Akihiko Kayaba

## Villain Description

### Goals

Become the ruler of his game and trap inside it 10,000 different players so he could be treated as a god and ultimately kill them in one way or another (succeeded, but later it ultimately backfired)
To defeat Kazuto and Asuna and kill whoever shall oppose him or his ambitious game (failed)

### Hobbies

Reading books
Cooking
Causing mayhem among the players
Controlling others

### Powers

Control over his game
Superhuman Strength

### Skills

Command over players
Wisdom and intelligence
Manipulation

### Type of Villain

Manipulative Tyrant

**Akihiko Kayaba** is the main antagonist of the *Sword Art Online* franchise, appearing as Heathcliff ingame.

He is the cunning leader of the Knights of Blood, who designed the game world in order to be worshiped by everyone as a god.

He is voiced by Marc Diraison in the English version.

## History

### Past

Akihiko has been working in and out of laboratories, and in his spare time he read books, up until the day he started designing a computer world of his own which everyone will remain inside it under his control and leadership. One day came and Kiyaba gave around 10,000 players a chance to participate in the game he built. However, unknowingly to them, this game was meant to take away their free will, and he encoruaged everyone to fight against each other, as he remained ontop of all of the other players. Ingame, he appeared in the form of **Heathcliff**, the strong leader of The Knights of Blood. He lead the strongest guild in the game universe, and he slayed a boss with his special techniques and abilities as he then gained the title of the Man of Legend. He also let the players make their own decisions, and kept them under his leash as the rest was up to them. However, he intervened when Kirigaya Kazuto and Yuuki Asuna (the series' two protagonists) wanted to leave the game, and he summoned them both to a battle, in which if they would loose then their brains will be destroyed along with their bodies, and if he would possibly loose (although chances for that were low), he would die along with his ambitious game world. He fought with no remorse and was desperate to keep his plans alive, and fight for his idea and for his control over everyone else. He and Kirigaya had a massive, rough and ultimately deadly sword fight. However, Akihoko/Heathcliff cheated during the battle as he stabbed Asuna in her chest. Proud of his actions and with intent to sadistically kill whoever opposed him, he revealed Kazuto that he never planned a way for other players to defeat him. However, after Kazuto seemingly died, he reappeared ingame as he then managed to stab Heathcliff's abdomen as the sword broke down his shield. Akihiko was shocked, and realizing that he's lost the game, he and his ingame identity Heathcliff dissolve and his game collapses.

## Personality

He is seemingly a nice man in the real world. However, that was all a facade, as he just wanted them all to enter the game and operate under his leash. He is ruthless, cunning, sadistic and he enjoyes controlling others and hurting them in life. He is shown to be remorseless and sadistic in actual when he stabs Asuna just before he boasts to Kazuto that he cannot be defeated.

Despite accepting his fate near the end, he had zero redeeming qualities, no remorse or good traits,

and he showed no emotions towards other players or people in general. He seemed to enjoy tooling between the players and creating more and more disorder and war between them. In other words, Akihoko was a monstrous psycopath who took people's lives with a smile on his face. He also boasted to others, as he was very arrogant, egoistic, empty hearted and vicious.

## Trivia

* He is one of the two darkest villains of the series, along with Shouichi Shinkawa.

## Gallery

***The Great Villains Wiki*** presents a gallery for Akihiko Kayaba.