Fabian Aichner[2] was born in Pfalzen on 21 July 1990.[3]
Professional wrestling career
Independent circuit (2011–2017)
On 9 December 2011, Aichner made his debut under the ring nameAdrian Severe at a New European Championship Wrestling (NEW) event.[3] He competed in the final of the NEW World Heavyweight Championship tournament in March 2012, but did not win. On 2 February 2013, he won the NEW World Heavyweight Championship by defeating Vicious Impact Power, but lost it back to Power on 2 November.[4] In 2014, he won the King of the North tournament.[5] At the end of the year, Cagematch ranked him at No. 5 for the Euro-Match des Jahres Cagematch Year End Awards.[6] After his return to the independent circuit following his participation in WWE's Cruiserweight Classic in 2016, he won the NEW World Tag Team Championship tournament with Mexx.[7] In 2017, he competed for the German Wrestling Federation (GWF) and Belgium's Flemish Wrestling Force (FWF).[8][9]
In June 2016, WWE announced Aichner as one of the 32 participants in the Cruiserweight Classic tournament.[10] He was selected to represent Italy during the tournament,[11][12] and was eliminated by the United Kingdom's Jack Gallagher in the first round.[13] On 5 June 2017, it was announced that he had signed a contract with WWE.[14] He made his television debut on 27 September episode of NXT, losing to Kassius Ohno. While still under contract with WWE, he made an appearance at Evolve 115 (which has a partnership with WWE) and won the Evolve Championship from Shane Strickland. At Evolve 116, he successfully defended the title against Kassius Ohno, but he lost it to Austin Theory at Evolve 117.
Returning to WWE in September 2017, Aichner formed a team with Marcel Barthel, going on to compete on both the NXT and NXT UKbrands. They would later align themselves with Walter and Alexander Wolfe in May 2019, forming the team Imperium. On 13 May 2020, Barthel and Aichner defeated Matt Riddle and Timothy Thatcher (the latter substituting for Pete Dunne) to win the NXT Tag Team Championship.[15] They successfully defended against teams such as Oney Lorcan and Danny Burch, Breezango (Tyler Breeze and Fandango), and The Undisputed Era. They lost the championship to Breezango on the August 26 episode of NXT, ending their reign at 105 days.[16] They failed to regain the titles from Breezango in a rematch on the September 16 episode of NXT. On 26 October 2021, at Halloween Havoc, Barthel and Aichner captured the championship for a second time by defeating MSK, and would successfully defend their titles at WarGames against Kyle O'Reilly and Von Wagner. At NXT Stand & Deliver in April 2022, Aichner and Barthel lost the titles back to MSK in a triple threat tag team match also involving The Creed Brothers, ending their reign at 158 days. Aichner's final appearance as a member of Imperium was on the April 5 episode of NXT, when he and Barthel faced The Creed Brothers in a losing effort. Aichner then walked out on Barthel, and Imperium would later debut on the SmackDown brand without Aichner.
On the 24 May episode of NXT, vignettes aired promoting the debut of Aichner's new onscreen character, a wealthy Italian snob named Giovanni Vinci whose catchphrase was "Veni, Vidi, Vinci".[17] He re-debuted on the 14 June episode of NXT, defeating Guru Raaj.[18] On the 16 August episode of NXT: Heatwave, he unsuccessfully challenged Carmelo Hayes for the NXT North American Championship. On 3 September, at Clash at the Castle, he reunited with Walter (now called Gunther) and Barthel (now called Ludwig Kaiser) in Imperium. Imperium were drafted to the Raw brand in the 2023 WWE Draft.[19][20]
On the 22 April 2024 episode of Raw, after Kaiser and Vinci lost to The New Day, Kaiser attacked Vinci and kicked him out of Imperium.[21] A week later at Night 2 of the 2024 WWE Draft, Vinci was drafted to the SmackDown brand in the supplemental draft. On the 9 August edition of SmackDown, a vignette aired for Vinci’s return to the brand, reverting to his singles character from NXT 2.0 back in 2022.[22] On 6 September, Vinci wrestled his return match for the brand on the last SmackDown on FOX, losing to Apollo Crewsin three seconds.[23] Two weeks later, Vinci again lost to Crews and attacked Crews after the match.[24]
