Tao Jeanne


 * For Jeanne as a Guardian Ghost, see Tao Jeanne (spirit).

Iron Maiden Jeanne (アイアン・メイデン・ジャンヌ) is a fictional character in the Shaman King manga and anime series. She is a powerful shaman in her own right and the leader and symbol of the X-Laws.

After the Shaman Fight, she marries Tao Ren and takes his surname, being now referred as Tao Jeanne, the Iron Maiden (道アイアン・メイデン・ジャンヌ).

Appearance
She is known for her red eyes and very long silver hair and almost fragile appearance. She is extremely charismatic and Tamamura Tamao calls her a "princess" after hearing her speak for the first time. When she is within the iron maiden, she is nude except for a pair of old-fashioned pink PJ pants. When in her armored oversoul form, Jeanne wears a purplish metallic leotard with four metallic protrusions on her midsection area, an iron belt with a key lock in the center, a purplish cap with the Iron Maiden hat on the back of the headgear, wears sandals with spikes going into her feet, giant lock on her abdominal region like a chastity belt and has what appear to be large thumbscrews on her hands.

During the mission to bring back Tao Ren, she wore a Victorian-era style dress and dress shoes. It is revealed that this is Jeanne's favorite dress, which was made with high-class materials by a very talented tailor. This is slightly difficult to wear though due to its frills and she would like to wear more simple clothes.

In her adult years, Jeanne continues to wear her Victorian-era style dress, but after her marriage to Ren and becoming a house-wife, she cut her hair shorter and began wearing a simple blouse and dress and is commonly seen wearing a frilled apron.

Personality
Jeanne's heart is noble and pious, but she knows nothing of the outside world because she has stayed out of normal people's lives since she was a child. She may look a little arrogant but she is pure and has no evil intentions. Her passionate hatred of Asakura Hao derives from the fact she believes him to be the ultimate evil. Jeanne believes herself to be a martyr of sorts and is very soft-spoken and compassionate towards the X-Laws, especially towards Lyserg Diethel, but she has become detached from humanity and is unable to see that not everything is black and white.

Jeanne kills whoever stands in her way indiscriminately if they don't surrender to her pleas for peace. She believes she is helping the world and her actions will be justified by the end results.

In the time after the Shaman Fights, Jeanne saw the errors of her ways and adopted a belief that no one should kill, also raising her son to follow the same ideal as an ironclad rule. When confronted by Black Maiden, Jeanne even had Shamash impose a death sentence on herself to prevent Black Maiden from becoming a murderer.

Abilities and Powers
Jeanne, after Saigan Sati, has the level of Furyoku closest to Hao, making her more powerful than she appears. She spends nearly all her time inside the iron maiden keeping her in a near-death state, as she goes through constant periods of getting hurt and then healing, in order to slowly increase her strength by causing her Furyoku to gradually rise. It contains numerous sharp iron spikes and nails that pierce the flesh, causing great pain. There are so many spikes inside that even someone as slender as Jeanne still gets hurt.

Her iron maiden is made of solid iron and is quite heavy, however, it was easily crushed by one of the Patch Officiants, Magna. It was later repaired and kept in a shed in Funbari Onsen until it was stolen by Team YVS.

Spirit

 * See More: Shamash

Jeanne's guardian ghost is Shamash (Mash in the English version of the 2001 anime series and video games), the Babylonian god of justice. Shamash is a God Class spirit. She can use him to create torture devices in order to judge her opponent.

Jeanne can also bring back the dead with Shamash, who revives them with a kiss on the lips. Jeanne compares this method of resurrection to the story of Sleeping Beauty.

Past
She was born on March 2, 1990, she is From Mont Saint-Michel, France, it is revealed that Jeanne was not actually a savior with an omnipotent type of purity. She was an orphan girl taken by the original leader of the X-Laws, Luchist Lasso, who, alongside Marco Lasso, raised her to believe she was a holy person, who was destined to destroy Hao. Jeanne, herself, is nothing more than an ordinary girl who was granted both strong shamanic powers and a strong guardian ghost.

Little is known about Jeanne's past history other than she is an orphan. She was a French country girl with shamanic powers, who was raised in an old monastery. She received a divine revelation at the age of ten while praying in a Catholic church. A cross of light appeared and a mysterious voice revealed to her the world was to be destroyed unless it was purged of an evil force. Recognizing the evil force to be Asakura Hao, Jeanne chose to become a shaman.

Shaman Fights Second Round
She got on the patch plane headed to the Patch village and ended up somewhere in America. Not much is known about what she did or how she even got to patch village. She did beat the three-month time limit and teamed with Marco and Lyserg Diethel to create the X-I team. In its first match, her team was paired against the Team "Niles". When Lyserg was unwilling to kill their opponents, Jeanne had Marco throw her at Lyserg, hitting him. Jeanne decided to take over the match for Lyserg, so Marco unlocked the Iron Maiden and Jeanne stepped out. She Over Souled the Maiden and quickly trapped and killed Anatel Pokki. She then trapped Khafre Puljiz and Nakht Pitrah and implored them to stop sinning and repent. However, they refused, so Jeanne pitied them and killed them as well, ending the match.

