History Characters / BerserkAntagonists

* AsskickingEqualsAuthority: Mixed with LargeAndInCharge, they do appear to have some sort of system of leadership, if only a bare one, as the strongest and burliest troll in Qliphoth steps forward, to the exclusion of the others when they fail.

* ArrowCatch: While being chewed out by a Kushan general for failing to complete his mission, Silat catches an arrow in fight just inches before it hits the guy's face. He makes it even more badass by saying in DramaticDeadpan, "There are more pressing issues."

[[caption-width-right:350:Scerpio surrounded by the restless dead]]

* UncannyValley: His vacant, glassy eyes invoke his absolute lack of redeemable characteristics.

* CoolPet: Is frequently seen riding a garuda. [[spoiler:After he joins up with Rickert's group, it and a few others of its kind becomes their method of escape from Falconia.]]

* AllGaysArePedophiles: The only male character besides Gennon in the Golden Age Arc who's unambiguously homosexual, and they're both guilty of raping pre-pubescent boys.

* WeaponOfChoice: As stated above, a trident that harmonizes with his knight division's whale/shark theme. He later uses a ranseur when he dons his shark armor at Doldrey.

* EpicFlail: His WeaponOfChoice is a spiked ball on a long chain, which he spins so fast that one can barely keep track of it. Adon boasts that Samson's iron ball can crush the skull of a water buffalo in one strike, and when Guts first deflects it the ricochet crushes the head of a hapless Tudor mercenary inside his helmet.

* WeaponOfChoice: His favorite weapon is a long-hafted [[BladeOnAStick berdiche]], with which he is capable of cutting men in half.

* WeaponOfChoice: He has a lot of exotic and weird - [[ImpossiblyCoolWeapon but nonetheless cool]] - weapons that deem him a circus freak. Warriors from the Kushan empire and the Bakiraka especially are notorious for using these types of weapons.

* WeaponOfChoice: The maduvu or maru, a real-life Southern Indian weapon made of two metal-tipped horns facing in opposite directions connected by two hand grips and sometimes fitted with a shield. This appropriately complements their own horns and emphasizes their beastly nature.

* AnAxeToGrind: Favors a heavy battleax, befitting his brutish and intimidating nature.

* DarkSkinnedBlond: Depicted in the 1997-98 anime with a bronzed complexion that contrasts with his blond hair.

* PosthumousCharacter: By the time the series began, Abecassis has been dead.

* BerserkButton: Betrayal tends to set him off quickly.

* KarmaHoudini: Despite it being him that created the Man-Made-Behelit, which was used to corrupt the fetuses of raped women to mass-produce demon soldiers, as well as controlling the Pishacha that have butchered countless, these crimes are all pinned on Ganishka and he never actually faces much punishment, [[RetiredMonster being able to escape judgement as a simple farmer]].

* KarmaHoudini: Despite it being him that created the Man-Made-Behelit, which was used to corrupt the fetuses of raped women to mass-produce demon soldiers, as well as controlling the Pishacha that have butchered countless, he never actually faces much punishment, and [[RetiredMonster is able to escape judgement as a simple farmer]].

* NiceHat: A big, tricornered one.

* MakingASplash: UpToEleven. They are described as high-level water elementals, able to devastate armies and large structures with ease.

* CombatTentacles: Its main form of attack. [[UpToEleven The combat tentacles of its combat tentacles have combat tentacles.]]

* SeaMonster: Taken UpToEleven. It's a sea monster that can easily eat ''other'' sea monsters, and is practically made up ''of'' sea monsters.

* StrongAndSkilled: They're strong enough that their punches and kicks can literally crush their enemies, even if they're wearing metal armor, and fight with Karate-like punches and kicks.

* DarkChick: The female doesn't fight physically like her teammates, rather relying on her inflammable powder (see below).

He has the appearance of a dark-skinned {{Biseinen}} with long hair and is always accompanied by his grotesquely muscled bodyguards, the Tapasa.

* {{Biseinen}}: Silat is a lean-muscled, long-haired, and androgynous man who fights in an elegant manner.

* FreudianExcuse: [[spoiler: As a child, his own mother tried to murder him in favor of his brother, leading him to kill them both in paranoid, heartbroken rage. This paranoia continued well into adulthood, as he had to face several nobles plotting against him, and later killed his father and began a campaign of conquest because he was that terrified of betrayal and death. Soon his own son tried to assassinate him, and in despair, he summoned the Godhand, sacrificed his son, and became a demon king figuratively and literally.]] He's still a vile individual, but knowing this it's no ''wonder'' he grew up to be this way.

!The New Band of the Hawk
[[folder:The New Band of the Hawk]]
See [[Characters/BerserkBandOfTheHawk the Band of the Hawk's entry]].
[[/folder]]

* EvenEvilHasLovedOnes: Implied when he watches Guts kill Samson. He looks [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone shocked and horrified]] as his brother falls dead from a crushing blow to the head, implying that he genuinely cared for Samson... [[DirtyCoward of course, not enough to actively do anything about it. Rather he just sends more men after Guts instead of going up to face Guts himself]]. Some brother...though he at least got on the mercenaries who shrugged off Samson's death as [[AMillionIsAStatistic just another casualty.]]

