• The Drifter: They never stay in one place for long and Pom-Pom preserves to leave a world within a week of arriving at it. As a result, they meet a lot of people and say just as many goodbyes, as thousands of years can pass between visits from the Astral Express. But they always try to explore and understand every world they visit while trying to leave it in a better place than when they arrived. That being said, Fu Xuan claims at the end of Luofu's storyline that she has foreseen that they will come back and meet her again someday.
• Exposed to the Elements: Akivili's blessing protects those following the Path of the Trailblaze from the elements, which comes in handy when the group visit the icy world of Jarilo-VI. This doesn't apply to those around them, though, as seen when the Trailblazer and Natasha go out into the snow plains to look for her brother.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation:
  • In-game, the members of the crew come from a variety of different Paths such as The Preservation for March 7th and The Hunt for Dan Heng. However, this is only to denote their roles in gameplay, in the story, they all follow The Trailblaze which is not a playable Path.
  • You still have to pull for Himeko and Welt to have them fight alongside their compatriots even though they're part of the Astral Express's central team.
  • The Nameless are The Drifter and never stay in one place for long, with goodbyes being seemingly forever as they plot their next stop. In gameplay, you can revisit any place you visited at any time, so long as you ran past a Space Anchor first (which is practically guaranteed).
• Guys Smash, Girls Shoot:
  • Dan Heng fights with a spear, while March 7th uses bow to snipe enemies from afar. The Trailblazer can also share the smashing role with Dan Heng if Caelus is chosen as the player character.
  • Inverted with Himeko (who wields a circular saw to fight in melee) and Welt (who uses his gravitational powers and black hole manipulations to attack from afar). Played Straight regarding their ultimates, with Himeko blasting her opponents with a Kill Sat from orbit while Welt slashes through a black hole he engulfed his enemies with.
• Helping Would Be Killstealing: Himeko and Welt, the two elder members of the Nameless, possess far more experience than their younger peers and incredible powers that would easily match many of the things the Trailblazer faces. But Himeko feels that Helping Would Be Kill Stealing and that the younger members deserve to get to experience the adventure on their own. That said, Himeko and Welt aren't averse to providing "off-site" help when it's warranted, such as when Himeko uses her Kill Sat attack to disable one arm of the Engine of Creation, saving the heroes from a messy fate.
• I Have Many Names: The group is referred to by the following names: the Nameless, the Trailblazers, and the Astral Express crew.
• Masculine, Feminine, Androgyne Trio: Among the teenaged-looking members of the Astral Express, Dan Heng is male, March 7th is the Girly Girl, and the Trailblazer's gender is selected by the player.
• Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: The Trailblazers themselves currently consist of the following: an alien conductor, a scientist who is obsessed with coffee, a man from an alternate universe, a guy fleeing a Dark and Troubled Past, a Genki Girl with amnesia, and someone with a Stellaron stuck in their chest who also has amnesia.
• Savvy Guy, Energetic Girl: The dynamic between all the men in the Astral Express and March 7th, with Dan Heng being the most prominent.
• The Sleepless: Downplayed. The Trailblazers can go for days without sleep thanks to Akvili's blessing, but once they do go to sleep, they need to catch up on all those days they missed. So it's frequent for them to sleep in extra late after a lot of exertion.

Receptacle Stelle (female) or Receptacle Caelus (male)

Introduced: April 26, 2023 (v1.0 "The Rail Unto the Stars" [game launch])
Stelle is voiced by: Chen Tingting (Chinese), Yui Ishikawa (Japanese), Kim Ha-ru (Korean), Rachael Chau (English)
Caelus is voiced by: Qin Qiege (Chinese), Jun'ya Enoki (Japanese), Kim Myung-jun (Korean), Caleb Yen (English)

The Player Character of Honkai: Star Rail. A mysterious person of unknown origin, they are awoken from deep slumber by the Stellaron Hunters when they invade the Herta Space Station, and are forcibly merged by them with a malevolent artifact known as a Stellaron, giving them untold and undiscovered latent power. Devoid of their memories, the Trailblazer joins the Astral Express crew, seeking the truth about themselves and the Stellarons.

Unlike other characters, the Trailblazer has the unique gift of being able to change Paths, combat types, and weaponry. As of v1.1, they can either be a Physical Destruction damage dealer or a Fire Preservation tank.

In animated shorts and trailers, Stelle is typically shown as the Trailblazer.

