Drath Mephruhn
| “ | You should have stuck to hunting monsters, Witcher. For there are things far worse than said monsters you slay for coin. I am that very thing. | „ |
| ~ Drath Mephruhn to Geralt |
Drath Mephruhn, also known as the Witch King and the Lich King, was a Necromancer who achieved lichdom through a deal with Dormammu one of the Maleficar.
Appearance[]
Although Drath is described as a "dying mage" and a "shade", he had a nearly skeletal appearance, like a corporeal undead. He was shown with glowing eyes, with wisps of shadow rising from within his tattered, hooded robes. Pike described him as "almost like a lich, but not quite". He often wore a spiked crown of steel to symbolise his position as Dormammu's greatest servant but also his inescapable Hellish service to the Dark Lord.
History[]
Background[]
Drath Mephruhn was a Necromancer whose original name had been lost to time for even he could not recall his past name but often remembers fragments of his original life and was in service to a king. He may have been a member of the Brotherhood of Sorcerers but was cast out for performing necromancy which was a forbidden use of dark magic.
At some point during his life, the mage was visited by Andariel, Dormammu's sister, and with the knowledge and power bestowed to him, the Necromancer was renamed Drath Mephruhn, a powerful lich. At Dormammu's behest, Andariel informed Drath Mephruhn of the Conjunction of the Spheres, a celestial event which only occurs once every 1,000 years where the realms that lay behind the veil from the land of man overlap and allow otherworldly creatures to emerge. Drath Mephruhn learned that by manipulating the celestial alignment to some degree he could allow Dormammu access to the material spheres of man and beast.
Defeat[]
Drath knew that he would be resisted by the monarchs of man until Dormammu suggested to corrupt said kings using a mark of his own making which would subdue the kings under his will so there would be no interruption. Dormammu would have Drath brand some of the kings of man, of whom held darkness in their hearts and a desire for power, with the Darksign. The Darksign would twist and corrupt their souls until they become nothing but husks of their former selves and leave Drath to his rituals uninterrupted. However, Drath Mephruhn's activities caught the alert of the Apostles of Hecate who, after an arduous battle, defeated Drath Mephruhn's by obliterating his body and took extra precautions by destroying the Phylactery that contained portions of his soul. However, they did not realize that other Phylacteries of Drath Mephruhn laid hidden with the former branded kings who now became the Ringed Wraiths.
Return of the Lich King[]
Despite the setback, Dormammu had Andariel and the Ringed Wraiths search for others that would be more than willing to continue Drath Mephruhn's work. Much later, they recruited Sylas and Amara Briarwood who used the Ringed Wraiths to find the phylacteries and bring them to the Briarwoods where they harnessed hundreds of souls to feed Drath Mephruhn's phylacteries in order to reconstitute his body and continue the arcane ritual thatt would bring Dormammu unto Earth.
However, they would take it a step further. The Briarwoods were aware of the Feywild, the Lands Between and where all manner of mythical creatures and fae congregate and reside, but more importantly they knew of the Erdtree, a World Tree that took form from a branch of Yggdrasil or the Tree of Life, that resided there which acted as the pillar keeping the realm stable and the embodiment of the Feywild as a whole. They would need a branch from the Erdtree and use it as a vital piece to manipulate the celestial energies of the Convergence which would spread throughout the Erdtree, affecting all the realms and have them collapse to create a singularity that would not only be absorbed into Angband but allow Dormammu to cross over.