His ally qualified, so let's see if he has a good shot at it too.
Here is my second and, at the moment, last proposal for the anime series of Shingeki no Bahamut. After recently proposing the main antagonist of the franchise Gilles de Rais, a personal favorite of mine, I think it is fair for my next candidate to be the secondary antagonist of the franchise. This one might not be as straight forward as my previous two proposals, mainly because Gilles puts the heinous standards at such a high level that the argument for Belzebuth might be a bit more complex, but overall I would say he have a shot at qualifying just like his "ally".
But before starting, as always, I would like to make a couple of notes. First of all, just like with Gilles' proposal, I will use the japanese version, and as such I will call him "Belzebuth" rather than "Beelzebub" since, according to the wiki of the franchise, that would be his more correct name in that version. It doesn't change much, but I think it's fair to say it for clarity sake, in the votes you can call him as you prefer since I personally prefer the name Beelzebub. Also, much like my previous proposal for Gilles, this will obviously contain spoilers for the series, mainly for the first season, so if you haven't watched it I personally suggest to do it. Regardless of the fact you watched it or not, I hope the proposal will be of your likings. I will try to keep it shorter than my Gilles' proposal which was, admittely, a bit too long.
So, without further waiting, let's get started!
What's the work?[]
I already explained the work in my last proposal, so might as well reuse it a bit given it was quite extensive. Shingeki no Bahamut, also known as Rage of Bahamut, is a Japanese anime series produced by MAPPA and based on the digital collectible card battle game of the same name developed by Cygames, who also helped in the production of the anime. The series is made of two seasons.
The first season, called Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis is made up of 12 episodes and was released between October 2014 and December 2014. The second season is Shingeki no Bahamut: Virgin Soul, it has 24 episodes and aired between April 2017 and September 2017. While this second season is directly connected to the first one, taking place 10 years after it, the first season works as a closed story on its own, and is the one where the candidate appears, as such I will be mainly focus on that.
Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis takes place in the fantasy world of Mistarcia, where humans, Gods and Demons all exists within the same reality. 2.000 years priors to the beginning of the series, an ancient dragon known as Bahamut attacked the world, attempting to destroy it completely and forcing the three races to collaborate. Thanks to the sacrifice of the Demon King Satan and the Ruler of Gods Odin, the creature was sealed, with the two becoming the Demon Key and the God Key respectively, two halves that, if united, would create the Trascendent Key, the only thing able to reawaken the monster. Thousands of years later, the God Key is stolen by a girl known as Amira, who stumbles upon a bounty hunter named Favaro Leone, with the latter being unwillingly forced to help the girl in escaping those that hunts her down while escorting her to meet her mother who is waiting for her. The two are also helped by the fallen knight Kaisar Lidfald and the necromancer girl Rita, and the four will discover that behind everything there is a conspiracy of a couple of individuals who seeks to reawaken the Bahamut once again, one with the intention of destroying everything and the other wanting total domination over everything.
Who is Belzebuth? What did he do?[]
Belzebuth painfully extracting Nicole's essence, the action that basically kickstarts most of the events that follows.
| “ | Azazel: What are you scheming, betraying Lord Lucifer like this!? Belzebuth: You will know soon enough, when the time comes. |
„ |
| ~ Belzebuth while attacking Azazel, revealing his destructive intentions |
Belzebuth is an extremely power-hungry demon who lives in the Demon Capital, Cocytus. His immeasurable thirst for power attracted the attention of Gilles de Rais who, using a concoction of his creation to turn into a demon and create the fake identity of Martinet, approached him with a proposal of serving him. Gilles had his own plans to free the ancient being known as Bahamut in order to make it destroy everything, and to reach this objective he needed a demon like Belzebuth. So, he tricked him into believing that, if the host of the Trascendent Key necessary to free the beast was made with his own power, than it would obey him.
