#ppg headcanons

-The figure told him he had great powers no mortal could fathom and promised him his freedom in exchange for the life of his firstborn child. Rian scoffed at this claim and said that unless he was a judge, he had no more power to free him than he did. In response, the figure told him he'd sweeten the deal; not only would Rian gain his freedom, but he would be more successful that all his rivals combined and riches beyond his wildest imagination. Intrigued and amused, Rian agreed to the terms.

-To Rian's shock, he woke up the next day to find out that all the charges against him had been mysteriously dropped. Baffled but not about to question a good thing, he went along with it and immediately went back to work. Soon after, the majority of his business rivals began to drop dead under suspicious circumstances. As a result, his own business continued to rise, and wishing to mark a new era for himself, he changed his name to Richard Morbucks.

-He slowly expanded his business to other pursuits, both legal and illegal, and by the time prohibition was repealed, he had more than enough options to keep himself well afloat. A couple years after his release from jail, he met and married Daisy, the daughter of one of his wealthiest clients, ingratiating himself into their family and becoming even wealthier in the process. Soon afterwards, his wife gave birth to their first and only child, Richard Jr. However, his wife suffered severe complications and passed away when Richard Jr. was only a few months old.

-Both the birth of his son and death of his wife reminded him of the deal he made with the mysterious figure years prior, and as a result he became overprotective of Richard Jr. to the extreme, never letting him out of his sight even to go to school. Instead, he was taught at home by tutors.

-As a result of his sheltered and lonely upbringing, Richard Jr. idealized friendships and relationships, and often tried to befriend the children of the servants, much to his father's dismay. Over time, he began to resent his father for his overbearing nature and felt like he was intentionally isolating him from the rest of the world. When he reached the age of sixteen, he put his foot down and insisted his father let him go to school and meet other kids his age. After some convincing, his father acquiesced and agreed on one condition: he got to choose the school. Richard ended up sending his son to the most expensive private school in the area.

-Soon after Richard Jr. was enrolled, he developed feelings for one of his classmates, Julia, who also happened to be the daughter of his father's last and oldest remaining business rival. She quickly grew to reciprocate his feelings and, in love but knowing their families would never approve, they agreed to keep their relationship a secret. A few months later, Julia became pregnant with Richard Jr.'s child. Seeing it as a sign they were truly meant to be together, Richard Jr. proposed and they ran off to elope.

-When Richard discovered what his son had done, he was furious and immediately tried to contact his lawyers to get the marriage annulled as soon as possible. However, he was stopped when Julia's father called him and said he wanted to make peace for the sake of their children and future grandchild. As a gesture of good will, he offered to take Richard and his son on a hunting trip. His son pleaded with him to agree and let him stay with Julia. Not wanting to drive a further wedge between himself and his son, he eventually gave in.

-On the day of the hunt, Richard Jr.'s gun malfunctioned, causing him to accidentally shoot himself and bleed to death in his father's arms. By the time the ambulance came, Richard Jr. was already dead.

-Shortly after Richard Jr.'s funeral, Julia overheard her parents talking one night and discovered that the hunting trip was a setup; her father intentionally gave him a malfunctioning gun with the hopes that it would kill him, or at the very least injure him badly enough to get him out of the picture. Horrified at what her parents were capable of, she ran away to her father-in-law's house, telling him everything.

-When Julia told him his son was murdered, Richard's grief and self-hatred soon turned towards a deep desire for revenge. Not wanting to show his hand, he kept a cool facade and thanked her for doing the right thing. He offered her a place to live so she wouldn't be forced to go back to her parents, and promised that she nor her baby would ever want for anything. However, soon after Julia gave birth and was no longer needed, Richard had her committed to an asylum under the false accusation of postpartum psychosis. In addition, he used his shadier connections to get her father killed in the same manner he murdered his son, causing his business to deteriorate and the remains of his rival's family to fall into financial ruin. As for his new grandson, Richard Morbucks III, he claimed full custody for himself as soon as Julia was out of the picture. He never told his grandson about what really happened to his mother, instead telling him that she abandoned him on his doorstep after his father's death.

-Seeing his grandson as a second chance at parenthood, Richard doted on him and indulged nearly every material whim he had. Richard III was given significantly more freedom to go about and socialize than his father before him, his grandfather secretly worrying that it was his over caution that caused his son to detach from him and go behind his back in the first place. He also instilled in him a strong sense of family pride, the importance of money, and the need to keep his heart close to his chest. As a result, Richard III grew up with a much more coldly pragmatic view of the world than his father did, seeing others only through the lens of how they could benefit him.

-Much to the delight of his grandfather, Richard III showed a knack for business from an early age and was eager to learn everything Richard could teach him. However, he began to worry about the business's future long term as his grandson passed through his 20's and 30's with no sign of settling down and starting a family, preferring short-term relationships with few commitments and one night stands.

-When Richard III was in his early 40's, he began an affair with his much younger secretary, Regina, who quickly fell pregnant. Richard went to his grandfather for help, who saw this as a solution to his problem. He encouraged him to propose as soon as possible and be active in the child's life; warning him that neither of them were getting any younger and that he wanted to make sure his grandson had his future settled before he died. To please his grandfather, Richard III asked Regina to marry him, to which she immediately agreed to.

-It wasn't long before Richard III began to regret his decision. He quickly found his new wife to be pushy and demanding, insisting on a lavish, multimillion dollar wedding and expecting his servants to wait on her hand and foot the moment she moved in. Likewise, she found him to be overbearing and controlling, treating her as little more than an accessory and an annoyance. Once it was discovered that she was having a girl, Regina insisted on the name Princess, "so everyone would know she came from royalty," (and because it was a not so subtle allusion to her own name) which Richard found corny and distasteful.

-Once Princess was born, he expected Regina to stay home and take care of her, to which she had no interest or intent to do. Instead, she often left her with the help while she attended parties or would take the private jet without asking for spontaneous getaways with her friends. This caused many serious fights between the pair, and before Princess's first birthday they filed for divorce.

-After Regina threatened to sue Richard for full custody of Princess and never let him see her again, he reluctantly agreed to a settlement; under the condition that he be given custody of their daughter, he would grant his soon to be ex-wife's wish for millions a year in spousal support. Regina was all too happy to agree.