Lust

Lust (ラスト, Rasuto) was a Homunculus and one of the first antagonists in the Fullmetal Alchemist series. Lust is the first Homunculus to appear in the series and plays a significant part in the plots of both the manga and 2003 anime series, usually partnered with Gluttony to whom she appears to have a particular, almost motherly closeness. Her Ouroboros mark is located on her sternum, just above her breasts.

Powers and Abilities
Though named for the vice of lust, Lust does not appear to be lascivious herself, but rather an object of lust for others. Due to her enticing looks and high intelligence, Lust easily and effectively plays the role of manipulator within the Homunculus ranks, moving covertly around the country to lure weak-minded people (usually alchemists) into the clutches of Father to be used and disposed of when no longer needed.

Aside from her skills as an infiltrator and puppet-master, Lust has the usual Homunculus abilities of incredible longevity, astonishing regenerative capabilities, and a great resistance to death that borders on immortality. Her own unique ability is to extend her fingertips into long, flexible, thin blades sharp enough to cut through just about anything with ease. The length to which her fingers are able to stretch has not been shown to have any particular limit as well, earning her the nickname "Ultimate Spear" among her Homunculus peers.

In the manga and 2009 anime
Lust first appears in Chapter 2 of the manga, revealing herself to have been behind Father Cornello's attempted uprising in Reole, having given him an incomplete Philosopher's Stone and false promise. In the manga, Lust is the only female Homunculus and the second to be created by Father, apparently made from his lustful emotions and souls from the dead nation of Xerxes. Due to her high intelligence and devotion to Father's plan, Lust appears to have a great deal of free reign and authority within the organization, seeming to have a position second only to Pride and on par with Wrath. Lust also has a great disdain for humans, thinking them frail, predictable and generally stupid. Moreover, she appears to take pleasure in using and throwing them away. Lust is the first to introduce the idea of Homunculi as superhuman, the next wave of evolution of humanity, and takes pride in her nature.

Aware that Colonel Roy Mustang is getting closer to the truth of the Homunculi's actions through his subordinates, Lust uses her contacts in the military to have the Flame Alchemist transferred to Central City and attempts to keep tabs on him by posing as a human and dating 2nd Lt. Jean Havoc (under the alias "Solaris") in order to glean information regarding the Colonel's activities. Of course, despite Lust's best efforts, Jean avoids telling her anything vital or confidential about his work.



When Envy reports to Lust that Mustang has begun personally investigating the murder of Maes Hughes and the mystery of Laboratory 5 in secret, the two Homunculi collaborate on a plan to keep the Flame Alchemist out of trouble. They leak falsified information to the military implicating 2nd Lt. Maria Ross as Hughes' killer. However, Roy catches wind of this information and counters with his own plan, orchestrating Ross's escape from prison and simulated death with the help of Number 66 - the other of Laboratory 5's former guards who, unknown to the Homunculi, had been discovered by and agreed to cooperate with Mustang's group. After Envy recognizes 66 from the penitentiary attack, Lust sends the former guard's reanimated body out to track down its soul and orders Envy and Gluttony to take care of the traitor when found, inadvertently falling right into the second part of Colonel Mustang's plot. Mustang's unit manages to draw both Gluttony and Envy out of hiding and tail 66's fleeing body back to its home base - the lower levels of Central Alchemical Laboratory #3 and the entrance to the Homunculi's underground lair. Noticing the intruders, Lust goes after the first group of Mustang and Havoc, who have penetrated into the basement level human experimentation chambers of Lab 3. When Roy notices Lust's Ouroboros and asks if she was involved with Hughes' death, Lust responds that she was involved and wishes she could have finished off Hughes herself, prompting Roy to shoot her in the leg and command that she kneel. Lust heals the wound effortlessly and responds that such a meager attack could never bring her to her knees and when several more shots to the head, chest and abdomen also fail to subdue her, Jean and Roy realize the truth - that the woman before them is an actual Homunculus. Lust commends the officers for their cognizance and peels back the wound in her chest to reveal her Philosopher's Stone heart, stating that it is the secret behind her apparent immortality.

