Relius Clover

**Relius Clover** (レリウス＝クローバー*Reriusu Kurōbā*), also known as the **Puppeteer** (人形師 *Ningyōshi*), and **the One**(ザワン *za Wan*) as one of the Ten Sages, is Carl Clover and Ada Clover’s father, and Ignis Clover’s husband. He was a colonel in the Engineering Department for the World Void Information Control Organization, and worked alongside Yūki Terumi and Hades: Izanami. He is a playable character starting with *BlazBlue: Continuum Shift Extend*.

## Appearance

Relius is similar in appearance to his son Carl. He shares his son’s light blond hair and an affinity for the color purple, although the shade of purple he wears is magenta instead of violet. He also wears a golden opera mask, but the reason for this has not been made clear as of yet. Relius wears a purple shirt with black rimming and has his trademark knee-length magenta cape flowing over it. Much like Carl’s cape, Relius’ has a golden X-shaped fixture to hold the cape in place and has two rings protruding out of the lower front halves of it in a similar fashion to the rings on his weapon, the Detonator: Ignis. His baggy white tights are tucked into his stylized black and purple boots, these boots have golden toecaps that have a silver colored nail-like fixture on the top; the mouth of the boots also have a white and golden cuff to them.

In his younger years during the *Phase Shift*series, his appearance is not too different; key differences, however, include shoulder-length hair, a white chemise collar shirt with maroon cuffs, a white scarf with a purple gem, a purple vest, and black trousers. He was constantly described as having a face like wax.

When Relius was in his late teens to early twenties, he was remarkably skinny and had short blond hair styled in a bob. Underneath his trademark cape, he wore a formal black suit and tie. Instead of an opera mask, he wore a leather-like blindfold that covered his eyes.

## Personality

Relius is the twisted, evil mirror image of his son Carl. While he is calculating and courteous like his son, he is cold and utterly devoid of empathy. His only true care in the world is his research. Relius is even willing to go so far as to kill gods for the sake of science – a curiosity which Terumi just so happened to pique. Carl, his son, hates him for taking Ada and his mother away, and spends a majority of his travels in pursuit of Relius. During Noel Vermillion’s story in BlazBlue: Continuum Shift, Relius attempted to kidnap her in order to 'examine' her, and he had gotten a hold of Arakune at the end of his respective story. He did not hesitate to attack his own son when confronted by him.

It is revealed through BlazBlue: Continuum Shift’s Story Mode that part of Relius’ lack of empathy stems from his prior experiments, as well as his experience in the Boundary. During the process of restoring Nirvana, as well as the time he fell into the Kiln, he saw what he believed to be a person’s true form: a ball of bluish-green light which Relius refers to as a person’s soul. From this revelation, Relius began seeing humans as nothing more than “things”, rather than living beings and therefore their existence is meaningless (conveniently excluding himself).

In BlazBlue: Chronophantasma, he reveals that his allegiance with Hades: Izanami is merely a means to an end. In truth, Relius finds the world repulsive and doomed to repeat the same mistakes over and over again. To rectify this, he intends to recreate the world as he envisions, becoming its “ultimate architect”, a world where beings such as Amaterasu and Hades: Izanami will no longer be necessary. However, Bang Shishigami foils his plans and Izanami betrays him leaving him to his fate, so Relius was supposed to be manipulated by his son and Litchi Faye Ling until he fixes Ada, but he somehow avoided this in BlazBlue: Centralfiction.

Interestingly, when he was much younger in the Bloodedge Experience novels, Relius was, notably, kinder than he is in his later years. He both helped Naoto Kurogane up after being attacked by Valkenhayn Hellsing and gave advice to both Naoto and Raquel Alucard, even when it was not required of him.

## Powers and Abilities

Relius possesses a vast knowledge of both science and magic and is widely known as the genius “Mad Puppeteer” with unparalleled skills in Alchemy.[1] He has created several weapons utilizing his intellect, such as the Murakumo Units, the Event Weapon named Nirvana, and his own puppet Ignis, using his own wife’s body and soul as a catalyst. He has also somehow survived numerous brushes with death.

Armed with his immense knowledge in magic, mechanics, Magic Formula and his puppet Ignis, Relius has been shown to be one of the most powerful and dangerous beings in the BlazBlue universe, having fought and defeated the likes of Valkenhayn of the Six Heroes in some of their encounters and rarely showing any effort in any of his fights seen thus far.

Even in his youth, Relius was a major presence in a fight, using six silver marionette arms to fight opponents, despite this, he could not keep up with the sheer, raw power of Clavis Alucard, even with the assistance of Valkenhayn. At that time, his life-force value hovered around 9152.

Relius’ Drive is Detonator (デトネーター Detonētā), where he summons Ignis to his side. Unlike his son, Relius’ Drive does not require the button to be held down in order for her to be active, let alone use special moves, and she moves much faster, flying and hovering close to him. Like Nirvana though, Ignis operates on a limited gauge and will disappear once depleted. Alternatively, she will disappear if Relius takes a direct hit. He is also less reliant on Ignis as he has plenty of specials that utilize various mechanical constructs. His Overdrive is Maxim Dance (マキシムダンス Makishimu Dansu), which recharges Ignis’ gauge much quicker than normal.

Relius is one of the Qualified.

## TMNT X Pokemon

Relius dreams of doing some experiments on the Turtles. Especially April since she is a Human-Krang Hybrid to understand her body and the systems in it.