Blinded by his thirst for power, Belzebuth believed him and, to create a suitable host for the Key, he kidnapped an innocent angel named Nicole, torturing her and painfully extracting her essence. The poor angel fell in a comatose state because of this, with her essence being used by Belzebuth to create a girl named Amira, a hybrid half-angel half-demon made with the essence of both the angel Nicole and the demon who kidnapped her. After this action, Belzebuth understood that he needed to stay in the shadow to avoid attracting too much unwanted attentions, especially from the Demon Lord Lucifer. As such he gave Martinet the duty to teach Amira and instruct her to steal the God Key and than go search for her mother, something she does given that the two demons gave her false memories that made her their unwilling pawn.
After this, he remains mostly in the background, letting his "servant" Martinet do most of the work for the plan. However, Azazel eventually manages to kidnap Amira and perceives Belzebuth's essence within her. Once the girl is freed and brought to Anatae, Martinet tricks Azazel to attack the city instead of reporting back to Lucifer, where he is defeated by Jeanne and forced to retreat while being chased by some angels. Belzebuth intercepts him before he can flee to Cocytus, the Demon Capital, attacking both him and the angels that are chasing him, killing all of the angels and leaving Azazel for dead. Belzebuth than goes to the Demon Lord Lucifer to tell him that Azazel failed to retrive the God Key stolen by Amira, and asks him to be given the task, with Lucifer reluctantly agreeing but noticing that the demon is planning something.
As Amira continue to get close to Helheim, the place where Gilles' manipulation is leading her, the seal around Bahamut starts to weaken and Belzebuth takes the chance to rally up his fellow Demons, telling them that it is now the time for the Demons to exterminate the Gods and rule over everything. Soon after, Amira and the others he is travelling with, Kaisar Lidfald and Favaro Leone, arrives where they believe Amira's mother should be, but they are instead welcomed by Martinet, who tells them that they are actually in Helheim, where the Demon Key is. Martinet than presents Belzebuth to everyone, explaining that he is basically the real father of Amira, with him taunting her for it. Martinet than summons Nicole, freeing her from her ice grave to let her die in front of Amira as a consequence of the torture she withstood by Belzebuth, something that breaks down Amira psychologically and force the Demon Key to fuse with her to create the Trascendent Key, all while the two demons grins sadistically.
Belzebuth about to kill the hundreds of angels that are trying to contain Bahamut. He is stopped by Azazel, but most of them dies anyway when Bahamut reawaken, so ...
After the fusion is complete, Belzebuth coldly impales with his lance what is basically his own daughter before trapping her in a sphere and starting to go towards Abos, where Bahamut is sealed, planning to sacrifice her in order to reawaken the dragon. Martinet brainwashes Favaro while Kaisar, the necromancer girl Rita, the God Bacchus and the still alive Azazel join forces to stop the march of the two. Belzebuth attempt to kill the hundreds of angels that are trying to contain Bahamut, but is stopped by Azazel who starts fighting him in an attempt to avenge himself of what he did to him prior. However, all their effort are in vain and Amira, who is now the Trascendent Key, fuses with Bahamut and breaks the seal.
With the reawakening of the beast, all the armies of both Gods and Demons arrives to Abos, wanting to stop the creature before it starts its destruction. Belzebuth catches the occasion and, believing that Bahamut will obey him, proclaims that the Gods will be exterminated and the Demons will obey to him because only he is at the top of eveything and everyone, before ordering Bahamut to blast away the armies of the Gods. Much to his surprise, however, the beast turn his head towards him and blasts him away instead, destroying his lower body and fatally wounding him as he falls down his own flying fortress. The dying Belzebuth is than seen on the ground, perplexed by the fact that Bahamut didn't obey him, with his last words being curses at Martinet before he is eventually stabbed in the mouth by Azazel, who finally take his revenge for being used as a pawn by him.