Before Roy and Havoc can act, Lust goes on the offensive, rupturing a large water pipe in the ceiling and dousing them - rendering Roy's ignition gloves incapable of drawing a spark and thus removing his Flame Alchemy from the fray. Jean and Roy flee the room, desperately dodging the Ultimate Spear's dangerous fingernails as they escape, and Roy uses the transmutation circle on his gloves to transmute the water in the room into combustible hydrogen and flammable oxygen, which build up quickly in the underground chamber. With the addition of Havoc's cigarette lighter, Roy creates an explosion that incinerates Lust's body. But when Mustang and Havoc enter the destroyed room to investigate, Lust quickly regenerates, impaling Jean through the abdomen with her fingernails and severing his spine. As Jean collapses to the floor, paralyzed, Roy rips the Philosopher's Stone from Lust's body in the hopes of using it to heal his friend's wounds. Without the stone, Lust's body disintegrates, but reforms around its supernatural core as the Flame Alchemist raises it over his head. Lust stabs Roy through the abdomen and shreds his glove, lamenting that such a perfect Human Sacrifice had to go to waste, but stating that once he had stuck his neck in this far, he could not be allowed to live. Lust leaves Roy and Havoc to bleed to death on the floor and heads off to intercept the other group, consisting of Alphonse Elric, Riza Hawkeye and Number 66.

Lust angrily encounters them on the threshold of Father's lair and realizes that 66 was used as bait to draw the Homunculi out of hiding, additionally lamenting that Alphonse - yet another Human Sacrifice - had to involve himself in this. Lust effortlessly cuts Number 66's armor body to pieces and then turns her malice on Al and Hawkeye, who realize that Lust has already encountered Mustang. Anguished at the thought of Roy's death, Hawkeye unloads all of her firearms into Lust's body, but to no avail. Lust observes Riza's breakdown with a sort of pity and comments on how sad and pathetic humans are before moving in for the kill. As Alphonse defends the Lieutenant, allowing parts of his armor body to be damaged, Lust does not realize that Mustang has re-emerged behind her. Having cut a transmutation circle into the back of his right hand and seared his abdominal wounds shut with fire, Roy begins his attack anew, using Havoc's lighter to create the sparks. Lust attempts to retaliate, but is held at bay by a rapid succession of huge explosions as the Flame Alchemist asserts that he will continue killing her until she stays dead. Lust's Philosopher's Stone runs out of energy and her powers cease. As her body begins to disintegrate, Lust smiles at Roy's face, saying that there are worse ways to die than at the hands of a man like him. Lust also says that she loves how cold and focused Mustang's eyes are, but adding that the day will soon come when those same eyes become clouded by suffering. Her body and Philosopher's Stone are reduced to dust. Lust is the first Homunculus to permanently die (Greed, though melted down before Lust's death, was merely reabsorbed into Father's soul and returns later on in a new body).

2003 anime
In the anime, Lust is the first Homunculus formally introduced in the series (although technically not the first witnessed by the Elrics, chronologically). She is largely the same as her manga counterpart, however, she begins to crave becoming a human as the series progresses. Her main purpose amongst the Homunculi is gathering information and traveling abroad, manipulating alchemists into creating Philosopher's Stones (her work can be seen for what it truly is in her dealings with Cornello, Mugear, Lujon, and others). Gaining true humanity is the focal point of her ambition, arguably much more so than the rest of the Homunculi.

Lust claims to have first observed the Elrics while she was evaluating the potential of the alchemist Majhal to create a Philosopher's Stone. While she was always in the background, using those like Cornello or Mugear, Lust only revealed herself to the Elrics years later during the events of the 5th Laboratory, where she attempted to convince Ed into creating a true Philosopher's Stone. Lust doesn't introduce herself or Gluttony by name to Edward until they met face to face again in Lior. Even then, she only introduces herself intending to kill Edward immediately after.