## Trivia

**Naming**

* “Relius” is a name which seems to be derived from the Latin name “Aurelius” which means “Golden”; it is typically a name given to males since Anglo-Saxon times but it has greatly declined in popularity.
* Most of Relius’ special moves are in Latin while most of Carl’s are in Italian.
* Relius is contrasted further from Carl in that he makes more usage of gratuitous Latin in his battle dialogue, and that the translations of his attacks are arguably ambiguous.

**Appearance**

* When electrocuted, Relius’ skeleton reveals various mechanical parts, such as gears and a prosthetic arm, which implies that he may have experimented on himself in the past.

**Other**

* His birthday, June 1, is International Children’s Day.
* His Astral Heat uses different binding methods for each character:
* Ragna: Arms bound to an X-shaped stake with an irritated expression on his face.
* Jin: Arms are chained spread-eagle, while legs are chained at the ankles.
* Noel, Lambda, Nu, Mu: Placed inside a Murakumo unit test tube. The Japanese text on the right of each device has different readings for each Murakumo. Naturally, Noel and Mu have the same readings, but with different character sprites, while Lambda and Nu use the same sprite but with palettes swapped. During this time, dry ice-like fog can be seen on the floor.
* Rachel: Tied via rose vines to a cross. Gii is morphed into a tabernacle and Nago, still an umbrella, is being constricted by a vine.
* Taokaka: Locked inside a pet cage.
* Tager: Limbs magnetized by 2 giant U-magnets. This one actually uses various different sprites for Tager.
* Litchi: Kneeling on the ground with her hands tied to her enlarged staff. Lao Jiu is tied above her, uable to help. A magic circle on the floor is used to trap the character.
* Arakune: Poured inside a huge lab beaker/flask while being burned alive by a bunsen burner. Strangely, his mask appears to be sweating.
* Bang: Hands are tied behind his back as cinderblocks are placed on his knees to break his legs. A large row of cinderblocks yet to be placed are seen behind him. A magic circle on the floor is used to trap the character.
* Carl: He and Ada are suspended by puppet strings in a marionette fashion.
* Hakumen: Chained to the seal Kokonoe used on him in his Story Mode in BlazBlue: Continuum Shift.
* Tsubaki:
* BlazBlue: Continuum Shift Extend: Sits on the floor praying, facing the wrong way (back turned to Relius) as her blindness has overcome her. Some of Izayoi’s feathers are seen around her. A magic circle on the floor is used to trap her.
* BlazBlue: Chronophantasma: Stands with hands chained above her head, back still turned to Relius although she is trying to face him. A magic circle on the floor is used to trap her.
* BlazBlue: Chronophantasma: Stands with hands chained above her head, back still turned to Relius although she is trying to face him. A magic circle on the floor is used to trap the character.
* Hazama: Sits in a chair looking bored. The way he sits is a reference to BlazBlue: Phase Shift 1. A magic circle on the floor is used to trap the character.
* Makoto: Panicking while trapped inside a giant hamster ball. A magic circle on the floor is used to trap the character.
* Valkenhayn: Strapped via leather belts to an iron maiden and gagged so he cannot bite back.
* Platinum: Inside a barrel with swords slotted in, crying a fountain of tears.
* Mirror-Relius: Lies asleep in a different chair opposite of the winning Relius while the losing Ignis is disabled.
* Amane: Locked inside an ancient Japanese brothel cage used for displaying prostitutes, sitting down and facing away from Relius while hiding his face with his sleeve.
* Bullet: Put in crawling position, hands bound behind her back with red tape.
* Azrael: Crucified on a cross made from a long board and stocks, then hung upside-down from a magic circle on the ceiling.
* Izayoi: Arms held above her head by a giant puppet arm, which sprouts smaller arms that grab the rest of her body.
* Kagura Mutsuki: Suspended in the air with his hands tied behind his back with rope from a gallows stand. His Zweihander is on the ground and out of his reach.
* Yūki Terumi: Sitting in a chair with his arms tied behind it. Behind him is a mirror that reflects his ghost form, effectively creating a looping paradox.
* Kokonoe: Strapped into a chair with a cat-shaped helmet on her head with several tubes connecting it to a mind-reading machine.
* Celica Ayatsuki Mercury: Inside of Minerva taking the form of a futuristic glass coffin.
* Hibiki Kohaku: Strapped to a large metal gear.
* Naoto Kurogane: Blindfolded while chained to a chair.
* Konoe Ayatsuki Mercury: Bathing in a cauldron of boiling blood, naked.
* Hades: Izanami: Laying limp/unconscious, surrounded by candles and floating skulls, all lit with purple flames. Yasakani no Magatama sits behind her with the bits hanging downwards.
* Es: Placed inside of a tube where she was created, like on this illustration.
* Mai: Strapped and restrained onto a chair mechanism.
* Susanoo: Standing still. Broken, glowing chains are attached to his wrists, as well as laying on the floor.
* Mitsuyoshi: Struggling with a giant pet recovery collar around his head.
* Also, in his Astral Heat, if one looks closely at the lighting on the walls, several shadows of dangling corpses can be seen as well as what appears to be their blood. They are possibly previous test subjects.
* In the console version of BlazBlue: Chronophantasma, characters say specific lines when hit by Relius’ Astral Heat.