Pietas is portrayed by a real person, not CGI or AI. All I can say about that is OMFG! Nik Nitsvetov is a photographer and award-winning cosplayer who often serves as a cosplay judge at conventions. A gamer and anime fan, he cosplays characters from many popular series. He lives in Russia and is a strong supporter of Russian Cosplay. His personal photography ranges from cosplay to portraits and often includes animals and nature.
When I first saw Nik, I was on Depositphotos looking for a picture of a male angel for a friend's cover. I was scrolling along, seeing only females with ephemeral wings, when suddenly I stopped. I went, "Wait. What?" And scrolled back up. There was a beautiful male with blond hair and he had wings. But unusually, he was also wearing a bandit-type mask. I had to know more.
When I clicked on the picture and zoomed in, there was Pietas looking straight at me. I was virtually speechless. There could not be a better person on Earth to play my immortal king. I bought the photo, and then searched for more. At the time, I hadn't realized he was cosplaying Sephiroth from Final Fantasy. I'd always thought Sephiroth would be a good Pietas. I never expected to find him IRL.
I didn't know who the models were (a woman was in the photo also), and because there was no contact info for the photographer, I had no way to find out. So I decided to use Google Image Search, and uploaded the photo. It showed me the same pose on a DeviantArt account. When I got there, it turned out to be the woman's account. I asked her who the model was, and she gave me his name. I Googled him, but found only a few pictures that I wasn't sure was the same person. Nik has dark hair. It was more than a year before my Google search paid off. Nik had created an Instagram account. I followed him right away. A few months later, he started a Patreon account. I immediately supported him.
It took me months to get up the courage to message him. My friend Holly (who had now become his fan as well), urged me to reach out. With my heart in my throat, I messaged him on Patreon, asking if he'd ever consider cosplaying a character from a book. I included a drawing my son had done of Pietas using one of Nik's photos. When Nik asked me to tell him more, you'd have had to tie my feet to the ground like a helium balloon. I was floating.
The image below is what I showed Nik, minus the wording. I have since used this to create a T-shirt (I'm wearing one right now), a mug, and a tote. Like them? You'll find them in my Tee Public store. The shop also includes a shirt with one of Pietas's stock phrases: "Because I Am Your King."
Images on this page licensed and used with permission.
