Gekydo

## Gekydo, The Dead King

"*Dear sister...I am no **monster**...I am the **natural order** of things. **Death** become **life**. The conjunction **undone**. And now...to claim what is **mine**...*"
—Sivard's final words before his death and rebirth as Gekydo[src]

**Gekydo, The Dead King** is an entity born from the soulless flesh of **Sivard Aulfhedinn**, a knight of the House of Ice and bastard of House Felldragon who would go on to claim the Forbidden Rune during the Age of Madness, eventually transforming into the greatest threat Pydwell would ever face.

Raised in his ancestral fiefdom of Chel, Sivard trained and became friends with Wesaxe knight John Godwin, with whom he fought during the Collapse of Avarlell. His burning of the sacred temple of Galadhon during the sacking of the city earned him the title "*Gekydo*", elvish for "Defiler". He would go on to reclaim his birthright and stake a claim to the throne of the Drakengard Empire during the Second War of Succession, and claimed the Rune of Darkness upon Morgott's defeat. The rune corrupted him, and he eventually bound it to his flesh to create an unstoppable undead army. Upon the death of his soul, his body became a vessel of the rune's dark power and was resurrected as the Dead King. Apparently unstoppable, he was cast out onto the Beach, where he gave form to the nightmarish anathema as part of his plan to return to the mortal world. He thus became *Helregnin*, the Dark Lord fated to battle the Hero of Mortals at Ragh nar Roog.

Beginning in 8:492, the Crimson Rite prepared to summon Gekydo and the anathema to the mortal world, starting with the weakening of the boundry between the living and dead realms during the Third Northern War. The Dead King's return became inevitable when the Dragon of the Wind awakened in the year 9:0, followed by the ascension of Minerva an Kett to the title of Hero of Mortals; thus, according to the will of the Great Will, the Dead King must enter the mortal realm to provide disparity, triggering Ragh nar Roog and the reshaping of the world.

## Biography

### Folklore & Legend

The legend of the Dead King began during the Collapse of Avarlell in the later years of the Age of Madness. The tale claims that a human lord led an army to wipe out the remaining alders that had fled Avarlell and, while sucessful, was afflicted with an elven curse of undeath that trapped both him and his army on the Beach. Corrupted further by the nature of the Beach, the Dead King gave form to the nightmares that roamed the realm, transforming them into the anathema.

Gekydo's recurrence in mortal dreams led to him being granted the title of *Helregnin*, the Dark Lord prophesied to battle *Ælenishaff*, the "Serpent Reborn" and hero of the mortals, at the great battle of Ragh nar Roog. Gekydo is thus the successor to Morgott, the Dark Lord of the Age of Madness, for the title.

### Early Life & Background

#### Childhood

Sivard Aulfhedinn of the House of Ice was born shortly before his family was removed from lordship of Chel, robbing Sivard of his birthright. Nonetheless, the boy was raised within his family's fiefdom by warriors of the Pale Order, faceless knights sworn to guard the northern monarchs. Under their tutelage, Sivard grew into a fine warrior that aspired to join his fellows, thus giving up all desires of the flesh.

## Overview

### Physical Appearance

Born a human of noble blood, Sivard was a handsome man with the distinctive white hair of his bloodline. Tall and lithe, he was a skilled and agile fighter. As he aged he slowly learned cryomancy, the innate magical art of his family, and as a result his skin grew more pale.

When Sivard took the Rune of Darkness upon his flesh, his handsome features became twisted by malice; his skin, already pale due to his frost magic, turned deathly white to match his hair. His veins darkened to grey, almost black, from the rune's corruption.

Reborn with unnatural life by the rune, the monstrous Gekydo hides behind a suit of armour apparently made of bones and otherworldly metal. His face is hidden by a helmet that doubles as a crown. The entity does not speak, and commands his anathema and undead legions presumably through telepathy.

### Personality

"*The she-elf...she cursed me. With a **title of shame**. I wish to know its meaning. [...] She called me **Gekydo**,"
"...Could mean **destroyer**, but the context...it's more sacrilegious...**Defiler**,*"
—Sivard and John on the meaning of Sivard's elvish title[src]

A kind, noble and couragous knight that wished to restore his House to its former glory, Sivard was a principled warrior that detested acts of malice and carried great guilt from his participation in the Collapse of Avarlell. Upon discovering that he was a bastard of House Felldragon, he was driven by love, not by ambition, to claim the throne of the Emipire and improve the lives of the common folk of Pydwell. He considered the name that the alder had given him - *Gekydo*, elvish for "Defiler" - an insult and a mark of shame, and he became determined to clean his soul of the atrocities that he committed against the elven race. A skilled commander and leader, he earned the loyalty of the lords of Chel and thus reclaimed the title of thane, ultimately with the goal of becoming king of his own realm.

