Lord Nightmare

Lord Nightmare (eNeMeE in the English dub of the anime) is a wicked final boss character and major character in the Kirby series, despite only making three major appearances in the games. His goal is to spread dark nightmares and influences throughout the galaxy, and uses his cunning wit to accomplish the feat.

In his debut, Nightmare is responsible for corrupting the Fountain of Dreams and attempting to spread his nightmares all across Dream Land. King Dedede tries to stop Nightmare from succeeding by breaking the Star Rod, but Kirby unwittingly summons Nightmare when he returns the Rod to the tainted Fountain, and thus has to defeat Nightmare before his evil plans become reality.

Nightmare first rose to prominence in Kirby: Right Back at Ya!, securing the role of the show's main antagonist. He acts clandestinely behind the scenes through his company, Nightmare Enterprises, to attempt to take over Pop Star and conquer the known universe.

Nightmare has had notable appearances in Kirby's Adventure, its remake, and Kirby Mass Attack, and has been featured in a number of cameos in other games.

History
Nightmare (eNeMeE in the English dub of the anime) is a wicked final boss character and major character in the Kirby series, despite only making three major appearances in the games. His goal is to spread dark nightmares and influences throughout the galaxy, and uses his cunning wit to accomplish the feat.

In his debut, Nightmare is responsible for corrupting the Fountain of Dreams and attempting to spread his nightmares all across Dream Land. King Dedede tries to stop Nightmare from succeeding by breaking the Star Rod, but Kirby unwittingly summons Nightmare when he returns the Rod to the tainted Fountain, and thus has to defeat Nightmare before his evil plans become reality.

Nightmare first rose to prominence in Kirby: Right Back at Ya!, securing the role of the show's main antagonist. He acts clandestinely behind the scenes through his company, Nightmare Enterprises, to attempt to take over Pop Star and conquer the known universe.

Nightmare has had notable appearances in Kirby's Adventure, its remake, and Kirby Mass Attack, and has been featured in a number of cameos in other games.

Physical Appearance
Nightmare initially manifests as the Power Orb. In this form, Nightmare is a dark sphere covered in silver, glowing stars. A gradient runs across the sphere: the top of the sphere is dark blue while the bottom is dark pink. In a number of early appearances and artwork however, the sphere is simply pitch black and colorless.

His real form is a wizard (though his Kirby's Adventure sprite slightly resembles Count Dracula) donned in a spinning, tornado-like robe. In the official art for Kirby's Adventure and the anime his robe is covered in stars just like in his first form. But in the actual games, Nightmare's cloak is simply a dark purple robe. On his face, he wears a pair of shades with a single black-chromed lens that flashes. Underneath his cloak lies his weak spot, a wildly-twisting accumulation of darkness. Above his robe, Nightmare wears silver pauldrons and a small red medallion around his neck (sometimes obscured by his chin in-game). In the games Nightmare has human-like teeth, while in the anime his teeth are sharp and jagged. According to official artwork from Kirby's Adventure, Nightmare has thin bony arms, though this characteristic was not included in later installments of the series except for the anime.

In Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land, Nightmare's second form is slightly changed. He now has a total of four shoulder pads instead of just two, and much longer horns on his helmet. His chain and medallion are also now consistently visible during the fight. There are also two more jewels on his headpiece. This game's design also reflects a notable decision made to his size in Kirby: Right Back at Ya!, in which he dwarfs even the Halberd. In accordance to the show, he is also almost as tall as the screen now.

His design in Kirby Mass Attack takes a number of visual cues from his design in Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land, though his shadowy cloak no longer conforms to the shape of his tornado-like core and instead bears more resemblance to the original shape of the cloak as seen in the Kirby's Adventure artwork.

The game
In Nightmare in Dreamland, Nightmare was torturing the residents of Dream Land by giving them nightmares. King Dedede was well aware of this and went to the Fountain of Dreams where Nightmare was, stole the Star Rod thus sealing Nightmare inside it until Kirby placed the Star Rod back to its rightful place, and then broke the Star Rod into to fragments to give to his friends to guard. Kirby was not aware of what lurked inside the rod until he put in back into place. Once Nightmare was free, King Dedede then swallowed Kirby and the Star Rod and spat them both out in Nightmare's direction. Nightmare had not been at full capacity when Kirby first fought him. In fact when the first Kirby/Nightmare battle commenced, Nightmare was only a ball of dark energy. When Nightmare was defeated the first time, he became his real form and fought Kirby on another planet that resembled the moon. Kirby was following this new form of Nightmare on Warpstar when Nightmare tried to take him down. One of Nightmare's star shaped shots finally connected and Kirby flew off of Warpstar and onto the battleground of which would be Kirby and Nightmare's final battle. Kirby's only weapon against Nightmare was the Star Rod itself. Once defeated, Nightmare was vaporized.

Kirby's Adventure and Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land
Nightmare is a powerful entity that serves at the final boss in both Kirby's Adventure and its remake. In both games, he can only be defeated by the powerful Star Rod that Kirby collects in both games.

In these games, Nightmare takes control of the Fountain of Dreams in an attempt to extend his control over Dream Land. Trying to prevent this, Dedede breaks the Star Rod and scatters it around Dream Land, temporarily leaving Nightmare unable to take control and seems to trap him inside the Fountain of Dreams. Kirby, unaware of Dedede's intentions, restores the Star Rod and places it back in the fountain. With the Star Rod back in place, Nightmare reveals himself. Nightmare and Kirby then fly into space (Kirby did this with the help of Dedede).

In his initial orb form, Nightmare, for the most part, stays on the right side of the screen, shooting empty blue stars at Kirby. The fight is similar to the fight with Kabula in Kirby's Dream Land, but with a time limit, for the entire battle takes place in the planet's atmosphere as the two are falling to Pop Star's surface. As such, if Kirby doesn't deplete Nightmare's health bar in time, Nightmare will flee and Kirby will crash into the ground and lose a life. After the final blow is struck, Nightmare retreats and flies to Pop Star's moon. Kirby follows close behind on a Warp Star.

As Kirby pursues him, the Power Orb suddenly metamorphoses into his true form. After knocking Kirby from his Warp Star and onto the surface of the moon, Nightmare teleports in close to finish him off, effectively beginning the second phase of the battle. In his second form, Nightmare attacks Kirby by shooting stars at him, ramming into him, and using his tornado-like core to drill into him. He takes fewer hits to defeat than in his first form, but can only damaged by hitting his weak spot, the accumulation of darkness at his core, which is usually protected by his impenetrable cloak. He briefly reveals his weak spot during each of his attacks. After Kirby lands the finishing blow, Nightmare's body explodes, destroying a huge portion of the moon as a result. After this, Kirby returns to the Fountain of Dreams, places the Star Rod back in there, and everything returns back to normal.