• Ambiguously Human: What they are is a driving force of the early story, as their body is "downloaded" over a Stellaron and seemingly have become an entity tied to the Aeons with their supernatural powers. Once they can finally get the opportunity to ask questions about it, fulfilling the right conditions reveals they're an Artificial Human, created specifically by unknown means for hosting the Herta Space Station's Stellaron by fate before the Stellaron Hunters even found them, and holding the blessing of an unknown Aeon that specifically makes them immune to the Stellaron's potential influence.
• Amnesiac Hero: Whatever is going on with their containing the Stellaron, Kafka and Silver Wolf knew the Trailblazer was going to lose their memories over it. Bits and pieces seem to fill their mind from time to time, but the gaps are so vast that very little is solidified yet.
• Bad Powers, Good People: A Stellaron with the Path of Destruction should theoretically be a chaotic Physical God, but their inexperience, humanity, and morals help temper them to be a heroic individual.
• Been There, Shaped History: After the events of the Jarilo-VI arc, the Belobog Culture and History Museum made some replica exhibits modelled after the weapons they use to pay tribute to their role in saving Belobog from the Stellaron crisis. While one of the exhibits is their Preservation lance that once belonged to Alisa Rand, the other is the baseball bat they picked up from Herta Space Station and use in their Destruction Path. In a sense, the Trailblazer contributed something new to Belobog's history despite the bat itself being rather mundane by comparison.
• Blood Knight: Depending on the player's choices, the Trailblazer can be extremely eager to get into fights. Some dialogue choices make it their primary motivation for helping others or complain when a fight wasn't challenging enough.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: If the flavor texts is anything to go by, if one doesn't straight up consider them a Cloudcuckoolander. Dialogue choices play with how quirky they can get but their thoughts and some behaviours like described in Companion Cube are completely out of the player's control.
• Canon Name: Though you can give them a custom name, the menu interface for selecting between the two identifies the male Trailblazer as "Caelus", and the female Trailblazer as "Stelle".
• Chemically-Induced Insanity: After the Trailblazer helps Dan Shu rescue a blind girl, Dan Shu decides to give the Trailblazer a strange medicine as a thank-you present. Assuming they ingest the medicine the Trailblazer begins to feel unusual and returns to the Seat of Divine Foresight to find Mara-Struck swarming the building. After fighting off the Mara-Struck, the medicine's effects disperse and they realize that whatever they took caused them to hallucinate Cloud Knights as hostiles. They eventually conclude that the Stellaron inside their body repelled the effects of the medicine before it afflicted permanent damage.
• Cloudcuckoolander: The dialogue choices do determine how spacey they are to some extent, but some of their other behavior the player has no control over like their fixation on random inanimate objects do paint them naturally as being very much out-there, with their internal narration often resembling something straight out of Disco Elysium as their mind concocts strange narratives.
  • The Trailblazer has a bizarre obsession with trash receptacles much to March's and Dan Heng's occasional exasperation, in one interaction they even hallucinate that a trash can is a treasure chest. When coming across two trash cans, one standing and one toppled over, they come up with a whole plot of betrayal and revenge with the former looking sadistically at its adoptive parent "Tatalov", whose "guts and blood" (the trash bags) are spilling out.
  • A standout example is when staying the night at the Goethe Hotel, the Trailblazer can enter the closet where they will believe they have "merged with the universe's most perfect closet as one single entity", only for their blissful state to be interrupted by footsteps they quickly conclude are from a "hotel devil" that has disguised itself as room service. They proceed to banish the "hotel devil" by leaping out of the closet and scaring the daylights out of the poor maid.
• The Comically Serious: A lot of the humor revolving around the Trailblazer involves them doing and saying things that are just plain odd while remaining stone-faced.
• Companion Cube: Many interactions with random objects in the world, such as trash cans, hotel room closets, and chests containing other people's belongings, have the Trailblazer become absolutely fixated and obsessed with them.
• Contrasting Sequel Protagonist: To both Kiana Kaslana and the Traveler, the respective protagonists of two previous miHoYo games, Honkai Impact 3rd and Genshin Impact.
  • While Kiana is actually smarter and more competent than her cheerful, book-averse, and lackadaisical façade suggests, the Trailblazer is a stoic, quiet type who is actually much weirder than they let on. Additionally, while both carry an Artifact of Doom in their bodies, Kiana only learns about hers late in her life and its existence is an active threat to her and the people around her until she learns to control it. By comparison the Trailblazer finds out about the Stellaron shortly after waking up, has shown no negative reactions to carrying it, and made no attempts to learn how to control it.
  • Like the Traveler, the Trailblazer is an otherworldly Player Character whose canon names relate to the sky (Caelus) and light (Stelle), have player-defined gender and names, and can switch combat specializations as needed; apart from that, however, they differ in several ways: at the start of their stories, whereas the Traveler has a set goal of reuniting with their sibling, the Trailblazer has very few memories intact; in terms of clothing, both Trailblazers wear a black-and-yellow coat over a white shirt (only differentiated with Stelle wearing a miniskirt and Combat Stilettos, while Caelus wears slacks and regular shoes), whereas the Traveler has gender-specific color schemes (black-and-gold for Aether, white-and-sky-blue for Lumine); and combat-wise, whereas the Traveler continues to wield a sword and retain their stats even when changing elements, the Trailblazer changes elements, weapons, and stat priorities in conjunction with Paths; in terms of traveling companions in the main storyline, the Trailblazer has March 7th and Dan Heng (both of whom are the other two starting playable characters in the game), while the Traveler only has Paimon (who is an NPC; meanwhile, the starter characters Amber, Kaeya, and Lisa do not tag along the Traveler's adventure in the story). When choosing which Traveler you want as the player character, the one you didn't choose becomes your missing sibling, while the Trailblazer you didn't choose has not been integrated into the story.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Regardless of gender, the Trailblazer wears a black-and-white outfit with shades of yellow, and have a Stellaron stuck inside of them. And yet they're The Hero of the story.
• Deadpan Snarker: Though you don't get to hear their voice with dialogue options for the deadpan part, there tends to be more than a few choices throughout interactions that highlight that they're not the happiest about the crap they're put through and respond with what can only be interpreted as sarcasm at best and pure, annoyed snark at worst.
• Determinator: When they put their mind to doing something, nothing can stop them. Even having a lance shoved through their chest doesn't slow them down for long, as their unyielding determination to protect their friends and all of Belobog catches the eye of Qlipoth, who grants them their fiery power.
• Dreaming of Times Gone By: Due to the Stellaron in their body, the Trailblazer has a dream in which the Stellaron spoke to a young Cocolia, witnessing the moment where it started to influence her down a dark path.
• Dub Name Change: In the Chinese dub, the female and male Trailblazers' Canon Names are respectively 星 (Xīng, "star") and 穹 (Qióng, "sky")^note A rarely used character which is not interchangable in everyday Mandarin with 空 (kōng, also "sky"), the Chinese name for Aether, the male Traveler of Genshin Impact, both of which form part of the Chinese name for Honkai: Star Rail (崩坏：星穹铁道, Bēnghuài: Xīngqióng Tiědào). In Japanese, the same characters are officially read as "Sei" (ほし) and "Kyuu" (そら) in Japanese, and in Korean as "Seong" (성) and "Gung" (궁), whereas the English dub uses their respective German and Latin counterparts.
• Game Preferred Gender: A bit downplayed, but much of the marketing seems to prefer the female protagonist over the male, as she is featured much more prominently. Although, there is one instance on the Xianzhou Luofu where one of the Cloud Knights will refer to you as sir regardless of gender.
• Genre Savvy: Amusingly from a modern context; when they're aboard the Star Rail for the first time, they outright say it feels like stepping into a science-fiction movie, and seem to understand RPG tropes just enough to have a habit of being able to guess if someone's about to spring a request or a wrinkle into the mix.
• Hello, [Insert Name Here]: The game lets you input a name for the Trailblazer. When the custom name appears in a dialogue, any voiced line will simply skip mentioning it, or use the appropriate pronouns in its place.
• Heroic Mime: Played with; their player-chosen dialog is typically unvoiced, but their internal thoughts are fully voiced.
• Heroic Second Wind: The Trailblazer has one after Cocolia launches a frozen lance at them. They go from plunging to their deaths to drawing the gaze of Qlipoth the Preservation, resulting in new abilities and a new weapon.
• Hot-Blooded: Some dialogue options depict them as gung-ho and ready to charge into the fray whenever someone needs help. Picking these options even gets you the achievement "Hot-Blooded Trailblazer".
• The Immune: Stellarons create a sort of "contamination" around them that influences their environment and affects the minds of applicable people, like what happened on Jarilo-VI. The Trailblazer, however, was created and blessed by an Aeon in just the exact right conditions that they're completely, or at least mostly, immune to their Stellaron's effects, making them the exclusively one-of-a-kind perfect vessel for containing one.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: The Trailblazer is on the receiving end of this at the end of their first fight with Cocolia. To add insult to injury, the force of the attack knocks them off the platform.
• Kleptomaniac Hero: The Trailblazer has a fixation on opening every single treasure chest they can get their hands on. In one sidequest, they're explicitly vexed and angry when told not to rummage through other people's things. When they try again on the same chest, now moved to a different location, they're on the verge of tears when they have to restrain themselves from prying it open. Even trash cans look like chests to them, as the Trailblazer can't help but dig their hands in to pull out any remotely interesting scraps they can find.
• Knight in Sour Armor: Multiple dialogue options have them groan and complain about helping others with their problems. But they still help anyway and put a lot of effort in to complete requests.
• Minidress of Power: Stelle runs around in a miniskirt and lacks Modesty Shorts (apart from what looks like white bloomers), but it doesn't stop her from bringing the pain.
• Multiple-Choice Past: In an interesting twist, this is invoked by the game itself. During Kafka's Companion Quest, the player has a chance to ask her two questions about themselves with the caveat that one answer will be a lie and the other a truth. However, even when asking her the same questions, depending on the player's choices during other parts of the quest, she can give them different answers regarding their past. One answer has her say the Trailblazer is an artificial body created to house the stellaron, another them being an accidental creation of an Aeon and yet another has Elio having found them though all of them end with the Trailblazer in Kafka's care. Which of them is true is hard to gauge though it is confirmed through Blade that they have worked with Kafka before and had been with her for a while.
  • Averted if you ask the right questions during Kafka's companion quest. You can choose to ask a second question where it is obvious whether or not it is true or false, thus allowing you to find out whether the first answer was true or not. Based on this, the true answer is that the Trailblazer is an artificial being created to house the stellaron.
• Mysterious Past: They definitely existed prior to the start of the story, as Kafka specifically knows them and they recognize her on sight. But their memory loss is an intentional part of the plan to get them traveling alongside the Astral Express in search of the truth. At least, Blade confirms in Kafka's Companion Quest that the Trailblazer had been traveling with Kafka long before the events of the game and was apparently a close companion of hers.
• New Powers as the Plot Demands: The climax of the Jarilo-VI Trailblaze Quest shows that the Trailblazer is capable of accessing multiple Paths while everybody else is locked to only one. At the conclusion of the arc, they become freely able to switch between the Paths of Destruction and Preservation.
• Only in It for the Money: Depending on the dialogue options you take, you can make the Trailblazer seem comically greedy, always thinking of the hefty reward when asked for help.
• Physical God: By being the vessel of a Stellaron, they are theoretically capable of mass destruction and extraordinary power far beyond the capabilities of humans, but specifically only show mere fractions of this power both because they don't understand themselves enough to even remotely hope to control it, and because as a Star Rail member, such power is completely antithetical to the safety of everyone and everything around them.
• Pre-Asskicking One-Liner:
  (Enemy Target Found) "We need a strategy."
  (Battle Begins: Weakness Break - Destruction) "This is our chance."
  (Battle Begins: Weakness Break - Preservation) "Time to go on the offensive."
  (Battle Begins: Danger Alert) "Stay alert."
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: Downplayed since both gender of the Trailblazer are generally The Stoic, but there is a slight difference in personality between Stelle and Caelus, particularly when delivering their Ultimate lines during battle. The former is calm and elegant, while the latter is aggressive and brutal.
• Sarcasm Failure: When Cocolia dies in her madness after you fight her and Bronya is grieving, the third option (usually the most silly or sarcastic) is "I can’t think of any joke…" For all their wisecrack, the Trailblazer at least knows to read the room − although Bronya tells them that some humor would actually be welcome at the moment.
• Schrödinger's Player Character: The story implies that both Stelle and Caelus exist at the same time, and Herta's own image art shows her with dolls of both as a Visual Gag, but the Receptacle the player chooses becomes the Stellaron's vessel and thus the Player Character, while it's unknown if the other will matter at all.
• The Stoic: Externally they're a rather blank face almost all the time, rarely expressing much unless something really catches them by surprise, though some element of this is due to their amnesia. Internally, they're a snarky weirdo with a penchant for being completely the opposite to what people see on the surface.
• Supernatural Gold Eyes: Has these, because they are a vessel for the Stellaron in their body.
• Token Heroic Orc: As far as the cast are concerned, Stellarons are usually trouble magnets that distort the localized reality and cause all sorts of hell upon worlds they awaken on, and it's not known if they're even evil or just not understood yet. The fact that Jarilo-VI's Stellaron is actively manipulating Cocolia to do its bidding only accentuates this. Meanwhile the Trailblazer is, whether by the Receptacle containment of a body overtop or by the unknown nature of the Stellaron within, a straight up heroic individual working with the Star Rail to help people wherever they go and shut down other Stellarons.
• Touched by Vorlons:
  • At the climax of their battle against Cocolia, the Trailblazer draws the attention of Qlipoth due to their heartfelt desire to protect Belobog and its people and is subsequently able to draw upon the power of the Path of Preservation.
  • According to Kafka when you interrogate her at the Luofu's Divination Commission, this is the destiny that the Stellaron Hunters have weaved for the Trailblazer. Their goal is to have them inherit the Paths of the different Aeons.
• Unique Protagonist Asset: The Trailblazer has the unique ability to switch between different Paths, which also changes their damage type (as of v1.0, Destruction and Preservation).
• Villain Takes an Interest: Nanook, Aeon of Destruction, takes a glance at the Trailblazer after the Stellaron within their body awakens to defeat the Doomsday Beast in the midst of absorbing its final attack to save March 7th, forcing Himeko and Welt to take them away from Herta Space Station, urge them to join the Astral Express, and head to Jarilo-VI.

