Characters / Ni no Kuni: Antagonists

A list of the antagonists of Ni no Kuni. Click here to return to the main character page.

White Witch/Cassiopeia (女王 The Queen/レイナス Reinas)

Voiced by: Jennifer Bryden

The titular villain who harbors great hatred towards Oliver due to him being the world's "Savior", and will do everything in her power to kill him.

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• The Archmage: If you thought Shadar was a good wizard you haven't seen anything yet. She makes him look like start of the game Oliver. Not only can she cast spells far beyond anything in Oliver's spellbook, she can cast those spells infinitely, apparently never running out of magic power. This all makes sense when you learn she's the Wizard King's daughter, and he was basically a Physical God.
• The Atoner: At the end of the game, she is horrified by all the evil acts she's done to the other world, and promises to make amends to everyone.
• Big Bad: Gives orders to Shadar, and is responsible for the plot being set in motion to begin with via the death of Allie.
• Casting a Shadow: Her Falling Star spell, as well as Nightshade.
• Celestial Body: Underneath of her cloak is a night sky.
• Cloudcuckoolander: A very dark, unfunny variant. She spends most of the game talking to what turn out to figments of her imagination made real by her magic. Turns out to be a subversion, she's actually aware the things she's talking, outside of Shadar, aren't real, but spending hundreds of years alone took such a toll on her that she'll settle for having nearly anybody around as long she isn't alone.
• Dark Is Evil: A lot of her abilities seem to be dark-based, in a bit of contrast.
• Dark Is Not Evil: She uses those same dark-based attacks to help you fight the final boss.
• Dub Name Change: She's Reinas in the Japanese version.
• Go Mad from the Isolation: She was the only survivor of the kingdom of Nazcaa, and created her companions using magic.
• Guest-Star Party Member: She will join you for the final boss battle.
• Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: Cassiopeia slowly went insane from loneliness and grief after accidentally killing her entire kingdom. The precise moment she snapped was when Pea, a manifestation of her childlike innocence appeared, in answer to her desire for companionship. In her brooding, half-crazed state, Cassiopeia lashed out and banished Pea, and with her the last vestiges of her humanity: in this moment, the White Witch was born.
• Light Is Good: Her true form as Cassiopeia.
• Light Is Not Good: Especially not after it goes mad from despair.
• Heel–Face Turn: After Pea joins back with her she realize the error of her ways.
• Older Than They Look: When she reverts back to her true self, she's still as young as she was ten thousand years ago.
• One-Winged Angel: During the final battle, she turns into a leopard-type creature.
• Orcus on His Throne: Never moves from her throne until she's confronted by Oliver at the end of the game.
• Physical God: She's easily the strongest person in the setting. Considering she's immortal, can snap her fingers and affect things from across dimensions, cause worldwide zombie apocalypses singlehandedly in mere seconds and give figments of her imagination life and godlike power of their own without even intending it, it may not be too much of a stretch to call her this. Justified in that she's the Wizard King's daughter.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: Her clothes change color depending on her emotion: Red for anger and Blue for calmness.
• Reality Warper: Apus, the Zodiarch council, even Pea, are all figments of her imagination made real.
• Really 700 Years Old: A given considering she and her council refer to themselves are arbiters of the world's fate. In truth, she's actually Cassiopeia, who is indeed over ten thousand years old.
• Royals Who Actually Do Something: With terrible results on her part.
• Sequential Boss: Technically, two forms out of three are her.
• Sympathy for the Devil: All of the misery in the game can be traced back to her, and she was personally responsible for the death of Allie. But after the Manna catastrophe that she personally unleashed left her all alone, it's hard not to feel bad for her. It gets even harder when she breaks down crying after her One-Winged Angel form is defeated, and the face under her mask wears a broken, utterly helpless expression. It's easily one of the most pathetic, heartwrenching sights in the game, considering what she was like during 90 percent of the story.
• The Man Behind the Man: Everyone doesn't realize she exists until about 90% a way through the main plot, as she sends Shadar to do all of her dirty work, and he never mentions her.
• Time Abyss: She's roughly ten-thousand years old by the time the story takes place, yet she doesn't look or sound any different than when she first became the White Witch.
• Unmoving Plaid: Her cloak has the entire galaxy!
• Utopia Justifies the Means: Believes that the world should be destroyed because its flawed.
  • Also a deconstruction: remaking the world "perfectly" was just Cassiopeia's defense mechanism for having accidentally caused the apocalypse in the first place. Only the loneliest, most desperate person alive would seriously consider such a thing, and only when the alternative was wallowing in guilt forever.
• Villainous Breakdown: When the party reveals that she can't just remake the world just because she doesn't like it, she goes berserk. After she is defeated in her One-Winged Angel form, she loses all composure and collapses into a sobbing wreck.
• Voice of the Legion: It honestly makes her fairly creepy.
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: Was in fact daughter of the Wizard King, and after his death became the queen of Nazcaa at a very young age and spent most of it sheltered while the corrupt Zodiarch council run the kingdom. When she got older and saw the state of her kingdom, she created the spell of manna to try and save Nazcaa, but it ended up turning everyone but her into monsters that murdered each other, destroying Nazcaa and leaving her all alone. She now seeks to destroy the world and make it anew. All the many, many tragedies in her life have driven her into believing that the world isn't fixable and should be remade into something that wouldn't have the cataclysm of Nazcaa happen again.
• Yin-Yang Bomb: Wields both dark and light magic.