Like most noble knights, Sivard sought the power of the Great Runes with good intentions; he bargained to claim the Rune of Darkness in order to keep it out of the hands of those that would use it to do great harm. Little did anyone know, Sivard included, that the rune's power could overwhelm the strongest of men; when around the rune, Sivard's powers grew stronger, and his darker urges became harder to ignore. The noble warrior and king slowly descended into madness, becoming impatient, demanding, cruel and prone to random acts of violence, all consequences of experimenting with the rune.

As the Empire began to collapse, Sivard's desire for the throne twisted into an obsession; determined to win the impending war, he poisoned his army and resurrected them as unstoppable undead warriors. When his allies tried to take the rune from him he bound it to his very flesh, fully giving in to its corruption. He now considered his elvish title *Gekydo* to be a source of pride, not shame, and took it as his new name. His turn to darkness necessitated his death; with the sword Himinsverd, Sivard's body and soul were slain, presumably ending the threat he and his undead posed. However, the death of his soul made his body a vessel for the rune's dark power, and he rose from the dead as a silent, unstoppable monster; in other words, pure evil.

Centuries on the Beach, banished from the mortal world, have rotten away any trace of Gekydo's mortal past. Nothing remains of the noble Sivard; all that is left are the embers of a skilled and relentless warrior enveloped in the nightmarish dark power of the Forbidden Rune. Even the denizens of the Beach fear and loath him, including the primordial nightmares that seek to escape the Beach entirely to avoid him. Gekydo can be considered nothing less than the embodiment of all evil in the world, driven solely by the desire to drown the mortal world in darkness.

## Powers, Equipment & Abilities

### Powers

* **Cryomancy:** As a member of the House of Ice, Sivard Aulfhedinn possessed an intrinsic knowledge of ice magic, also called cryomancy.
* **Dark magic:** Gekydo's mastery of the Rune of Darkness grants him unlimited knowledge of dark magic, most notably necromancy.
	+ **Necromancy:** A master of the most forbidden of the dark magics, necromancy, Gekydo is able to revive the soulless flesh of anyone he chooses, creating legions of merciless, mindless soldiers that obey his every command. Through necromancy, Gekydo is able to entrap the souls of unfortunate dreamers on the Beach, using them to give form to nightmares and create the anathema. Some nightmares, such as the King in Antlers, have attempted to escape the Beach and thus the Dead King to save themselves from the fate of joining his legions.
	+ **Death whispering:** Gekydo can see and hear the spirits of the dead and the dying, a talent called death whispering. He uses this power to telepathically control his undead legions, both in the mortal realm and on the Beach.
	+ **Blackflame:** As both a necromancer and undead, Gekydo and the anathema wield the blackflame, a primordial fire born of the Void. As the vessel of the Forbidden Rune, Gekydo wields the full power of the blackflame.
* **Rune of Darkness:** Also called the Forbidden Rune, the Rune of Darkness is a fragment of the One Rune and the conduit of all dark magic in Pydwell. After claiming the rune during the Age of Madness, Sivard Aulfhedinn became corrupted by its power and cursed his soldiers to follow him in undeath; upon the death of his own soul, the rune resurrected his corpse as Gekydo. The Dead King now wields the rune's full power; if the legends are true, it is bound to his very flesh.
* **Immortality:** With his soul destroyed, Gekydo exists in a state between life and death; he is thus a creature of the Beach, perfectly attuned to its nature and its power. As a result, no mortal weapon can harm Gekydo, and no injury can slow him; only the Hero of Mortals is capable of destroying the Dead King forever, though it is not certain that the Hero will prove victorious, only that they will clash swords at Ragh nar Roog.

### Equipment

#### Armour & Apparel

* **Suit of Bones:** Gekydo wears a suit of armour made out of otherworldly metal and human bones. The armour has two purposes: shielding the Rune of Darkness that is bound to the flesh beneath, and enhancing his nightmarish nature thus weakening the souls he captures.

#### Weapons

* **Sword of Shrieks:** Gekydo wields a jagged sword known as the Sword of Shrieks that emits the high-pitched screams of the souls it has slain; the Dead King combines the trapped souls with nightmares to form the anathema, though only a few souls can be manipulated in this way. The sword was originally the family sword of the House of Ice, wielded by Sivard Aulfhedinn before his downfall, and is designed to channel the innate ice magic wielded by their bloodline.

### Abilities

* **Master swordsman:** Trained his entire life by the armed forces of Chel, Sivard - and thus Gekydo - is a master swordsman; only John Godwin could match him in training, and many elven warriors fell to his sword during the Collapse of Avarlell. His swordsmanship earned him respect throughout Pydwell and eventually enabled him to reclaim lordship of the House of Ice, as well as make him a serious candidate for the imperial throne. Following his downfall, Sivard's skills with a sword remained in Gekydo.

## Trivia

* The name "Gekydo" is elvish for "Defiler"; without context (i.e. Sivard's burning of a sacred temple), it means "Destroyer".
	+ The name is derived from the Japanese word "Gekido", which means "rage, fury or wrath".