Trailblazer of Destruction

• Batter Up!: Their weapon on Destruction form is a baseball bat that they found lying in the Herta Space Station.
• Boring, but Practical: Their fighting style is merely slamming things hard, more so if their attacks are upgraded into Blowout forms. Regardless, their ability to switch between wide-ranging and single-target attacks as well as their massive damage output still makes them an effective and versatile Destruction type.
• Crutch Character: Somewhat downplayed, as the Trailblazer of Destruction can remain viable in more difficult content, such as the Memory of Chaos or the later levels in the Simulated Universe, but once the player has access to other damage dealers, the Trailblazer ends up lagging behind in terms of damage output, as they don't truly specialize in any one area.
• Gathering Steam: Their Talent gives the Trailblazer a stack of an Attack buff (of which they can hold up to two at a time) whenever they inflict Weakness Break on an enemy. Their fourth-ascension Bonus Ability, Perseverance, allows each stack to also improve their Defense, and their sixth Eidolon Resonance, A Trailblazing Will, also allows them to gain stacks via landing kills.
• Healing Factor: Their second Eidolon Resonance, An Unwilling Host, restores their HP based on 5% of their Attack stat whenever they hit enemies weak to Physical attacks.
• Healing Hands: Their Talent is an on-demand field heal that restores the party's HP based on 15% of each character's Max HP,
• Herd-Hitting Attack: Their Skill hits up to three enemies at once, one on either side of the Trailblazer's principal target.^note Damage is equivalent to 62.5–156.25% of the Trailblazer's Attack stat In its Blowout form, the principal target will take more damage.^note 180–325% to the target, 108–189% to surrounding enemies The Trailblazer's sixth-ascension Bonus Ability, Fighting Will, adds a fixed 25% damage boost to both forms.
• Invocation:
  (Ultimate activation) "Rules are made to be broken."
• Jack of All Stats: The Trailblazer of Destruction is competent in a number of areas but doesn't truly excel in any of them, capable of adapting to different enemy wave formations, buffing their stats, and sustaining themselves and their party. Their Skill and Ultimate can deal respectable damage, their passive abilities encourage players to Weakness Break enemies to trigger their status buffs, and they have another passive as well as an off-field Technique that provides healing.
• Kick Them While They Are Down: Their fourth Eidolon Resonance, A Destructing Glance, increases their Critical Rate by 25% against enemies suffering from Weakness Break.
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Their Ultimate of this path is the only one with two modes of operation (Single Target or Blast) and whose animation plays immediately upon activation before selecting the target.
• Mythology Gag: Their weapon of choice being a baseball bat is a reference to how Kiana from Guns Girl Z (the game that predated H I3rd) began the game with a bat as her weapon.
• Regenerating Mana: Their second-ascension Bonus Ability, Ready for Battle, restores 15 Energy at the start of battle, while their first Eidolon Resonance, A Falling Star, restores 10 Energy whenever either form of their Ultimate defeat at least one enemy.
• Stance System: Their Ultimate allows the Trailblazer to unleash upgraded "Blowout" forms of either Basic Attack or Skill.^note For the former, damage is equivalent to 300–525% of the Trailblazer's Attack stat compared to 50–130% in its base form; for the latter, 180–325% to the target and 108–189% to surrounding enemies, compared to a uniform 62.5–156.25% in its base form
• Status Buff: Their Talent boosts the Trailblazer's Attack^note by 10–25% each time they land a Weakness Break, which can be stacked up to two per battle. Their fourth-ascension Trace, Perseverance, also allows each stack to grant a 10% Defense boost (to a maximum of 20%), while their sixth Eidolon Resonance, A Trailblazing Will, automatically triggers the Talent whenever they defeat at least one enemy.
• Upgrade Artifact: Using "Shadows of Destruction" unique to them, their third Eidolon upgrade, A Leading Whisper, adds two levels each for their Skill and Talent, and their fifth, A Surviving Hope, adds two for their Ultimate and Basic Attack.

Trailblazer of Preservation

• 11th-Hour Superpower: The Trailblazer unlocks the power of Preservation after being Impaled with Extreme Prejudice by Cocolia at the end of the Jarilo-VI storyline. The Trailblazer's unyielding will to protect their friends and all of Belobog draws the attention of the past Supreme Guardians and eventually the Amber Lord themselves, who infuse their power into the lance that the Trailblazer now wields.
• Barrier Warrior:
  • Their Talent erects Shields onto the party whenever the Trailblazer uses their other active abilities for two turns.^note Damage absorption is equivalent to (4–7%)+(20–102.5) of the Trailblazer's Defense stat
  • Their Technique allows the Trailblazer to erect a Shield that lasts through the first turn.^note Damage absorption is equivalent to 30%+384 of the Trailblazer's Defense stat
  • Their sixth-ascension Bonus Ability, Action Beats Overthinking, increases their Attack stat by 15% and restores 5 Energy for every turn the Shield is intact; and their second Eidolon Resonance, Time-Defying Tenacity, further increases the Shield's resiliency.^note Absorption is increased based on 2%+27 of the Trailblazer's Defense stat
• Boring, but Practical: Their Preservation form is also rather simplistic, their Skill acting as a simple taunt and their Ultimate being an all-encompassing attack. However, their Attack stat barely changes from their Destruction form which allows them to deal respectable damage for what is otherwise a defensive Path.^note With the damage of their Ultimate being calculated based on 50–125% of their Attack stat + 75–187.5% of their Defense, at high Trace levels it is comparable to that of their Destruction form's multi-target Ultimate against the primary target. Relatively speaking, however, they're less simple than their Destruction form due to their "Magma Will" mechanic and their intended role of tanking enemy attacks.
• Defend Command: Their Skill has them put themselves in a defensive stance using their lance, granting them Damage Reduction^note By 40–55% depending on Trace Levels as well as goading enemies into targeting the Trailblazer for one turn. Their second-ascension Bonus Ability, The Strong Defend the Weak, allows their Skill to also reduce the party's incoming damage by 15% for one turn.
• Foil: The Trailblazer's powers in this state are more or less a complete opposite to Cocolia's. Due to being empowered by the Amber Lord, the Trailblazer's abilities are tailor-made to protect others, shielding their allies, taking damage for their team, and retaliating with explosive bursts of fire. By contrast, Cocolia wants to wipe away Belobog in hope of creating a new world, creating a Storm of Blades out of ice that damage the entire party and being entirely on offense the whole fight.
• Gathering Steam: The Trailblazer of Preservation can collect up to eight stacks of Magma Will whenever they take a hit or use Basic Attack or Skill. Once at least four are collected, the former will be enhanced to increase damage as well as damage range.^note Damage is equivalent to 90–168.75% of the Trailblazer's Attack stat against primary target (compared to 50–130% in its base form), 36–67.5% to surrounding enemies Their Ultimate automatically enhances the next Basic Attack and negates its Magma Will cost. On a related note, the Trailblazer's first Eidolon Resonance, Earth-Shaking Resonance, increases the damage potency of their Basic Attack based on 25% of their Defense stat, twice so on its enhanced form, while their fourth, Nation-Building Oath, automatically grants four stacks of Magma Will at the start of battle.
• Heal Thyself: Their fourth-ascension Bonus Ability, Unwavering Gallantry, restores their HP by 5% of its maximum value whenever they use their enhanced basic attack.
• Invocation:
  (Ultimate activation) "Lance ablaze!"
• Knight in Shining Armor: The Trailblazer's Preservation form was unlocked out of a desire to protect Belobog from a Stellaron-addled Cocolia. Fittingly, their weapon is a Jousting Lance.
• Legendary Weapon: The "Everwinter City Museum Ledger of Curiosities" limited-time event reveals that the lance they use in this form once belonged to Alisa Rand, the first Supreme Guardian of Belobog.
• Lodged-Blade Recycling: The lance the Trailblazer wields in combat is the same ice-encrusted lance that Cocolia skewered them through the chest with in their initial confrontation with her Stellaron-empowered Mother of Deception form.
• Mighty Glacier: Unlike other Preservation characters. On top of the shield they can regenerate with every action, their Skill reduces all damage by almost half even at at base level and can boost their defence to an insane degree, allowing them to take a lot of punishment from enemies. They can also put out impressive damage with their enhanced basic attacks and Ultimate ability. Their speed stat also becomes lower in this form; this gives them less chances of attacking and more for defending^note Though optimally, they'll like to be faster than most enemies so that they can use their defensive skills first.
• Mythology Gag:
  • As a lance wielder, they have several references to Durandal from Honkai Impact 3rd:
    • Their weapon (lance) and Fire element references Durandal's first battlesuit Valkyrie Gloria. Their basic attack is a thrust akin to said suit's basic attack, and their enhanced basic attack looks similar to the initial attack of VG's Ultimate.
    • Their Skill has them put themselves in a defensive position to block attacks using their lance, like Bright Knight: Excelsis suit's "defend" move.
    • Their Ultimate is a mighty lance thrust that ends in a giant eruption of fire behind them, like Palatinus Equinox suit's Ultimate. ^note The difference is that Palatinus Equinox deals physical damage, and that Durandal does it on horseback instead of on foot.
  • Their lance's design and fire element is similar to Kevin Kaslana's Judgment of Shamash, though it's a greatsword instead of a lance.
• Playing with Fire: The Trailblazer's lance is infused with flaming hot magma. Burying it in the ground with 4 stacks of Magma Will causes bursts of fire to erupt from the ground. Meanwhile, their Ultimate ability has them rush past their foes, causing a trail of explosions before making the battlefield erupt with an enormous plume of fire.
• Power Stereotype Flip: You might think the power of fire is better suited for more destructive endeavors, but here, the Fire Trailblazer has more defensive skills. The context for when they acquire their power, however, actually explains how fire can "preserve".
• Rule of Symbolism: The Trailblazer of Preservation's ensemble, consisting of a lance, fire-elemental attacks, and a defense-oriented build fits well to the climax of the Jarilo-VI Trailblaze Quest, where the Trailblazer gains the form after Qlipoth takes notice of their strong desire to protect Belobog from the Stellaron-corrupted Cocolia, and their association with fire thematically fits their role in melting, so to speak, the Eternal Freeze that has plagued the planet for centuries.
• Status Buff: Their sixth Eidolon Resonance, City-Forging Bulwarks, increases their Defense stat by 10% whenever they use enhanced basic attack or Ultimate, to a maximum of three stacks (equivalent to 30%).
• Upgrade Artifact: Using "Shadows of Preservation" unique to them, their third Eidolon Resonance, Trail-Blazing Blueprint, adds two levels each to his Skill and Talent, and their fifth, Spirit-Warming Flame, adds two to Ultimate and one to Basic Attack.

