Blood-Mother
| Blood-Mother | ||||||||||
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| Corrupted Earth Spirit | ||||||||||
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| Origin: | Magic
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| Archetype: | Dominator
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| Security Level: | ??
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| Biographical Data | ||||||||||
| Real Name: | None
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| Known Aliases: | Crystal Blake
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| Age: | Dawn of Earth
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| Gender: | Female
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| Species: | Earth Spirit
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| Ethnicity: | None
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| Birthdate: | Unknown
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| Birthplace: | Unknown
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| Relatives: | None
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| Characteristics | ||||||||||
| Height: | 5'6
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| Weight: | 122lbs
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| Eyes: | Green
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| Hair: | Red
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| Complexion: | Variable
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| Physical Build: | Variable
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| Status | ||||||||||
| Alignment: |
Lawful Neutral | |||||||||
| Reputation: |
Reputable | |||||||||
| Identity: | Semi-Secret
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| Years Active: | 2 Years
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| Base of Operations: | Paragon City, Rogue Isles
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| Citizenship: | Rogue Isles
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| Education: | High School, Arachnos
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| Occupation: | Criminal, Bouncer
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| Marital Status: | Single, Never Married
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| Known Powers and Abilities | ||||||||||
- Master Hand to Hand Combatant - Reflexes, Strength, Endurance, and Agility operate at Super Human levels | ||||||||||
| Equipment and Paraphernalia | ||||||||||
Rocket Board
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Endurance |
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| Agility |
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Speed |
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| Fighting |
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Projectiles |
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Resistance |
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| Intelligence |
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Psyche |
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| Intuition |
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Charisma |
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Overview
The Blood-Mother is one of the most powerful corrupt nature spirits known to exist. She was born of the taint within the Mother Goddess caused by all the death and destruction throughout the centuries. While all the Blood-Mother's magic abilities are formidable, her nature based powers are truly terrifying.
Appearance
The Blood-Mother appears to be a woman in her early 30's. She bears black, tattoo-like features on her face, believed to be the mark of a pure nature spirit. Aside from that, her body and face appear to be flawless in every way. Her voice is normally sultry and alluring, but changes to a softer more soothing tone at times. At first glance, she may appear to be the perfect woman.
While some may say her unnatural beauty is due to her being a spirit of nature, that would only be partially true. The Blood-Mother is neither a ghostly spirit, nor is she flesh and blood. She is actually sentient stone (or crystal to be exact), the flesh on her body is simply to maintain a human appearance. The true reason for her beauty is that her form was quite literally carved and chiseled by the hand of nature who has centuries of experience. Making her form, in fact, flawless.
Since her shape is created by her own power, she can change her appearance easily. She often switches between different clothes and hairstyles, but often leaves her body and facial features the same. It is possible for her to take any shape, be it a beautiful woman, or a hulking monstrosity.
Powers and Abilities
The Blood-Mother combines earth, blood, magic, and her own evil taint to create and manipulate a unique substance called "Blood Crystals". These crystals are sharper than razors and harder than diamonds. They share the dark red coloring of their name and have been used in a variety of ways.
Offensively, shards are employed as throwing or stabbing weapons making them a primary method of attack. The Blood-Mother can also create large amounts with frightening speed, using the crystal to encase and incapacitate her foes. She has kept a few of her kills as trophies. Beings that will remain encased and displayed forever.
Defensively, the Blood-Mother can cover her entire body with these razor shards to protect her from physical attacks. Also, since her entire body is made of this same substance she has a high resistance to physical damage. Her body is hard enough to withstand bullets, and laser refract off of her like light in a prism. She does have several distinct weaknesses, none of which she speaks of regularly.
One of the stranger abilities of the Blood-Mother, she is able to merge her spirit with another Mage. Being that her physical body is merely a shell, merging her spirit with another magic user is a simple task if both members are willing. The Mage temporarily gains vast arcane knowledge and an exponential increase in magical power. There is however, a single drawback. The Blood-Mother is, at the simplest definition, and evil taint born of centuries of death and evil. Along with vast power the Mage also quickly becomes more sadistic and corrupt, eventually becoming uncontrollable. Many mages have met their demise in this power mad state, much to the Blood-Mothers amusement.
In fact, she has very little to fear from death. Like nature, her existence moves in cycles. If her physical form is destroyed, she would eventually take a new form, and the cycle would begin again. It has been theorized that the evil spirit could be permanently destroyed through magic, but magic strong enough to destroy the spirit of the Mother Goddess is not known to exist.
