Nightmare Gottschalk (ナイトメア＝ゴットシャルク) is a sickly dream demon who vomits blood frequently. He calls himself the personification of bad dreams. Despite his ill health, he refuses to go to hospitals because he hates hospitals and injections. He has the ability to read people's mind and enter their dreams. Nightmare is also the lord of the Clover Tower and has a lot of subordinates. However, because his physical condition is bad, Gray usually does most of his work.
Appearance
He has short, smooth silver hair that reaches just past his chin, and one (two?) grey eye(s). As it is a rule that he must always keep his right eye closed, Nightmare wears a black and gold eyepatch over it to keep it closed. When not in dreams, he wears a dark grey suit with a frilled white shirt underneath, and in dreams his outfit is less formal. One consistency about his outfits is the purple handkerchief that's always tucked into a pocket. Nightmare is described as having very pale, perfect skin and lips so pale they're almost purple; this is because of his bad health.
Personality
When first introduced, Nightmare is both mysterious and suspicious, talking to Alice only in her dreams. When the world moves to Clover, however, he is revealed to be a childish, lazy, and selfish person. He has a sweet tooth and likes cats and other animals (such as the baby seal he named "Gomakichi"), and he will skip work to sleep, keep warm, or escape into dreams whenever he is given the chance, much to the annoyance of Gray (and Alice if she stays at the tower). Being sickly, Nightmare uses this as yet another excuse to avoid work. He reads the minds of everyone around even when they tell him to stop, making more of a nuisance of himself than anything. Despite all this, he is a very powerful and fearsome person when the need arises, and he is shown to be very kind to those he cares about.
He may be an incubus, but Nightmare is the most innocent of all of the cast. Intimate moments are usually disrupted by him getting embarrassed and/or coughing up blood; cuddling is his preferred form of expressing affection.
Media
Trivia
- Nightmare's last name 'Gottschalk' literally means "god of mischief."
- He insists that he is not a caterpillar but a bagworm.
- Nightmare is terrified of haunted houses.
- The actual powers that Nightmare possesses are only hinted at and shown briefly, but among them are controlled self levitation even outside of dreams, absolute control of dreams when inside them, some ability to manipulate his surroundings, and the power to selectively wipe a person's memories to the exacting standards of being able to change their mind or even make them forget their entire past. Whether these are his abilities alone or are what all incubi can do is unclear.
- According to one of his light novels, Nightmare is not the only incubus; there are others.
- He is supposed to be the only role holder who can interact with his self of a different time setting (parallel world), and only in dreams- this is an interaction to remain limited but that he nonetheless abuses in Mirror World.
- Even though by all accounts Nightmare is a terrible boss, his subordinates genuinely like and respect him.
- Nightmare insists that he enjoys listening in on gossip, even if it's bad things about himself. There are hints that this is not entirely true.
- Nightmare doesn't mind eating healthy food, it's just that Gray's version of healthy food is always inedible.
Quotes
Don't go killing me off! (To Alice-Country of Clover:Nightmare)
I hate hospitals. (To Alice or Gray)