Steel Ball
Steel Balls (鉄球, Tekkyū) are versatile weapons designed to facilitate Spin featured in Part VII: Steel Ball Run. In two types, they belong mainly to Gyro Zeppeli and Wekapipo.
Steel Ball
- Known users: Gyro Zeppeli, Gregorio Zeppeli
The Zeppeli Family's Steel Balls are polished, highly spherical balls of steel, about the size of a baseball or boule. They are grooved on opposite faces by two large hexagons, almost joined by lines crossing the balls between their corners.
These Steel Balls are designed to facilitate a powerful and versatile form of Spin focused on the manipulation of human or animal anatomy. They may be thrown far and with force, and maintain a lengthy, regular Spin, able even to boomerang after impact to the catch of their user.
They are used originally by the executioners serving the royal family of Naples, handed down through the generations of the Zeppeli Family. The techniques of the Steel Ball were developed with the aim of finding an honorable method of execution.[citation needed]
Wrecking Ball
- Known user: Wekapipo
Wrecking Balls facilitate a form of Spin designed to induce temporary hemispatial neglect (左半身失調, Hidarihanmi Shitchō, lit. left-half ataxia); effectively killing all sensation in the left side of a target, explained as the cause of the ball's impact travelling through the body to cause a stroke or hemorrhage in the motor cortex.
The Wrecking Ball is primarily used by the imperial guard serving the royal family of Naples.
Trivia
- The Zeppeli clan's Steel Balls may be modeled after the heavy, often metallic balls utilized in the Boules family of sports, with further inspiration for their application drawn perhaps from the Italian variant of Bocce Volo.
- In Battle Tendency, Joseph Joestar makes use of a pair of large, metallic clackers, which he charges with Ripple after coating them in a special conducting oil. These clackers would spin and rebound in much in the same way as Steel Balls.
References