Early History
Since the dawn of mankind, nature’s spirit has had many names. Gaia, Terra, but most came to refer to her simply as “The Mother”. She was the spirit of the earth and all living things, preserving the natural balance of life, death, and rebirth.
The Mother became aware of a dark taint within her spirit. A taint born of all the blood spilled into her soil, and her deep hidden anger and resentment towards mankind. As this taint grew, the Mother feared it would overtake her and the balance of nature would be lost forever. So the Mother separated this taint from herself, in turn creating a new spirit. She cast this spirit down, trapping it deep within the Earth, where it was meant to remain forever.
However, this spirit born of the Mother's evil taint had already become strong enough to take physical form. While new to the "living" world and still weak, her influence would touch mankind throughout history.
Akkadian
By the time Sargon died, the wars had all but died out. They had defeated all within the reach of their empire. Sargon's youngest son Rimush took over the throne. The Blood-Mother was not pleased with this lack of bloodshed, and secretly instigated revolt among the people. Rimush battled many revolts in his 9 years of ruling before he was allegedly assassinated.
Manishtushu, Sargon's eldest son, then took the throne. This son was also assassinated during a Sea battle against 32 Kings who had united against him. Historical records show that at lease 25 of the 32 Kings were approached by a "Beautiful Goddess". These records imply that the Blood-Mother orchestrated the confrontation in secret. Naram-Sin, Sargon's grandson was next in line for the throne. He was easily swayed by "Ki" into further conquest. He pushed his troops forward in one bloody contest after another. He was said to have had an army of 350,000 men, the largest of any up to that date. These battles continued on and off through the passing decades until they culminated with the defeat of the Lullubi.
When Naram-Sin died, his son took over the throne. However, he was never approached by the Goddess Ki. Over the next 100 years, the Empire entered a rapid state of decline. It's borders continued to weaken until the Akkadian's were defeated by the barbarians known as the "Gutians". There barbarians were lead by the Blood-Mother who watched the battle, relishing in the fall of the old empire, her power having been substantially increased over the passed generations. When the battle was over, the mysterious woman was nowhere to be found.
Roman Empire
During the reign of the Roman Empire, the Blood-Mother relished in luxury under the name "Livia Faustina". Her beauty was revered, and many sought her affections. Enjoying the attention and the finest comforts that Rome could offer, Livia greatly enjoyed her time within the Empire. The Roman Empire was set on conquest, leaving no need for her intervention. Instead, the Blood-Mother enjoyed her beauty and riches (easily provided through magic) while the Empire's conquests fed her power. There were few who knew of her magical nature, and they worshiped her as a goddess much to her delight.
Having money and beauty wasn't enough for her though. She needed power. To that end, she used her wealth to secretly take control of most of the merchant trade within Rome. Soon every major supplier to the Empire was secretly in her employ. This action gave her a great deal of power to manipulate events as she pleased. A useful tool when fighting boredom in the lap of luxury.
Of course, Livia still fell prey to the occasional fits of boredom. Throughout her time in Rome, she was secretly responsible for several deaths. She could sense the darkness inside a person, and she was a master at drawing that darkness out. She would take different forms, usually beautiful women and find her victims in the darkness of night. She would encourage their perversity, applaud their cruelty helping them to lose their humanity in a fog of primal rage and lust. Her victims were eventually driven or manipulated into madness and usually arrested for some grievous crime and executed.
Aside from being fawned over by potential suitors, the woman known as Livia Faustina remained somewhat low key for the duration of the Roman Empire. Behind the scenes, her power continued to increase during Rome's decline and subsequent fall to the Turks in 1453. After the fall of the Roman Empire, Livia had no intention of remaining under the rule of the Turks. She quietly vanished from the city.
The Renaissance
After she left the Roman Empire, she traveled to Florence Italy, who at the time was in the midst of the Renaissance. Taking the name "Valeria De Laurentis", she eventually followed the same pattern and became a prominent member of the Merchants Guild. Although she did not hold a high rank within the Guild, her vast wealth placed her at the head of the Aristocracy. As she did in Rome, she spread her influence through Florence, until she secretly controlled most of the merchants within the city and beyond. This time however, she also spread to control most of the illegal activities within the city as well.
Under this identity, she traveled through most of Europe. She spent a majority of her time in England and France. Europe seemed entrenched in war constantly, but the nobility enjoyed lush pampering and luxury. It was the perfect place for Valeria.