Dan Heng

Introduced: April 26, 2023 (v1.0 "The Rail Unto the Stars" [game launch])
Voiced by: Li Chunyin (Chinese), Kent Itō (Japanese), Kim Hye-sung (Korean), Nicholas Leung (English)

^{Click to see his full Warp artwork.} 

• Armor-Piercing Attack: His Talent increases the Wind Resistance Penalty of Dan Heng's next attack^note By 18–45% depending on Trace levels whenever he receives a Status Buff from his allies, activated at least every two turns.
• Catapult Nightmare: After leaving Jarilo-VI, Dan Heng has a nightmare involving Blade and wakes in this fashion, suddenly sitting up in a panic and breathing heavily. Unfortunately for him, Kafka directs the Astral Express to the Xianzhou Luofu in pursuit of Stellaron activity, where none other than Blade is getting involved with Xianzhou authorities.
• Cooldown Manipulation: His second Eidolon Resonance, Quell the Venom Octet, Quench the Vice O'Flame, reduces the cooldown of Superiority of Reach from two turns to one.
• Critical Hit Class: Players are incentivized to build up Dan Heng's Critical Rate to get a lot of mileage out of his Skill, which is guaranteed to inflict Slow on his target whenever it scores a critical hit, and by extension his Ultimate, which enjoys greater damage against Slowed enemy. In addition, his first Eidolon Resonance, The Higher You Fly, the Harder You Fall, increases his Critical Rate by 12% whenever his target's HP is over half.
• Dark and Troubled Past: While he refuses to outright discuss his past, he's got some particularly bad blood with the Xianzhou Luofu to the point where he's essentially "kill on sight" if he ever dares step foot in it again. It's also mentioned in one of his stories that he's changed his appearance numerous times while running from whatever it is he's running from. That said, he fears Blade even more than the Alliance, which causes alarm bells to go off when he finds out that Blade is on the Xianzhou Luofu and convinces him to board the ship to warn his friends.
• Dub Pronunciation Change: The characters of his name (simplified 丹恒, traditional 丹恆, pinyin "Dān Héng") are read as "Tankō" (katakana "タンコウ") in Japanese and "Danhang" (hangul 단항) in Korean.
• The Exile: Has been banned from setting foot on the Xianzhou Luofu due to a cardinal sin executed by his previous incarnation, Dan Feng, which causes him to decline to visit the Luofu with the others. Relatedly, according to some papers found on the Luofu, it was Jing Yuan who gave said sentence, when the Vidyadhara Preceptors and Ten-Lords Commission planned to give Dan Feng a harsher sentence. He immediately breaks the rule when he discovers that Blade is onboard, recognizing the latter's danger. After Phantylia's defeat, Jing Yuan absolves Dan Heng's ban as thanks for his assistance, and allows him to freely visit the Luofu from then on. However, Dan Heng only takes his time to look after Bailu and repair the Ambrosial Arbor's seal, and has decided to leave afterwards as a Nameless.
• Extra Turn: In a variant, his fourth Eidolon Resonance, Roaring Dragon and Soaring Sun, automatically pushes forward his next action (right before the current character or enemy's turn) whenever he defeats an enemy with his Ultimate.
• Famed in Story: He becomes popular in the Belobog Underworld after he shows up at Fight Club under the title "Cold Dragon Young" and wallops some of their battle bots. You can find some fans in the Fight Club hotly anticipate his return, to which you can give them a photo of him for their collection.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation:
  • In the final set of missions of the Xianzhou Luofu storyline, Dan Heng undergoes a transformation into the Imbibitor Lunae for the remainder of the story arc. However, his original pre-transformation self can still be used and deployed at this time despite not changing back into his "Dan Heng" self until after Phantylia's defeat.
  • Dan Heng and the Imbibitor Lunae can both exist in the same team and fight alongside each other despite being the same person.
  • In the battle against Phantylia, Dan Heng (as the Imbibitor Lunae) will aid you as an assist character who can unleash a powerful attack against the boss upon command once you have enough energy. Both Dan Heng's original self and the playable Imbibitor Lunae can be participating in the same fight as playable party members, making it there be up to three Dan Hengs with no explanation.
• Glass Cannon: Dan Heng can deal very high damage and is very fast, as expected of his Hunt archetype, but he has low HP and Defense, and can't take a hit very well, though this can be ameliorated through his second-ascension Bonus Ability, Hidden Dragon, which reduces the chance of enemies targeting him whenever his HP falls below half.
• Guyliner: Wears red eyeliner at the bottom corner of his left eye.
• I Choose to Stay: After completing his Companion Mission, Dan Heng is offered a chance to resettle in his homeland by Jing Yuan, with the former's banishment having been revoked. Inverted however, as Dan Heng insists that the Astral Express still needs him and is staying with them through thick and thin.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: He gets stabbed through the chest by Blade's sword during their encounter on the Xianzhou Luofu. He survives, and causes him to reveal his true identity as the Imbibitor Lunae.
• In-Series Nickname:
  • "Cold Dragon Young" is a moniker of his, and it's mentioned during his participation in the Fight Club boxing ring of Boulder Town.
  • During the Xianzhou Luofu Trailblaze Quest, Sushang keeps calling him "Silent, but Deadly" because he rarely speaks despite volunteering to fight alongside her and Luocha.
• Invocation:
  (Ultimate activation) "The truth of life and death, revealed in an instant."
• Kiss of Life: Subverted. Attempts to give the Trailblazer CPR upon finding them unconscious in the Herta Space Station, but March 7th sees that they are awaking and pushes him out of the way.
• Martial Pacifist: If his combat voice lines are any indication, Dan Heng doesn't particularly enjoy fighting and typically tries to avoid it whenever possible. In Belobog, he was justifiably opposed to telling Cocolia all the details about the Astral Express's purpose and the Stellaron, fearing it would lead to conflict. Given that he's "on the run", it's logical that he'd like to avoid conflict as much as he could.
  "I have no interest in conflict."
  "Fighting is meaningless."
• Mythology Gag: Dan Heng shares some similarities to Xiao, as well as to some extent Kaedehara Kazuha, from an earlier miHoYo RPG, Genshin Impact—in general, all three are handsome, youthful-looking men with wind-aligned powers and are haunted by Dark and Troubled Pasts; in particular, Dan Heng shares Xiao's mastery of the spear and origins in a place with a Chinese cultural aesthetic, as well as Kazuha's maple-leaf aesthetic and fugitive status.
• Pre-Asskicking One-Liner
  (Enemy Target Found) "That enemy certainly isn't friendly."
  (Battle Begins: Weakness Break) "It's too late to repent."
  (Battle Begins: Danger Alert) "Move carefully."
• Simple, yet Awesome: Of the three starter characters, Dan Heng's kit is the most focused, lacking the Trailblazer's adaptability or March 7th's sheer utility. The choice between using his Basic Attack, Skill, and Ultimate can be boiled down to how hard he wants to hit one enemy at a time. Relative to his fellow Hunt Pathstriders, Dan Heng also lacks additional gimmicks (e.g., Seele's Extra Turn, Yanqing's Full Health Bonus, or Sushang's damage bonus against Weakness Broken enemies), the closest being that his Ultimate deals bonus damage against Slowed enemies and the ability to increase his Wind Resistance Penalty. Despite this, Dan Heng is one of the strongest DPS units in the early game, and among the launch characters his single-turn damage is second only to Seele.^note Seele and Dan Heng are calculated on single-turn damage, without Eidolon Resonances, with their respective optimal Relics, equivalent critical hit stats, and Superimposition 5 Cruising in the Stellar Sea, where Dan Heng deals about 1% less than Seele. However, because of Seele's Extra Turn ability, the difference is more pronounced in practice. See here for more details.
• Sins of Our Fathers: Even though Dan Feng's sins were supposed to be extinguished after his reincarnation into Dan Heng, the latter was still punished for the acts of his previous incarnation by being banished from the Luofu.
• Starter Mon: Dan Heng is one of the two characters you more or less begin play with; you'll catch up with him in the main elevator of Herta Station, and he permanently joins the roster mechanically at that time.
• Status Buff: His Technique boots Dan Heng's Attack by 40% for the first three turns of the next battle, while his fourth-ascension Bonus Ability, Faster Than Light, grants him a 50% chance to enjoy a 20% Speed boost for two turns whenever he attacks.
• Status Effect-Powered Ability: His Ultimate increases in damage potency against Slowed enemies.^note Depending on Trace levels, its damage is equivalent to 240–480% of Dan Heng's Attack stat by default, 312–624% against a Slowed enemy In addition, Dan Heng's sixth-ascension Bonus Ability, High Gale, adds a 40% damage boost for his Skill against Slowed enemies.
• Status Infliction Attack: Cloudlancer Art: Torrent has a guaranteed chance to inflict Slow (12% penalty on their Speed stat) on Dan Heng's target for two turns whenever it lands a critical hit. His sixth Eidolon Resonance, The Troubled Soul Lies in Wait, increases the penalty to 20%.
• The Stoic: He never talks about his past and is quite serious, putting him in contrast with March. The only time that he has displayed more expressive emotion is after waking up in a panic from a nightmare in the "Nightmare" trailer. In the game proper, his mask of stoicism also has a rock taken to it when he realizes Blade is on the Luofu, and the Trailblazer, March 7th, and Welt have marched right on board, blissfully unaware of just who or what they're facing.
• Straight Man: Whenever the Trailblazer or March 7th goof off, Dan Heng will often be there to make wry comments about their antics.
• That Man Is Dead: An interesting variant where technically the man in question, Dan Feng, really is dead and Dan Heng is his next reincarnation. Dan Heng insists on Jing Yuan to stop treating him as if he’s the High Elder Dan Feng and instead treat him as Dan Heng, member of the Astral Express crew.
• Undying Loyalty: Dan Heng considers himself first and foremost a member of the Astral Express crew, and insists he is not Dan Feng, his previous incarnation. His loyalty to the Astral Express is exemplified at the end of his Companion Quest, where Dan Heng turns down Jing Yuan's offer to stay at the Luofu despite his banishment edict being annulled, choosing to instead travel with the Trailblazer and friends.
• Upgrade Artifact: By getting his Eidolons, you can activate his third Eidolon Resonance, Seen and Unseen, which adds two levels to his Skill and one to Basic Attack, while his fifth, A Drop of Rain Feeds a Torrent, adds two each to his Ultimate and Talent.
• Weapon Specialization: Dan Heng's associated Light Cone is "Only Silence Remains" (4★), whose "Record" passive increases his Attack stat by 16–32%, as well as Critical Rate by 12–24% if there are less than two enemies in the field. With the way his kit works, the latter boost increases his chances of inflicting Slow with his Skill (thus increasing his Ultimate's chance to deal more damage), especially when there are a few enemies left or when facing off against bosses.

