Ansem (disambiguation)

Ansem is the name taken by several beings in the Kingdom Hearts series. The name originated from a researcher whose experiments into the darkness of the heart led to the release of Heartless onto the worlds.

Kingdom Hearts
In Kingdom Hearts, Ansem was the name given to a researcher, identified as Ansem the Wise, who was an old friend of King Mickey. Sora and his companions Donald and Goofy, both subjects of the King, collected the Ansem Reports in search for knowledge of the Heartless in order to devise a way to stop them. Sora also sought to find his friends Kairi and Riku, who had been seperated from him during the storm on Destiny Islands. Sora and his companions, in questing to stop the spread of the Heartless, squared off with Maleficent and her allies, who sought to use the Heartless to gain power over the worlds.

Riku, seeking a way to restore Kairi's lost heart to her, found himself on opposing sides with Sora and began to delve into the power of darkness. He faced off against Sora at Hollow Bastion, managing to weaken Sora's resolve to take the keyblade from him (since the keyblade resided with the person with the strongest heart). Sora later caught up with him, and with renewed resolve, was able to claim the keyblade again, and defeated Riku in a small scuffle. After fleeing from Sora, Riku was approached by a cloaked being, and offered extraordinary dark power, as well as a keyblade of his own. Riku accepted and was possessed by the entity, and given a keyblade with the ability to unlock people's hearts. After Maleficent was vanquished by Sora and his party, Riku and Sora squared off in front of the Door to Darkness for control of Kairi's heart. Despite the dark power available to him, Riku lost to Sora once more, and the dark being controlling him revealed itself as Ansem, Seeker of Darkness.

Some time later, Sora and his friends confronted Ansem at the End of the World, where he abandoned Riku's form and fought them with the aid of a dark Guardian. Ansem was once again defeated and transformed himself and his guardian into a living ship swarming with Heartless. When even this was not enough to overcome Sora, Ansem tried to open the door to Kingdom Hearts, expecting to be empowered with all that darkness had to offer. Instead, he was overpowered by blinding light and vanished, believed to be destroyed.

Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories
The name "Ansem" resurfaced in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories during Riku's storyline. When Sora appeared in Castle Oblivion, Riku appeared there as well due to his strong ties to him. He was confronted by Ansem, who taunted him, telling him he could only remember dark hearts and that his heart was full of only dark memories. Riku journeyed through the basement of the castle, occassionally speaking with Ansem, who urged him onward and attempted to corrupt his heart again.

Once Riku reached the Twilight Town world, Ansem appeared before him, threatening him. Riku, whose dark powers had matured after his journey throught the castle, recognized him as a fake, however. "Ansem" then revealed himself as DiZ, saying he impersonated Ansem to guide Riku through the castle and develop his dark powers. Riku continued onward to find Naminé, who had been previously entered Riku's memories as Kairi to help him overcome Zexion's illusions and harness the full power of darkness still residing in him.

Naminé showed Riku where she was keeping Sora, who by then had been suspended in liquid to have his memories repaired. Naminé told Riku she could do something similar for him; she could seal his heart and memories against Ansem's influence and he could be rid of him for good. Riku declined, however, choosing instead to awaken Ansem within himself and defeat him himself. As he ascended into the main floors of the castle out of the basement, he was halted by Ansem. The two fought one another, both calling upon the power of darkness, but Ansem was defeated and subdued. Riku, sure of his control over the darkness in him, left the castle along with King Mickey and DiZ.

Kingdom Hearts II
In the beginning of Kingdom Hearts II, the identity of "Ansem" surfaces quickly as someone aiding DiZ and wearing the black cloak of the Organization. Jiminy's Journal describes only as a mysterious person seeking out the power of darkness, whose motives are unclear.

After sealing pathways between several worlds, as was instructed by Master Yen Sid, Sora and his friends reunite with King Mickey at Hollow Bastion, where they help recover access to the city's computer system for Tron. Once they complete this task, Mickey informs them that the being calling itself "Ansem" was only an impostor, and was actually a powerful Heartless. He also told them that the corresponding Nobody had come to be the leader of Organization XIII. Mickey remarked that he remembered being around the Organization's leader, and around another person, and that they felt like the same person; regrettably, he could not remember who the person was.

Shortly afterwards, Hollow Bastion was invaded by countless Heartless, prompting Mickey and Sora to join Leon and the others in fighting them off. While in battle, the leader of Organization XIII revealed himself (later identified as Xemnas by Axel), and Mickey recognized him as the Nobody of Xehanort, the head research apprentice of Ansem the Wise. Thus, Ansem, Seeker of Darkness was identified as Xehanort's Heartless.

DiZ and Riku
It wasn't until Sora reached the Castle That Never Was that the last of the mysteries surrounding the name "Ansem" were cleared up. After Naminé helped Kairi escape the Organization's imprisonment, the two wandered the castle until they were halted by Saïx. Before he could apprehend them, however, a cloaked figure wielding a recognizable variation of the Soul Eater (later identified as the Way to the Dawn) appeared and attacked Saïx, who escaped into a dark portal. Naminé identified the figure as Riku, and after Saïx's escape, Kairi ran to pull off Riku's hood, uncovering Riku's face and revealing that he had taken on the form of Xehanort's Heartless.

After Xigbar's defeat, King Mickey, who had run off on his own after entering the castle with Sora, found DiZ surrounded by enemies and rescued him. DiZ then pulled off his face coverings and revealed himself as Ansem the Wise, an old friend of the King's whose experiments created the Heartless. He accounted for his activities since he had last seen Mickey before taking his device and attempting to encode Kingdom Hearts as data.

The device he had created to encode the Organization's bounty of hearts was not as predictable as he had believed, however. After Ansem's last encounter with Xemnas, the device exploded, seemingly vaporizing Ansem the Wise and knocking Sora and all of his friends to the ground. When they recovered, Riku had regained his original form, retaining all his dark power as well, and was finally able to fully discard the "Ansem" identity.