Darth Nihilus

"He is no longer a human... One cannot have power of that magnitude and still perceive the universe as we do."

- Kreia

Darth Nihilus (—3,951 BBY) was a Sith Lord around the time after the Jedi Civil War. Apprentice of Darth Traya, he was one of the few survivors of the Battle of Malachor V. He was a shadowy figure that wore a red and white mask and was dressed in a black cloak.

Darth Nihilus consumed the Force from Force-sensitives in order to stay alive. He could even consume entire Force-sensitive planets. Besides his terrible powers of hunger, Darth Nihilus was also a master in lightsaber combat, and fought in an elegant yet aggressive one handed style.

Biography
Little is known of the true beginnings of Darth Nihilus, Sith Lord of Hunger, other than the fact that he was once a humanoid male, a survivor of the Mandalorian Wars, and may or may not have at one point been a prisoner of the Mandalorians. Although his role in the Mandalorian Wars is a mystery, it is possible that he may have been one of the Jedi that defied the Jedi Council to follow Revan into the wars. After the war he was found by Darth Traya to be Force-sensitive, and she began training him in the ways of the Sith at the Trayus Academy on Malachor V. After his true powers and potential were realized, Nihilus, along with his apprentice, Darth Sion, plotted and turned against their dark mistress Traya. They cast Traya down, stripped her of her power, and expelled her from the Sith Order. Nihilus and Sion had now begun their shadow war against the remnants of the Jedi Order. They hunted Jedi to the brink of extinction.



Darth Nihilus ravaged and consumed whole worlds, to feed his insatiable appetite for power, from the bridge of his flagship, the Ravager. Nihilus's powers were so all-consuming, which may be related to the thought bomb used by Kaan and the Brotherhood of Darkness three thousand years later, that all those who came into contact with the Sith Lord became slaves, mindless servants to his will. Nihilus had learned his terrible powers under the watchful eye of Darth Traya. His hunger for power was what gave birth to his insatiable appetite for all things living; indeed, he became so powerful that he ceased being a man of flesh. His flesh remained, but only in the form of a shell encasing the dark gaping void that swallowed all life it came into contact with. Nihilus viewed the Galaxy as a tool to feed his insatiable appetitie. He believed that the purpose of all life was to feed his powers.

One servant of Nihilus was Visas Marr, a Miraluka female from Katarr, a planet consumed and destroyed by Nihilus. The Sith Lord sent Visas on a mission to find and bring the last of the Jedi before him, so that he could consume his power and essence. However, this would be the Sith Lord's undoing, for the Jedi Exile broke her from Nihilus's bonds, and she turned against her former master. Along with the Exile and Canderous Ordo, she defeated him on board the bridge of the Ravager. The Exile was able to survive the Sith Lord's terrible power, for he had previously lost his connection to the Force, and this shielded him from certain death at the hands of Nihilus. When Nihilus tried to feed on the Exile, he exhausted himself, leaving him temporarily vulnerable. After an exhausting fight, the Exile finally managed to slay the Darth Nihilus, thus eliminating one of three reigning Sith Lords. After his death, his body dissolved in an aura of dark side energies.

What happened to Nihilus after his body dissolved is unknown. Whether he was truly gone, or returned again to challenge the Jedi and the Republic, remains a mystery.

It should be noted, that Darth Nihilus was the most powerful being in the Galaxy at this point in time. The Exile could not have stood against Nihilus's powers. What brought about the end of Darth Nihilus was his overconfidence, as happened with a similarly extremely powerful Sith Lord, Darth Sidious, almost 4,000 years later. He believed that he could survive anything, that nothing could stand against his terrible powers of hunger. He exhausted his power trying to feed on the Exile's Force signature which, like his own was that of an echo, or wound in the Force. He succeeded only in weakening himself.

Behind the scenes

 * Like most of the Sith Lords, Darth Nihilus' name has some meaning (nihil is Latin for "nothing"). He has no loyalties to anyone but himself, and will consume both Sith and Jedi with his hunger, which notes that his name fits his current personality quite well. Nihilus is also derived from the term "nihilism", or "belief in nothing", most notably concepts of truth and purpose.
 * It should be noted that Nihilus never speaks a clear word in the game, he simply emits patterns of sounds similar to the Sith Holocrons found on Telos.
 * It should also be noted that the same style of lightsaber combat used by Nihilus during your encounter with him is used by another main villain of the Knights of the Old Republic series, Darth Malak.
 * Darth Nihilus was going to face off with Darth Sion, at some point in the original, uncut game on the Ravager, after the Exile supposedly dies. Nihilus is proven to be the stronger of the two.

Appearances

 * Unseen, Unheard
 * Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords