Daphne

Daphne (ダフネ Dafune) is an anime only character, and the main antagonist of the Daphne arc. She is first seen as a saleswoman, but she is later revealed to be trying to capture Natsu.

Personality
Daphne is very quirky and energetic. She goes to extreme lengths to get her products sold. Daphne often jumps around the room and comes across as highly enthusiastic. When Gray shows up, she speaks to him as if she is his master, and she drops the energetic facade. She has no qualms or morals. She will do anything to complete her research, toying with lives if necessary, seeing how her own town used Hidden to hide from her only for her to punish her town by making the citizens unable to dispel the spell in response. She goes to such extents to make her own Lizardmen destroy each other as punishment for not being able to find the townspeople. Her sadistic nature is best seen when she claimed that she could not possibly imagine the fun she would have in destroying Magnolia. She is also a true narcissist, believing herself a genius and mocking her opponents at each chance possible.

History
At some point in her childhood, Daphne saw a Dragon flying through the sky. After she saw the Dragon, she attempted to tell her fellow villagers about it, but none of them believed her. After this event, she became obsessed with Dragons and started her own project of creating artificial dragons.

Daphne arc
Note: Events occurring in this arc are only in the anime and do not constitute canon material.

Natsu Dragneel and Wendy Marvell first meet her in a seemingly abandoned hotel. She, at first, presents herself as a saleswoman for some health food she created, called Metamo. She constantly asks Natsu, Wendy, Happy, and Carla to try her food, and displays how they can help people lose weight. Everyone is fascinated by the results.

After more persuasion, Natsu manages to calm Daphne down and asks her about the Dragon she claimed to have seen. Daphne reveals that it was a lie to get more customers, specifically a Dragon Slayer, much to Natsu's dismay. Gray Fullbuster then walks in and Daphne reveals she trapped everyone in a dimension where they will be unable to escape from. Gray thanks Daphne for trapping Natsu, and tells him he wants to fight him and Gray and Natsu begin their length battle. Towards the end of their fight, Gray freezes Natsu's legs and Daphne uses her Hidden Darkness Spell to trap Natsu. She reveals that she planned to use Natsu's Magic Power from the beginning to power an artificial Dragon called the Dragonoid.

On her Dragonoid, Daphne soon departs flying towards Magnolia, with Erza following her, while Elfman, Macao and Wakaba carrying Gray, try to alert the guild and the citizens, she sends her Lizardmen to deal with them. Mocking Erza and her attempts to stop her, Natsu remembers the promise he made to the citizens of the City Without Sound, and bursts in Magic, which shocks Daphne as her Dragonoid is overloading, but calmly regulates the Magical absorption rate. When Erza defeats the Lizardmen and is ready to deal with her, she coldly replies it is too late for her to do anything. Preparing to stomp on Erza, she is briefly stopped by many of the Fairy Tail Mages.

Natsu manages to contact the other Fairy Tail Mages, telling them to blow up the Dragonoid with him in it. While the plan is considered, Makarov comes up with a better one that involves the guild getting Natsu mad enough to overload the Dragonoid's system with his Dragon Slayer Magic. Daphne frantically tries to get the system back under her control, but eventually Natsu manages to bust free and quickly takes down her and the Dragonoid together.

Before she is defeated, she mentions her reasons for her actions. When she was a kid, Daphne once saw a real dragon one day while out playing. However, no one in her town would believe her when she told them about it. She waited on the same spot for years but the dragons never came back. Eventually Daphne came to the conclusion that they went extinct and vowed if she couldn't see one again, she would make one instead no matter what it took. However, just as Natsu is about to land the final blow, she sees the image of Igneel and cries at the sight of seeing another dragon again.

Tenrou Island arc
Daphne is seen in her prison cell, eating her Metamo.

Inventions

 * Dragonoid: A mechanical Dragon which bears a resemblance to the Dorma Anim. This dragon is capable at least of flying like a true one, and is expected to be capable of firing fire as well. This armor takes on a Dragon Slayer's Magic as a fuel and has a complex system that allows it to regulate the Magic flow so as to avoid an overload. It is also quite resilient as it took attacks from many Fairy Tail Mages, and even if it was enough to hinder briefly, it took no visible damage.

Magic and Abilities
Concealment Magic: A Darkness type Magic can create an illusionary place in a different dimension invisible from the outside. Somehow, Daphne is able to create a pocket dimension, trapping her captives in an illusionary inn with a barrier that can deflect attacks.


 * Hidden Darkness: As an ex-citizen of the City Without Sound she is capable of using this spell to hide herself. The nature of this Magic seems to turn the user into a shadow-like being to avoid harm. She is also capable of putting a seal on this spell, thus making anybody using it being unable to change back.

Lizardmen: She creates these creatures as her soldiers. She seemingly has a vast amount of them. They all have the ability to copy their opponents, and fight almost on equal terms with their counterparts. They have two weaknesses seen so far, they are not as experienced as the real user, so they can be easily defeated if the real user exploits their own weaknesses to their advantage. Since they imitate their opponents, if they fight somebody with little to no real battle abilities, they are likely to be just as weak and easily defeated.

Genius Intellect: She is a self-proclaimed genius and true to her claims she has been capable of creating different sort of things, ranging from her Diet-Food up to the Lizardmen and even the Dragonoid. With this genius, she was capable of completing a deep scheme. Her intelligence is such that she is always one step ahead of her foes, predicting their maneuvers and preparing effective counter-measures.

Major Battles

 * Natsu Dragneel vs. Daphne