"Noisy bug..."
"We make you fight each other... and hurt each other.. We turn that into a show! And the enjoyment of all your warped minds becomes the strength of our God.. It is disappointing that we can't turn our fight into a show.. At the least, we would kill you in style!"
—Augus, Breath of Fire II
In the land where the almighty dragons are seen as either gods or demons, the many generations of the warrior dragon Ryu, the winged Nina, and their companions have gone through many journeys destined to save the world, and among these are the most vile figures they face in their quest.
All spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned!
- Breath of Fire II:
- Father Habaruku is the founder of the St. Eva Church, which steals the souls of its believers in order to power up Deathevan. Habaruku's favorite method for winning followers involves replacing respected members of various communities with literal demons that disguise themselves as those people. In order to gain control of the church, Habaruku had his kindly predecessor Ganer Bateson—also Ryu Bateson's father—removed from the position before having him strapped to a horrible demonic contraption with his life energy itself used to power it for about ten years.
- Father Manson is the right-hand of Habaruku whose role is to lure lost souls and dissenters of the Eva faith into soulless devotees. Priest of Bando Church, Manson lures in people with his kind façade, before abducting them to his secret undead lair, where he has his victims isolated in the dark cells with no sustenance, driving them to desperately pray to Eva for salvation, unaware that they are offering their souls to him. When the victims finally succumb, Manson has them sent either to the main cathedral to fuel Deathevan in prayer, or turned into his personal zombie servants with his necromancy. By the time Ryu's group comes to track him down, they find hundreds of victims, before Manson tries to kill the party as well.
- General Shupkay is the ambitious Highlander who wishes to fulfill her megalomaniac ambitions no matter the cost. Having risen in popularity after the Gulfheim War, Shupkay ruthlessly turned her kingdom into a militaristic dictatorship, hunting and sending those against her to the monster-filled dungeons, and using her own soldiers, even fresh recruits, as fodder in her wars. Seeking the ancient weapon in Highfort for world conquest, Shupkay placed the area in a military lockdown, and tries to kill the party and Sten after they overheard her ruthless scheme. Taking advantage of Sten's return, Shupkay lures him to the weapon by taking the Princess of Highlander hostage to torture Sten to death in front of her to power the weapon with her despair, before using herself to power it in a last-ditch effort to kill the party.
- Kuwadora is the imposter of Prince Jean who plans to use his position to drive Simafort to ruin. Ruthlessly ambitious, Kuwadora uses his newfound role to eliminate those in his way, torturing a dissenting soldier with dehydration and trying to get the real Jean and his companions executed. Using dirty tricks to stay ahead, Kuwadora uses threats on the families of his servants, and when that's questioned, follows Petapa to the rumored Self-Destruct Mechanism of the castle to use it himself to destroy Simafort, revealing that he's a demon who's purpose is to spread the most misery to the frog kingdom as possible, and even when defeated he activates the mechanism, gleeful that Simafort is doomed to destruction.
- Augus is the Coliseum manager in Coursair and devout follower of Deathevan who arranges his matches to be as bloody as possible to spread his lust for violence by using his position to coerce warriors to destroy each other in the ring, before interfering to kill the survivor behind their back, corrupting the townspeople to his twisted whims. With countless matches, Augus tries to bribe Ryu to do the same to Katt before killing him with poison darts, and when this fails tries to kill him and his companions as horribly as possible.
- Breath of Fire III: Mikba is the head of the crime syndicate responsible for the conflict of the first half of the game. A powerful crime lord, Mikba's numerous operations include trafficking and murder, with many towns under his iron fist and helpless under his wrath. When Ryu's family gets involved with him, Mikba sends his two enforcers to burn their home and murder them despite being children, and later allows his men to run his many operations, not caring about the damage caused. When his empire began crumbling because of Nina and Rei, Mikba cowardly leaves his men to die, before later attempting to kill Rei and Ryu's party when he received power from Myria, turning into a demonic monster as he brutalizes them.
- Breath of Fire IV:
- Yuna of the Fou Empire appears as merely self-righteous and smarmy, until one sees the atrocities he committed. Taking Nina's sister Elina as a test subject due to her popularity, Yuna turned her into a mutated Endless, bragging all about what he has done. He also built a massive canon to launch Hex, a toxic warhead that's actually the embodiment of anguish of tortured victims at the hands of Yuna driven to the brink of insanity, used to turn places into uninhabitable wastelands. One of these victims was Mami, Fou-lu's Love Interest whose torture and sacrifice drove Fou-lu into believing Humans Are the Real Monsters and becomes intent on destroying them, of which Yuna he takes advantage by directing him into his Empire manipulating its downfall to slip away and continue his crimes in the future.
- Captain Rasso first appeared like a petty villain not to take seriously, but after becoming enraged with hero Ryu he truly became monstrous. A military noble, Rasso was a massive bully who used force and intimidation to get what he wants. After Nina and Ryu hurt his pride, leaving a scar, Rasso hunted them throughout the adventure with reckless abandon, not caring about the damage it caused. When given orders to capture Ryu down in Chek, the Lost Village, Rasso snapped and unleash his full wrath, decimating Chek and fatally damaging Ershin, before locating the citizens who went in hiding so he could personally kill and torture every single one of them to hurt and taunt Ryu by presenting mangled corpse to him, before using his most powerful weapon to beat the heroes to the brink of death. A villain so petty that he'd commit genocide out of spite, Rasso was so bad it nearly drove Ryu into believing humans were only cruel individuals.
