Galaxia

Galaxia is Meta Knight's primary weapon. It is first named in episode 60 (Crusade for the Blade) of the original Japanese version of Kirby's anime, Kirby: Right Back at Ya!, aired in December 7th, 2002 in Japan. This is the episode where all the available back story of the sword comes from, as no details are ever revealed about it in the games.

Appearance
It is golden in appearance, with a blade about as long as Meta Knight himself is tall, with a single rounded or oval ruby set within its hilt. Its handguards point towards the blade, which has a mirror-like, polished appearance compared to the hilt. There are usually six spikes along its blade, although there can be anywhere between zero to eight depending on artwork, and they range from simple outward pointing spikes to ones which have a slight outwards curve to them, similar to a fiery pattern.

As portrayed in the anime, Galaxia's blade has the unique property of only phasing into existence once it is unsheathed. This makes its sheath very short - a simple shallow cup for the small part of the hilt extending above the sword's handguard, which avoids encumbering Meta Knight's movement. The phasing blade also explains the Hammerspace (magic satchel) effect where Meta Knight seemingly produces a sword longer than himself from out of nowhere in the games.

Kirby wields Galaxia thrice in the anime; once in Sword and Blade, Loyal and True / Hour of the WolfWrath, once in Scare Tactics - Part II, and once in Crusade for the Blade. Both times, he wears the traditional green Link hat from Sword Kirby, but swings Galaxia instead of an ordinary sword. Despite these appearances, the official site for the anime does not name it as a copy ability, and from its appearance it is likely a derivative of Sword. Regardless, fans have named the move "Galaxia Kirby", much as "Master" Sword has been named after Master.

Galaxia's name sounds masculine in Japanese pronunciation, and feminine in English. This coincides with the fact that the sword's voice is male in the original, and female in the 4Kids dub.

In the Anime
In Kabu's own words, Galaxia is a powerful sword forged by Photron (Photoron in Japan), the mighty ruler of the fire people (people of light in the Japanese version), "in a time long forgotten, thousands of years ago when the universe was young", created "with a will and life of its own". Galaxia's name was given by Photron himself, but for what purpose it is forged for, and who was its intended wielder was never revealed.

Nightmare Enterprises sent Kirisakin to steal the sword hide it away in a dark cave, and guard it throughout the millennia that will come to pass until it is seen again. According to Kabu, possession of Galaxia gives Nightmare the power to control the universe, but how, he did not elaborate. The sword did lie dormant in the cave for a long time, so despite what Kabu had said, Nightmare must have had difficulties harnessing the sword's power; since if he had, he would have succeeded in his goal of ruling the universe millennia ago.

"If my mother gave her life for this, I shall too."

- Silica

Its legend lived on, however, and Meta Knight and Garlude were eventually sent by the Star Warriors which they were associated with to retrieve the sword. The two met their match against Kirisakin, a Demon Beast powerful in its own right. Garlude sacrificed her life to make the mission a success, and Meta Knight escaped with Galaxia and a heavy heart.

It is not until a long time later when Silica, Garlude's daughter, sought out Meta Knight to retrieve the sword for herself, as she was misled that Meta Knight betrayed Garlude and left her to die to keep the sword to himself. Her opinions were corrected by Galaxia's sentient voice itself when she touched the sword and it found her to be unworthy of wielding it, and Silica later became an ally of Meta Knight.

In the games
Meta Knight first appeared in Kirby's Adventure, but there was nothing particularly interesting about the sword which he wields, and it looks like the swords Sword Kirby, Sword Knight and Blade Knight use. In Kirby & the Amazing Mirror, released in 2004 after the anime episode was aired, Kirby uses Meta Knight's sword which gave the Master Copy ability to confront Dark Mind.

Despite never being stated if it was Galaxia or not, it bears striking resemblance to it in color, and the only difference is in the design of the blade, since Meta Knight never wielded a golden blade in the games he featured in before. Master sword's design in Kirby & the Amazing Mirror varies within the game itself; in the ending artwork in the game, its blade is silver / steel gray in color, but during gameplay, it looks like a larger, golden sword with the same hilt as the Galaxia, and does not have the spikes on the blade like Galaxia does. When the game is paused while Kirby has the Master ability, its icon on the pause screen shows its outline with Galaxia's spikes. Official artwork of Meta Knight for Kirby & the Amazing Mirror shows him swinging a spiked golden sword, which is a portrayal which is inconsistent with the rest of the game.

Subsequent visualisations of Meta Knight's sword in the games is based on Galaxia's design. Kirby's Epic Yarn (2010) is the first game main series title to directly give it a name, as the Galaxia Sword can be found in Battleship Halberd as a treasure - Meta Knight himself wields different yarn swords in this game. Two years earlier, Super Smash Bros. Brawl (2008) named Meta Knight's Final Smash "Galaxia Darkness", which also refers to the sword.

In the Kirby Quest sub-game of Kirby Mass Attack, Galaxia is fought as a boss separate from Meta Knight himself, with 2,500 HP. If Kirby manages to defeat it, he then wields it against Dark Matter, who comes right after as final boss of the sub-game. If the player lands the best timing possible, Kirby then fires a sword beam which takes out whichever form Dark Matter is in in one hit.

Properties
As explained in Kirby: Right Back at Ya!, Galaxia was forged with a spirit and will of its own, and so may only be wielded by a select, powerful few. The unworthy only find harm, are killed, or are turned evil when they touch it, which makes the sword radiate overwhelming electricity. Only Kirby and Meta Knight ever wield Galaxia in the anime (Kirby wields it twice). Whoever wields Galaxia was shown to have virtually all moves by Meta Knight used in the past games, including the sword beam attack which appeared in Kirby Super Star. In the anime, Sword Kirby can still produce sword beams, but when wielding Galaxia, the beam takes the form of a concentrated blast of golden/green energy instead of white, and is powerful enough to shatter rock, create immense crevasses in the ground, and completely overwhelm opponents' defences and slice them right in two.

In the games, Meta Knight wields it like Sword Kirby, but with several additional moves. In Meta Knightmare Ultra, he makes use of his trademark Mach Tornado by spinning Galaxia around him.

Trivia

 * Galaxia is Spanish for Galaxy.
 * In Kirby Mass Attack, for the Kirby Quest minigame, Galaxia is shown in the Backgroud of the logo.
 * When Meta Knight first appeared, he did not use Galaxia as his weapon. He used a regular sword.
 * Galaxia Kirby makes a cameo in Kirby Mass Attack as one attack in the Kirby Quest Minigame and in Kirby's Return to Dreamland when he has the Ultra Sword ability.
 * Galaxia Kirby only makes an actual appearance in the anime.