backyard and manipulates him into helping it create an "Absolute World" with the lie that he can use his powers to pull his sister Delilah from the Backyard and cure their condition while keeping him in the dark of the event’s purpose in destroying all life on Earth. The Universal Will also began its third attempt to manifest in the real world by possessing a human body to understand human emotions.

The Sanctus Maximus Populi Hapinus the 27th was driven insane and eventually met an early end in 2177, and Ariels took the position as the new avatar of the Universal Will. Developing a hatred for redundancies with her newfound emotions, Ariels began to manipulate events more directly. During this time, she herded the surviving Japanese together into various colonies, ostensibly for their own protection. In 2185, the Universal Will created the first Valentine, an entity born in the Backyard with a single-minded drive to carry out orders implanted in her by "Mother". Valentine invaded the Kingdom of Illyria with an army known as the Vizuel with the goal of obtaining a "key" from the descendants of Justice (either Dizzy or Sin would do,) that would allow her to unlock the Cube, a device in the Backyard that would allow her to take control of the Backyard itself. Valentine was ultimately thwarted and killed by Sol and company, and the events were dubbed the Baptisma 13 incident.

In 2187, two more Valentines were created: Ramlethal and Elphelt. Realizing that the original Valentine's failure came from a lack of emotions, the Universal Will embedded the two with emotions from the outset. Ramlethal allied herself with the Conclave to carry out their secret plan of reviving Justice, while Elphelt was made into a sleeper agent, infiltrating Sol's group with no knowledge of her orders until she was activated. Once again, the Universal Will's plans were thwarted, with Justice's revival ending in failure and the members of the Conclave save Chronus being killed, along with Ramlethal turning against her Mother. However, the Universal Will was able to retrieve Justice's body for another attempt, and Elphelt was activated and retrieved to be used as Justice's new consciousness. To gather the energy necessary for the second revival attempt, she would once again weaponize the Japanese, transforming them into Anti-Matter gears and triggering them to explode en masse. After some test runs, the Universal Will finally revealed her true identity to the public before dropping a small army of antimatter Gears on Illyria City and leaving to attend to Justice's body. However, yet again her plans were thwarted; attempts to transform more Japanese were stopped by Kum Haehyun's Tuning, Illyria was saved by the Assassin's Guild, Zepp and various other characters coming to the rescue, Bedman was defeated by Venom when he was finally forced to awaken to counter his Terra Machina System, and Sol and company discovered Justice's location, retrieving Elphelt from Justice's body and replacing her with Jack-O, an unknown fourth Valentine created by Asuka R. Kreutz to revert Justice back into Aria. The fate of the Universal Will is currently unknown after its defeat, but its human host Ariels is currently under strict detainment by the Illyrian government and her status as Sanctus Maximus has been stricken from history.