March 7th

Introduced: April 26, 2023 (v1.0 "The Rail Unto the Stars" [game launch])
Voiced by: Nuoya (Chinese), Yui Ogura (Japanese), Jung Hye-won (Korean), Skyler Davenport (English)

^{Click to see her full Warp artwork.} 

• Affectionate Nickname: In the Japanese dub, the Trailblazer calls her "Nano," which is derived from the reading of her name in Japanese, "Mitsuki Nanoka." It's averted in the English dub, where she is consistently referred to as March.
• Amnesiac Hero: She woke up from a block of ice with no memories of her past, she has even forgotten her original name. She named herself after the day on which she woke up.
• Anti-Debuff: Her second-ascension Bonus Ability, Purify, allows her to remove one debuff from the ally whom she uses her Skill on.
• Awful Truth: It is highly implied that her past is this, considering the Garden of Recollection is responsible for suppressing her memories with the justification of protecting her well being.
• Badass Adorable: March 7th is a cheerful, friendly young lady with mean archery skills and a nifty defense-oriented fighting style.
• Barrier Warrior: Her Skill erects a Shield around an ally for three turns,^note Depending on Trace levels, damage absorption is equivalent to (38–66.5%)+(190–973.75) of March 7th's Defense stat in addition to a Draw Aggro effect if the ally has at least 30% HP. Her fourth-ascension Bonus Ability, Reinforce, extends the Shield's duration to four turns, while her second Eidolon Resonance, Memory of It, allows March 7th to automatically grant a less potent Shield to the ally with the lowest remaining HP percentage for the first three turns of the next battle,^note Damage absorption is equivalent to 24%+320 of her Defense stat and her sixth, Just Like This, Always..., heals the Shielded ally based on 4%+106 of their Max HP for every turn the Shield is intact.
• Black-and-White Morality: March 7th seems to have this kind of mindset. When Kafka hacks into the Astral Express's communication and tells them about the Stellaron on the Alliance Ship and how she and her group were being framed for smuggling the Stellaron onboard, March 7th argues that what happens to Stellaron Hunters has nothing to do with them and wants to vote against helping the Stellaron Hunters in any way. When she goes to get Dan Heng, she wants him to vote against going on the ship, and when the Trailblazer says they should go along with Kafka, she's a little miffed at them. It's only after a bit of time passes and she has time to think about it that March 7th realizes that the situation isn't entirely about her and that there is a lot at stake.
• Butt-Monkey: She often ends up at the butt of the Trailblazer and Dan Heng's jokes, and is very easily bullied by children far younger than her.
• Camera Fiend: She always carries a Polaroid camera with her and takes pictures of everything, in case she ever forgets anything again.
• Counter-Attack: her Talent allows March 7th to immediately counter enemy attacks against a Shielded character up to twice in between her turns.^note Depending on Trace levels, damage potency is equivalent to 50–125% of her Attack stat Her fourth Eidolon Resonance, Never Forfeit Again, allows the Talent to be triggered thrice, in addition to a damage boost equivalent to 30% of her Defense stat.
• Doesn't Trust Those Guys: March 7th does not like the Stellaron Hunters, believing them to be irredeemable villains.
• Dub Pronunciation Change: March 7th's name is rendered "三月七" ("Sānyuèqī") in Chinese, which are read as "Mitsuki Nanoka" in Japanese (via kun, or native, reading).
• Entitled Bitch: Downplayed but present, relating to her naive views on morality. March is convinced that the Nameless are the heroes of the galaxy, and that whatever planetary governments they encounter should accept their help with the Stellarons with open arms. When this doesn't happen, she gets annoyed that the locals don't immediately trust them with the mysterious artifacts that can ruin entire planets.
• Everyone Has Standards: March is all for helping people because as a member of the Astral Express, they help people in need. However, she has her limits when it becomes clear that they are being taken advantage of. When she thinks that the Luofu is going to send them to the frontlines, she hysterically declares that she absolutely refuses to go because she’s had enough of essentially being treated like errand boys.
• Fashionable Asymmetry: Several parts of her design are asymmetric, such as her clover-like button and camera being only on the left side of her jacket, her right-hand-only thumbless glove, and her right-leg-only strap.
• Foreshadowing: In her Companion Mission, where she and Fu Xuan try to look into her memories, several "memory" versions of people she knows somehow say things along the lines of "don't focus on the past" and/or "keep looking into the future" even though she shouldn't have any memory of them saying those lines. There's also special loading screen in said mission that says "March 7th, don't look back, keep moving forward". Fu Xuan also senses foreign interference that grows stronger the further they go. In the end, March finds out that a Messenger from Garden of Recollection has entered her mind and given her a warning to not continue looking deeper into her past, lest it hurt her.
• Glacier Waif: Pun unintended, while she dresses like a pop idol and is very girly overall, March 7th is a Preservation pathstrider. Her skills incentivize builds that capitalize on high amounts of defense to make her shields borderline impregnable. This means she ends up being way tankier than what her appearance would apply.
• Genki Girl: Despite her Mysterious Past, she's shown to be lively and cheerful every step of the way.
• Human Popsicle: The Astral Express found her frozen in a block of ice. Ever since, she has joined them, hoping to find her past during the journey.
• Hypocrite: Two examples.
  • When the Astral Express Crew has to vote on whether to go to the Luofu or not after Kafka's message, March wants Dan Heng and the Trailblazer to vote against it because it's a Stellaron Hunter telling them to go. If the Trailblazer tells her that they are going to vote in favour of it, she gets incredibly huffy over their choice saying that she should have known they would side with Kafka because of their shared history and tells them to think before they make their final decision. When they are all gathered in the Parlour Car to vote, regardless of the Trailblazer's choice, March votes in favour of going. When questioned about changing her mind, March sheepishly admits that she calmed down and thought about it and realizes that innocent people getting hurt does not come before her own personal biases and grudges. The Trailblazer is not impressed and calls her out on it.
  • Throughout the Luofu arc March frequently complains about how the Cloud Knights and other associated personnel don't trust them yet, despite absolutely refusing to trust Kafka under any circumstances and later telling the Trailblazer point-blank that she trusts no one that isn't a Nameless.
• An Ice Person: She shoots arrows that deal ice damage to enemies. More specifically she has control over Six-Phased Ice, a special type of ice that cannot by melted or broken by normal means.
• Insane Troll Logic: March 7th tends to veer into this whenever she tries to piece something together on her own. An example appears in Luocha's Companion Quest, where she watches camera footage of Luocha entering an alley, then another clip that shows that Yinshu was the only person shown leaving the area for two hours afterwards. Her conclusion? Yinshu is Luocha, having somehow genderbent and de-aged himself into a little girl.
• Internal Homage:
  • The animation of March 7th's "The Power of Cuteness" skill has her performing a Finger Gun along with winking and smiling to the camera. It's a complete visual recreation of Kiana Kaslana's pose in the app icon of Honkai Impact 3rd.
  • During the cutscene where she and the crew are running away from Silvermane Guards, she looks back while sticking her tongue out, much like what Kiana does to the giant robot Arahato in the "Reburn" promotional video.
• Invocation:
  (Ultimate activation) "Gotta try hard sometimes."
• Jack of All Trades: When fully upgraded, March 7th's kit has a little bit of everything. Alongside the powerful Shield, counterattack, and reasonably reliable area-of-effect Freeze in her base kit, her fourth Eidolon Resonance gives her counterattack a third charge and lets its damage additionally scale with her Defense, while her sixth adds a healing-over-time effect to her shield.
• Line-of-Sight Name: Sort of. Since the Astral Express crew found her on March 7, they simply picked that as her name.
• Mascot: March 7th represents the game as its icon in the app stores and in various social media/online platforms.
• Meaningful Rename: Justified, as she doesn't remember her real name, but she calls herself March 7th after the date she was discovered.
• Multiple-Choice Past: While March 7th is investigating her past with Fu Xuan, she comes across several memory projections that throw out possible stories about her past, ranging from being a refugee from either the disasters caused by the Propogation or Nanook (March has different refutations against these two), to being a fallen Aeon who has been cut off from its Path (which she finds hard to believe but does not rule out the possibility).
• Mysterious Past: She was found in a block of ice with zero idea of her identity or origins. Her Companion Quest has her consult Fu Xuan in an attempt to seek out answers to her origins. Whatever her past was, it's apparently significant enough for a Messenger from the Garden of Recollection to actively impede her attempts at doing so, telling her that the past is meaningless and she should only keep moving forward.
• Mythology Gag:
  • In many ways, March 7th can be considered a younger version of Elysia from Honkai Impact 3rd, a happy-go-lucky pink haired girl armed with a bow who has a mercurial personality and simply loves to adventure and meet new people. They're also both ice-elemental and have been depicted as sealed in crystal/ice.
  • Much like Amber from Genshin Impact, March 7th is a 4★ Starter Mon archer with a cheerful personality, who automatically joins the party at the beginning of the game, albeit having an indirect Fire/Ice Duo dynamic, with March 7th being the Ice to Amber's Fire.
• Nice Girl: March 7th is a sweet young lady who easily makes friends with people around her, including new arrivals such as the Trailblazer.
• Pink Means Feminine: Pink is a prominent color in her hair, eyes and attack effects while she herself is rather girly.
• The Pollyanna: March 7th isn't the type of person to dwell in despair or even concern herself with the circumstances behind her own Mysterious Past. She simply lives her life for the moment, full of optimism, determination, and adding positive vibes to the Astral Express' journey even during the darkest moments. In her Companion Mission, even after she failed to get any memory of her past, she at least gets to know that the Garden of Recollection had something to do with said memories, so she isn't feeling too bad.
• Pre Ass Kicking One Liner:
  (Enemy Target Found) "Crush now or crush later?"
  (Battle Begins: Weakness Break) "I told ya I could fight!"
  (Battle Begins: Danger Alert) "Oh great, another walk in the park."
• Proud Beauty: She's quite vain and proud of her looks, often calling herself a cute or beautiful girl and complaining when she has to do things that could mess with her skin, like pulling an all-nighter.
• Pun: She says "Have an ice day!" just as she froze the guns of the Silvermane Guards when she and her friends escape from them in Jarilo-VI.
• Regenerating Mana: March 7th's first Eidolon Resonance, Memory of You, automatically restores 6 Energy for herself for every enemy Frozen with her Ultimate.
• Rose-Haired Sweetie: Her hair is neon pink and she is sweet, lively, and energetic.
• Screw Destiny: She expresses this sentiment at the climax of the Jarilo-VI Trailblaze Quest. When Bronya says that even if they are doomed to destruction, she and the people will bravely walk hand in hand into the darkness with their heads held high, March 7th isn't having any of that.
  March 7th: "No! That end won't come to pass while we're around!"
• Series Mascot: March 7th's face is the icon for the game's app, making her the de facto mascot and poster girl of the game.
• Speaks Fluent Animal: She can understand what Diting, Tingyun's bionic dog, is saying. When asked how she can, March offers a less than satisfactory explanation:
  March 7th: That's just the psychic bond between cute girls and cute puppies!
• Starter Mon: She's the first party member you get, and will stick with you through thick and thin.
• Stepford Smiler: Himeko's interpretation of March 7th's incorrigible good cheer is that she's covering up deep anxieties, mainly about being the only person on the Express (before the arrival of the Trailblazer, at least) who truly has nowhere else to go as she doesn't even remember who she is or where she's from. Himeko, Welt, and Dan Heng may all be unable to go home for various reasons, but at least they all know where home is. Some support for this reading turns up in one of her lines whenever she is knocked out, where she whimpers "I don't want to be alone...". This splits the difference between Himeko's view of things and the interpretation of March as The Pollyanna, suggesting that she's not too sad about her lost memories but fears that her found family will leave her behind one day once they're able to return to their former lives.
• Status Infliction Attack: her Ultimate has a base 50% chance (65% with her sixth-ascension Bonus Ability, Ice Spell) to inflict Freeze on enemies for one turn, forcing them to lose that turn and take damage,^note Ultimate's damage is 90–180% of her Attack stat, and if they get frozen, they take additional damage equivalent to 30–75% of said stat, while her Technique is guaranteed to Freeze a random enemy at the start of battle.^note With subsequent damage equivalent to half of March 7th's Attack stat
• Stone Wall: March 7th's skillset incentivizes building up around her Defense stat to strengthen the resilience of her Shields and her personal durability in exchange for leaving her offensive firepower rather middling, with her Ultimate being less about raw damage output and more for freezing enemies.
• Support Party Member: March 7th's kit packs an impressive amount of utility. Her Skill allows her to erect a Shield onto her allies (with her second-ascension Bonus Ability, also adding a debuff removal effect), while her Ultimate has a hefty chance of inflicting Freeze on all enemies in addition to a respectable damage output. Should you unlock her Sixth Eidolon, her shield even gets a healing effect taped onto it.
• Technicolor Eyes: March's eyes are distinctly two-tone pink and blue unlike any other character in Star Rail thus far, making her origins all the more mysterious.
• This Is Gonna Suck: When her first turn against a very tough enemy starts, she will say:
  March 7th: "Oh great, a walk in the park."
• Trauma Button: The events of Jarilo-VI has left her more distrustful of other people’s intentions as when Tingyun leads them to the Palace of Astrum, she’s openly questioning whether it’s a matter of time before Tingyun orders the Cloud Knights to arrest them. She also seems to dislike people of authority as she openly complains about Yukong’s chilly reception and has reservations about staying at a hotel after their last experience. In her Companion Mission, Fu Xuan laments that she can't see the snow vistas of Belobog through March's memory, which is confined to the Goethe Hotel's lobby; the latter says that finding out that she and her friends are wanted criminals after staying there had left a deep impression on her.
• Upgrade Artifact: By getting her Eidolons, you can unlock her third Eidolon Resonance, Memory of Everything, which adds two levels to Glacial Cascade and one to Frigid Cold Arrow, and her fifth, Never Forget Again, which adds two each to The Power of Cuteness and Girl Power.
• Weapon Specialization: March 7th's associated Light Cone is "Day One of My New Life," whose "At This Very Moment" increases its wearer's Defense by 16–24%, thus making her even tougher than she already is, as well as increases the party's Damage Resistance by 8–12%, hence expanding her defensive repertoire.

