Zolgrish

**Zolgrish** is a Lich, Lith's silver mine business partner, and Inxialot Nagaar's apprentice. He goes by **Zolgrish Berkyx** as his human alias when he goes shopping.

## Appearance

After regaining control of his undead energies, Zolgrish appears dressed in a luxurious golden mage robe. His face can be mistaken for a human's if not for the red light of undeath burning in his eyes instead of pupils. He assimilates Dann'Kah, his appearance becoming a tall man with pointy ears wearing a golden magician robe. The world energy accumulated inside his body forms a crown of pure mana above his head and makes his skin shine like the god of light had descended among men.

The Lich is a tall man with a skeletal body, with barely enough skin on his face to express emotions. The cold, red light of undeath shines inside his withered eyes, giving him a cruel gaze.

### Human Form

Zolgrish's human appearance back when he was still alive looks like a man 1.78 (5'10") meters tall with brown eyes, hair, and a short beard.

## Personality

The Lich is eccentric and loves experimenting, often paying no need to those he considers hindrances or annoyances to his research. He also forgets people's names, referring to "Scourge" (Lith's alias) as Scarge, Forge, Sarge, Bart, Snart, Borg, Lamb, Nolon Mario, Luigi, Zalma, Zelda, Feron Stooge, Scrooge, Groog/Groucho/Bongbat, Scant, Kant,

He also calls Tista Testalos/Ding, and Nalrond Nimble/Nemea/Dong/Blorgflux respectively.

He is also deranged, frequently making decisions without much thought, such as disabling his lab's protections to let Lith inside while forgetting that it would also let his former servants in as well.

## Equipment

The Lich wields a silvery staff with several violet mana crystals embedded on it.

## Background

Zolgrish constructed his residence in the Broken Spine, a discontinuous mountain range, due to its rich silver ore veins. This allowed him to satisfy his need for the precious metal without needing an external supplier. The lich had set up his underground lab at the fringes of his phylactery's range, acting as a relay point for his phylactery. If he had succeeded, he would have been able to expand his area of activity to the entire Kellar Region.

To avoid using dumber Lesser Undead, dangerous Greater Undead that require training, or "annoying" living beings as subordinates, Zolgrish bound the souls of monsters to his phylactery, giving them part of his undead life force. Whatever happened to him would happen to them, guaranteeing their loyalty and providing for most of their living expenses. Whenever one of them died, it was reborn with his memories. Whenever they were hungry, they would kill a few monsters and let the others feast on the corpse. His device resurrects them only if the body is destroyed, or rather, stripped to the bone.

Over time, he took two of his most intelligent minions as lab assistants - Dann'Kah the orc shaman, whose mastery over magic crystals helped increase the power of his Forgemastering creations, and Yozmogh the Balor, whose his eyes were a perfect amplifier for his spells. However, since their souls are stored next to his inside the phylactery, the repeated cycles of death and rebirth allowed them to feel the energy flow, until they became able to manipulate it.

Ratpack, Zolgrish's experimental Greater Undead, brings Lith to the 8th floor of the dungeon where Zolgrish is held prisoner. After defeating the prison guard, a Balor called Trou'Bleskamuz the Fierce, Lith meets the lich who has been reduced to an old battered skull with a life force weaker than a regular human's and a blood core the size of a pea. He gifts him one of the room's giant silver doors in return for helping him regain control of his phylactery.

They make their way to the lab on the 4th floor, retrieving the amplification device, an Adamant forge. However, Zolgrish had carelessly disabled the lab's protections to let Lith in, inadvertently allowing the monsters to invade the lab as well. Zolgrish and Dann'Kah wrestle for control of the energy flowing to the phylactery. Zolgrish bluffs his way into allowing Ratpack to stab the orc shaman with his Coward's Knife and Warps him and Dann'Kah away to the Disciplining Hall where he had killed Dann'Kah repeatedly in the past to force him into submission.

