Nico di Angelo
Legacy Name: Nico di Angelo

Nico di Angelo

Name Meaning: Nico means 'victory'. His last name, di Angelo, means 'the angel'. His full name means 'victory of the angel'.

Age: 15

Parentage: Son of Hades, the Greek god of the Underworld, final judgement, and all the earth's riches. His mother was Maria di Angelo, the daughter of a wealthy diplomat.

Appearance: Very thin, lithely muscled, with unruly jet black hair, dark grey eyes, and pale skin

Preferred clothing: Skull t shirt, black skinny jeans, boots, aviator jacket, silver skull ring, and a silver chain belt

Weapons: A three-foot long Stygian Iron sword, which is said to be 'as black as a nightmare'. It helps Nico channel his powers of controlling and summoning the dead. It can also drain souls to give him more power. Only Hades and his children can use Stygian Iron.

Abilities:
- Geokinesis:
Nico can control the earth by levitating rocks and making them sharp and deadly, then send them hurling towards his enemies. He can also open up fissures that swallow his enemies whole, in addition to making the earth tremor and quake, making his foes offbalanced and therefore easier to attack.

- Necromancy:
He has divine authority and control over the dead. This makes him able to reanimate skeletons and zombies and command them in battle. He has one particularly loyal zombie, Jules-Albert, that acts as a chauffeur whenever Nico needs to be driven somewhere. Jules-Albert was a birthday present from his father Hades, who wanted to do something nice for his son. Knowing he couldn't personally drive Nico places, Hades wanted to make sure he could still go to the mall and do 'normal teenage things', so Hades gave Nico a zombie chauffeur, perhaps not realizing most kids don't have their own personal driver, much less an undead one.

Nico can also summon deceased souls by digging a pit, filling it with food (he tends to use McDonalds burgers and fries) and then chanting in Ancient Greek. Anyone need advice from beyond the grave? Nico can help with that.

- Death Sense and Empathy: Nico can sense death, either as it's happening, or when it's going to happen to someone he loves, even if they're a great distance away. He can also sense when someone he's close to is being judged in the Underworld. He's innately able to pick up on other people's soul energy and able to recognize how strong, or weak, their aura is.

- Ghost Control: Nico also has physical control over ghosts, being able to drag them around by their ears or force them to be silent with a simple hand gesture. He can make even the chattiest of ghosts shut up by shushing them, or by giving them 'the look'.

Nico also has the terrifying ability to zombify, and then ghostify, an enemy, and then erase it's presence permanently. He can literally make you disappear off of the face of the earth.

- Osteokinesis:
Nico can summon and telekinetically control bones to either ensnare his enemies, or use them as weapons against his foes. He's capable of summoning hundreds of bones at a single time, if he has enough energy.

- Death Trance: Using pomegranate seeds, Nico can consume one seed and essentially make himself die for a single day, forcing his body to fall into a state where he consumes no oxygen and doesn't need to consume any other food. This skill proves to be very useful when he's kidnapped and left in a giant bronze jar for days on end, which actually happened once. Not a fun story.

- Umbrakinesis:
He has complete control over shadows. Nico can use them to shadow travel anywhere in the world, although transporting more than just himself drains his energy quite significantly. He can also force shadows to solidify, and then attack with them as if they were real weapons. And of course, he can use them for camouflage when he doesn't want to be seen.

- Hypnokinesis:
In addition to being able to control his own dreams, Nico can travel to and from other people's dreams, if he so chooses. He sleeps so deeply that you can tap dance around his head and Nico won't even budge. It's impossible to wake him once he's asleep. He can make other people fall into a deep slumber a well, which is a useful skill when you want someone to shut up.

- Induced Fear:
Nico, when angry, radiates an aura that induces intense fear, just like his father Hades, but on a much lesser scale. He tends to only radiate the essence of death when he's nervous, making the grass wilt underneath his feet "as if poison were seeping from the soles of his shoes."