Shadar/ Lucien (ジャボー Jabō / Natius)

Voiced by: Brian Protheroe and Oliver Mason (as Lucien)

The Dark Djinn, who was dubbed "Executor", and charged with bringing destruction towards the other world by the White Witch.

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• Anti-Villain: In his final moments, its revealed that Shadar wanted to bring peace to the world, knows that many of his actions are wrong but feels he must do commit, and it's possible that he was only doing it because he had become the Dark Djinn. Alicia says that the other world was a much better place while Shadar was in power than how it was when she was a child.
• Climax Boss: In Wrath of the White Witch, thanks to the eponymous Witch being the real final boss.
• Cynicism Catalyst: One you get to see in flashback after his defeat. Put simply, he used to be a Wide-Eyed Idealist, until he was forced to take part in a horrifying war. He refused to kill innocent civilians and helped a young girl (who turned out to be Alicia) escape, and his superiors had his entire hometown burned as punishment. Needless to say he crossed the Despair Event Horizon after that.
• Despair Gambit: The reason Shadar apparently makes so many glaring mistakes, like not enlisting the help of the Zodiarchs, or showing up to taunt Oliver before leaving, rather than killing him on the spot. Because Oliver will simply be reincarnated if killed, to be truly defeated, his spirit must be broken: Shadar strings Oliver along, tempting him with the Soulsnare, have him jump through hoops and brave countless dangers...before revealing that it was All for Nothing. It very nearly works: Ollie ends up in a Heroic BSoD and loses all will to continue his quest, but luckily Pea shows up to snap him out of it.
• Disc-One Final Boss: In the DS version, he was the actual final boss. However, the game continues in the PS3 version to reveal himself as The Dragon towards the White Witch.
• The Dragon: Of the White Witch.
• The Dreaded: By everyone in the other world.
• Despair Event Horizon: By refusing to fight in a ruthless conflict, and for letting the daughter of a great sage escape, his hometown is razed by his superiors.
• Doomed Hometown: Unlike examples of this trope, his own superiors did this to him as a punishment! All for letting an innocent child live.
• Dying as Yourself: Peacefully moves on to the afterlife with Alicia as Lucien.
• Elemental Powers: Uses all the elements Oliver can, sans light. Just about all of them are dark influenced though. Interestingly, his fire spell looks somewhat similar to Oliver's Burning Heart, only blue.
• Evil Counterpart: To Oliver. Literally. His Evenstar spell to Oliver's Mornstar. Which Oliver himself can use after defeating him.
• Evil Cripple: Downplayed: he leans very heavily on a cane, his posture is stooped, and he gives off an air of being physically decrepit.
• Evil Makes You Ugly: He looked like a normal teenager in the past, but when you finally see him unhooded in the present his face is aged and withered, with ogre-like tusks jutting from his mouth. Once he reunites with Alicia's spirit, who convinces him there's still some good in him, he returns to his younger look.
• Evil Redhead: Though he wasn't always evil...
• Evil Sorcerer: Powerful enough to break hearts, allowing his reign to continue with almost no resistance.
• Evil Sounds Deep: Though we never hear how he sounds after he reunites with Alicia, he sounded like a teenage young man in his flashback.
• The Faceless: His face is completely blacked out and cannot be seen. At least until his last moments.
• Fallen Hero: Wanted to be one of the greatest wizards in the world. Fell into despair after his idealist nature was crushed under the cruel heel of reality.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: No one had even heard about Shadar until he started ruining peoples' lives with his magic.
• The Heavy: While the White Witch and the Zodiarchs remain in the shadows, Shadar is the one carrying out their will and subjugating the world through fear and tyranny. Oliver's party spend the majority of the game training and searching for the means to defeat Shadar, while the latter directly opposes them and tries to destroy Oliver, setting up the Internal Reveal that Shadar was serving a higher power.
• Immortality: On the plus side, this means his Soul Mate in the Otherworld is constantly reincarnated, which Alicia uses as the basis of her plan. Not that the ravages of time do him any favors.
• Intergenerational Friendship: A very, VERY weird case with Alicia. When they first met she was a child, but as an adult she ends up traveling forward in time and becoming the mother of his Alternate Self. She reunites with him in child form after his defeat.
• Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: He was a Wide-Eyed Idealist that took part in a heinous war and because he refused to fight, lost everything dear to him. Is it any wonder he became the Dark Djinn?
• Luke, I Am Your Father: He says this when he reveals to Oliver that they're soulmates, but it's not meant literally. It refers to the fact that thanks to Shadar causing his soulmate to be constantly reborn by shattering their connection to each other, Alicia happened to use his soulmate's lost soul to give birth to Oliver, indirectly making Shadar his father.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: The Executor/The Dark Djinn.
• One-Winged Angel: His final phase has him turn into a Dark Djinn.
• Sequential Boss: In a game with relatively few of them. He has three phases!
• Start of Darkness: After his defeat, we're given his backstory. It... isn't pretty.
• Teleport Spam: He has a habit of teleporting out of the way whenever you get close to him when you fight him, much like the Nightmares before him.
• Trap Master: His "Circles of Hell" attack works like this. Unfortunately, your allies have an annoying habit of stepping on them.
• Together in Death: Platonic example, with Alicia.
• Utopia Justifies the Means: Wanted to rid the world of war. Ironically through becoming The Dreaded, he pretty much succeeded. An interesting case of a villain invoking this trope without really meaning to.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: In the original DS version, as he says he did what he did to protect the world and its people. In the console version, he doesn’t think he is this because he is acting under the White Witch’s orders, but Alicia suggests that he still desired to shape a better world deep down.
• Vile Villain, Saccharine Show: VERY much so. The guy is a faceless Evil Sorceror with unimaginable power, with Mind Rape as his go-to weapon of choice.
• Villain's Dying Grace: When Oliver defeats him, he decides to sever the connection that exists between the two of them so Oliver will not die with him.
• What the Hell Is That Accent?: A kinda sorta drudic-ish one.

