ANTAGONISTS

The vast expanses of our Motherland have always attracted those greedy for others' wealth. Some are drawn by the riches of our natural resources, some by sources of powerful forces and ancient artifacts, and others simply by the dream of eliminating a competitor preventing them from gaining world domination.

The Russian Superheroes have stood guard over our Motherland for centuries, invariably thwarting the plans of those who dreamed of its enslavement. As a result, they have made enemies, including individuals endowed with superpowers, transnational mega-corporations, and entire species.

ECLIPSE

Initially, ECLIPSE was conceived as a structural unit for the search for ancient artifacts and lost technologies. The technology of the Vril Society, an occult group that existed within Nazi Germany's SS, as well as that of the Japanese Unit 731, soon fell into the hands of this company.

This included half-human, half-androids Mononoke Onryō and Mononoke Ikiryō, developed based on alien technologies, along with several others, totaling more than a dozen. Additionally, the ECLIPSE GROUP established relationships with a number of dark cults, which allowed it to form an alliance with the "Lords of the Abyss" — another ancient race banished to the depths of the Earth.

Known representatives: Director of the Corporation (possibly Harry Fisher himself or his mentor Boris Melkin).

Mononoke Onryō and Mononoke Ikiryō

Mononoke Onryō and Mononoke Ikiryō are twin siblings and among the last youkai (cyborgs created from alien technology) crafted by Shiro Ishii for the Emperor.

It is unknown whether they were taken to the Hidden Palace or were in Hiroshima when the laboratory camp was hit.

The latter is suggested by the scars and burns on their bodies, though these could also be from their transformation or training. Before their transformation, the siblings were likely Korean Nyŏngbyŏn [b](guerrillas fighting the Japanese in northern Korea) and were captured during one of the battles. Mononoke Ikiryō sometimes experiences fragments of déjà vu associated with this period.

PHYSIOLOGY AND SUPERPOWERS:

During their transformation into cyborgs, the usual calcium skeleton was replaced with a metal one made of a titanium-based alloy with “memory” (i.e., the ability to partially self-heal). Muscle tissue consists of biosynthetic fibers, which have increased strength characteristics and the capability to regenerate. The skin is made of a special type of biosynthetics that can withstand high and low temperatures, and aggressive environments, and also contains electrical organs, like those of an electric stingray. The sense organs are also artificial — the eyes can see in the range from infrared to ultraviolet, and the hearing range is expanded so much that it can perceive radio waves directly, without equipment.

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But the main transformation, of course, altered the siblings' brains. Now, their brains consist entirely of self-healing nervous tissue, which not only handles thinking but also direct data transmission. This makes the Mononokes' reaction several times faster than a human's and gives them limited telepathic abilities.

These abilities allow the siblings to induce fear or rage in any intelligent creature. They perceive these emotions through the skin's electrical organs and feed on them. The enemy's fear or rage also strengthens the Mononokes in battle.

The brother and sister possess increased strength, endurance, reaction speed, and vitality. They are insensitive to pain, do not need food or drink, and their ability to go without breathing allows them to stay indefinitely underwater or underground. In case of serious injuries, they can fall into a coma resembling death. They are skilled with all types of bladed weapons and firearms but prefer cold weapons.

GEAR:

Armored suits made of a fabric with properties reminiscent of shark skin.

These suits have enhanced camouflage capabilities, rendering the Mononokes nearly invisible in the visible, infrared, and radio spectra when stationary.

Upon contact with unprotected skin, they cause serious injuries and can damage other materials (e.g., tearing clothing or even creating holes in thin metal). The suits are resistant to light firearms, cold steel, and low-pulse beam weapons.

Mononoke Onryō wields a strongly curved sword, while Mononoke Ikiryō uses a pair of sickle-shaped weapons.

They also use conventional firearms, such as submachine guns (Reiwa 17 type).

TRICKSTERS

The Tricksters are an ancient race that once ruled the Earth over 150 million years ago. They are believed to be of alien origin, and it's speculated that our planet was their resource colony.

The Tricksters are intelligent non-humanoids, resembling our arachnids (it's possible that spiders are part of the fauna of the Tricksters’ home planet, brought to Earth during its colonization). They feed on the life energy of other creatures, much like spiders drain flies. By absorbing the energy of a sentient being, the Tricksters gain supernatural strength, the ability to change their physical appearance, mimicking other races they interact with, and can prolong their lives as long as they have access to such energy.

The trickster race possesses technology beyond human comprehension. For instance, they created the so-called "Web of Lies," a system for rapid travel between points that are sometimes tens of light-years apart. Via this system, they could transfer enormous amounts of energy, exchange information, and even use it to capture the inhabitants of other worlds.

The Tricksters were overthrown approximately 150 million years ago by the Union of Young Races, led by the Russian superheroes.

However, the surviving members of the species still possess incredible power and harbor dreams of revenge. Each of them desires to gain control over the universe and the ability to "drain" as many sentient beings as possible.

Outwardly, they resemble spiders, with a fat, jelly-like body covered with a durable shell based on molecularly modified chitin, thin but long-lasting. They have a large head with a dozen compound eyes of different sizes, allowing them to "see" in different ranges (for example, the Tricksters don't hear sounds but "see" them), a mouth with four pairs of mandibles, and a funnel-shaped throat dotted with rows of teeth. They possess two pairs of claws (one very powerful), ten pairs of paws, a tail equipped with a sting (which can atrophy if not used for a long time), and rudimentary wings. With their wings, the Tricksters can produce sounds and can imitate not only human speech but even electromagnetic pulses.