She is often directly involved in encouraging humans to seek out the Philosopher's Stone, using their desire for the stone to her advantage. Once baited, the alchemists are molded into following whatever path that best suits Lust and the other Homunculi's designs. She also tends to be more involved with the intrigue side of various conspiracies. Lust was created by Scar's brother, when he attempted to use alchemy to bring his lover back from the dead. After he was cast out from Ishvalan society as a heretic, Envy visited the wretched creature and fed it red stones, giving her human shape, and her new name. She was not the first Homunculus to bear the name of Lust, and is the third youngest Homunculus, with only Wrath and Sloth being younger.

While ruthless throughout most of the series, she changes near the end during the Lior incident as she begins to recover some memories of her life as a human, and she softens particularly towards Scar and the Elrics. But her involvement was reckless, and allowing the Elrics' escape–a locket containing strands of hair from the woman she "was" prevented her from action–raised doubts about her loyalty. Lust was taken to Dante, who gave her a chance to redeem herself by helping Wrath take out Edward while Sloth abducted Al. Finally realizing Dante's true intentions were never to make the Homunculi human, Lust defected from the Homunculi. After at first trying to kill Ed, Lust betrays Wrath and forms an alliance with Ed under the condition that he help make her human. In return, she would reveal to the Elrics the identity of her master. However, to save Sloth from the ambush Edward and Lust set up for her, Wrath uses the locket and the transmutation circle that Lust made for Edward to use on Sloth, immobilizes and kills her by transmuting his arm temporarily into a blade. Before her death, Lust wonders where she will go when she dies. As if the whole reason she wanted to become human so badly was so she could die and, ironically, her question is answered. She is the second Homunculus to die in the anime.

Trivia

 * Lust's death at the hands of Mustang could be a direct reference to Dante Alighieri's epic poem "The Divine Comedy" wherein the lustful are tossed about by fiery winds while in Hell and purified by passing through walls of intense flame while on the seventh terrace of Purgatory.


 * Lust greatly resembles "Miss Nynetales", a main character from Arakawa Hiromu's discontinued early manga series Shanghai Youma Kikai. Additionally Havoc also resembles "Jack" from said series who was working under "Miss Nynetales". Lust and Havoc's relationship in the FMA manga was most likely a reference to that project.
 * Ironically, Laura Bailey, the voice actress for Lust, is the wife of Travis Willingham, the voice actor for Roy Mustang. And it is Mustang who kills Lust in the 2009 anime.


 * In a four-panel omake chapter in the manga, Lust is shown to have a talent for crushing walnuts with her cleavage.
 * Outside of the 2003 anime series, Lust is the only female antagonist in the Fullmetal Alchemist story.
 * Near the end of Conqueror of Shamballa, Lust makes a brief cameo alongside Scar as one of the gypsies that meet up with the Elrics in Germany.
 * As Lust died, she seems to have accurately predicted Mustang's fate of becoming blind after seeing the Gate of Truth near the end of the series, saying that, "I look forward to the day when those eyes will be wide with agony."
 * In a shot of Volume 22, Arakawa states, while holding an FMA volume with no visible number, that she didn't get to draw Lust (or Hughes) on the back spine of that printed volume, meaning Arakawa was planning to have her somewhere on one of the back spine volumes along with the other main characters but apparently didn't have the chance or the time to do so. This makes Lust and the original Greed the only Homunculi who are not in a back spine volume shot.
 * Lust was ranked 23rd most popular character in a recent fan poll, a spot she shares with Black Hayate. This makes her the fourth most popular Homunculus.
 * The 2003 anime mentioned that she was the "new" Lust, making it currently unknown as to who the first one was, nor was the latter given a backstory as to explain their origin.
 * In one of the omakes mocking Pride devouring Gluttony, Lust is merged with Gluttony instead, making her obese and giving her Gluttony's face.
 * Bryan Konietzko (Avatar: Legend of Korra's director) stated he was fine with saying that Asami Sato's design (character from Avatar: Legend of Korra) was influenced by Lust and is flattered by the fact that people would think so, as "Lust is such a killer design". He did, however, say that he used Lust's lipstick color for Asami.