Count Bleck

"Bleh heh heh heh heh heh... The man known as Blumiere died long ago. Now there is only Bleck! The Dark Prognosticus's choice to fulfill the prophecy. Nothing more!"

- Count Bleck

Count Bleck (also known by his real name, Lord Blumiere) is an evil count and is seemingly the primary antagonist of Super Paper Mario. While "Bleck" is normally used as onomatopoeia for disgust, it could be interpreted as a corruption of the word "Black" (as in darkness); his Japanese name is also a play on the French word for "black", noir.

Count Bleck is responsible for bringing forth the Chaos Heart by forcefully marrying Princess Peach to Bowser, so he can use the Heart to open The Void, which will ultimately engulf all dimensions. He leads a troop of minions to help move along his plans, including Nastasia, the assistant that has powers to force people under her control, O'Chunks, the strong, dim-witted follower, Mimi the shapeshifter, and Dimentio the evil jester (and, to a lesser degree, Mr. L, a brainwashed Luigi). In the end, however, he changes his ways and redeems himself by destroying the Chaos Heart, thereby helping Mario save all worlds.

Background
Prior to the events of the game, Count Bleck went by the name Blumiere and was a member of the Tribe of Darkness, a group that had broken off from the Ancients after stealing the Dark Prognosticus. One day, Bleck was found injured at the base of a cliff by a human girl, Timpani, and nursed back to health. Despite his father's warnings to stay away from humans, Blumiere became intrigued by her and snuck out of his castle frequently to meet with her, eventually falling in love. After learning his father had threatened Timpani and realizing their love could not survive there, Blumiere proposed to her, promising to spend as long as it would take to find a place where they could be happy. Before they could be married, however, his father abducted and banished Timpani from their dimension, wiping her memory and cursing her to wander through worlds until the day she died. Upon learning of this, Blumiere traveled through dimensions searching for her, unaware that she had been found barely alive by Merlon, a descendant of the Ancients living in Flipside, and turned into a Pixl known as Tippi in order to save her. It is implied by one of Carson's stories that he met Nastasia at some point during his search - after freeing a bat from a trap, he witnessed her transform into a woman and swear allegiance to him out of love.

Blumiere eventually returned home convinced that his love was gone forever. Believing life and existence to be meaningless without her, he stole the Dark Prognosticus against the wishes and pleas of his father, using its prophetic power to destroy his dimension and planning on doing the same to every world. Blumiere took the alias of Count Bleck and, along with his new assistant, moved to a new castle in a world of darkness, eventually gaining three new recruits to his plan - Mimi, a shapeshifter; O'Chunks, a warrior and failed army general; and Dimentio, a mysterious magician.

Super Paper Mario
Eventually, Count Bleck puts his plans into action, targetting the Mushroom Kingdom. Armed with the prophecy's knowledge that the wedding of a princess and a monster will call forth the Chaos Heart, Bleck abducts Princess Peach and Bowser, along with Luigi and the entire Koopa Troop, and forcibly weds them, subsequently using the Chaos Heart to rip open The Void to consume all worlds. Due to a disturbance during the ceremony, Luigi, Bowser and his army, and Peach are spread across the castle - Bleck sends Nastasia, with her brainwashing powers, to force members of the Koopa Troop to join his cause and his other minions to various dimensions in an attempt to hinder Mario's progress toward collecting the Pure Hearts.

After Mario manages to defeat all three minions and has reunited with Peach and Bowser, the count begins seeing him as more than just a mere annoyance. Bleck turns to the Dark Prognosticus and learns that a "man in green" is the determining factor in whether the prophecy of destruction will come to pass. He then orders Nastasia to brainwash Luigi into Mr. L and sets him on the heroes - however, he fails as well. Angered by his multiple failures to stop them thus far, Bleck confronts them in person in Sammer's Kingdom, a world only moments away from destruction. After an argument ensues with Tippi over his motives and the value of all worlds, Count Bleck begins to suspect that she may be his lost love - however, he convinces himself that Timpani still living is impossible and continues his plans. After the four heroes manage to defeat Bonechill and obtain the final Pure Heart from The Overthere, Bleck orders his minions to take their positions throughout the castle, to try and defeat them when they arrive. It is at this point that Dimentio reveals to Bleck Tippi's mentioning of the name 'Blumiere' - the count takes this as irrefutable proof that she is indeed Timpani. Knowing, however, that he cannot stop the prophecy this far along, Bleck ignores Nastasia's urges to call off the Void, secretly hoping that Mario, Peach, Bowser, and Luigi will be capable of defeating him and saving all worlds.

When Mario and Tippi reach the inner sanctum of Castle Bleck, the three other heroes have been lost along with Bleck's minions. The count is initially immune to all attacks due to the Chaos Heart - however, Bowser, Peach, and Luigi's reemergence grants the Pure Hearts the power to negate the barrier, and Bleck is eventually defeated by them. Despite Tippi's doubts of killing the man she now knows to be her love, he insists that the heroes end his game before the Void destroys all worlds.

Before even this can be done, however, Dimentio appears and attacks the count; the blow is taken by Nastasia, who seemingly is killed by it. Dimentio then takes control of the Chaos Heart from Bleck, planning to use it to create a new world in his image once the old ones are gone. Merged with the newly-brainwashed Luigi, Dimentio banishes Bleck, Tippi, and Nastasia to Dimension D, where they are, with loyalty of Bleck's other minions, able to restore power to the thought-to-be-gone Pure Hearts and weaken Super Dimentio, giving Mario and his friends the potency to defeat him. Before his death, however, the jester manages to leave behind a 'shadow' of his power, according to Bleck, to ensure all worlds will end regardless. Aware of the urgency of the situation, Count Bleck returns everyone to the chapel where the Chaos Heart was born, and he and Tippi exchange vows and wed each other; the true love between them supercharges the Pure Hearts, uniting them into the Purity Heart and reserving the prophecy of destruction.