The Zodiarchs

A council of twelve who serve the White Witch.

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• Eastern Zodiac: Each wears a mask of one of the 12 animals.
• Enemy Without: After Cassiopeia's evil intentions disappeared, they were formed from the remnants of it. She is the Wizard King's daughter and a powerful sorceress capable of forming the Zodiarch council through ''sheer imagination''. On a deeper level (explained late in the post-game), they're essentially the Council of Twelve from Cassiopeia's past, the ones who drove the kingdom into ruin by taking advantage of the girl after her father's death (which they secretly caused). Their evil was apparently so pronounced, that they ended up leaving a mark on Cassiopeia's psyche, and they were able to be "reborn" as the Witch's Zodiarchs.
• Eldritch Abomination: As the final boss, they're something different from all the monsters you've fought so far. Something alien.
• Final Boss: The real evil behind it all.
• Giant Space Flea from Nowhere: They appear flat out of nowhere for the final battle.
• Grew Beyond Their Programming: Cassiopeia made them as glorified Yes-Men to comfort her in her loneliness. By the time of the story, they evolved beyond that into vessels for the evil of the White Witch.
• The Faceless: They all look the same, and if that wasn't enough, they all wear masks. They can be told apart on some level, as the masks are of different animals from the Eastern zodiac.
• Light Is Not Good: Nope. They may be godlike beings who live in an shining castle in the sky, but they're quite, quite evil and cruel. After separating from Cassiopeia, they also add Dark Is Evil to their aesthetic.
• Small Role, Big Impact: The original Zodiarchy, the Nazcaän Council of Twelve, were merely a group of scheming mages, with no grand plans beyond 'Rule Nazcaä as despots'. They've been dead for millennia before the game even begins. Nevertheless, their petty, power-hungry actions end of causing mind-blowing levels of suffering for the whole of the Other World for thousands of years hence. It's not an exaggeration to say that if it weren't for them, 90 percent of the awful things the Other World goes through would never have happened.
• Staff of Authority: They all have one, each themed after their Zodiac animal.
• The Starscream: Just as the original Council of Twelve had no loyalty to Cassiopeia, the phantoms the White Witch created turn on her at the end, when she lets go of her resentment and hatred.
• Voice of the Legion: Only when they speak in unison and as the final boss, otherwise it's just their voices echoing through their masks.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: They intended to rule Nazcaä as decadent aristocrats, but their actions caused The White Witch to try out a twisted spell that destroyed the world. Bonus points for them teaching her that up is down and poison is healing. Oops.
• Walking Spoiler: Their true nature and role in the game's backstory reveals a lot about the conflict.
• White and Gold are Divine: Their outfits and staves are predominantly white with gold trimming, and they act as arbiters of the world. That said, they are quite evil.

Gallus (Shazar)

Voiced by: Christopher Godwin

Tenth member of the Council of Twelve, he faithfully serves the White Which... or does he? In the DS version he was just an Optional Boss, but the PS3 version expanded his role considerably...

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• Affectionate Nickname: Pea calls him "Doodle-Doo", thanks to his Zodiac animal being the Rooster. Becomes hilarious when you find you he's her father.
• Animal Motifs: He's the Rooster of the Chinese Zodiac.
• Barrier Change Boss: He used different attacks depending on what barrier he has up.
• Meaningful Name: Gallus means rooster in Latin.
• The Chessmaster: Heroic version. Shadar destroyed Mornstar in the present, but Gallus was able to send the heroes back in time to retrieve it in the past. Then he turns out to be both the spirit of Cassiopeia's father, and hence the Wizard King himself, as well as the spirit of the Infinity Plus One Wand Astra. He's also the reason Oliver met Pea, making him the catalyst of most events in the game.
• Dragon with an Agenda: To the White Witch. His agenda being to save her.
• Enigmatic Minion: No one knows what the heck he's doing, not Oliver and company, not Shadar, not even the White Witch and her council.
• Foreshadowing: His magic wand looks like a larger, more grand version of Mornstar, which is noteworthy based on how each of the Zodiarchs' respective wands are shaped like their respective animal. Naturally, this is no coincidence. They're twin wands, and he created both, given that he's the ghost of the Wizard King.
• Good All Along: To be expected considering he's the spirit of Cassiopeia's father.
• Light Is Good: Unlike the crazed Cassiopeia and the Zodiarchs, Gallus is 100% on the side of the angels.
• Living Weapon: Of the Infinity Plus One Wand, Astra.
• Only the Worthy May Pass: The reason he fights Oliver. Which means his Barrier Change is actually him Invoking Final-Exam Boss.
• Optional Boss: In the DS version, he's optional. The PS3 version gave him a more prominent role in the main story... and the fight with him is mandatory this time. But don't worry, he's been heavily Nerfed.
• The Mole: Is the one that aides Oliver the most. Without his help, Oliver wouldn't have been able to ever best Shadar, let alone the White Witch.
• Royals Who Actually Do Something: Yes, even though he's dead!
• Save the Villain: Justified. She's his daughter.
• Spirit Advisor: Of the Stealth Mentor variety.
• The Starscream: Set up as one.
• Token Good Teammate: He's pretty much the only member of the Zodiarchs who's a genuinely upstanding guy. Makes sense, since he's the ghost of the Wizard King, aka Cassiopeia's father.
• Walking Spoiler: His real identity and motives for his actions throughout the game reveal much about the story.
• The Worf Effect: When you fight him he's quite literally a ghost of his former self, the Wizard King.

Rift Monsters

14 monsters based off of the bosses faced in the main story, and are faced as a part of bounties investigating bizarre rifts that appears all over the world. They are Fury of the Forest, Dickory Dock, Badiatur, Smashura, Vulcaan, Imperial Jelly, Porco Rosso, Candelabracadaver, Golden Dragon, Mehen, Commodore Crossbones, Cerborealis, Bileheart, and Zodiarchangel.