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Hercules
Real Name: Hercules 
Class: extradimensional
(Olympian diety)
Occupation: warrior , wanderer
Affiliations: Olympian pantheon
, member of the Avengers
Scale of Operations: worldwide
, pan-dimensional
Powers: Hercules' Olympian
physique provides him with unbelievable strength, endurance, and resistance to
injury. Hercules never ages and can only be killed on the Olympian plane of
existence. Hercules has a Golden Mace which is crafted from an unknown,
highly-indestructible material. History: Hercules is the son of Zeus,
king of the Olympian gods, and a mortal woman who lived in ancient Greece some
three thousand years ago. Recognizing the need for a son who would be powerful
enough to defend both the Olympian gods and humanity from future dangers he
foresaw, Zeus seduced Alcmena in the guise of her husband, King Amphitryon of
Troezen. Thanks to Zeus's enchantment, Hercules was born with the potential for
extraordinary strength, which he first displayed before he was even one year old
by strangling two serpents which attacked him. As an adult, Hercules is best
known for his celebrated Twelve Labors, which were performed in part to prove
his worthiness for immortality to Zeus. (One of these Labors, the cleansing of
the Augean Stables, was actually performed by the Eternal called the Forgotten
One, who was sometimes mistaken for Hercules.)
In the course of these Labors, Hercules provoked the wrath of
three immortals who remain his enemies to this day. By slaughtering the
man-eating Stymphalian Birds, he enraged the war god Ares, to whom they were
sacred. In temporarily capturing Cerberus, the three-headed hound that serves as
guardian to the Olympian underworld, Hercules offended Pluto, the lord of that
realm. By killing the Nemean Lion, the Hydra and other creatures spawned by the
inconceivably grotesque and powerful monster Typhoeus, Hercules gained the
bitter enmity of Typhon, the immortal humanoid offspring of Typhoeus and a
Titaness.
However, it was the centaur Nessus who caused Hercules' mortal
demise. Nessus kidnapped Hercules' wife Deianeira, whereupon Hercules shot him
with an arrow. Feigning a wish to make amends, the dying centaur told Deianeira
how to make a love charm from his allegedly enchanted blood, aware that it was
now tainted with the lethal poison of the Hydra, in which Hercules had dipped
his arrows. Some time after Nessus' death, Deianeira, distraught over her
husband's latest infidelity, rubbed the supposed love charm into Hercules'
shirt. Zeus then intervened, consuming the pyre with his thunderbolts and
bringing Hercules to Olympus to be made a true immortal.
In recent years, the Asgardian witch called the Enchantress hoped to gain
revenge on her enemies, the hero team Avengers. She mesmerized Hercules and set
him to attack the team, but the Avenger Hawkeye managed to free him from his
thrall and the Enchantress was routed. However, Hercules was exiled from Olympus
by Zeus as punishment for his unauthorized excursion to Earth. The Avengers
housed Hercules as their guest for months, and he often assisted them in their
adventures. He was eventually made an official member of the team, but he
returned to Olympus with the Avengers to rescue the other Olympians from the
vengeful Typhon. Afterward, Hercules elected to remain on Olympus with Zeus's
blessing.
Later, the Olympian god Ares hoped to incite war among Olympus and Asgard, and
eventually Earth. Ares turned all the Olympian gods to crystal, and, as Hercules
was unaffected by being only half-god, Ares' agents beat him severely and
abandoned him on Earth. Hercules remained amnesiac for many weeks, until he was
discovered by Hawkeye and returned to the Avengers. With the Avengers' aid, the
plot was uncovered and Ares was stopped. Hercules and his teammate, the
Asgardian god Thor, sealed the access to both worlds.
Hercules continued to occasionally interact with Earth, as was the case with his
brief membership in the super-team called the Champions. He also kept in touch
with the Avengers, assisting them against menaces such as Korvac the Enemy.
Eventually, Hercules rejoined the Avengers on a full-time basis.
When the Avengers' mansion headquarters was invaded by Baron Helmut Zemo's
Masters of Evil, Hercules was beaten so severely by a contingent of Masters that
he was left near death, in a coma. Zeus arranged for Hercules to be returned to
Olympus, and in revenge, ordered the imprisonment of the Avengers in Hades. The
Avengers escaped to confront Zeus directly, but they were saved only by the
intervention of Hercules, who had made a recovery and convinced his father the
Avengers were not to blame. Nevertheless, Zeus ordered that Hercules remain in
Olympus forever.
It was not long, however, until Hercules disobeyed his father, returning to
Earth when the Avengers required help against the villainous High Evolutionary,
who misguidingly hoped to forcibly jumpstart humankind's evolution. In the final
battle, Hercules was attached to a machine that would "evolve" him to
a superior state than the Evolutionary. Instead, the device jumpstarted the
Evolutionary's physiology as well, evolving both to a state beyond godhood, and
the two dissipated from Earth's plane.
In reality, the two were captured by the enigmatic beings known as the
Celestials and held prisoner in the so-called Black Galaxy. Thor and his friend,
Eric Masterson, discovered their fate during an adventure at the High
Evolutionary's citadel, Wundagore. Both Masterson and Thor helped rescue the
two, and Hercules, Thor, and Masterson returned to Earth, while the High
Evolutionary turned Wundagore into a spaceship and returned to the Black Galaxy.
Hercules, Thor, and Masterson were then viciously attacked by Mongoose using
weapons he had stolen from Wundagore. Mongoose almost killed Thor using a
powerful energy beam. Masterson took a killing blow for Thor, giving Thor and
Hercules a chance to defeat Mongoose. Unfortunately, Masterson was dying from
his wounds, which led Thor and Masterson to be merged together. Hercules
remained on hand to help his friends, and he would also return to the Avengers
shortly afterwards, becoming an active reserve member during the UN
reorganization of the team. Hercules returned to full-time active duty during a
disappearance of Thor.
Hercules was soon confronted by Zeus, and they had a falling out over Hercules's
apparent preference for the mortal world. Punishing his son, Zeus stripped him
of his immortality and much of his godly power, exiling him once more. The
traumatized Hercules drew emotional support from the Avengers, especially
Deathcry, whom he later aided in returning to her alien Shi'ar homeworld. Upon
his return to Earth he quickly joined the Avengers and remained at their
side, coming from time to time. He accepted the rule of Onslaught just
like everybody else.
The Adventures of Hercules become unclear
afterwards. All that is needed to know is that he was in Asgard, or what
was left of it, with Thor when Storm and her allies came for help. They
joined her Resistance without hesitation.
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