The fate of the couple after the wedding is never completely disclosed - Bleck claims that using their love to stop the Void would cause both of them to 'cease to exist', yet both Merlon and a revived Nastasia voice their beliefs that the count is living happily together with Timpani. This idea is given proof by a post-credits scene showing the count's silhouette standing near that of a woman, implied to be Tippi's human form, in a paradise world, supposedly the one he had promised they would one day find.

Physical Appearance
Bleck wears a white top hat and coat, and is usually shrouded in a white cape fading to blue at the bottom. The inside of the cape is dark blue and starry, like the background texture used in the Outer Space portions of Super Paper Mario. When Count Bleck transports everybody away at Bowser's Castle, the same blue pattern used on The Thousand-Year Door pedestal when Mario holds a Crystal Star can be slightly seen inside his cape. He also wears a large red brooch, somewhat reminiscent of Princess Peach's blue jewel.

His eyes and mouth are both a glowing red color, and he wears a monocle on his left side. Strangely, both of these feature become light blue when he is defeated by the Heroes of Light, and remain that way until the Pure Hearts are restored. It is possible that this was his previous appearance, before he transformed from Blumiere into Count Bleck.

Personality
Count Bleck is a more unique figure among Mario's rogues gallery, as he is the only villain so far who is motivated by sadness and regret, and not by a lust for power or control. He is a tragic villain, whose actions are born from the purest of emotions: love. Regardless, Bleck has demonstrated a lust for destruction and disregard for all life, except those close to him. He, at first, seems to be a stereotypical villain with no feelings, but it is soon revealed that Bleck is an emotionally tortured person, who is not as evil as he first appears.

Prior to his meeting with Timpani, Bleck was known to be extremely kind and cherished all life and the universe itself. When he met Timpani, he fell in love, and was shown to be an extremely caring and devoted man to the woman he loves. This came to a tragic end, however, when his father sent Timpani away on an endless walk through other dimensions to die. The loss of Timpani made Bleck vengeful towards the world. Bleck wanted to destroy the universe, because he thought that life was meaningless without Timpani.

This turned Bleck into an evil and sadistic villain, who sought the destruction of all worlds. Bleck showed how evil he had become immediately after his transformation into a villain by murdering his own father, in an act of revenge, and wiping out his own dimension. Bleck sought to kill all that is, was, and would be, and had an overwhelming amount of hatred at all worlds, as he saw them as the things that took his love from him. Even though Count Bleck was evil, he was still capable of doing kind acts, such as freeing a bat from a trap, who went on to become Nastasia, his closest minion. Bleck was also shown to be very polite and not openly sadistic, but still harboured much hatred and anger.

Bleck also cared very deeply about his minions (with the possible exception of Dimentio, who had a more sinister agenda of his own). Bleck treated O'Chunks, Mimi, and Nastasia as if they were family and felt very close with all of them. He was very forgiving towards them and never punished them with any type of physical or mental torture or abuse. However, in the event such a thing was needed, the form of punishment was writing papers or singing songs, which Bleck didn't even issue. Nastasia, instead, issued those forms of punishment. The Count was also shown to be very upbeat (despite his tragic origin), and was always smiling (though that may have only been a cover to mask his true feelings). Bleck also seemed to be very likable, as all his henchmen had a strong bond with him with (the only exception, again, being Dimentio).

The story started with Bleck wanting nothing more than the destruction of the entire universe, but gradually showed him to be more humane and remorseful of what he has become. By the end of the story, Bleck was shown to be a very caring and loving person, who only did his evil deeds out of his love for Tippi by avenging her (apparent) death. In the end, it was Timpani who made him realize the error of his ways, and they both saved the universe together. His love for Tippi is what made him evil, but it is also what redeemed him. In the end, Bleck is not only a tragic villain, but a tragic hero, who sacrificed his life to stop what he had started.

Powers and Abilities
In addition to being able to use the Dark Prognosticus, Count Bleck has many other magical powers granted by the Chaos Heart that aid him in and out of combat. His most obvious and frequently used power is his ability to freely float without any hindrance to gravity. This power is particularly important due to his lack of visible legs. He also often shows his ability to teleport at will by "flipping", along with the Dark Prognosticus which always teleports at his side. Also, he can use the Chaos Heart's power to shield him from any harm.

In combat, Count Bleck uses his scepter to conjure globs of dark magic and hurl them at Mario and other foes. These globs are unique amongst projectile attacks in that nothing can block them; not even Peach's parasol or Barry. He can also summon a huge vortex of dark energy that sucks up his enemies, however, this skill is simply dodged by running away from it. Count Bleck can temporarily slow the flow of time as well, throwing his enemies off. Finally, he can speed himself in a way similar to using a speed flower of red energy and simply ram into his opponent, damaging them, although this can leave him vulnerable to Barry's spiky barrier, which, if activated quickly, will damage him and protect the player. His shadow blast attack will do 3 damage, his Void move will do 8 damage and the player will take 2 damage when walking into the Count.

Count Bleck is also shown to be quite clever and intelligent. He also is very charismatic, as his followers are loyal to the end, and he is capable of easily persuading others to join his cause (and having both of his female minions develop crushes on him, a very slight one in Mimi's case). However, it's much more effective for him to rely on Nastasia's mind controlling powers to gather more minions.

Lord Blumiere
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