Mitigating Factors?[]
Belzebuth coldly impales Amira with his spear. Dad of the year.
| “ | Bahamut has finally reawakened! Heed my words, gods! Our long-standing war has now come to an end! You will now prostrate before us demons. Heed my words as well, all of demonkind! Etch my name into your memories! I am Belzebuth! At the top I stand, above all others! | „ |
| ~ Belzebuth proclaiming his superiority over everything and everyone. |
He really doesn't have any. While Gilles had two other identities that are than revealed to have no redeeming qualities, he is always straight forward and never hides his heinousness. He is a power-hungry demon who sees himself as superior to anyone else, proclaiming to be superior to even Demons, not caring about any of them, not even for the Demon Lord Lucifer who he wants to dethrone. He doesn't show any care for Martinet despite him being his "subordinate", his relationship with him being one of pragmatic interests to arrive at what he believes is a common goal, but at the end of the day he still sees him as inferior compated to him.
He doesn't even care about what is basically is his own daughter, Amira, coldly stabbing her in the chest and using her as a Key to reawaken Bahamut in a process that basically kills her, not showing any remorse for any of it. Demons are also shown time and time again to have a full on morality in the franchise, with one of the best examples being Azazel who goes from being a pretty ruthless villain to a genuine hero who fight for his own kind, which means that Belzebuth's actions were made by his own volition rather than being forced by his nature. And lastly, the fact that he was a victim of Gilles manipulations too is not treated with sympathy, but rather as a karmic punishment for his own evil deeds, with the work itself never shying away to make the viewer understand that Belzebuth was in for his own thirst for power, something that Gilles simply used for his own advantage.
Heinous Standards?[]
Belzebuth ordering Bahamut to annihilate all the armies of the Gods (Top 10 photos taken moments before disaster)
| “ | The girl with the key left the city! They are plotting to take the holy land for themselves and revive Bahamut! My fallen brothers of darkness! Take up your swords! Now is the time to annihilate the Gods' forces! | „ |
| ~ Belzebuth manipulating and rallying up his fellow demons while proclaiming his intentions of annihilating all of the Gods' forces |
Okay, here is where things get interesting. First of all, I want to go over the major villains that doesn't affect much about this proposal, and given I already went in depth about all of them in my last proposal of Gilles I will be quick this time: Amon, ex bounty hunter who is directly responsable for the execution of Kaisar's father and the death of Favaro's dad and his whole group; Azazel, the demon who killed Favaro's dad with his group and attacked Anatae causing a massive amount of casualties, but he later on redeems himself; Charioce XIII, the king who goes mad after Martinet drugs him and makes him paranoid, leading to him slaughtering several of Jeanne's supporters; Charioce XVII and the Onyx Task Force Captain, the new king and his right-hand man who move war against the Gods and enslaves the Demons, leading to several atrocities, but are extremists who wants to stop Bahamut and the former redeems himself later on; Alessand Visponti, a knight who kills Mugaro (a children) just to be promoted to Captain, orders his men to kill any demon they cross (including childrens), leave his men behind to save his own skin and stabs Diaz despite the fact he was willing to spare him regardless of what he did.
Belzebuth, on the other hand, is a lot bigger in scale compared to all of them. He kidnaps and tortures the angel Nicole in order to extract her essence and use it to create a vessel for the Trascendent Key, Amira, leaving Nicole in a comatose state and later on bringing her to her death because of what he did to her. He kills several angels (I think around 8 since that's the number of trails of fire I counted) that tries to stop him when he goes to intercept Azazel and gravely wounds the latter, leaving him when he thinks he is dead. He participates in psychologically breaking down Amira to force her to fuse with the Trascendent Key, stabbing her on the chest once the process is done, not caring that she is basically her own daughter since he created her with his own essence too. He tries to kill the hundreds of angels that are trying to contain Bahamut, only being stopped by Azazel's intervention. He is also a central part in the reawakening of Bahamut, an event that caused millions of deaths across the world, and to do so he made Amira fuse with the beast in a process that basically killed her. And lastly, his plan was to use Bahamut to exterminate all the Gods and Angels (bringing his attempted killcount at least in the millions, but most likely in the billions) and planning to use the dragon to overthrone even the Demon Lord Lucifer to rule over the Demons and the whole world.