Himeko

Introduced: April 26, 2023 (v1.0 "The Rail Unto the Stars" [game launch])
Voiced by: Lin Su (Chinese), Rie Tanaka (Japanese), Kim Bo-na (Korean), Cia Court (English)

^{Click to see her full Warp artwork.} 

• Alternate Self: of Murata Himeko from Honkai Impact 3rd, complete with the association with fire element and the same Chinese and Japanese voice actors.
• Big Damn Heroes: Although Himeko prefers to allow the newer Astral Express members to learn how to handle things on their own, at Welt's request she relents and helps once during the climax of Jarilo-VI by calling down an orbital strike from the Astral Express on the Engine of Creation, striking it and distracting it from crushing the heroes.
• Chainsaw Good: Her Basic Attack, Sawblade Tuning, involves swinging around a briefcase containing a circular saw.^note Damage is equivalent to 50-110% of her Attack stat Her Talent attack also has her briefcase turn into a flying drone with a sawblade arm that cuts through all enemies at once.
• Coat Cape: Himeko only wears the right sleeve of her coat, while the left is left hanging loose.
• Crippling Overspecialization: Himeko specializes in striking multiple enemies at once and following up with additional attacks when inflicting 3 Weakness Breaks, making her quite powerful for farming Calyxes. Unfortunately, her overall damage output is quite low against single targets, and it suffers even further in boss fights, where inflicting Weakness Break may take a while. That said, she automatically gains three stacks of Charge once she does break elite or boss enemies, allowing her to immediately launch a follow-up attack as compensation.
• Damage-Increasing Debuff: Her Technique creates an area-of-effect that lasts fifteen seconds; if a battle is started within its radius, all enemies suffer a 10% boost to incoming Fire damage for two turns.
• Damage Over Time: Himeko's second-ascension Bonus Ability, Starfire, grants all her attacks a 50% chance to inflict Burn on enemies for two turns, which damages them at the start of their turn.^note Damage is equivalent to 30% of her Attack stat
• Dub Pronunciation Change: Himeko's name is the kun, or native Japanese, reading of 姬子, which is read as "Jīzǐ" in Chinese, while the Korean dub opts to retain "Himeko" (hangul 히메코, whereas the characters can be read via hanja as "Huija").
• Early-Bird Cameo: The Star Rail version of Himeko is seen once in the twelfth chapter of the Honkai Impact 3rd webcomic Alien Space as a portrait on a control panel that Void Archives is seen sifting through. Her face is obscured by the camera angle so as to avoid giving away her identity, with only her hair curl and dress to identify her. This ultimately kickstarts Welt's decision to continue his quest to stop the Sky People, as he discovers that the "Himeko" that Void Archives found in the space station's logs originates from a parallel universe that the Sky People plan to invade.
• For Want of a Nail: Unlike her Honkai Impact 3rd counterpart, this Himeko is likely what would have happened had she continued her interest with outer space since her youth, and became a space scientist in her adulthood.
• Full Health Bonus: Her sixth-ascension Bonus Ability, Benchmark, boosts her Critical Rate by 15% while her HP is at least 80%.
• Gathering Steam: Her Talent allows Himeko to gather stacks of Charge whenever the party Weakness Breaks an enemy (with one stack prepared at the start of battle), which are then consumed once three have been gathered to allow Himeko to trigger a follow-up attack. ^note Damage is equivalent to 70–175% of her Attack stat In addition, her first Eidolon Resonance, Childhood, allows the Talent to boost her Speed by 20% for two turns, while her fourth, Dedication, grants her another stack of Charge whenever her Skill triggers a Weakness Break.
• Guest-Star Party Member: Himeko becomes a temporary fourth party member (alongside the Trailblazer, March 7th, and Dan Heng) during an early exploration-related prologue quest in the Herta Space Station, including the battle against Doomsday Beast.
• Herd-Hitting Attack: Her Skill damages Himeko's target and surrounding enemies, with a higher damage to the former.^note Depending on Trace levels, damage is equivalent to 100–250% of her Attack stat against her target, 40–100% to surrounding enemies
• Invocation:
  (Ultimate activation) "Perhaps you still don't understand..."
• Kill Sat: Her Ultimate has Himeko calling down a massive Orbital Bombardment from a satellite floating in space and rain down hell on her enemies, which will also restore Energy for every enemy defeated.^note Depending on Trace levels, damage is equal to 138–276% of her Attack stat Her sixth Eidolon Resonance, Trailblaze!, adds two extra hits, each dealing damage worth 40% of the original damage to random enemies.
• Lady of War: A beautiful woman in an elegant white-and-red dress that's not afraid to take the field and hand out pain with her circular saw. She even takes the time to sit down and sip some coffee as the Kill Sat from her ultimate fires.
• Lethal Chef: This version of Himeko seems to struggle with making coffee. The only member of the Astral Express who can tolerate her coffee is Dan Heng, and he only drinks it because it tests his grit.
• Ms. Fanservice: Himeko is certainly quite the lovely sight, with her sensual outfit that accentuates her breasts and curves, as well as a refined appearance and mannerisms, including casually sipping coffee while her Kill Sat rains down hell on her enemies.
• Must Have Caffeine: She's seen only drinking coffee, and comes with an achievement called "Coffee Lover" if her Ultimate is used three times in a single battle.
• Mythology Gag: One Curio in Herta Space Station is the remains of Murata Himeko's sword from Honkai Impact 3rd. The gag is in if you have Himeko and have her interact with the Curio, there'll be an additional text:
  She was reborn in the fire. She was smiling in the fire.
• Pre Ass Kicking One Liner:
  (Enemy Target Found) "Practice target?"
  (Battle Begins: Weakness Break) "I have something for you."
  (Battle Begins: Danger Alert) "Be careful."
• Situational Sword:
  • Her fourth-ascension Bonus Ability, Magma, increases the damage potency of her Skill by 20% against Burnt enemies.
  • Her second Eidolon Resonance, Convergence, increases damage against enemies with no more than half their HP by 15%.
• Team Mom: She serves as the de facto leader and matriarch of the Astral Express crew, often doting on the Trailblazer, March 7th, and Dan Heng as if they were her own children.
• Upgrade Artifact: By getting her Eidolons, you can unlock her third Eidolon Resonance, Poised, which adds two levels to her Skill and one to her Basic Attack, and her fifth, Aspiration, which adds two each to her Ultimate and Talent.
• Weapon Specialization: Himeko's associated Light Cone is "Night on the Milky Way" (5★), whose "Meteor Swarm" passive gives its wearer up to five stacks of a 9–15% Attack boost for every enemy in the field (to a maximum of 45–75%), as well as boosts their damage output by 30–50% for one turn after dealing a Weakness Break. Given that Himeko specializes in dealing with enemy mobs, this helps her swiftly dispose of them, as well as improves her viability against elite- or boss-grade enemies by increasing the power of all her attacks, manual or follow-up, whenever she breaks them.

