Quercus Alba

Quercus Alba was the Ambassador of Allebahst in the United States and a witness in a double murder in the embassies of Allebahst and Babahl. For more than ten years, he served the country of Cohdopia and then Allebahst as their foreign ambassador to the United States. However, this was all a front to his true identity: the leader of an international criminal organization that specializes in counterfeiting and smuggling contraband.

A fallen general
Quercus Alba was originally a general who led Cohdopia through many successful wars. He was touted as a war hero and positioned as the Cohdopian ambassador to the United States. However, his power eventually corrupted him and he became the leader of an international smuggling ring. He used his position and his influence over the Cohdopian court system to become legally virtually impregnable, and he took on the look of a feeble old man who blamed himself for everything that went wrong in his embassy. Thus, no one ever suspected him of any real wrongdoing. Alba also acquired the assistance of the Amano Group, which used its vast international connections to accelerate the ring's infectious activities.

The first rebellion

 * Main article: KG-8 Incident

In 2008 or 2009, Cece Yew, an employee at the Amano Group, went to the police with incriminating evidence against the embassy, so Alba ordered Manny Coachen to kill her. Coachen did so but was captured by the police soon afterward. Coachen was spared a conviction thanks to the efforts of Ernest Amano, who had one of his men steal the security footage at Cece's apartment that would have incriminated Coachen (as well as Alba, as it would turn out ten years later). In the wake of the trial, Alba sent in one of his agents to pose as Cece's mourning sister "Calisto" and keep an eye on the related parties.

Byrne Faraday and Tyrell Badd, the prosecutor and lead detective in the trial, were determined to take down the smuggling organization and expose its leader. "Calisto" was able to position herself within the group, and the three became the Great Thief Yatagarasu. Alba allowed the Yatagarasu to expose his allied companies, all the while trusting "Calisto" to keep them from reaching their ultimate goal.

The second rebellion

 * Main article: Turnabout Reminiscence

However, three years later, Faraday overstepped by breaking into the Cohdopian Embassy and stealing what would later be known as the Yatagarasu's Key, and in retaliation Alba ordered "Calisto" to take him out. Meanwhile, another witness threatened to expose Alba's criminal dealings, a Cohdopian embassy employee named Deid Mann. "Calisto" devised and executed a plan to kill both individuals and retrieve the key, which effectively nullified all remaining threats to Alba at the time. Thus, for the next seven years, Alba continued his malicious activities unopposed. During that time, Cohdopia succumbed to civil war and was split into two countries, Allebahst and Babahl. The Cohdopian Embassy subsequently divided itself symmetrically with each country controlling one half of the property, and Manny Coachen became the assistant to Babahlese ambassador Colias Palaeno.

The final rebellion

 * Main article: Turnabout Ablaze

In 2019, Manny Coachen organized a goodwill event between Allebahst and Babahl. As a part of this event, two identical-looking statues, one from each country, would be tested to see which country owned the real Primidux Statue. This would determine which country would have more sway over matters related to a possible reunification. Coachen already knew that Allebahst's statue was the real one, so he hired a thief, Ka-Shi Nou, to switch the two statues so that Palaeno would become the ambassador of a reunited Cohdopia, effectively overthrowing Alba as the leader of the smuggling ring.

Alba, however, figured out that Coachen was about to betray him. Near the end of a special Steel Samurai show in the Theatrum Neutralis, Alba confronted Coachen in the dressing room of the stage and attacked him with an ornamental knife from his office. Coachen managed to stab Alba with the Yatagarasu's Key before Alba delivered a fatal blow to the neck. A cart containing boxes of Samurai Dogs was in the room; Alba removed some of the boxes and stowed the body inside.

Quercus Alba and Miles Edgeworth first crossed paths when Alba interrupted an argument between Edgeworth and Interpol agent Shi-Long Lang about access to investigate the Allebahstian side of the embassy. At first, Alba refused to allow Edgeworth permission, but he changed his mind when asked by Colias Palaeno, the Babahlese ambassador.

It was some time before Edgeworth saw the Allebahstian ambassador again. Just as Edgeworth and Lang felt they were getting close to the truth, Alba appeared to tell them to hold off the investigation. Desperately, Lang accused Franziska von Karma, forcing Alba to let the group investigate his office for evidence. Edgeworth realized that the sticks used to support the passionflowers growing on his windowsill were actually the crossbow bolts used to switch the two Primidux Statues. Using his logic, Edgworth came to the realization that Quercus Alba was the smuggling ring's leader and the murderer of Manny Coachen and Ka-Shi Nou.

Alba played innocent and demanded proof. Edgeworth obliged, presenting the smuggling ring trump card and the video tape of the KG-8 Incident. The prosecutor showed Alba the contents of the video, which clearly showed Manny Coachen entering Cece Yew's apartment with the ring's card in his hand. Also, a Cohdopian governmental car could be seen outside the apartment with a shadowy figure inside. Edgeworth stated that by checking the Cohdopian records, he could determine the person sitting in the car.

At this, Alba laughed and dropped his frail old man façade, straightening up to his full height. He smugly pointed out that any such records were destroyed long ago during the civil war, and so there was no way Edgeworth could possibly prove the identity of the figure in the car. However, Edgeworth spotted that the figure in the car was wearing the same medal as the one on Alba's chest. Despite proving that Alba had been in the car, he couldn't be arrested because of his right as an ambassador to be tried in his own country. As a show of his legal power over Edgeworth, Alba admitted that he had murdered Ka-Shi Nou out of self-defense, showing Edgeworth the wound that he had received while killing Coachen, which he claimed had been inflicted when DeMasque attacked him with bonsai trimming shears. Since this crime had occurred on Allebahstian soil, Alba had the right to be tried in his own country for the crime.

Alba left to fetch eviction papers for the entire investigation team. This was largely a feint to get them to leave, however, because the Theatrum Neutralis was considered American soil and so Alba had no power to kick them out.

After Alba left, a pictur of a photo op that included Ambassador Palaeno, the Steel Samarai, and Ambassador Alba in his facade. Edgeworth found out that one of the flowers in Alba's bunch was really the Allebahstian knife disguised as a flower. Edgeworth also examined the security footage he got from Frankziska von Karma. Edgeworth thought it was strange when the Steel Samarai was pushing the pushcart because there is a huge lump in the pushcart. Manny Coachen wasn't seen in the footage so Edgeworth proved the crime scene of the death of Manny Coachen was the Theatrum Neutralis.

Personality
On the surface, Ambassador Alba appears to be a hunched, frail old man who is mostly agreeable but often blames himself when things go wrong. This is a façade, however, as he is perfectly capable of standing up straight, and in actuality he is a cold, ruthless, arrogant man who sees human lives as mere pawns for him to use in his "game". His cold and calculating personality is akin to that of Manfred von Karma or Kristoph Gavin, while his arrogance and confidence in his immunity from the law is comparable to that of Redd White or Damon Gant.

Name

 * His English name is the species name for the White Oak. This may be a reference to his appearance, as he looks very much like an old tree; his beard bears a resemblance to the leaves of the White Oak, his long nose resembles a tree branch, and his wrinkled skin bears some resemblance to tree bark. The name may also be a reference to his age (as oak trees can live for hundreds of years) or simply following the floral theme of Allebahst.


 * His Japanese name, "Carnage Onred", may be a reference to "red carnation".