After Tao Ren was killed, Yoh asked her to revive him, which she agreed to only if he, Yoh, dropped out of the Shaman Fight. She revived Ren by Shamash kissing him (much to his anger) and compared it to Sleeping Beauty.

While driving around the island with Tamao Tamamura, Marco and Lyserg Diethel, she is suddenly attacked by a man they at first believe, to be Anatel. However, he reveals that Anatel was his brother and that he is named Anahol. Anahol wants revenge on her for the death of his brother and begins attacking the car the four of them are in with his Sphinx guardian ghost but fails as Lyserg uses Zelel to get them away to safety.

Lyserg pleads with Jeanne to call upon Shamash to help them fight, but she is too shocked about something to react and the car is destroyed. Later it is revealed that before she died, she used Shamash to heal Marco, who previously had been pierced right through the chest.

Invading the Plants
After their arrival on the Continent of Mu Team "X-I" together with Team "Funbari Onsen" and Team "The Ren" all forfeit thus making Hao the winner by default. As they intend to follow the Patch Tribe they are stopped by Luchist and a large battle ensues between him and Marco that end when Luchist pierce both of them with his bullet much to the shock of Jeanne.

After Lyserg is stabbed by Bron in the second Plant, Jeanne realizes that as the only that can move she would have to step in and shatters the lock on her Iron Maiden. She quickly forms a Guillotine with her Over Soul and cut off Bron's arm and restrains his movements with vices that would crush his cranium and knees. But Bron merely expands his Over Soul to cover his entire body and jumps at Jeanne though he is stopped by Lyserg who proclaims that she should not waste her Furyoku on Bron. After reviving both Horohoro and Ren who were both killed by Bron she exhausts her remaining Furyoku and forced to stay behind at the Plant where she sits and the bottom and prays for the warriors.

After the Plants are turned off she realizes that Hao has awakened and feels not only the death of everyone he has killed but also Hao's own suffocating feelings of loneliness right before her soul is absorbed into the Great Spirit. Inside the Great Spirit, Hans Reiheit fires her Iron Maiden from his Archangel Azazel revealing Jeanne inside and declaring her intention to give him love she creates a huge Over Soul of Shamash to hug him, but is stopped by Luchist who believe she could hurt by coming to close to the Black Hole Hao had created.

Funbari no Uta
In the seven years after the tournament, she reforms the X-Laws into a charitable group named X-Charity. While traveling Europe she met with Tao Ren, eventually marrying him and together they had a son Tao Men. After giving birth, she goes on a maternal leave, leaving Ren in charge of X-Charity.

Red Crimson
After Ren and his company, the Leidi Group, rose to power, a group named Red Crimson appeared, wanting revenge against the Tao Family for exiling them 100 of years ago. Jeanne was caught in the crossfire of the conflict. Red Crimson had Black Maiden from Team YVS murder her, but when Jeanne pleaded for her not to kill anyone, the Black Maiden hesitated. When Jeanne decided to have Shamash give herself the death sentence, Kamogawa Yohsuke stopped time with his YVS Cards and fired the gun Black Maiden was holding, himself, killing Jeanne when time resumed. Yohsuke later implanted a false memory of killing Jeanne into Black Maiden. Black Maiden then took Jeanne's spirit and made her into her guardian ghost for the Flower of Maize.

Flowers
After Jeanne's death, the Tao Family built a grave for her, as it was against Jeanne's and Ren's wishes, that she be revived. After some of the members X-Laws somehow found out about Jeanne's death, John Denbat, Meene Montgomery, and Hans Reiheit volunteered to stand guard at her grave, without even being asked to.

Gate of Babylon
The events concerning the Babylon Gate occur in the 2001 anime series only.

The Gate of Babylon is a portal to another dimension that can only be opened by Shamash. The ultimate purpose of the X-Laws is to open the Gate of Babylon to seal away Asakura Hao. Midway through the anime series, the Gate of Babylon was only mentioned to Yoh and his group, who were puzzled by its meaning. When Jeanne finally gathered enough Furyoku to open the gate, everyone present, including the X-Laws, Yoh's friends and Hao's followers were pulled into the gate. However, Hao breaks out of the powerful prison, as the Spirit of Fire grabs Shamash in with them and devoured Shamash, gaining his powers. The prison then proceeded to crumble, releasing all of its occupants and rendering her powerless.

Trivia

 * She is most likely named after Jeanne D'Arc (Joan of Arc), one of the Patron Saints of France.
 * Jeanne is the only X-Law who doesn't have an Archangel.
 * Once a month Jeanne is locked inside her room for a whole day and forced to eat cakes non-stop.