Steve (Earth 64)

ORIGIN HISTORY:
Although now a powerful fighter in the burgeoning criminal underworld of the Northern Kingdom, Steve had humble beginnings. Born of a witch and a human, the "half-mystical" child was an outcast from the start. Her birth shocked her mother's vast community, which expelled the family for violating their tribal norms. Ionia's humans no longer accepted the taboo union, although Steve's father's infamy as a local boxer often prevented them from expressing their disapproval.

The little security that the family enjoyed disappeared on the day that Steve's father disappeared. Suddenly, those who bit their tongue at the sight of young Steve were free to express their contempt. The boy was perplexed, wondering where his father had gone and why the problems suddenly seemed to follow him.

Steve grew up quickly, becoming insensitive to the provocations and threats he underwent and, in a short time, he started using his fists to silence the insults. When news of his fights reached his mother, she made him swear not to go near the Noxian wells where his father had fought.

But the more Steve struggled, the more he thought about his father.

Anxious to find the man he only vaguely remembered, Steve escaped to the well late at night, after his mother went to bed. Immediately, he was delighted with the spectacle. Dozens of human soldiers, fresh on the shores of the Central Kingdom, roared with bloodlust from the stands around them. In the center of the arena, fighters from all backgrounds and martial disciplines faced each other in terrible duels with a variety of weapons - the winners generously paid in emerald. When the event ended, Steve asked about his father and learned a harsh truth: his father had bought his contract and gone on more profitable tours abroad. He had abandoned his family in search of fortune on the other side of the world.

Burning with rage, Steve asked the matchmaker in the arena for a fight, hoping that somehow his father would come back from his tour - and be the opponent standing on the other side of the pit. The matchmaker called the boy to a fight in the next letter, imagining that he would be easy food for one of his star fighters.

Steve would prove that he was wrong.

From the moment he landed his first punch, "The Magic-Boy Bastard" has been a boxing sensation. Although Steve had no formal martial arts training, his primordial strength and ferocity more than made up for it, and he leveled his more technically sound opponents like a battering ram. Never abandoning the hope of one day fighting with his father, he soon became the undisputed "king of the well", with a swollen chest of cash prizes - and a trail of broken opponents - in his name.

Night after night, Steve brought money and comforts to his mother, always lying about how he acquired them. It warmed her hardened heart to see her so proud of her success that she was no longer forced to work on housework. Still, Sett couldn't help feeling that he could do better. Being the king of the well was good, but being the person who owned the well ... that was where the real money was.

Late at night, after defending his title in front of a record crowd, Steve presented his new demands to the human matchmaker and his companions. He suggested that he be given control of the arena and its revenue. When they refused, Steve locked the doors. Minutes later, the doors were reopened and the humans emerged severely mutilated, with a message on their bloody lips: the half-magician was the new boss.

With prosecutors out of the picture, Steve took control of the well in which he fought. Ionians, who had only been conditioned to war recently, flocked to the arena, paying to satisfy a desire they only now knew they had. Steve made the most of his newfound bloodlust, accumulating wealth and power beyond his wildest childhood dreams, while turning the well into the center of an underground empire of gambling and addiction.

The sorcerer who reigned supreme in the well now runs his illicit ventures with the same iron fist. Whenever someone challenges their authority, he personally reminds them of where they are. Every punch Steve throws is a heavy blow to his old life of poverty and ostracism, and he aims to ensure that the old life remains low.