Kratos


 * This article is about the main character in the SCEE game God of War. For the character in Greek Mythology, see Cratos. For the Tales of Symphonia character, see Kratos Aurion.

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Kratos is the main protagonist for the game God of War and its upcoming sequel, God of War II. His voice was provided by the American actor Terrence "T.C." Carson.

Kratos' Background
Krartos is not Spartan by birth. His origins are unknown, but it is known that he is the illegitimate child of his mother and an unknown father, whom he finds out later on to be Zeus. The rumors about his father's identity ran rampant among Kratos' home village, growing to the point when Kratos and his mother had no other choice but to flee the village and settle in the militarist city-state of Sparta.

During this time, Kratos' mother gave birth to a second son. For most of their childhood, Kratos and his little brother were inseparable. However, when the Spartans came to recruit the boys into military service, that all changed. Those that were physically and mentally fit were drafted into the Spartan military. Those that were weaker were sent to the mountains outside Sparta to fend for themselves. Kratos' brother, unfortunately, was part of the weaker bunch and was sent to the mountains. He died soon afterward and was raised in the Underworld. He now spends his time brooding over his older brother's betrayal and plans on getting his revenge on Kratos.

Kratos grew up and became a commander in the Spartan army. He started off with fifty men, which swelled to over a thousand soldiers. Fighting for the glory of Sparta, Kratos' methods were insanely brutal and ruthless. During this time, he also married a Spartan woman and fathered a daughter. Despite his reputation as a commander with questionable methods, only his wife was brave enough to face his mood swings and fury. His daughter, despite being scared of her father, loved him dearly. Also a devoted follower of the gods, Kratos' protector is Athena, goddess of wisdom and purity.

The War with the Barbarians and Kratos' Bargain
Undefeated in battle, Kratos faces his greatest challenge. From the east, a massive barbarian army emerges, threatening Sparta, as well as all of Greece. Kratos and his men were sent to deal with the incoming menace, hoping to expect an easy victory like so many before them. They were sadly mistaken. Despite the discipline of the Spartan forces, they were not ready for the savagery of their opponents. The Spartans put up a good fight, but the barbarians overwhelm the Spartans, slaughtering them mercilessly.

While the Spartans and Barbarians clash below, Kratos and the Barbarian Chief engage in single combat. When Kratos is bested, and facing certain death, he calls for assistance from Ares, the god of war. Sure enough, Ares hears Kratos' pleas and saves his life by decimating the barbarians. As for Kratos, he had a special gift for him: the Blades of Chaos. Forged in the fires of Hades itself, Kratos receives his weapons from Ares, painfully chained to his wrists as a reminder of his servitude to the God of War.

Kratos uses his new weapons by decapitating the Barbarian Chief. Afterwards, Kratos and his forces began to serve Ares, carrying out his will by slaughtering anyone and everyone who was against Ares.

The Ghost of Sparta
In his quest for power, Kratos makes his ultimate mistake. Under orders from Ares, Kratos and his men, now emboldened by the God of War, attack a small village whose temple was dedicated to Athena. Kratos arrives at the temple entrance, where the village Oracle warns him not to enter, for the price he'll pay will be extremely dear. Ignoring the Oracle's pleas, Kratos shoves her aside, kicks the door down and starts killing villagers left and right.

The screams of his two final victims bring Kratos out of his bloodlust. To his horror, he discovered that he had just murdered his wife and daughter in cold blood. Ares appears to him, telling him that he was on his way of becoming a great warrior. With his wife and daughter gone, nothing can stop Kratos from being Death incarnate. Full of remorse for what he has done, Kratos cremates his wife and daughter.

Upon exiting the burning temple, the Oracle confronts Kratos. Because of the extremity of his crimes, Kratos is cursed to bear the ashes of his wife and daughter onto his skin, giving him the appearance of a ghost, and as a mark to let everyone know who he is and what he has done. Thus, the legend of the Ghost of Sparta was born. Because of Ares' deception, Kratos has a new goal in life: eliminate the God of War.

The Assault of Athens
For the past decade, Kratos has been fighting his own demons, as well as those in physical form, in hopes that Athena and the other gods would forgive him of his crimes. While travelling through the Aegean Sea, Kratos encounters legions of undead soldiers, as well as the serpentlike Hydra amid several wrecked ships. Poseidon, god of the seas, lends a helping hand by giving Kratos the powerful technique called Poseidon's Rage. After killing the Hydra and its spawn, Kratos accquires the Captain's Key (and kills the Captain), thus gaining access to the Captain's cabin. Inside, he finds the survivors slaughtered, bringing back memories of his past deeds.

