Pietro de Valencia

**Pietro de Valencia**, before his fall, was a Church cardinal with world-wide ambitions.

## Story

### Pietro's Desire

Pietro was raised by Church standards and quickly rose the ranks of the Church as an Exorcist. Skilled and intelligent, he defeated several Demons and contributed to the sealing of Demon Lords. However, he suffered several losses from this war, resulting in him being obsessed with a way to seal away demons forever. Reading occult lore, he discovered that his previous methods were unsufficent and that one day, Demon Lords would return.

Pietro studied until he found a solution : to use Thaumaturgy, both holy and unholy, in order to control and subjugate Inferno itself, controlling the "dark half of the chessboard" to prevent it from being anymore of a threat. Despite the catastrophic consequences for the world's equilibrium, Pietro - who was a natural-born Divine Mage - started to develop methods in order to wield Black Magic as well.

### The Mastermind

Pietro spent years performing experiment on Chosen individuals, taking part of their flesh in experiments to graft this flesh onto his own body. When the Dein Umbra organization opposed the Church, Pietro kidnapped their leader Isa Norwind's wife Serena Norwind and used her as a seal for Satan. Then, in order to retrieve all seven stones in which Demon Lords were imprisoned, Pietro corrupted his right-hand man Gabrielo Sigreal with the influence of Beelzebub's stone.

Results went as expected - Gabrielo and his team brought Pietro back all gemstones, although there was a price to his actions : Gabrielo's life. Pietro experimented Thaumaturgy by resurrecting Gabrielo and making him serve him once again under the name Omen. Finally, when all stones were reunited in a single place, Pietro performed a final ritual and merged with Hell.

### Pietro's Legacy

Gabrielo's team - Dorothee McDaniels, Ansam, Layton and Henry Belmont, burst into hell in order to prevent Pietro from controlling it - knowing that he would eventually be corrupted by Inferno's essence and become a worse monster, a Blasphemy. Pietro fought against them, certain that his way was, if not righteous, at least the best possible. Yet he was defeated and fell.

As he fell, the darkness caged within him emerged from his chest, seemingly killing him and taking the shape of the Inferno's original essence, Leanor Pandaemonium. Thus, Pietro died, ironically, from being unable to control the very thing he sought to become.

Pietro's actions deeply shocked the minds of the Church and other massive organization for decades. He apparently left a successor, a hundred years after, Frederico de Valencia, with unknown motives. He was apparently resurrected by Angra Mainyu much later to act as his pawn, but he left - and to this day his whereabouts are unknown.

## Apparearance

Pietro is a weak and frail old man with light blue eyes and messy grey hair, still kept in a ponytail. He wears crimson clothes, befitting a cardinal, and walks using a cane. His left arm is seemingly handicapped, unable to move, and bandaged - while in fact, it is an amalgamate of corrupted Chosen flesh used as a catalyst to harness dark powers.

## Personality

Supremely utilitarian, jaded by the price his side paid to defeat Inferno once and terrified at the prospect that it would be in vain, Pietro would do anything, no matter the cost, to defeat Inferno once and for all. With neither regrets nor empathy, he experimented, tortured, corrupted and brought the death of dozen people, deeming them necessary evils for mankind's final triumph.

However, Pietro was by no means self-righteous. He knew what he did was morally wrong, but lost too many things and was too desperate to care. He sacrificed his own salvation to protect mankind in a heartbeat, knowing how wrong his actions were, because in his mind, he was already lost.

## Powers

* **Divine Magic Mastery:** Pietro, as a holy Exorcist of the Church, knows prayers, sacraments and exorcisms that directly draw from the Akasha's power to perform divine miracles.
* **Thaumaturgy Mastery:** After having a pseudo-demonic arm grafted to him, Pietro was able to perform major Thaumaturgy spells such as resurrection magic, opening gates between Inferno and Interra and even taking control of Hell itself.
* **Seven Demons Knight:** After absorbing the Seven Demon Lords within him, Pietro became a formidable god-like warrior with the ability to manipulate all primal Elements save for Darkness, and was only defeated because of Leanor's existence.

## Storylines

* Chronicles of the Damned features him as the main antagonist.

## Trivia

* "de Valencia" is not Pietro's surname but his title as a Cardinal from the Spanish town of Valence (Valencia), which in Timeline Zero's Interra apparently is known for its talented Exorcists.
* Despite that, Pietro is an Italian surname. That is because despite being born in Italy, Pietro was trained as an exorcist in Valencia.