Hardy

Hardy (ハーディ Hādi) is the goddess of the underworld and ruler of hell. Her apostle is Giselle and her shrine is Bellnahgo Shrine.

Plot[]

Hardy is first brought up when Rory shows fear of riding the Tokyo subway during her first visit to Earth, when she reveals that Hardy has asked for her hand in marriage. Hardy is the one who opened the gate in Japan. Her primary reason for opening the Gate can be summed up as "Because she wants something new in her world that will likely get her interest piqued". Another reason is to destroy the ''old system'' of the Empire and teach them a lesson about humility by having them facing an enemy far more powerful than them indicating that she is aware of the tremendous military power of the JSDF over the Empire. She also doubts that Giselle can beat the JSDF showing that she takes the military power of the JSDF seriously unlike Zorzal and his pro-war supporters.

Despite being worshiped by most mortals in the Special Region, she is shown to be neglectful and indifferent with their devotion and suffering since she cares mostly for her own interests. Furthermore, she also believes strongly in the philosophy in natural selection in which she decided to look the other way when the Flame Dragon massacred hundreds of people because she viewed it as just a powerful tool for her to destroy the Gate to prevent more calamity of the space-time continuum as well as destroying the JSDF to maintain the balance of the underworld since the Flame Dragon is the only powerful thing in the Special Region that can give serious trouble to the JSDF. To her, human suffering and activities are just mere entertainment. As the result of her heartless and selfish approach to her subjects, Yao and the rest of the Dark Elves, formerly ardent worshippers, have since disowned her.

She was surprised, amazed and also shocked to see that a human like Itami could defeat the Flame Dragon. This causes her to realize that the JSDF is far more powerful than she initially thought. Furthermore, she also gains an interest in the world beyond the gate, when she discovers that Earth has multiple gods for different fields like Music, Wisdom or War, of which she finds quite amusing. However, much to her dismay, she realizes that none of the underworld gods from beyond the gate are a match for her taste since most of them are male (Yama, Hades, Anubis) and she even calls one of them ugly, especially Anubis due to his dog-like appearance. However, she eventually falls in love with Aphrodite, the Greek God of Love and Beauty, to the point that she makes Itami to promise her a trip to the world beyond the Gate; much to Itami's dismay since he's not even sure these deities really exist or not and the knowledge of them only came from the book of Earth Mythology owned by Lelei.

Trivia[]

Despite acknowledging the JSDF's immensely superior power over the Empire, she knows nothing about the JSDF's full power and the devastatingly advanced technology beyond the Gate as she was confident that the Flame Dragon would drive the JSDF out, only to find, much to her great surprise that it was killed by Itami's C-4. This shows that the Gods in the Special Region have little to no knowledge about Earth.
Rory Mercury chastises Hardy's recklessness in opening the gate to Japan and expresses fear of having to deal with their modern army as she feels that they are far stronger than any pesky races she's dealt with in the past (Rory is shown to be shaking in fear).

Rory Mercury stated that Hardy was reckless and stupid for opening the Gate to Japan, as her action has great potential in causing imbalance to the Special Region due to the JSDF's advanced technology in disrupting the will of the Gods in stagnating the level of technology in their world. Another reason is that she is afraid that she cannot stop the JSDF if they get serious on Apostles like her and wreak havoc in Special Region.
The JSDF is basically doing her dirty work in teaching the Empire a lesson about humility.
She is the only homosexual character in the series.

Gallery[]

Several full Manga pages are here, click on an image to enlarge them