* FleshEatingZombie: Even after possessing a human, they are commonly shown to prey on other humans, cannibalizing on those that were not yet possessed

* DisappearsIntoLight: [[spoiler:Upon being given the CoupDeGrace by Femto, he dissolves into a dazzling breach into the fabric of reality.]]

* SlaveMooks: The War Slaves are captured enemies of the empire forced to fight in the front line, lest they be killed by the troops behind them for trying to desert. They will either kill or be killed by their own countrymen, which the Kushan use to break the enemy's will to fight.

* LargeHam: For a serious guy he is surprisingly fond of grandstanding during battles, to the point that Guts calls him a "circus performer".

* MeaningfulName: In real life, UsefulNotes/{{Silat}} is a type of martial art indigenous to Indonesia and Malaysia. The usage of the term is similar to Kung-fu in China, where it's actually a catch-all term that encompasses a large variety of styles. It's a fitting name for a person who fights with such exotic weapons and unorthodox styles.

* SuperNotDrowningSkills: The short mercenary dives underwater and through narrow passages like a freaking fish, and he is not shown out of the water for a good few minutes.

* AdiposeRex: A fat monarch of the FatBastard variety.

* AlmightyIdiot: [[spoiler:In his final form he has almost godly levels of power and is capable of truly horrifying amounts of destruction, but his ego has completely collapsed. He can't even remember who or what he is. ]]

%%* AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence: After the Millennium Falcon Arc, it seems that [[spoiler:Ganishka's body has now been transformed into the proverbial Tree of Life whose branches spread all over the world]].%%Examples aren't ambiguous, and examples aren't recent. Is he an example or isn't he?

* DespairEventHorizon: He reached his when [[spoiler:his own son, whom he secretly feared, orchestrated a coup d'état and attempted to have him assassinated during a banquet held in his honor. Dying, with his drink having been poisoned and repeatedly impaled with spears, his bleeding wounds combined with his despair activated his beherit, resulting in him sacrificing his son in exchange for being reborn as an apostle.]]

* EnemyMine: He offers this to Guts after realizing the Black Swordsman is as much Griffith's enemy as he is. Guts, while glad that the apostles aren't above infighting, declines.

* EvilerThanThou: His goals are just as grisly as those of the Godhand, but he still believes his are better than theirs.

* FreudianExcuse: [[spoiler: As a child, his mother tried to murder him in favor of his brother, leading him to kill them both in paranoid, heartbroken rage. This paranoia continued well into adulthood, as he had to face several nobles plotting against him and when he killed his father and began a campaign of conquest because he was that terrified of betrayal and death. Soon his own son tried to assassinate him, and in despair, he summoned the Godhand, sacrificed his son, and became a demon king figuratively and literally.]] He's still a vile individual, but knowing this it's no ''wonder'' he grew up to be this way.

* NonStandardCharacterDesign: Ganishka is the only Apostle yet whose monster form appears as a completely separated spirit rather than a physical change of his own body.

* SmarterThanYouLook: He's vile, cruel, looks like a buffoon, and is generally one of the most unpleasant people in the entire manga, but one would be gravely mistaken to ever call him stupid.

* VillainousUnderdog: Strangely, this is his relationship to Griffith, although, to characters within the story, it seems like it's the opposite. On paper, Ganishka has thousands of demonically-enhanced monsters, hundreds of thousands of troops, and the resources of the world's largest nation, while also being one of the most powerful Apostles on the planet, while Griffith starts off with no evident abilities beyond his great charisma and only a few thousand soldiers at most. But Griffith has the flow of causality on his side, and therefore every time he and Ganishka come to blows, circumstances always turn out as good as possible for Griffith and as bad as possible for Ganishka--and while Ganishka is an Apostle, Griffith is an incarnation of the God Hand and miles above him on every level. He is doomed by fate itself to only ever be an impressive foe for Griffith to vanquish, and the one time they properly face-off, Ganishka quickly realizes he is ''utterly'' outclassed.

* HandSeals: He controls his magic by using hand gestures or ''mudra''.

* SeaMonster: Daiba described them as superweapons capable of slaying ten ships by themselves.

* FightingAShadow: [[spoiler:The real Kundalini is a small lean snake-creature that controls the far larger water form. Killing it causes the form to collapse.]]
* MakingASplash: UpToEleven, they are described as high-level water elementals, able to devastate armies and large structures with ease.

** His rebellion against the Godhand is driven by his innate nature as an Apostle to follow them. He rejects the hiearchy he is a part of, and this drives his RageAgainstTheHeavens. However, despite fighting to the bitter end, he is consumed with an immense fear of Griffith, as he slowly realizes his place in the totem pole of evil. Ehen Griffith directly approaches him, Ganishka is forced on his knees in front of his entire army. It's like being forced to submit to a god after denying its existence for so long. This causes him to undergo a second DespairEventHorizon.