While Kratos has his hands full with scores of undead and Hydra, Zeus calls forth Ares and Athena, the latter warning him of her brother's impending invasion of Athens. Although the gods can't personally interfere, Athena and the other gods can use Kratos on their behalf.

Resuming his travels through the Aegean Sea, Kratos is plagued with constant nightmares of his family's slaughter at his hands. Neither wine nor the company of women can erase the horrific memories from his mind. He prays to the statue of Athena who tells him that if he succeeds in stopping Ares from attacking her namesake city, then the gods will forgive his past sins.

Arriving in Athens, Kratos disembarks from his ship and is personally greeted with Ares'legions of monsters and undead. He hacks his way through the city, seeing Ares wrecking shop with his minions, yanking Medusa's head off to use as a weapon, thanks to Aphrodite; and afterwards he is greeted by the Oracle of Athens. However, Harpies show up and kidnap the Oracle, forcing Kratos to progress through the city. Here, he is given the power by Zeus himself to use the Supreme God's thunderbolts as weapons.

En route to the Oracle's Temple, Kratos encounters an old man digging a grave in the midst of Ares' assault. For a senile old man, the Gravedigger knows a lot about Kratos. Kratos catches up with the Oracle at her Temple and rescues her from falling to her death. She then reveals the item that has the power to kill a god - Pandora's Box. All Kratos has to do is go through the Desert of Lost Souls, summon Kronos (the last remaining Titan, who is also Zeus' father) and succeed where everyone else has failed: he must conquer the Temple of Pandora and come out with Pandora's Box. The temple is chained to the back of the enormous Titan, whose punishment is to crawl through the desert until the sands rip the flesh from his bones.

Pandora's Box
Exiting Athens with the intent of killing Ares and saving his sanity, Kratos travels through the Desert of Lost Souls. By eliminating three Sirens, whose irresistable song led unwary men to their demise, they lead the way to Pandora's Temple. Created by the master builder Pathos Verdes III, a self-proclaimed 'loyal subject and chief architect of the gods', this temple was designed to house Pandora's Box. He summons Kronos by blowing on the Horns of Pandora, who lumbers over to him. Kratos grabs a loose piece of rope, swings across Kronos' face and latches himself to the massive side of the temple. It takes him three days to reach the summit.

The decomposing, zombielike Body Burner is still at work, burning the bodies of the fallen that the Harpies bring to him. The Body Burner is a former Greek soldier who was the first casualty of Pandora's Temple, and was cursed by the gods to burn the bodies of those killed inside the temple. Skeptical that Kratos can do the impossible, he gives the Spartan a word of warning and urges him to return home. Kratos refuses and enters the temple. He enters the temple and while making his way through the massive structure, two more gods give Kratos their aid: Artemis, the maiden goddess of the hunt, who bestows upon Kratos her bladed weapon which bears her name; and the Lord of the Underworld himself, Hades, who gives Kratos the power to summon the spirits of the dead to help in his battles.

Kratos then goes on to passing the three challenges to gain access to the upper levels of the temple: The Challenges of Atlas, Poseidon, and Hades. Once he finds his way to Zeus Mountain he faces new traps, as well as new enemies as he progresses through the Cliffs of Madness. Despite these setbacks, Kratos hacks, slashes and breaks his way to his ultimate goal: Pandora's Box.

Athena congratulates Kratos on doing the impossible: he is the first human ever to retrieve Pandora's Box since its construction. However, Ares also senses that Kratos was successful in his task. Not wanting to see Pandora's Box used against him, Ares picks up a broken, jagged piece of column and hurls it towards the Temple of Pandora. Kratos is impaled by the column and he watches helplessly as several Harpies take Pandora's Box as he dies.

Escape from Hades
Kratos finds himself in the Underworld, falling toward the River Styx. He reaches out and ends up clinging onto the captain he had killed earlier, who is clinging onto a huge bone pillar. Kratos stabs him, pulls himself up, and knocks the captain into the blood red river. From the bottom of the Underworld, Kratos carves a path of destruction through Hades' minions and makes it to the highest point of Hades' realm.

A rope with a huge stone attached to it drops from above. Not one to ask questions, Kratos climbs the length of rope and when he reaches the top, he finds himself back in the world of the living. The Gravedigger, with his insane digging, has saved Kratos from an eternity down in Hades. With a message that the gods were rooting for Kratos, he disappears. It appears that the Gravedigger was Zeus in disguise.

While Kratos was making his way through Hades, Ares gained control of Athens and has trashed the Oracle's temple. Kratos finds the fallen Oracle in a pool of her own blood. She is surprised to see Kratos alive but she says that Ares has won the battle. Kratos at this moment couldn't care less, since his revenge is at hand.