Since Europe seemed to spend most of it's time at war already, Valeria had very little influence over historical events. As she traveled through Europe she discovered more about music, and used her time learning to play several instruments including the piano and violin. She discovered the beauty of art and saw first hand the works of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci.
It was perhaps in this time that the entity known as the Blood-Mother, found peace as much as something such as herself can. Society was structured and those lesser knew their place. She spent her time in wealth and luxury as she had become accustomed. She had young men and women at her feet, and beauty all around her. Valeria was content there for many years. However, times changed and the world around her began to shape itself into something she could no longer understand.
People spoke of freedom and equal treatment, as if those beneath her deserved to be treated as equals. In her eyes, despite her charade, nobody was her equal. At least an Aristocracy held to that belief in some way. This "new world" everyone spoke of sounded like a horrible place full of wretches and scum all of whom were supposed to be her equal. Disgusted by the very thought, Valeria left the first and only place she had ever actually called home.
Recent History
Age of Heroes
The Blood-Mother remained unseen after her departure from Europe. It wasn't until the first heroes and villains began to appear that she resurfaced. Heroes and Villains had become the new Aristocracy, and the Blood-Mother was more than ready to find her place among them. She took the name "Crystal Blake" and settled into the Rogue Isles. It was during this time that she first began to use the moniker of "Blood-Mother", becoming a powerful villainess withing the Rogue Isles.
Unlike a majority of her existence, there was little need for subtlety in this new time. The game was simple; the villains would do whatever they wanted, and the heroes would try to stop them. There were few people who could challenge her vast Arcane power. In fact, it wasn't until she faced a hero calling himself "Statesman" that she met her first true defeat. While her defeat angered her, it was also exhilarating.
The dictator of the Rogue Isles also possessed great power. Lord Recluse and The Blood-Mother fought several times in the early days of heroes. They eventually formed a unspoken treaty, in which they did not interfere in each others schemes to maintain a relative sense of peace in the Isles. Through her arcane research, the Blood-Mother learned the source of both Statesman and Lord Recluse's power. Due to her nature, she could not use the Well of Furies as they did. It was however in her best interests to ensure that nobody else ever found and used the Well. She has repeatedly killed those who got too close to discovering the Well's location.
During her research she also discovered several alternate versions of the world she knew, decades before they became known to the world at large. Including the world known know as Praetorian Earth. This alternate dimension was ruled by Marcus Cole, better known as Statesman. "Emperor Cole" created a utopia on his world, at the expense of freedom. Intrigued by this new world, the Blood-Mother arranged a personal visit.
Praetoria
The Blood-Mother killed a woman named Natalie Brooks, and assumed her identity. Under this persona, The Blood-Mother worked inside the Behavioral Adjustment Facility (B.A.F.). She met many people with strange and sometimes powerful abilities. However, none caught her attention as much as a young girl named Mercy.
Mercy was just a child, trapped inside a horrible facility. Yet she strolled through the hallways with an innocent smile. When she spoke to "Natalie", she seemed to look through the Blood-Mothers visage. She was a sweet girl, who had the power to open portals between any two points. It was possible that the young girl could have escaped any time she pleased, but the thought had probably never occurred to her. She seemed content, at least for the time being.
As much as she would deny it, a nurturing maternal side is as much in her nature as her violence. Mercy brought this side out of The Blood-mother, and soon Crystal confided in Mercy her true name and nature. Over the following year, Crystal and Mercy grew close. In fact, Crystal soon began to care for Mercy as if she were a daughter. She held as much love for the child as she had ever had for anything in her long existence.
One day, Mercy was taken by the orderlies for "treatment". Unable to let the girl go, Crystal tracked Mercy down in the facility. She found the young girl in a lab, screaming as they ran some kind of experiment on her. A burning rage unlike anything she had ever felt swelled inside of her, and the ancient entities dark magic began to crackle to the surface. The Blood-Mother began to slaughter the scientists inside the lab, followed by the guards responding to the alarm. The Blood-Mothers vast power was overshadowed only by her anger.
After killing everyone she came across, she cut the straps from Mercy's bed, freeing the girl. Mercy reached over, wrapping her small arms around Crystal, hugging her tight. In a calm and soothing voice, Crystal asked Mercy to open a portal to get them out of the facility. Mercy smiled wide and held out her hand as a glowing portal appeared in front of them. They walked through it together entering the relative safety of Praetoria. Soon, the Blood-Mother's magic took them both back to Primal Earth.
