Morland Reyes

Morland Reyes is one of the main characters in the Elsaverse, as he is the main villain in the first story arc. Morland was the King of Terrans in the parallel universe, but he forged a secret alliance with his kingdom's enemies to betray his people and came to Sangrive to enjoy a new rise to the top, using evil methods. He is the father of Charles and Chloe Reyes, and he has a foreshadowing power that lets him know in advance the consequences of his words and actions, unless Chloe is involved in them. His former Elite Guard, Xara, captured him and brought him back to their realm, where he's currently detained.

Personal
Morland is probably the most powerful Terran alive, as his power allows him to live his life withouth ever making a single mistake to get what he wants. And, being an evil, selfish and manipulative person, this means that he has all what it takes to become an undisputed leader. Which, indeed, is what he did, raising up to the throne and ruling over his people during many years. However, he always felt that the journey is more enjoyable than the destination, and he eventually got bored of it. Knowing about the existence of different universes Terrans can open portals to, he devised a plan to enjoy another raise to the top somewhere else, but playing with a safety net, just in case. So he sealed a secret deal with the Drae, his kingdom's mortal enemies, to give them his throne away in a war; in exchange, they'd keep a portal constantly open so that he could come back to his realm at any moment. One day, the Drae set up an ambush in which all of Morland's Elite Guards bar Xara perished; when she reported back to Morland, he closed the trap, betraying her trust and ordering his most loyal assassin, Crow, to leave her badly hurt and blind. The commotion this originated gave them enough time to flee.

Morland and Crow arrived in Sangrive basically empty handed, but Morland's power was more than enough to start their journey. And, considering that time moves slower in their home world than in Sangrive, which means that they age way slower than humans, they had no need to rush things. Starting small, Morland began to amass money and connections, buying hotels, casinos and other companies until he became a big tycoon in the city; more than thirty years after his arrival, he was starting to get involved in local politics, by trying to put a puppet of him in the Mayoral office. Along the way, he didn't hesitate to resort to more than questionable methods, like bribes, threats, extortion or insurance frauds, but also sexual exploitation, poisoning and murder; at his service, a little army of whores and assassins to carry out all the dirty jobs for him, dutily instructed and disciplined by Crow. Crow's obedience was assured by fulfilling her desires: having a lab in which she could experiment with her potions and poisons, a total freedom to test those creations on unfortunate subjects she could kept imprisoned in the dungeons, and getting to have sex with him on a regular basis.

In all these years, Morland only made one single mistake: having a daughter with a human woman. Unfortunately for him, not only Chloe didn't inherited any power from her Terran ascendant, but she actually revealed as the only blind spot for Morland's power: the consequences he foresees for his actions may not be the real ones if Chloe is involved in those actions. Moreover, while still being as smart as her father, Chloe also took the moral compass her mother tried to give her, becoming a sweet and kind-hearted young girl; like a negative of a picture, she is exactly the opposite of her brother, Charles, who Morland defines as someone who is "as loyal as a collie, and about as smart", and who got a power that consists on suppressing other people's powers when he's around, except his father's. Charles quickly embraced Morland's lifestyle and goals, to the point of even infecting the scarlet fever to his own mother, causing her death; Chloe, on the other hand, just wanted to be an ordinary girl, but Morland made sure to keep her on a tight leash, both literally and figuratively. Through physical and mental abuse, Morland made her learn to fear him, he cut off almost all her social relationships, scaring her teenage love, Paul, away by threatening him with having Crow kill him, and finally introduced her in the family business on her 18th birthday, by forcing her to have sex with one of his potential business partners.

From that moment on, Morland used his own daughter as one of his minions, whoring her out and assigning her some minor missions without fully disclosing his plans to her, as he could never be sure about her effectiveness. Frustrated about that malfunction she causes on his power, Morland used to whip Chloe's tattoed right arm whenever she failed on a mission or tried to make her own choices, as a way to keep her in line. However, one day he went a bit too far, when he ordered Chloe to cause an accident without telling her that this accident would put her childhood friend, Miranda, in a coma. After visiting her daily for almost a year while Miranda was in bed, Chloe realized she could actually oppose Morland covertly without him knowing it, and started to do so when she met Xara, who had been sent to Sangrive to bring Morland and Crow to their home world justice. Under Morland's eyes, Chloe just began to fail more and more frequently, until she couldn't stop Jessica Springfield from preventing a massacre at Joey Bertradino's Mayoral rally. Chloe's failure in that operation didn't exactly derail any plan in a dramatic way, since the bombing still hurt Mayor Bertradino's chances for a re-election, as intended, but Morland lost all his trust on her daughter and, after a last hard punishment, left her go away from him, hoping she would just flee and would stop messing with his plans.

Morland never thought her daughter could be betraying and sabotaging him on purpose, but she was; when he found Xara and his power told him that the best course of action was to abduct her and keep her alive in his dungeon, Morland didn't even imagine that Chloe could be involved with Xara's group. Cornered by an expert fighter like Xara and a totally uncontrollable agent like Chloe, for the first time since his arrival in Sangrive, Morland was in a serious danger and couldn't resort to his power, as Chloe's presence wouldn't let him know for sure the outcome of this situation, so he just tried to run away trough the interdimensional portal, back to his home world. Chloe tried to stopped him, and even pointed a gun at him, but she just couldn't shot her father. Feeling a bit proud of her daughter after knowing she was indeed fighting him all this time, Morland said goobye to her and started walking towards the portal, but Chloe's boyfriend, Paul, tackled him down and knocked him out. Then Xara only had to take his unconscious body, get through the portal, and fight her way back to the Terran High Command, where Morland was put away.

Miscellaneous

 * After arriving in Sangrive, Morland adopted the surname Reyes, which literally means 'Kings' in Spanish. 'El Rey' Casino means literally 'The King'.


 * In Chasing Beth (2021) is hinted that Morland got help from other Terrans, Anton Blackhawk and his wife Tatiana, during his first years in Sangrive.