niko bellic (born t. belić) is the second child of radomir and milica belić (née kovačić). he was born in 1978, 3 years after his brother zlatan, in torak, vojvodina, serb. radomir was the child of predrag and aleksandra belić and the twin brother of milorad and older brother of tatjana, and milica was born out of wedlock to jovana kovačić and is an only child
niko is an autistic trans man with (c)ptsd. he began socially transitioning around the age of 14, beginning his medical transition after the war (through illegal testosterone starting from 1998 and an underground top surgery in 2005)
he lived with his parents, brother, and grandmother up until the war, living relatively close to his cousin roman's family home. he attended the elementary school in torak, the middle school in žitište, and finally the vocational school in zrenjanin. in 1992 he witnessed his brother get murdered by two soldiers, which completely changed the course of his life. in 1995 he joins the yugoslav men's army illegally as a man named nikola, motivated by the fate of his brother and a wish to make a change, a choice that would completely traumatize him afterward. following darko's betrayal, he gets imprisoned as a prisoner of war for some time, before being rescued by the state and getting expulsed for his identity "fraud"
with his life as he knew in shambles, he moves to belgrad in hopes for a new beginning. unable to find proper work, he does odd jobs, and over time slowly gets involved in crime as well. he eventually gets convicted and spends months in a women's penitentiary, withdrawn from testosterone. his mother managed to save up money in the meantime in order to bail him out. niko finally got involved with bulgarin because of his false promises and manipulative tactics and is only able to get out thanks to the boat incident in the adriatic