Erma Williams

Erma Yureimoto-Williams is the main protagonist of the webcomic series Erma created by Brandon Santiago. She is a hybrid of human and yokai, being born from the union of her human father and yokai mother.

Overview[]

Erma is an 8-year old girl living in the small town of Blairwood, Illinois. She lives an easy-going life with her father Sam, a human writer who writes about his experiences with the supernatural both within and outside his home, and mother Emiko, a yokai who moved to the United States to escape from her domineering parents. Erma is the spitting image of her mother, not only resembling her in appearance but possessing the same ghostly powers as her.

Throughout the webcomic series, Erma spends her days hanging out with her friends, often getting into all sorts of supernatural hijinks. Her antics have occasionally resulted in people being scared out of their wits or in certain degrees of property damage, but such incidents never seem to have any lasting consequences. Erma isn't shy about using her powers openly, regularly using them to play pranks on her friends and to protect others from harm. The residents of Blairwood are largely accepting of her, even if they do find her to be a bit creepy.

Erma is very curious about the outside world and is always eager to explore new places and discover new things. On several occasions, she has explored the forest surrounding Blairwood where she has discovered numerous creatures. Most recently, she and her parents traveled to Japan for a Yureimoto family reunion where she was introduced to her aunts, cousins and her grandparents. This trip almost ended in disaster after a group of yokai who hated the Yureimoto family attempted to imprison Erma inside a cursed tree that contained hundreds of tormented souls. While Erma broke free of her bonds, her terror caused her to twist into a terrifying, wrathful demon that unleashed her full power upon the area around the tree, destroying surrounding buildings and plant life. When Erma's family realised what was happening, Emiko reached out to her daughter and was able to snap her out of it. While upset and traumatised by the ordeal, Erma was assured by her family that what had happened wasn't her fault. The day after that incident, Erma bid farewell to her extended family and returned home, feeling physically and emotionally drained after the week's events.

Appearance[]

Erma appears as a small humanoid girl with pale white skin, black eyes sporting pearl-white irises, and a long mane of raven-black hair. Her usual apparel consists of a long white dress and black shoes. A lot of the time, Erma tends to hide her face behind her hair, which adds to her ghostly image. At times, whether she is genuinely angry or just trying to scare someone as a joke, her face distorts and blurs while her eyes go blank or glow, making her appear especially monstrous.

Personality[]

Overall, Erma is a sweet, kind and caring girl who is both very intelligent and curious about the world around her. As a young child, she is remarkably energetic and adventurous; she enjoys playing with her friends and using her powers to play pranks on people. However, she is also very protective of the people in her life and should she or her loved ones be threatened, she will not hesitate to fly into a vengeful rage against whoever crosses her.

Although Erma isn't shy about showing off her yokai abilities, she is not without her secrets. She loves the cartoon show Warrior Unicorn Princess, but is embarrassed to let her friends know about this.

Powers and abilities[]

Flight - Erma can defy gravity at will and fly or levitate.
Wall Crawling - Being able to control her centre of gravity, Erma can crawl along walls and ceilings with ease.
Body Manipulation - Erma has shown to be capable of stretching, morphing and even detaching parts of her body at will. She most commonly does this with her hair, extending it in winding tendrils to wrap around objects.
Telekinesis - Erma possesses the power to move and manipulate objects around her without physically touching them.
Digital Teleportation - Erma can travel through television and computer screens.
Aquatic Teleportation - Erma can also travel between different bodies of water.
Invisibility - Being half-ghost, Erma can render herself invisible at will.
Intangibility - Erma is capable of passing through solid matter.
Magical Expertise - Erma reads up on many forms of arcane magic and has been known to practice various spells, usually for entertainment purposes.
Possession - Erma can take control of animals, inanimate objects and people.

Trivia[]

Both Erma and her mother are based on the ghostly character of Sadako Yamamura/Samara Morgan from The Ring.
Erma has never spoken throughout the series, though it is implied that she can. On numerous occasions, she has been shown whispering to others without an accompanying speech bubble. Other times, she has been shown about to speak, only to be comically interrupted.
Erma hates having long hair, but it always regrows instantly when she tries to cut it. Her hair can only be cut using a special pair of magical scissors that her mother uses.
Erma can be summoned by chanting her name thrice in front of a mirror. This trick is similar to the method of summoning Bloody Mary or the Candyman.
Erma fears Santa Claus and his elves, ironically seeing them as monsters. This causes her to keep a knife under her pillow in case she hears his reindeer outside.
As she is a child between a human and a yokai, Erma is known as a Hanyo (half-demon). Hanyo are the hybrid offspring between human and yokai and are the Japanese equivalent of the western Cambion.