Xerxes (300)

"It isn't wise to stand against me, Leonidas. Imagine what horrible fate awaits my enemies when I would gladly kill any of my own men for victory."

- Xerxes, 300

Xerxes I is the king of the massive Persian Empire and the main antagonist of Frank Miller's comic series 300, and its film adaptations. He believes himself to be a god, and is bent on taking over all of Greece to avenge the death of his father, Darius.

Darius, full of hubris from his seemingly unstoppable domination of the world, attempted to conquer Greece. His army was crushed at the Battle of Marathon, and Darius himself was wounded by an arrow from the Athenian Themistocles, which he later died from. The grieving Xerxes was sent on a journey into the desert by his adviser Artemisia, and he wandered into a hermits' cave, which was filled with otherworldly liquid. He bathed in it, and emerged as the massive "god-king", and returned to Persia to declare war on Greece.

Xerxes sent messengers to the kings and leaders of Greece demanded their submission, but they were dismissed by the democratic Greeks in the north, and executed by the Spartans in the south. Xerxes then began his invasion plans. He was stopped at the pass of Thermopylae by Leonidas and three-hundred soldiers, who held his army back for several days before being slain, infuriating the god-king. He arrived at Athens and razed the city to the ground.

Artemisia commanded Xerxes's fleet at the Battle of Salamis in an effort to crush the remaining Greek resistance, but the timely arrival of a Spartan fleet turned the battle into a Greek victory, and Artemisia was killed in the battle. Defeated, Xerxes retreated to his contingency force.

Battle v. Ajax the Greater (by Laquearius)
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