The mandibles are equipped with poisonous glands containing a powerful acid that corrodes organic matter. With a sufficient amount of this poison stored in their throat sacs, the Tricksters can spit it at their victims. The claws of the paws and the stinger on the tail have glands that produce a powerful neurotoxin. One pair of claws has monomolecular sharpening and is capable of cutting through a sheet of armor steel. The other pair is used as hands for manipulating objects.

KNOWN REPRESENTATIVES:

Eyvil. In his quest to gain control over human souls, Eyvil posed as a producer. He is determined to acquire the soul of one of the Russian superheroes, knowing that this hero possesses incomparable power. Recently, he gained a supporter — AnNet who willingly became his assistant in order to gain supernatural powers.

DARGONA

Dargona is an independent antagonist, a demon of evil. She is a beautiful, ageless woman, tall and slender, with luxurious long golden-red hair and brown eyes that reveal extraordinary intelligence and cunning.

While her face holds iconographic features, the expression is unmistakably unkind. One glance at her is enough to understand that this woman is cruel and extremely selfish. All universal human ideas about Good and Morality are either ridiculous to her or nonexistent.

She is dressed in loose, light, sometimes translucent flowing clothes. Dargona's arms and other exposed areas of her body are covered in glowing, multi-colored tattoos depicting symbols similar to those of the Superheroes.

BACKGROUND:

She is the illegitimate daughter of the Byzantine Emperor Julian the Apostate and a maid from Mesopotamia, from a family of Chaldean magicians. Dargona has the ability to take on the appearance of other people once she has seen them in person or in an image.

Since childhood, she was jealous of the Princess of the Empire, believing that as the only surviving child of Julian, she had more rights to power than them. From her early youth, she strove for knowledge, rightly believing that it bestows strength. She independently learned some skills, including the ability to take on the appearance of other people. She used this method to spy and eavesdrop. Subsequently, she took up blackmail and managed to accumulate quite a lot of money, but she paid for her greed. She was caught and punished, and faked her death after being whipped.

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Earlier, Dargona’s mother, suffering from leprosy and excommunicated from the court so that she could not see her daughter for many years, led the girl through an initiation ritual, giving her a new name - Dargona (before that she bore the Christian name Vasilina). Also, presumably, her mother told her about the Great Library of the Council of the Sages.

Taking the guise of a young man named Basilisk, the son of a wealthy Byzantine merchant whom Dargona seduced and killed, she managed to gain acceptance into the scholia of the Council of the Sages. To achieve her goals, Dargona feigned extreme humility and studied with great eagerness, becoming the "best student" of the scholia. She was allowed into the common part of the Great Library, but this was not enough for Dargona.

The Sages, being people with pure hearts, did not even suspect what kind of snake they had welcomed into their midst. Their trust in the modest, humble, and highly gifted acolyte grew so much that they soon decided to entrust Dargona with cleaning the secret section of the Great Library. Dargona eagerly anticipated gaining access to the most Secret Knowledge, but her plans were not destined to come true.

A wanderer who arrived at the Council of the Sages (one of the Russian superheroes) exposed Dargona, revealing her secret intentions. Dargona turned to her mentor, Kiriill, lying to him that she only hid her true identity because women were denied access to truly great knowledge (which was not true).

But Kiriill, shocked by the very fact of Dargona’s deception, voted for his student to be expelled. In this, other Sages agreed with him — after all, wisdom and lies are incompatible. But Dargona took it her own way, accusing the Sages of what would be called misogyny in the future. She vowed to crush the Council, and, above all, to brutally punish the “traitor” Kiriill.

She was still driven by the thirst to master all the magical possibilities that exist in this world. At the same time, wealth and power became for her only a pleasant bonus, which will inevitably follow when she becomes the most powerful sorceress in the world, who not only has no equals but even anything close to her level.

To achieve this, Dargona began to scour secret places and abandoned sanctuaries of dark cults. The name that her leper mother gave her turned out to be a pass to places where a normal person would not dare to go. Dark cults opened their doors to her, and Dargona gained access to the knowledge of ancient centuries when the world was ruled by evil forces, but this was not enough for her.

In an abandoned shrine in the middle of an endless desert, Dargona met a mysterious creature – the Shadow of Greatness – who "cut her superpowers, like a jeweler cuts a diamond..

As a result, Dargona’s powers increased many times over, and she managed to assemble an army of dark entities, the remnants of the once — defeated armies that invaded our world.

After this, Dargona declared war on the Council of the Sages. The war lasted almost half a millennium — from the 1050s to the 1450s.

Some of the Sages were mercilessly killed by Dargona. The rest, including her mentor Kirill, were imprisoned. But before that, the Sages managed to hide the Great Library somewhere.

Thanks to the powers that the Shadow taught Dargona to use, she defeated the Sages, using their own superpowers against them. She almost managed to plunge the world into chaos, but her armies were defeated by ordinary people who had no superpowers at all. History has not preserved any information about that war — Dargona tried to destroy all sources that testified to her crushing defeat.

Dargona did not draw any conclusions from this. She decided that she simply did not have enough superpowers to subjugate the rebellious people.

Since then, Dargona, assisted by many of her minions, has been searching throughout the Earth for those gifted with one or another superpower. All these Superheroes are marked with special signs, each unique. To take the ability from its owner, Dargona must touch this sign — and then the sign will appear on her skin in the form of another new tattoo. And the main obstacle is that the owner of the ability must agree to its transfer.

This is not an exhaustive list of the antagonists in our project. Over the long centuries, millennia, and eons that the Superheroes have existed, they have made enough enemies. Fortunately, they rarely enter into alliances, and even when acting together, they continue to strive to trip up their ally. The above list will be updated...