Zuwen’s henchwomen are three villainnesses that
appear in the 2011 French comic book Un Parfum d’Éternité from the Moréa series by Arleston-Latil, Labrosse and Goussale.
The three Asian women first appear as the two heroes, Moréa and Terkio, meet the sinister merchant Mong Zuwen in his opulent, Far East-style mansion located beneath his large warehouse for Asian importation goods in Havana, Cuba. Moréa and Terkio hope to retrieve information on a mysterious substance named Tharotex, a powerful explosive that was used in a bomb attack in an earlier scene. Zuwen concedes that he is familiar with the product, but claims that he is not selling any. After the brief conversation, the heroes are escorted back through the warehouse by a different girl, dressed in white. The girl discreetly offers the information they seek in exchange for a large sum of money. Suddenly, a throwing star hits her in the thorax and kills her instantly. Zuwen’s three other henchwomen appear brandishing their ninja weapons, and encircle the heroes. Moréa and Terkio quickly realise that not only are they outnumbered, but the henchwomen’s fighting skills are superior to theirs. They therefore decide to take down their adversaries one by one. The first attacker, armed with a sword and calling out that “this white bitch shall die” is punched by the heroine through a shattered refrigerator door. The one armed with a spear then attempts to stab Moréa to death but fails, and the heroine responds by violently slamming the glass door against her opponent. As the knocked out henchgirl’s slackened body hangs through the frame, Moréa closes the door and thereby shoves her into the refrigerator, mockingly adding “au frais!”, which means that the evildoer is now stored in a cool place. However, the heroine has little time to savour her victory because she is immediately attacked by the recovered first assailant. The henchwoman wraps her muscular legs against Moréa’s neck in attempt to break it. Seeing no other option, Moréa heftily bites into the girl’s thigh, breaking her femoral artery. The ninja fighter cries out in pain and remains lying on the floor, now incapacitated to fight. A small puddle of blood appears underneath her body. Instead of killing her defenceless opponent, Moréa advises her to keep the pressure on the wound to avoid fatal amounts of blood loss. Far from showing gratitude for this act of mercy, the defeated henchwoman responds by swearing revenge and insults Moréa ("pale bitch") once again. Moréa then joins Terkio who is being strangled to death by the third villainess. The heroine saves her partner by grabbing a golf club which she uses to knock out the villainess by a single, hefty blow. At the end of the day, Moréa has defeated the three henchwomen single-handedly. As Terkio is trying to recover from the strangulation, Moréa begins tying the villainess’ hands behind her back before restraining her feet with the same piece of rope. Bound and out cold, that girl won’t be going anywhere; the one in the refrigerator seems still unconscious, and the other one is seriously injured and losing a lot of blood. Moréa and Terkio nonetheless make their way out of the warehouse as quickly as possible, as other attackers will surely set upon them.
Unfortunately, after this spectacular fight and their painful defeat and humiliation, the girls do not play an important part in the rest of the episode. Two of them do appear on other occasions, though we may assume that the one that was bitten is undergoing medical treatment, or has died from her injuries. We see them again as they have captured one of Moréa’s friends and fastened her to a chair. They threaten her with vicious methods of torture in order to get information, and apparently take great pleasure in that. During a later scene, the girl manages to escape. In a rather disappointing finish, the henchwomen are eventually attacked by a band of monkeys and are forced to flee.
