Dracula (Lords of Shadow)

"Don't you dare call me that! Eu sunt Dracul!"

- Gabriel Belmont, after years of exile

Gabriel Belmont is the main character of the Castlevania: Lords of Shadow series. He is at first the noble protagonist of the first game, but goes through many tragedy that breaks him and transforms him into the titular villain of the series in this rebooted timeline, Dracula.

Biography
Gabriel is born from the estranged merchant family of Cronqvist, but as a baby, he was dropped into the monastery belonging to the Brotherhood of Light. His first name came from one of the Archangel of Gods, Gabriel, and his surname is picked by himself due to his love of mountains (Belmont means 'Beautiful Mountain'). He's raised as a member of the Brotherhood, discovers his talent in fighting and eventually weds his childhood sweetheart Marie.

While he was away on a mission, Marie gives birth to his son Trevor Belmont. However, the Brotherhood knows through a prophecy that Gabriel will one day fall into the darkness, so they asked Marie to keep Trevor's birth a secret.

Lords of Shadow
Through means unknown, Gabriel finds out that Marie perished. Around the same time, the connection between heaven and earth shattered, plaguing the land with monsters. Gabriel is sent by the Brotherhood to investigate the events, also with the rumors about a powerful mask called "God's Mask" that may be capable to bring Marie back to life and ask if there's a way to save the world. Gabriel is more concerned of bringing the life of his love back but dutifully proceeds with the task with his weapon, the Combat Cross.

Gabriel is aided by an Old God, Pan, and a senior Brotherhood member Zobek, and learns that to save the world, he must destroy the Lords of Shadow, the Lord of the Lycanthropes, Lord of the Vampires and Lord of the Necromancers. Throughout his journey, however, Gabriel unconsciously did many horrendous things such as killing an innocent girl in his sleep, frightening him and slowly driving him into madness. He presses on his quest, however, with the promise that he'll be able to reunite with Marie once again. Slowly, the people he came to know of started dying, including Pan.

Gabriel finally manages to form the God's Mask, but then Zobek reveals his true card, he is in fact the Lord of Necromancers and was behind the horrid things Gabriel did, including even the death of Marie, Zobek has used his Devil's Mask to influence Gabriel to murder her. All while taunting Gabriel, Zobek proceeds to blast the warrior with his magic and gloats on how he'll use the God's Mask for his own purposes, only to be interrupted by Satan who reveals that Zobek has served his purposes in forming the God's Mask and he will use it to restart his rebellion against Heaven and God.

Gabriel is seemingly ready to join the spirits of the dead, but Marie resurrected him to fight against Satan and saving the world. Even after his victories, it turns out that the God's Mask he sought for cannot grant his wish of reviving Marie. As Marie bid farewell to her husband, Gabriel collapsed to his knees and wept.

Reverie & Resurrection
After being forever separated with Marie, Gabriel starts to lose his faith against God and humanity in general. He then receives a telepathic call from a vampire he met previously, Laura, warning him that his act of killing the Lords of Shadow has the effect of unleashing the creature known as 'The Forgotten One', set on destroying the world. Gabriel once again ventures to defeat The Forgotten One, but only to no longer feel the guilt of failing to serve humanity. However, to even enter the realm of the Forgotten One, Laura sacrifices herself so Gabriel can drink her blood and survive the realm... in turn, turning Gabriel into an immortal vampire.

Gabriel boasts to The Forgotten One that he's more evil than the latter, and eventually defeats the creature, absorbing him. But at this point, he's had enough with humanity for tricking him. He discards the Combat Cross and returns to the human world filled with desire of vengeance against men. He also discards his name, and refers himself as 'Dracul'... otherwise known as 'Dracula'.

Lords of Shadow: Mirror of Fate
As Dracula, Gabriel takes over the castle of the Lord of the Vampire and makes it his own, mastering various dark magic. The Brotherhood of Light, feeling responsible for his turn to evil, sent knights to slay him, all failing and slain by Gabriel himself... Until eventually, one certain member carrying a copy of the Combat Cross, his own son Trevor Belmont. Gabriel does not realize this man's identity until he inflicts a mortal wound of Trevor, and finally realizes his identity. Horrified, Gabriel tries resurrecting Trevor with his blood, to no avail. The least he could do is to give him proper burial and labelled the coffin with the name 'Alucard' as Trevor referred both of them as 'opposites'.

Enraged with how the Brotherhood sent his own son to kill him, Gabriel resumes his plan and sends a horde of werewolves to kill everyone in the Brotherhood's sanctuary, including Trevor's wife Sypha. However, Trevor's son Simon manages to escape in the mountains, is raised there and when he comes to age, Simon goes to confront Gabriel to avenge his parents.

Simon is not alone, however. Trevor, now embracing his new identity as Alucard, comes to aid Simon to defeat Gabriel and eventually Gabriel is forced to retreat with his castle crumbling.

Lords of Shadow 2
Sometime after his defeat against Simon and Alucard, Gabriel manages to reconstruct another castle, in which it gets attacked and taken over by the Brotherhood of Light, depowering him. Gabriel must once again take it upon himself to reclaim his power.

Lords of Shadow Epilogue
After the events of Lords of Shadow 2, Gabriel lost much of his power and goes to an exile, as time passes into modern timeline, he continues to hide, until Zobek pays him a visit and informs him that Satan's acolytes are preparing for Satan's second coming, and only Gabriel can stop him. If he succeeds, he would be lifted from the immortality that curses him and finally allowing him to die.

Trivia

 * Gabriel can be said as an amalgamation of Leon Belmont and Mathias Cronqvist. Like Leon, he is the first Belmont in history. However, unlike Leon, he fell into despair with tragedy like Mathias and renounced his faith, becoming Dracula
 * He is voiced by Robert Carlyle in the English version and Keiji Fujiwara in the Japanese version.