Soft & Wet

"Soft & Wet... When my soap bubble touches something and breaks, I take something from there."

- Josuke Higashikata

Soft & Wet (ソフト＆ウェット) is the Stand of Josuke Higashikata, originally belonging to Josefumi Kujo, featured in the 8th part of the JoJo's Bizarre Adventure series, JoJolion. It is a humanoid Stand with a mechanical and sailing theme to its appearance. It can create bubbles that will steal properties and objects.

Appearance
Soft & Wet is a humanoid Stand of a streamlined, robotic form, light in color, and similar in height to Josuke.

On the top of its head is a five-pointed star bound with a circle. Horns roughly two-thirds the width of its head grow from the region of the ears, shaped as tapering pentagrammic prisms. It has round eyes, shaped as slotted screw heads; vertically dividing very small, slight, round pupils. Its face has a thick gap running from the top of the forehead past the bottom of the chin.

The front of two broad plates covering its torso is cut like its face in the shape of a large anchor; as well as in a line beneath both arms and between the base of its back and shoulders.

Its feet and hands are covered with plating, as are the sides of its hips and shoulders, both of which are shaped like sharp hearts and bear a five-pointed star. It has fine arms and legs, with dark, exposed ball-and-socket joints supported by short exterior cables. Its pelvis is bare and mechanical. The gaps in its plating reveal a deeper surface, covered in a fine pattern of horizontal ridges. An internal structure is visible at its profile, showing blocks approximating human centers of mass.

The design was created to match up with Josuke's outfit, rather than its ability. Araki imagined a sailor's uniform combined with the flotation devices in a life vest. In later chapters, its torso takes on a more 'heart-like' shape. It also gains a circular jewel under its neck, and its shoulder pads become triangular, jutting out of its shoulders perpendicularly. Its ears have also grown a bit longer since it first appeared.

Soft & Wet is white and purple in the colored manga, but, is yellow and green in the video games adaptation of the series featuring it.

Josefumi's bubbles were initially featureless. After his fusion with Kira, Josuke's bubbles now bear a five-pointed star, similar to Kira's bubbles, and appear to be a sort of fusion between two bubbles of different sizes.

Personality
Soft & Wet's Stand cry is "ORA ORA ORA ORA" similar to other members of the Joestar family, however every so often an "ORA" is switched to an "ARA". This could be the consequences of the fusion of Kira and Josefumi, being corrupted and altered.

Abilities
Soft & Wet is a humanoid close-range Stand. It possesses enhanced strength, demonstrated first when it breaks a large portion of an apartment wall with a single back kick, and is also capable of extremely rapid hand-to-hand combat. The extent of the damage it can inflict is limited, however, as it is unable to break rocks.

Its strength in melee exchanges compared to other Stands has been further demonstrated in the brief encounter with Yotsuyu Yagiyama's Stand, I Am a Rock. Despite its volley of fast-paced strikes, Soft & Wet easily avoided and overcame it with a single 'Ora'-articulated strike.

When its user transforms into a different person as a result of undergoing equivalent exchange, Soft & Wet is granted additional abilities as a result.

Post-Equivalent Exchange
In addition to its aforementioned abilities, Soft & Wet's gains properties after its original user undergoes equivalent exchange with the late Yoshikage Kira. Josuke's Soft & Wet is able to create bubbles which are a hybrid of its own and Killer Queen's, which are divided down the center with a visible seam connecting both halves. This lead to a change in Soft & Wet's ability, adopting properties of Kira's ability.

Soft & Wet: Go Beyond
"There are "things you can't see", Josuke... they're different from the visible soap bubbles at your fingertips. They're something that does not "exist" in this world, but the fact that they don't "exist" means that they can go beyond reason!"

- Rai Mamezuku

In reality, Soft & Wet's soap bubbles are thin lines that spin rapidly. Rai Mamezuku describes this as part of the Spin. Upon learning of the actual mechanic behind his Stand's ability, Josuke gains a new power, which he dubs Soft & Wet: Go Beyond. The rapidly spinning bubbles created using this technique extend from Josuke's birthmark, and are described as being uncontrollable and impossible to aim without assistance.

As summarized by Mamezuku, The fusion of Soft & Wet's soap bubbles with the explosive bubbles of Killer Queen has given Josuke the ability to generate invisible bubbles which utilize an "Explosive Spin" (爆発的な回転) to move at extremely high speeds. This speed combined with the near-infinite thinness of Soft & Wet's lines (which Mamezuku describes as being "infinitely close to zero") gives Go Beyond properties that transcend the limits of ordinary physics. According to Mamezuku, these bubbles "don't exist in this world."

Go Beyond's bubbles can phase into and cross through any barrier. This is first noted by Mamezuku when an invisible bubble manages to clip into a wall without damaging it. It is later shown to greater effect when a bubble created using Go Beyond bridges the distance between T.G. University Hospital and the Higashikata Estate by entering Paisley Park's domain, albeit with the help of Yasuho Hirose. Upon hitting Tooru, one of Go Beyond's bubbles even appears to phase through his skin, similar to an application of Killer Queen's ability which had been a core element of Kira's fighting style.

In addition to this, Go Beyond is not subject to Wonder of U's flow of calamity. These bubbles are theoretically non-existent, so directing them toward Wonder of U or its user is not seen as an act of pursuit and doesn't trigger Wonder of U's ability.

At one point, Mamezuku also states that these bubbles can overcome the Higashikata family curse and Holy Joestar-Kira's curse, though the exact mechanics behind this have yet to be seen.

Due to the extreme speed at which Go Beyond's bubbles can spin, they can be used as projectiles to devastating effect. Upon making contact with a target, Go Beyond can instantly erode whatever part of their body it touches. In addition to this, Go Beyond's bubbles can burst with an extreme amount of force; a direct hit on Tooru was able to launch him multiple feet into the air.

Go Beyond was originally used subconsciously by Josuke. He managed to unknowingly produce an invisible bubble from his birthmark while charging up a high-velocity soap bubble to launch at Wonder of U. Upon learning of the invisible bubble's presence, Josuke demonstrated the ability to create one at will. However, he is incapable of controlling or aiming them after they are created. Thus far, the only workaround to this limit has come in the form of a combined attack with Yasuho Hirose, where she aims Go Beyond by using Paisley Park to guide the invisible bubble through the cellphone that Josuke is holding and out of one in her hand, which she points at the attack's target.

Gallery
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Trivia



 * Prior to its full reveal in JJL Chapter 4, a scrapped early design appeared in promotional artwork drawn by Araki. This version had smaller "ears" with narrow slits on them, holes on its face, and in one instance even a visible nose.
 * Originally, Soft & Wet was planned to have the ability to attach screws to things, but the ability was ultimately given to Nut King Call instead.
 * Its Stand Cry is originally "ORA ORA ARA ORA" when it first does a punch rush against Ojiro Sasame. However, it becomes a regular "ORA ORA ORA" in every fight afterwards.
 * Hirohiko Araki believes that there are infinite possibilities that can come of a spherical shape like a bubble, considering it to be a very important aspect of JoJo and a contrast to an "unbeatable weapon" common in other shonen. He equipped Caesar Zeppeli with bubbles as they are weapons with faults, and it was fun to write them having to cover for them through strategy, dealing with the different merits and demerits that each of them have. Gyro Zeppeli and Josuke inherit these spheres, and his stance on that hasn't changed from when he originally drew Caesar.
 * The fifth volume of JoJolion mentions that Araki loves drawing Soft & Wet's ears.