Final Battle Against Ares
Kratos comes upon Ares, who is gloating to Zeus over his victory in the Battle of Athens, as well as his bad choice in favoring Athena over him. In one hand, dangling from a chain, is Pandora's Box. Ares is surprised to see Kratos standing behind him. He is even more surprised to see that he has escaped the Underworld. Ares then mocks his father's choice of champions, assuming that Kratos was not a threat. Once again, Ares underestimates his enemy, as Pandora's Box is sent crashing to the ground, courtesy of a well-aimed thunderbolt from Kratos.

Kratos opens the box and the power of the gods is unleashed on him. He grows to Ares' height (about 50-75 feet tall) and prepares for mortal combat. Ares reminds him that all of his skills and weapons were taught to Kratos by Ares himself. In a show of unfair sportsmanship, six spiderlike limbs emerge from his back as his sword is at the ready.

For a coward, Ares is a formidable opponent, but Kratos' resolve allows him to win the first round. Never one to play fair, Ares sucks Kratos into his subconscious.

As Kratos falls, Ares explains to him about the many ways how to kill a man. But to Ares, the most effective way to kill a man is to break his spirit. And for Kratos, that means he has to relive the moment he invaded the temple and killed his family. He kicks the doors open and his wife and child are there, alive. This time, they are surrounded by numerous doppelgangers of himself. In a rage, Kratos vows that Ares will never take his family a second time, that he has a chance for some serious retribution.

Kratos charges into the array of clones, defending his family at all turns. The temple breaks away, but he fights on, using the extreme ruthlessness he used while as commander of his Spartan troops. After the extraordinary feat of singlehandedly defending his family, Kratos declares to Ares that he has taken his family once, but not a second time, and that the price he had to pay was not worth the power he gained.

Furious that Kratos had rebuked him, Ares takes his Blades of Chaos from Kratos and uses them to kill his family...again. Kratos is on his knees, lamenting the loss of his wife and child as he and Ares are transported back to Athens. As Ares taunts Kratos and prepares to deliver the final bow, Kratos sees the final gift given to him by the gods: the Sword of the Gods, which was acting like a bridge. Kratos avoids the blow, and grabs the weapon, telling Ares that he still has allies with him.

The two enemies, one a god, the other a mortal, teacher and student, square off. Now that he has the Blades of Chaos back in his possession, Ares has some of Kratos' old attacks, but that didn't stop Kratos from gaining the upper hand. Weakened by the constant assault, Ares sees that his end is near. He reminds Kratos that he came to him in his most desperate hour and that he was only trying to make him a great warrior. Kratos flatly replies that Ares had succeeded, right before running Ares through with his sword. Ares falls over and dies, his godlike essence releasing in a massive explosion.



The End of a Journey
Athens has been saved and will be rebuilt. However, the nightmares continued to plague Kratos. He pleads with Athena to take his nightmares away. Athena says that even though his sins were forgiven, they never made a deal for Kratos' nightmares to vanish. Feeling abandoned by the gods, Kratos makes his way up to the Suicide Bluffs in an attempt to rid himself of his nightmares. He flings himself off the cliff and into the waters below, hoping that his misery would end with his death.

The gods, however, had other plans for Kratos. As Kratos sank into the water, he felt a powerful force grab him and pull him out the waters and back onto the bluffs. There, the statue of Athena spoke to him, saying that a man like Kratos will not die by his own hand after doing the gods a great service. Also, due to the fact that Ares was now dead, there is an opening for the position for God of War. Athena opens a portal to Mount Olympus, the home of the gods and tells Kratos to enter. As an added bonus, she gives him the Blades of Athena, the exact opposite of the Blades of Chaos.

Kratos does so and approaches the empty throne of the God of War. Trophies from his past conquests hang on either side, one of them happens to be Ares. Kratos takes his seat, as the new God of War and for eternity as man goes to war with one another, they did so under the watchful eye of Kratos, the God of War.

However, Kratos was not satisfied. He had defeated Ares and avenged himself and his family, but there was something missing. Ever since he was a child, he never knew who his father was. Tracking down his mother, who was on her deathbed, Kratos demanded to know who his father was. Knowing full well of the consequences if she told him, she barely got a word out before she transfrormed into a monstrous beast, intending to make her son her last meal.

Putting aside the affection he had for his mother, Kratos executes the beast. As she laid dying she uttered only one word before passing on. That word was the name of his father, which is Zeus. He was the son of a god, which made Ares and Athena his half-brother and half-sister. Now Kratos plan on getting revenge for the god who abandoned him and his mother.