He successfully assimilates Dann'Kah, assuming his elven features. Returning to Lith, Zolgrish destroys the amplifier since it had been tampered with. The space occupied by the amplifier looks like a black hole collapsing on itself, but with it destroyed, the souls are freed, each one releasing a small pillar of light that shoots towards the sky. The lich gifts Lith an Adamant Forge while taking back the artifacts that Yozmogh had on him, though he lets Lith keep the Eraser. He sets the underground lab to self destruct before leaving, causing the entire Broken Spine mountain range to collapse several hundred meters below ground level.

Lith meets Zolgrish a year later when visiting the silver mines and organizes a secret partnership after agreeing to keep the mines hidden, though Lith manages to swindle the madman into a 60-40 profit arrangement. Zolgrish's armies of lesser undead work to open the silver mines soon as Lith is granted its ownership by the Griffon Kingdom. Thanks to their relentless labor and expertise, it takes the legion of skeletons just a few months to dig their way to the silver veins and even recover some of the old tunnels.

When the Horseman of Dusk sends a call-to-arms for the Dusk Court, Zolgrish sends back a letter rejecting the summons and tells him not to bother him again unless he has a much better offer.

Zolgrish becomes an apprentice under Lich King Inxialot Nagaar, who designs a replica of the ancient Awakened city of Urgamakka for the Council apprentice test. The two undead are tasked with overseeing Urgamakka 24/7 from the control room since they have no need to rest nor apprentices that they can favor while the rest of the Awakened just check the footage from time to time. They accidentally release the Gargoyles with the intent to wipe out the apprentices, though Ratpack manages to lower the output after a call from Council representative Raagu Drerian. The two Liches attempt to feast on a hearty meal but had forgotten how to eat, leaving Ratpack to clean up their bodily messes.

Inxialot and Zolgrish intently study the Horde's fight against the apprentices as the final test. They ignore the warnings of Vareen the Plaguespreader breaching the city's defenses, putting the apprentices' lives at risk. After Vareen overwhelms the Hordes, Inxialot Warps Zolgrish in to buy time. Zolgrish introduces himself as Inxialot in revenge to avoid the Eldritch from pursuing him in the future. However, Vareen quickly eliminates Zolgrish, though Zolgrish had left his phylactery behind. He demands compensation from Inxialot.

## Zolgrish's Underground Lab

The dungeon has several entry points, most of which are unguarded. While the edges of the caves and the surface of the corridors leading inside are rough with claw marks and bloodstains, the tunnels are smooth and flawless, due to the monsters digging through meters of rock with their bare hands. Deep underground it resembles more of a home than a dungeon, with doors, magical lights and tags to identify each room. There are even signs at every crossroad, pointing toward different zones. One of the rooms hosts a huge glass workshop with vials, beakers, and many components for alchemical apparatus of every shape and size.

Every corridor is identical on every floor. The ground and the walls are constructed with a honey hued mix of stone and soil while the importance of every door can be determined by their silver-wood ratio due to silver being the best mana conductor.

The ground floor is a storage area for non magical equipment, the equivalent of a broom closet. Zolgrish's living quarters takes all the first underground floor, while the servants' quarters are on the second one. The third and fourth underground floors are the lab, the fifth the ingredient deposit, the sixth the treasury, and the seventh a silver mine. The eighth is a prison for specimens and failed experiments that are unable to be destroyed, with reinforced doors, each room bigger than those of the other floors and enveloped in multiple unique arrays. Each door has as blue mana crystal the size of a fist at each of its 4 corners and a different magic circle formed by small purple mana crystals the size of a nut.

### Forgemastering Lab

Zolgrish's phylactery amplification is located on the fourth floor. It is extremely large, extending as far as the eye could see and taking up the entire floor. There is no room or wall separating the various sections of the lab, only pillars to keep the ceiling standing. The stone walls are carved into bookshelves and each one of them is filled with ancient tomes or scrolls. The richly decorated spines of the books are the only element of color in the otherwise honey hued stone surface. A blue translucent force field covers all the bookshelves, protecting their content from the energy employed and released during the Forgemastering experiments. There are at least 20 silver forges, each covered in runes of power which form magic circles still pulsing with blue energy. Some circles are complete, others a work in progress, but all of them have an object resting on their center, ready to be enchanted. The books are arranged according to a color code that goes from black to white, going through the complete light spectrum.