Welt Yang

Introduced: April 26, 2023 (v1.0 "The Rail Unto the Stars" [game launch])
Voiced by: Peng Bo (Chinese), Yoshimasa Hosoya (Japanese), Han-sin (Korean), Corey Landis (English)

^{Click to see his full Warp artwork.} 

For tropes specific to him before he boarded the Astral Express, see here.

• The Ageless: Looks mostly the same as he did in the "A Post-Honkai Odyssey" story mode from Honkai Impact 3rd.
• Always a Bigger Fish: Welt mentions in his conversations that he at first thought the Aeons were analogous to the Honkai from his home universe, only to quickly find out that individual Aeons are orders of magnitude more powerful than the Honkai ever were.
• Area of Effect: His Talent generates a force field that lasts fifteen seconds, within which enemies see their movement speeds halved, as well as Imprisons them for their first turn if you attack them. The slowing effect sees use against enemies that may try to hit you (and make them react slower to your presence), or Trotters that may try to flee from you.
• The Cameo: Some characters from Honkai Impact 3rd (Void Archives, Welt Joyce, Tesla and Einstein) appear in his character splash artwork.
• Casting a Shadow: His attacks have black-and-purple colors, with his Skill essentially have him create dark tears in reality and his Ultimate summoning a synthetic black hole - an odd stand out in the Imaginary element, which is otherwise mostly associated with more light-themed skillsets.
• Celebrity Paradox: As Silver Wolf's trailer has shown, Honkai Impact 3rd is confirmed to be an actual in-universe game in the Star Rail universe, which creates an interesting conundrum for Welt because he's one of two characters (the other being Void Archives) confirmed to come directly from the Honkai Impact 3rd universe and not contradict his existence in the Star Rail universe in the process. The fact that no one in the galaxy recognizes Welt as "the character from HI3" strongly implies that events may have gone differently in the in-universe game or he may be absent from it entirely.
• Continuity Nod:
  • When Welt sees Luocha for the first time, he immediately recieves flashbacks of his experiences with Otto Apocalyse and the Void Archives. Since those experiences weren't exactly positive, he immediately suspects that Luocha may be involved with the Luofu's Stellaron troubles.
  • March complains about Welt's uncanny ability to eavesdrop on conversations in some dialogue lines, alluding to Welt's Super-Hearing power in his home world.
  • During Yukong's companion mission, Welt alludes to his own experiences as a parent. This is a little nod to Joey, his adopted son in A Post-Honkai Odyssey.
• Cool Old Guy: Welt is fairly kind and easygoing in spite of his stern appearance, and he has quite a few moments where he proves to be Not So Above It All. Himeko's line for him has her mention that he feels "young at heart" to her.
• Damage-Increasing Debuff: Welt's second-ascension Bonus Ability, Retribution, gives his Ultimate a 100% base chance to inflict the "Vulnerability" effect, increasing incoming damage against enemies by 12% for two turns afterwards.
• Dramatic Irony: The first time he sees Luocha's photo, he flashes back to the old times in his home world, particularly with Otto and Void Archives; he instantly raises his suspicion on the blond-haired man. Though he acknowledges that he shouldn't judge people by their appearance, after a series of investigations done by the crew, they find that Luocha is a generally good and helpful man and didn't find anything wrong with him - at least, until the Realm-Keeping Commission found a footage of Luocha overlooking the revived Ambrosial Arbor. The crew didn't get to meet or talk about Luocha again, but the end of the Luofu storyline proves Welt right: Luocha actually had a scheme, one that's grand enough to involve Aeons.
• Famed in Story: According to Pom-Pom, Welt's anime series is rather popular with the natives of planets that the Astral Express visits. It got to the point where on one particular visit he had scores of fans banging on the Astral Express's door for a sequel, forcing him to hide inside and pretend he was working on the train.
• Genre Savvy: In his voice lines, he seems to recognize that the Trailblazer has the qualities and characteristics of a lead protagonist and seems put off that them joining the Astral Express lessens his own chances of being a hero.
• Gravity Master: Welt wields a copy of the Divine Key - Star of Eden, a superweapon constructed from the core of the ninth Herrscher that gives its user the ability to manipulate gravity and spawn black holes. His kit mostly revolve around using the power of the Star to rein in his foes.
• Imagination-Based Superpower: As the Herrscher of Reason, Welt can recreate and even deconstruct any object as long as he understands its fundamental properties. Fittingly, for his playable debut, Welt is an Imagination-type character.
• Jack of All Stats: Welt can be a highly effective debuffer, SP generator, damage amplifier and DPS with the right build and team composition. His ability to do all of this at once makes up for him losing out in any of these one categories to other characters (such as Seele in the single-target damage department). In addition, his rare Imaginary element lets him hit many enemies with an otherwise hard to exploit weakness.
• Kick Them While They Are Down: His sixth-ascension Bonus Ability, Punishment, boosts his damage against Weakness Broken enemies by 20%.
• Magic Staff: Uses his Classy Cane to channel his powers against enemies and neutralise the Trailblazer after they are hit by the Doomsday Beast and lose control over the Stellaron in their body. His "Keeping Up with Star Rail" video reveals that the cane is the current form of his Star of Eden.
• Missed Him by That Much: Welt decides to sit out the adventure on Jarilo-VI, suggesting that the younger crew deserve to get some experience on their own. In doing so, he ends up missing their encounters with this universe's versions of Bronya, Cocolia, and Seele.
• Mr. Exposition: He provides exposition on some conspicuous objects that you discover for the first time on your journey, such as Calyxes and Relics. The Trailblazer usually sends a photo and asks "What is this, Mr. Yang?", and he immediately replies.
• Mundane Utility: According to Pom-Pom, Welt occasionally uses his Herrscher mimicry powers to show episodes of the anime he made back on Earth.
• Mythology Gag:
  • The Non Standard Game Over ending you can get near the start of the game lists Welt under his real name, Joachim Nokianvirtanen, in its Credits Gag. Doubles as a Late-Arrival Spoiler.
  • Synthetic Black Hole strongly references his past, including a glimpse of Tesla and his dangerous usage of black holes during the Second Honkai War.
  • Interacting with Welt in the Astral Express's Parlor Car and choosing certain dialogue options will make him recall several moments and events that happened in his home universe:
    • When asked to describe what kind of world he came from, he recalls his planet being haunted by a power known as the Honkai.
    • When asked about his powers, he says that it allows him to mimic anything as long as he understands its principles, while his black holes are a different matter entirely. Although these are subtle and brief, his power to mimic anything refers to the authority of Reason, while his black holes are created by the Star of Eden.
• Older Than They Look: Looks like a middle aged man in his forties when he is actually in his eighties as of the events of Honkai: Star Rail.
• Pre Ass Kicking One Liner:
  (Ultimate activation) "You know nothing of the weight behind this power."
  (Normal speed) " Witness the stars shatter before you... Survive or be destroyed, there is no other choice."
  (×2 speed) "Survive or be destroyed, there is no other choice."
• Promoted to Playable: Welt was a significant figure in the world of Honkai Impact 3rd, but always as an NPC. In Star Rail, he becomes a playable character.
• Random Number God: In addition to directly damaging the target, Edge of the Void can hit two random enemies, in addition to a chance to reduce their Speed for two turns.^note Depending on Trace levels, its damage is equivalent to 36–90% of Welt's Attack stat, while it has a 65–80% chance to reduce enemy Speed by 10% His sixth Eidolon Resonance, Prospect of Glory, adds a third random hit.
• Regenerating Mana:
  • Synthetic Black Hole automatically generates 5 Energy, which can be augmented by his fourth-ascension Bonus Ability, Judgment, to 15.
  • His second Eidolon Resonance, Conflux of Stars, restores 3 Energy whenever he triggers Time Distortion.
• Situational Damage Attack: His first Eidolon Resonance, Legacy of Honor, augments an additional hit to his first two uses of either Gravity Suppression or Edge of the Void after triggering Synthetic Black Hole.^note The additional damage is equal to, respectively, 50% and 80% of either attack's base damage multiplier
• Situational Sword: Time Distortion allows Welt to deal additional damage against Slowed enemies.^note Depending on Trace levels, damage is equal to 30–75% of his Attack stat
• Status Effects: Both Edge of the Void, Synthetic Black Hole, and Gravitational Imprisonment have a chance to inflict a 10% Speed penalty (for two turns for the former, guaranteed one for the latter two, in addition to the Imprison effect [see "You Will Not Evade Me" below]).^note Depending on Trace levels, the former has a 65–80% base success rate Welt's fourth Eidolon Resonance, Appellation of Justice, boosts the success rate for the former by 35%.
• Story-Breaker Power: If Honkai Impact 3rd and the "Alien Space" epilogue are any indication, Welt is the most powerful member of the Astral Express crew (at least until Dan Heng's true past is revealed). He states that the Aeons of this universe are considerably more powerful than the Honkai, but this merely places him somewhere below them in potential strength. His Herrscher core protects him from the vacuum of space, and his mimicry powers have no limit beyond his own intellect and imagination. However, Welt is more than content to act as support to the younger members and his Character Story explicitly states that he "rarely" fights and relies on his Gravity manipulation when he does. It goes further, teasing the question of how powerful Welt is now, in comparison to his heyday during the Second Eruption.
• Team Dad: He acts as de facto second-in-command for the Astral Express crew, and isn't afraid to provide helpful advice to them in times of need. He even brings up that he knows what it's like being a parent in Yukong's side quest.
• Unrealistic Black Hole: His Ultimate ability, Artificial Black Hole, has him swallow his foes in a black hole that he then cuts in half, damaging them and inflicting the Imprisonment debuff to delay the targets' actions and slow them down.
• Upgrade Artifact: A variant—his third Eidolon Resonance, Prayer of Peace, adds two levels to Edge of the Void and one to Gravity Suppression, while his fifth, Power of Kindness, adds two each to Synthetic Black Hole and Time Distortion.
• Weapon Specialization: A variant—Welt's associated Light Cone is "In the Name of the World" (5★), whose "Inheritor" passive increases its wearer's damage against debuffed enemies by 24–40%, as well as boosts their Skill's Effect Hit Rate by 18–30% and Attack stat by 24–40%. This setup means he is all but guaranteed to inflict Slow with Edge of the Void, thus increasing his damage potency against afflicted foes.
• Willfully Weak: His character story notes that Welt rarely takes to the front lines these days, and relies solely on using the Star of Eden in battle. As such, he's refrained from using his Authority of Reason in combat, and instead uses it merely to show off his animated works to people. The question of his true strength is similarly raised in the same entry, leaving it ambiguous just how strong Welt truly is in this new universe.
• You Will Not Evade Me: Both Synthetic Black Hole and Gravitational Imprisonment inflict Imprison on enemies for one turn, which delay their turn and inflict a 10% Speed penalty.^note The former can delay turns by 32–44%, as well as deal damage equal to 90–180% of Welt's Attack stat, depending on Trace levels, while the latter has a fixed 20% penalty