After the first year things seemed to settle down for them both. Mercy was well provided for, and sometimes a bit too well protected by her adoptive mother. When Mercy hit her teenage rebellion phase, it wasn't pretty. She was able to travel anywhere using her portals, leaving Crystal to magically track down and return the girl. Some would say it was normal family issues, just a bit more epic in it's resolution. Still, Mercy knew when to push and when to back down. It was never far from her mind exactly what Crystal was, and her true nature. Despite their love for one another, Mercy always knew to tread carefully.
When Mercy was 15 years old, their relatively peaceful life was shattered. During a quiet morning breakfast, their home was invaded by Praetorian Police. Mercy dove under the table as Crystal quickly stood from her chair, Blood Crystal blades protruding from her body. The PPD opened fire on her, they're bullets ricocheting off her harmlessly. Crystal began to systematically take down the invading troops in a bloody and brutal display of force. She did leave one of them alive long enough to learn what the purpose of the invasion.
It seemed that Emperor Cole had plans to one day invade Primal Earth, and Mercy was a large piece of that plan. Using her powers, Cole could bypass the worlds defenses and deploy his troops to any location at any time. The Blood-Mothers rescue, disrupted Cole's plans and he ordered his forces to track them down, kill Crystal, and return the girl. It had apparently taken them years to track them down. However, now they had a trail, and they would need to stay on the move to keep Mercy safe.
Darkness Reborn
Even without a physical form, her spirit remained there, watching events unfold as helpless as a child. She could not have been prepared for what happened next. After collecting Mercy again, they knelt her down in the middle of the room, and without a word, put a bullet into her. Crystal watched as her beloved daughter fell lifeless to the floor, scared and alone.
It would be a week before Crystal was able to take physical form again. Her new body felt more like a shell than ever before, she felt completely empty inside. It didn't take her long to find Mercy's body. She took her daughter from the morgue, and gave her a private burial in a secret place. For the first time in her existence, she collapsed weeping uncontrollably. She had never felt pain like this before, it was encompassing, consuming her entire being.
Then as it always does, her sorrow turned to rage. She no longer cared about her own existence, wealth, power. It all meant nothing to her. The only thing that mattered to her was finding a way to inflict the pain she felt on Emperor Cole and his entire world. Crystal had suppressed many of her violent and primal instincts for the sake of her daughter, but now they rushed to the surface, boiling over her. She knew that Emperor Cole possessed the power of the Well of Furies, a power she could never obtain. There was no way she could beat him in her current state. However, she was not alone, and she had a plan to even the scales.
Power Play
Shortly after burying Mercy, Crystal returned to Praetoria. Her only ally was here, even if she didn't know it yet. Crystal began to cast a spell. This spell was well known to her, as she used it often to return her to her secret lair whenever the need arises. As she finished casting she was teleported to her lair. She looked around at the stone walls. They looked almost perfect, but there were small differences that most would never notice. However after living for centuries, she knew every crack of her home. She began to walk through the familiar halls, her footsteps echoed through the stone structure.
The sound of her footsteps was broken by a another set of footsteps. They were heavy, loud, and charging towards her. Crystal turned towards the sound with an arched eyebrow. Suddenly, a large Golem made of Blood Crystal charged out of the shadows towards her. She smiled at the sight, imagining how terrifying that would be to a intruder. She held up her hand calmly as the golem crumbled away. Crystal continued moving until she got to the throne room.
"You must be eager to die if you've come here" A female voice said alluringly from the darkness
"I wonder if that sounds as melodramatic when I say it" Crystal replied back
From the throne stood a familiar figure. The Blood-Mother, or at least Praetoria's version of her. Crystal made her way to her doppelganger, and explained why she was there. The Blood-Mother is able to join her spirit with another mage, which increases their power exponentially. However the Blood-Mother's evil taint quickly drives the other mage into an evil madness usually leading to the mage's death. This time however, Crystal wanted to merge their two spirits together. It would create a new Blood-Mother, who's power would rival or possibly exceed an Incarnate.
The Praetorian Blood-Mother seemed less than interested in a permanent joining. Crystal explained that for all the Blood-Mother's power, she was the one that had what they had always desired. A purpose. Intrigued by this new-found purpose, the Blood-Mother agreed to share memories with Crystal. She would experience her memories, her life, as if she had lived it herself. Crystal watched the Blood-Mother's face as she lived her memories, and the two entities became one mind. She saw joy in her eyes as she raised Mercy, and watched the powerful villainess tremble as Mercy was killed.