## Quotes

* *"If you're reading this, you're not the moron I always thought you were. Happy deathday, Zolgrish."* (Zolgrish's note for the chain mail, Chapter 534)
* *"What plan? You were so confident that I was just following your lead, dear Garb. It's not my problem if something goes wrong. Ratpack and I cannot die."* (Zolgrish to Lith, Chapter 539)
* *"I don't get why Borg is so nervous. Worst case scenario, I'll make the arrays surrounding the lab collapse and flatten the mountain. Sure, I'll lose my lab and Borg will lose his life, but he's just a human. That way, I'd get my powers back and destroy the device. It's a win-win. At least for me."* (Chapter 539)
* *"The situation is much better than I predicted. Mario is unlikely to survive, but hired help is always expendable."* (Chapter 542)
* *"No matter the form you take, an idiot will always be an idiot."* (Zolgrish to Dann'Kah, Chapter 548)
* *"Good move, Groog. A Lich always needs someone expendable. Ratpack, go mingle with your peers. Testalos, Nimble, this is Ratpack, my assistant. He is dumb, slow, and clumsy, but he has a big heart. I know because I put it in his chest."* (Zolgrish to Lith, Nalrond, and Tista, Chapter 976)
* *"Ratpack, say goodbye to your new friends, Ding and Dong...They didn't try to kill you and that's what real friends do. Take a lesson from me and Blorgflux. If I don't reply to your first 100 or so calls, don't take it personally, Bongbat. I'm just that busy. Bye!"* (Zolgrish to Ratpack and Lith, Chapter 976)
* *"Dear Dust, I don't give a damn about your conflict so the next time you bother me, I'll just kill the messenger and pretend to have never seen him until I forget about him and turn my lie into truth. Right now, thanks to my business relationship with Scourge, I get all the silver I need and maybe a shot at getting myself Awakened simply by minding my own business. If you want me on your side, you have to offer me more to do even less. I doubt you're stupid enough to accept such terms, but hope dies last. PS: tell your sisters Dove and Nice to stay away from my lab. I have Salaark on the speed dial and a favor to call in."* (Zolgrish's letter to Dusk, Chapter 1301)
* *"The Word Trip? I thought it was just a myth."* (Zolgrish talking to Inxialot about the World Tree, Chapter 1497)
* *""People die every day, that's why we all have phylacteries. We'll contact the Council as soon as the fight ends."* (Inxialot and Zolgrish to Ratpack, Chapter 1522)
* *"Not any Lich! My name is Inxialot."* (Zolgrish to Vareen, Chapter 1525)

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Chapter 548: Bloody Revenge (Part 2)
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Chapter 975: Madness For Hire (Part 1)
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Chapter 976: Madness for Hire (Part 2)
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Chapter 533: Trouble (Part 1)
5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 Chapter 537: Master Plan (Part 1)
6. ↑ Chapter 539: Master Plan (Part 3)
7. ↑ Chapter 540: Master Plan (Part 4)
8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 Chapter 542: The Best Laid Plans... (Part 2)
9. ↑ Chapter 543: Past vs Present (Part 1)
10. ↑ Chapter 544: Past vs Present (Part 2)
11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Chapter 549: Utter Failure (Part 1)
12. ↑ Chapter 538: Master Plan (Part 2)
13. ↑ Chapter 1093: Trust Issues (Part 1)
14. ↑ Chapter 1301: The Thickness of Blood (Part 1)
15. ↑ Chapter 1511: Unbalanced Power (Part 1)
16. ↑ Chapter 1497: Old but Gold (Part 1)
17. ↑ Chapter 1503: Early Rankings (Part 1)
18. ↑ Chapter 1522: Spreading the Plague (Part 2)
19. ↑ Chapter 1525: Going All Out (Part 1)
20. ↑ Chapter 529: Unexpected Turn (Part 1)
21. ↑ Chapter 530: Unexpected Turn (Part 2)
22. ↑ Chapter 541: The Best Laid Plans... (Part 1)
23. ↑ Discord