None of the character I mentioned before comes close to his scale, given none have a genocidial plan like his. Amon and Alessand Visponti would be able to stand out given their lower resources, but the former might not be heinous enough (I would need to rewatch the show another time to make sure of it, though) and the latter have some very minor redeeming qualities, that doesn't prevent him from being a total scumbag. Bahamut tecnically surpass him in heinousness since it was trying to destroy everything and exterminate everyone, but it is just a Generic Doomsday Villain that was allowed to be as heinous as it was because of Belzebuth and Gilles' actions given they are the ones who reawakened it, plus it has far more resources since it is a immortal dragon which can destroy entire cities with a blast, so any comparison between the two would be unfair.
So, why is this interesting, you might ask? Well, because in this series there is another individual who is overall more heinous than him, and might actually make Belzebuth's position a harder one to consider. I am talking about Gilles de Rais, also known as Martinet, the real mastermind behind everything and the one that actively manipulated everything and everyone, including Belzebuth himself, into reawakening the Bahamut so that it would destroy the mortal world, Heaven and Hell, all just to enjoy the spectacle. He is a nihilistic monster who, to be honest, is worse than Belzebuth. However, I would say that the candidate still manage to stand out compared to him, so let's discuss why I think so.
First of all, the fact that Gilles attempted a complete extermination of all life while Belzebuth "only" tried to exterminate all Gods doesn't make him inherently much less heinous. I mean, it does, but it isn't caused by a lack of heinousness and cruelty from Belzebuth's side, but mainly becuase of a difference in objective between the two. Gilles wanted to see the destruction of everything, while Belzebuth wanted to rule over everything. Two very different objective, which obviously will lead to different approaches to the reawakening of Bahamut. Belzebuth could have easily ordered Bahamut to exterminate all life once he released it, just like Gilles, but at the same time he had no reason to do it since by killing everyone he would have nothing left to rule over, so it is logical that he wouldn't aim at the complete destruction of everything like Gilles, but rather at the extermination of the faction he hates and to take down any rebellion. Plus, Belzebuth still have an attempted killcount of at least millions, so it's not like he holds backs a lot. If he only wanted to rule over everything than I would be a lot less inclined to propose him, but with him wanting to exterminate all Gods than things gets a lot different.
Secondly, there is something important to consider when comparing the two, and this is the resources. At first glance, most would be inclined to say that Belzebuth have more resources given he appears to be stronger, but the thing is that Gilles did most (if not all) of his heinous actions through strategy, deception and manipulation. And this was possible only thanks to a kind of resource that Belzebuth doesn't have access to: Gilles' concoction that shapeshift the user. Thanks to that crucial factor, Gilles was able to play all the sides and manipulate everyone, including Belzebuth himself, into doing his bidding. Belzebuth, on the other hand, is a much more brute kind of villain, that doesn't really rely on strategy but rather force to obtain what he wants, and without the concoction he would have much less options to play off, giving Gilles a notable resource advantage compared to Belzebuth.
Lastly, regardless of everything, Belzebuth still plays a huge role in the reawakening of Bahamut, with Gilles contacting him and tricking him in the form of Martinet specifically because he absolutely needed him. Him creating Amira through Nicole and him impaling Amira to trap her in a sphere in order to bring her to Abos are two of the most important pieces needed to reawaken Bahamut, as explained in the previous sections. Without him, Gilles would not have been able to free Bahamut from its seal and as such would not even come close to being as heinous as he is. And yes, technically Belzebuth did all of that while being tricked by Gilles into believing that Bahamut would obey him, but it doesn't really change the fact that all those are still actions that he performed on his own volition in order to satiate his thirst for power. All those crimes were done by him in an attempt to commit a genocide against Gods and Angels while also ruling over Demons with a iron fist, and him being tricked by Martinet/Gilles doesn't affect the heinousness of his actions.
Verdict?[]
While I will admit he is not as strong of a candidate as good old Gilles, I think he still have enough to stand out on his own given the difference in objective, resources and especially the crucial role he plays in the reawakening of Bahamut, an event that lead to millions of casualties. To me he would be a solid yes, but I will let you all decide about it.