Hephaestus

**Hephaestus**, also known as **Vulcan**, is the God of Blacksmith, the Forges, and Volcanoes from Greco-Roman mythology. He is the son of Zeus and Hera, and is one of the Twelve Olympians who rule over the pantheon from Mount Olympus.

## Overview

**Hephaestus** is the Greek god of blacksmiths, metalworking, metallurgy, fire (compare, however, with Hestia), and volcanoes. He was often seen as a counterpart to Roman god **Vulcanus** and the Etruscan God **Sethlans**.

In Greek mythology, he was either the son of Zeus and Hera or he was Hera's parthenogenous child. He was cast off Mount Olympus by his mother because of his deformity or, in another account, by Zeus for protecting Hera from his advances. He was also the husband of Aphrodite, who secretly cheated on him with his brother Ares, and after he found out about the secret, divorced her and married Aglaia of the Graces.

## Appearance

In the past, Hephaestus had the appearance of a giant, deformed man with shoulders at different heights, which made it so that he always seemed to be leaning, and numerous scars scattered across his large and disproportionate muscular body. His hair was shaggy and covered in motor oil, and he had a shriveled left leg, always locked tight in a creaking brace. He was also described as wearing a permanent scowl on his face and had a booming voice.

In the modern era, however, he has permanently changed his form from that of a hideous giant to a mechanical cyborg through a combination of complicated surgeries and the Grigori's technology and research.

Nowadays, he appears as a handsome young man of average height and a muscular body befitting that of a Greek god. He has short and spiky golden hair, and his eyes have black scleras with golden irises. He also has pierced ears, and a black tattoo in the shape of the Grigori emblem on his lower back.

His outfit consists of street clothes, with all of his upper-body attire being sleeveless, which allows him to transform his mechanical pair of arms without a hassle. Inside his personal workshop, he wears a black jumpsuit with the sleeves ripped off, with the name *Ἥφαιστος* embroidered over the chest pocket in golden threats.

## Personality

Hephaestus is depicted as an aloof, pragmatic, and cynical god who has a fatalist point of view toward others, especially toward his fellow Olympians. He has a tendency to be gruff, as well as bitter and disappointed in people and, perhaps, in all organic life-forms in general. Hence, he preferred to put his faith in machines instead of people, as to him, machines will never disappoint, and even when they were broken, they could still be fixed, unlike people.

As the god and patron of various domains of immense importance toward mankind, he is an extremely diligent and hard-working god, often spending weeks nonstop to work on his duties without much caring about himself. According to his employees, his workaholic tendency borders on unhealthy, as he often neglects his basic needs in order to finish the amount of work he has for himself, both the paperwork he had to do as an Olympian god and the personal project he has given to himself.

In the modern day, due to mankind's dependency on many of his domains, his responsibility and importance become more and more significant in comparison to his fellow Olympians, to the point where he would have to spend months non-stop trying to finish his loads of paperwork.

He has a soft spot for those who were abandoned at a young age and feels compelled to help ease their pain, similar to how he had been saved by Thetis as a child when Hera abandoned him.

He is known for having a brutal and violent temper when angered, which is so intense that it makes his head bursts into fire - slightly melts away the synthetic skin and reveals bits of the mechanical skull beneath - and triggers volcanoes into eruption, with the destruction of Pompeii being an example for one of his "bad days". According to Poseidon, he inherited his temper from both of his parents, though his is multiplied tenfold.

As a crafter, he is confident of his own craftsmanship, calling it "the only thing special" about himself. He holds himself as the Divine Blacksmith of the Olympus very seriously, believing that it is the only reason he should be on Mount Olympus and if he ever lost the position or his creations ever decreases in quality, he will immediately kicked out by his family, now that he had lost all of his worth.

Despite this, he still has a very low self-esteem, mainly due to his past appearance and his history of being abandoned by his mother for his deformities, and thus considers himself to be the "*greatest flaw born of Khaos' lineage*". Ever since his arrival on Mount Olympus and living among the gods there, he became more bitter and hateful toward all things beautiful, including his own family, though after his marriage to Aglaea, he finally went to therapy and his hatred finally lessened. In Chapter XXX, however, it was revealed that he had stopped his therapist sessions ever since Aglaea's death and had once again wallowed himself in self-hatred.