Pom-Pom

• Ambiguous Gender: The HoyoLab blog post "Goopa Goopa! Here Comes the Intel on Pom-Pom!" lists Pom-Pom's gender as "Pom-Pom is Pom-Pom". In addition, their appearance and voice are fairly gender-neutral.
• Been There, Shaped History: Though not directly shown, an exploration the Trailblazer conducts of Jarilo-VI with Belabog's armillary sphere reveals a landmass in the northern reaches shaped like Pom-Pom. One can only wonder how that happened.
• Cartoon Creature: Pom-Pom most closely resembles a rabbit in appearance, what with their long ears and stubby tail, though their official bio on the blog post "Goopa Goopa! Here Comes the Intel on Pom-Pom!" lists their race as "I just told you! Pom-Pom is Pom-Pom".
• Half-Dressed Cartoon Animal: Their conductor uniform noticeably lacks pants and footwear.
• Mascot: Pom-Pom serves as another mascot of the game, constantly appearing in various sections such as the loading screens, and in the cutscene that plays whenever you pull from the Warp gacha.
• Neat Freak: Pom-Pom is a stickler for keeping the Astral Express in tip-top shape, and they will swiftly reprimand the crew for putting their feet up on the seats, touching the decorative plants, and tracking dirt in from the outside. They'll even get riled by as little as a scratch on the floor and mop it to a mirror shine in response.
• Psychic Radar: As the conductor, Pom-Pom is capable of sensing any and all irregularities that have to do with the Astral Express, whether that's the spatial integrity of the Star Rails further ahead of the train, or the presences of individuals inside the cars. This sense can even trump forms of concealment, as Pom-Pom detects the presence of the Messenger aboard the Express on some instinctual level.
• Really 700 Years Old: While it remains uncertain just what they are and how they're truly linked to the Astral Express, a depiction of Pom-Pom can be found on Jarilo-VI, hinting that they're old enough to have been around for Akivilli's initial Trailblaze across the stars, well over a millennia before the modern day. The Japanese dub partly hints at this by having them speak in old fashion way associated with elderly people.
• Ridiculously Cute Critter: Pom-Pom is an utterly adorable and fluffy bunny-thing, as March 7th can attest to.
• They're A Man In Japan: Pom-Pom is female in the Russian translation, apparently to avoid Pronoun Trouble (there's no equivalent of singular "they" in Russian language, and "It" Is Dehumanizing).
• Third-Person Person: Pom-Pom mostly refers to themself by their name, though they will sometimes use "I" when appropriate, such as when they formally introduce themself to the Trailblazer.
• Trademark Favorite Food: Their bio on the blog post "Goopa Goopa! Here Comes the Intel on Pom-Pom!" lists "donuts" among their favorite things.
• Unusual Ears: Their long ears are prehensile and they often use them as an extra pair of arms, as seen in many promotional images for the game.
• Weight Woe: Multiple events you can help them with when you come back to the Express have them concerned with gaining weight, including having you help find a button that fell off their clothes and playing fetch with them to help them work it off.
• You Wouldn't Like Me When I'm Angry!: Pom-Pom is described as nothing short of terrifying if provoked. Even Welt fears Pom-Pom's rage.

Messenger

• Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: Messenger freely admits that although she once possessed a body of flesh and blood, she has long since abandoned her physical form to become a being of pure thought.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: She has some odd ethics on memory and the manipulation thereof. She’s restricted any memories of herself from the majority of the Astral Express crew without permission, claiming that by limiting knowledge of her existence to only the Trailblazer, she's preserving the value of those memories by keeping them unique. She likewise claims that fulfilling the Trailblazer's request to restore their own lost memories would be a gross violation of law.
• Chekhov's Gunman: For the most part, Messenger is just a regular NPC you can interact with on the Astral Express, up until you take March 7th's Companion Quest and discover that Messenger^note which may or may not be the same Messenger in the Astral Express is responsible for suppressing March 7th's memories on orders from the Garden of Recollection.
• Dissonant Serenity: She sounds disconcertingly cheerful and calm when informing the Trailblazer that violating even one of the Garden of Recollection’s internal laws for the manipulation of memory will result in her immediate termination. Justified somewhat by the reality that Messenger has no physical body, and subsequently lacks biological instincts and hormones that would drive her towards survival or emotional responses.
• The Faceless: She’s is always seen in a reflective full-face mask underneath a hood, obscuring any possible features. Talking to her reveals that she does have a face, but insists on charging the Trailblazer an unnamed amount of memories to earn a look.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: Should the Trailblazer reveal her presence to the rest of the Astral Express crew, Messenger becomes annoyed with them and wipes the crew's memories of the conversation, as them knowing about her existence is against the Garden of Recollection's rules regarding distribution of memory.
• Living Memory: An unusually literal example. Messenger is a cognizant, self-perpetuating thought pattern that can only interact with the world by inserting herself into the memories of sentient beings. She exists independently of the physical world, and isn’t dependent upon any one person or place, but is in turn restricted in that she can only interact with memories, and must rely on the cognition of others to travel.
• Memory Jar: Her role as a Memokeeper is to venture out into the vast universe, collecting precious and irreplaceable memories to prevent them from fading. Her current mission is to follow the Astral Express and assess the memories that someone carrying a Stellaron will generate.
• The Needless: Lacking any kind of physical body, Messenger does not experience exhaustion, hunger, or pain. She does not need to eat, sleep, or fulfill any kind of material need, and exists in perpetuity even in circumstances that would deal fatal damage to an ordinary human, such as solar storms.
• Transferable Memory: Messenger's very existence is this trope. She's a living collection of memories capable of interfacing with and altering the memories of other sentients. She can download, delete, copy, paste, and edit memories at will akin to computer data, though she claims that the ways she can manipulate the memories of others is harshly limited by the Garden of Recollection’s own laws.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: She claims that her suppressing March 7th's memories is meant to protect her, implying that there is some Awful Truth hidden in them that will completely destroy her.