- Willpower:
Nico has incredible willpower, enabling him to survive a trip to Tartarus without losing his mind. Not just anyone can brag about that. He's literally been to hell and back..and survived.

- Endurance:
He's able to endure heavy amounts of emotional and physical pain, and still do whatever it takes to complete his mission.

- ADHD:
Like all demigods, he's got some attention problems. This particular issue helps him pay better attention to battles when everything's going haywire.

- Dyslexia:
Like many other half bloods, Nico is dyslexic, as his brain's hardwired for Ancient Greek, not English.

- Fighting skills:
Nico is an excellent swordsman, able to hold his own against dozens of enemies at a single time. He can quickly overcome multiple enemies in hand to hand combat, as well. Being the son of Hades has it's perks, as he can summon the spirits of ancient warriors, like Achilles, and ask them to teach him how to fight.

- Italian:
Nico is Italian by birth; as such, Italian is first and native language. English is his second language, since he moved to the U.S. when he was very young. And being a demigod, he eventually learned Ancient Greek, too.

Personality: When he was young, Nico was a bright, optimistic, hyperactive, nerdy fanboy who was obsessed with pirates and a cardgame called Mythomagic. As he aged and the war took it's toll on him, Nico turned dark and brooding, mistrustful because of the abuse he suffered and the losses he was forced to endure at a very young age. He bonds deeply with people, although it's hard to earn his trust. Once someone has earned it, though, Nico would literally go to hell and back for them, if it meant helping them or keeping them safe. He's very intelligent and curious by nature. Nico has developed keen observation skills and is a master when it comes to reading other people's motives. He also has a horrible tendency to keep people's at arm's length, afraid of letting people close to him out of fear of being hurt again. He'd do anything for his family, though.

Delving Deeper:

Nico hasn't had the easiest of lives. For starters, his dad is none other than Hades, the Greek god of the Underworld and all of the earth's riches. This makes him a demigod, also known as a half-blood. That means he's got a lot of special powers, like raising the dead and being able to talk to ghosts. It also meant that he's had a really rough life. His mother was murdered by his uncle Zeus (yes, that Zeus) when he was a kid, and his older sister Bianca practically raised him as her own. Until she sort of left him to become an immortal huntress under the goddess Artemis' care when he was eleven. Oh, and then she died in battle, which was impossibly devastating for Nico, as he now felt completely alone and didn't know who to trust.

Nico also fell in love with a guy who was as straight as a ruler, a guy named Percy Jackson, whom he blamed for his sister's death. All the other half-bloods treated him pretty badly because of his 'creepy powers' and he felt largely unwanted and unaccepted at Camp Half-Blood...which led him to isolate himself, out of fear of being unwanted and bullied. His private, internal struggle with his sexuality didn't help things either.

Of course, the wars didn't help his disposition any. Or going through Tartarus and back (literally), only to then be kidnapped and trapped in a jar, slowly suffocating to death over a period of days...and then more fighting, and more war.

Some good things did happen to him, though. He found his half-sister Hazel, and freed her from the Underworld, giving her a second chance at life. They became very close. He also made friends with Jason, the son of Jupiter, and with Reyna, daughter of the Roman god Bellona. It was those two, along with the satyr Coach Hedge, and a rather stubborn son of Apollo named Will Solace, who got through his tough exterior and convinced him to stick around Camp Half-Blood after the war.



It's been several months since then, and Nico is starting to feel like the Camp is his home. He has friends who accept him for all that he is, and has a wonderful relationship with his sister, Hazel. He and Will Solace have also become very close, and eventually the two started dating. The relationship is good for both boys, as Will is learning self-confidence from Nico, and in return, the son of Hades feels cherished, safe, and secure - things he hasn't felt since he was a child. Maybe now that the war is over, the two of them can continue to learn and grow from each other, and have a chance to be normal teenagers.