"They killed her!" The Blood-Mother shouted in anger but still crying
"Yes."' Crystal replied plainly
"This...is our purpose?" The Praetorian asked with a sense of understanding, "Combine our powers so we can destroy Cole?"
"Yes." Crystal replied again in a soothing voice, "We have never loved anything like her. They took that from us, and now they need to pay."
The Blood-Mothers eyes looked feral, "We will rip them apart for what they've done!"
"Then you'll do it?" Crystal asked
"Yes, we owe her that much" The Blood-Mother replied as she stood, "You do realize that our combined power and darkness could drive us completely mad"
"For the first time ever...I believe our heart is stronger than our hate"' Crystal replied, "I'm willing to take that chance."
There were no more words needed between the two villains. They began to cast an ancient incantation, and then their spirits merged and combined into a single body. They're body could barely hold their new power. Magical energy cracked and they took a new form. A new Blood-Mother was born.
Aftermath
The Blood-Mother confined herself to her lair for the next several weeks, to allow herself to adjust to her new power. She learned to suppress the majority of her abilities, as her full power was almost too destructive. Of course, when needed she was also able to call forth her full magical might to her bidding. Crystal Blake Vogue Cover Shoot
Once she returned to Primal Earth, she began to research Praetorian Earth and Emperor Cole. The existence of Praetoria had since become widely known among the hero and villain populations. Emperor Cole's plan to invade Primal Earth had also begun to circulate. The villains of the Rogue Isles had little interest in stopping him, they were more interested in how they could best profit or benefit by it. Crystal soon realized that her fellow villains would be little help to her in the battle against Praetoria.
It wasn't long until she heard of a strike team that had originated from Paragon City, and had supposedly left quite the dent in Emperor Cole's forces. The team was from a government group called S.C.O.R.P.I.O. Crystal decided it might be time to leave her life as a villainess behind and go to Paragon City to join up with this group. While she wasn't especially keen on the thought of helping a bunch of do-gooders, there was no sacrifice she was not willing to make to see Cole and his entire world burn.
Paragon City had put a program in place for villains who wished to reform, and better serve humanity as heroes. Just saying it made Crystal sick, but she went to Paragon City to "reform" herself. It was a slow and degrading process, watching heroes turn up their noses, and preach foolish concepts like "compassion" and "justice". Still, she endured the torment and her record was eventually cleared, giving her new status as a "Probational Hero".
Abilities
Ironically, Vipers most dangerous ability isn't even a super power. His greatest asset is that he is a master of true unarmed combat. There are no "Martial Arts" here. His fighting style is a compilation of brutal, bone-crunching, street combat techniques that have been tried, tested, and improved over the course of a violent 50 year career. Vipers knowledge of combat isn't limited to punches and kicks. He has studied, in depth, the science of violence. How the human body responds to adrenaline, cortisol, and a cocktail of other chemicals that the brain pumps into you during a fight. How the increase of heart rate leads to the loss of "Fine" and "Compound" motor controls, and how to fight around it. He is a true student of violence, always learning, always evolving. As a human, this made him extremely dangerous. Given his new abilities, even he hasn't found his limits yet, but they are deadly.
Equipment
Viper can run faster and farther than humans. He can jump farther and higher than most humans. However, he still can't fly, and sometimes you need to get somewhere that you can neither run to, or jump to. So in those cases, he has his trusted Rocket Board. Certainly a less civilized way to fly, but sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do. This method of travel isn't particularly fast, or efficient. However, it does get you from "A" to "B" while allowing you to avoid most danger, or reach difficult areas.
Weaknesses
Viper does have some regenerative abilities, and his reflexes make him extremely difficult to hit. However, *IF* he is hit, he feels it. His powers do not grant him any special resistances to damage, and so he remains vulnerable to all the same basic damage types that would kill a normal human. Blades still cut him, his bones still break, and bullets can still kill him. This is the reason Viper does not recommend attempting to Dodge bullets if it can be helped.
Viper appears to be vulnerable to temperature, specifically cold temperatures. Since his transformation, cold seems to feel colder to Lucas. He is vulnerable to cold temperatures, with extreme cold making him feel exhausted, and sleepy. While cold temperatures can be fatal to snakes due to their cold-blooded nature, it seems that Vipers human side prevents it from that extreme. However, slowing his mind, body and reflexes due to the cold, can be just as deadly.
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