X-O Manowar

Origin

Aric of Dacia was a man in a barbarian society which was at war with the Romans. While he was away from his village one night, Aric was abducted by a malevolent race of spider-like aliens known as the Spider-Aliens, a race which controlled a vast star empire. Aric was to be a food source for the Spider-Aliens and was imprisoned with many other humans who were doomed to the same fate. Aric encountered one man known as "Map-Maker" who showed Aric a way of escape via the Spider-Aliens' most powerful weapon, the X-O Manowar armor, a sentient suit of armor which could decimate legions of its user's enemies. The path to the armor was carved into Aric's hand.

When the Spider Aliens returned to Earth, Aric's prison was disrupted by an attack from a being known as Solar. Aric quickly made his way to the X-O Manowar Armor and bonded with it, quickly escaping the ship. Upon returning to Earth, Aric learns that a thousand years has passed since his abduction, although it has merely seemed like months to him. This was due to the fact that the Aliens were using a relativistic propulsion drive; while the inhabitants of the ship were moving at incredible speeds, time passed more slowly for them.

Aric quickly discovered that the Spider-Aliens had established a powerful beachhead on Earth through the company known as Orb. Aric destroyed the aliens in charge of the company and, using the suit's inherent technological abilities, hacked the computers to show that one Aric Dacia now was the owner and CEO of Orb.

The suit Aric wears grants him many abilities, including Super-Strength, Flight, energy projection, telekinetic abilities and heightened senses and is controlled via a ring emblazoned with an X inside an O.

Aric's original armor, Shanhara, was destroyed, but with the help of Solar was replaced with another, more advanced version using a human sacrifice to create it.  This armor was known as Pol-Bekhara.   Sometime later a new enemy Crescendo systematically destroys Aric's life and kills a great deal of his associates, including former X-O wearer and love interest Randy Cartier.

To make matters worse, the human essence never fully bonded correctly with the X-O and eventually tried to gain control of the armor itself.  Aric was force to expell Paul Bouvier's  lifeforce and this rendered Pol-Bekhara non-sentient.   Aric is then forced to fight Paul, now known as Alloy (Paul merged with the remains of Shanhara).  The two do battle and Aric is force to destroy his former friend.    Despite the loss of his armors AI, the X-O was still a formidable weapon and vastly superior combat wise to the original.
 
 

Skills

Aric was a barbarian around 990 A.D. and was a fierce warrior both armed and unarmed.  He managed to slay a spider-alien, a very resilient enemy with only a sword.
 

Equipment

Aric has wielded two sentient Manowar Class Armors.