### Roman Form

Hephaestus can change into his Roman counterpart of **Vulcan**. As Vulcan, he becomes more disciplined, militaristic, and warlike due to the Romans being a more warlike race than the Greeks. The Greeks envisioned Hephaestus as a benevolent and clever being. The Romans believed Vulcan to be the god of volcanoes, giving him greater respect among them.

## Weaknesses

### Harming, Trapping, and Banishing

* **Witchcraft**: As witchcraft is a form of magic wielded by witches to oppose those of heavenly nature, pagan gods such as Hephaestus are susceptible by witchery. There are many witchery spells and rituals that can be used to trap, weaken, and hurt him, with some rituals rumored to be capable of even killing immortals such as the pagan gods.
* **Celestial Weapons**: Weapons made out of sacred metals, such as Celestial Bronze or Imperial Gold, can be used against the majority of supernatural beings, including pagan gods such as Hephaestus.
* **Lack of Worship & Offerings**: As a pagan god, Hephaestus gains more power from the prayers, offerings, and sacrifices from mortal devotees, and is dependent on it to maintain his immense divinity. If he stops gaining offerings from his loyal followers, his powers may become immensely weakened. Due to his essence being tied to the Western Civilization, he can gain power from those associated and symbolized by his divine domains, or associated with him or the myths surrounding him.

### Killing

* **Divine Weapons**: The divine weapons of the gods, which are crafted from sacred metals and are imbued with their wielders' divinity, can be used to kill or injure fellow immortal gods like Hephaestus. However, due to his immense power, only a principal god’s Symbol of Power is capable of killing him.
* **Enochian Weapons**: Hephaestus can be killed using weapons made out of Enochian metals.
	+ **Longinus**: As the Longinus are Sacred Gears made out of Enochian metals of the highest-ranking, forged by Heavens' forges with the highest-quality Enochian technology and are imbued with fragments of the Biblical God's divinity, those with enough skills and experience can absolutely and permanently killed Hephaestus, to the point where he can never be reborn or resurrected again.
* **Faustian Weapons**: Hephaestus can be killed using weapons made out of Faustian metals.
* **Primordials' Weapons**: Weapons created and wielded by primordial entities can be used to permanently and absolutely obliterate every and any being in existence but other primordial entities, erasing their entire existence from the worlds so that they can never be reborn, or resurrected again without being saved by God's omnipotence.

## Trivia

* Another name for Vulcan is Mulciber which means "fire" in Latin, and is thought to be the namesake for the Demon Mulciber.
* His symbols are his heavy hammer, the ax, the anvil, and a pair of tongs.
	+ His sacred animals are the donkey, the dog, and the crane.
* His forge or workshop was often mentioned in Greek Mythology to be located under a volcano, and the work he did within it caused frequent eruptions.
* According to some stories, Hera had him by herself due the birth of Athena. But that would be considered impossible as he helped Zeus give birth to Athena.
* The prominent Roman Plebeian *gens*, the *Caecilia* claimed descent from him through his son Caeculus, who founded the city of Praeneste in the region of Latium.
* The Vulcanalia, A festival falling on August 23rd, the period of greatest drought and highest fire risk in Italy, was named after Vulcan.
* The word "volcano" and "volcanic" is derived from the name of Isola Vulcano - a volcanic island in the Aeolian Islands of Italy whose name originated from Hephaestus' Roman counterpart Vulcan.
	+ The minor planet 2212 Hephaistos was named after him.
	+ The sooty grunter (*Hephaestus fuliginosus*), is a species of freshwater ray-finned fish found in northern Australia that is named after him.
	+ The name "Vulcan" has been used for various other fictional planets, with the most famous one being the planet Vulcan from Star Trek.
	+ The Avro Vulcan (later Hawker Siddeley Vulcan) was a high-altitude strategic bomber operated by the Royal Air Force from 1956 until 1984.
* A Vulcan Statue located in Birmingham, Alabama is the largest cast-iron statue in the world.
	+ A 12-foot tall and 1,200 pound Vulcan statue at California University of Pennsylvania (CAL U) serves as the school's mascot.