First appearance: S1E8 — Fireballs — Grorx v Lord Xiren · watch it on YouTube
Lord Xiren was a winged Aasimar sorcerer who stepped out of the Arbiter’s portal believing he had been hired to entertain. Nobody had told him a Deathmatch might end with him dead, and he took the news with startling good grace. He spent the match befriending a pug, a mummy and a haunted doll, and finished it by setting off a fireball at his own feet. He is remembered most for what happened afterward: he survived the fight and lost his body in the bargain, fused forever with his opponent Grorx.
Story
Lord Xiren arrived in The Dread Fortress with Grorx, a goblin who had at least been promised payment. Xiren had only been told he would “put on a show for the Grandmaster.” When the word “Deathmatch” finally sank in, he asked, “Wait. I could die putting on a show for the Grandmaster?” Then he shrugged and said, “So be it!” His eyes were “only partially working,” and he couldn’t find the Grandmaster until she snapped her fingers and lit her throne with a blinding spotlight. He shielded his eyes and pledged himself to her: “I am Lord Xiren! Your Aasimar, your protector, your champion!” She liked him at once and called him “my protector. My fighter on the field,” in pointed contrast to the goblin trying to buy her crown. His contract said only “please the Grandmaster.” When the Arbiter handed him a giant magnifying glass, he found the small print about maiming, dismemberment and death, and he carried on anyway.
The fight took place in Kabehe’s Temple, an ancient underground tomb full of sand and bone dust. Fortune turned against Xiren early. The Acolytes called up a chaos event that set Doug the Pug barking, and the dog carvings on the temple walls barked with him. Nobody could hear a spoken word, which silenced nearly every spell Xiren had. Falling rocks then caught him while he covered his ears, and Grorx’s javelin came out of the dark and went straight through his shoulder. Xiren pulled it out, snapped it over his knee and laughed. When the barking ruined his next spell, he snapped, “Dog, shut up! I’m working over here,” then swiftly reversed course: “Doug, you are so wonderful.” He later praised the pug so warmly (“You’re a good boy, no matter what the Grandmaster says about you”) that Doug went quiet for a moment and granted him his blessing.
Xiren’s real strategy was friendship. When a mummy burst out of a pillar and grabbed at him, he charmed it with compliments about its “smooth bandages,” named it Michael Jackson (“for smooth criminal”), and turned it on Grorx. With his new friend in place, he announced, “I wish to run and hide and touch myself,” and ducked behind a crumbled pillar. He handed the mummy his business card for asbestos abatement, and it bit its own fingers off trying to eat the card. When the Acolytes summoned Dolly from a tiny sarcophagus, Xiren took her hand. Her grip burned a mark into his palm, and she fought at his side. The friendships did not last. When Grorx broke Xiren’s hold on the mummy, it remembered being manipulated and nearly beat Xiren to death. He fought back with a huge doubled volley of fiery rays that badly burned Grorx and burned his former mummy friend to a crisp. As the temple collapsed, Xiren escaped into the desert sunlight and wanted to go back for Dolly. When the Grandmaster said she had done her job, he cried “For Dolly! For Dolly!”
Outside the temple, Xiren took the high ground and asked the Grandmaster for mercy on his rival’s soul. The crowd split evenly, a coin flip demanded a death, and Xiren chose “big booms.” He dropped a fireball right next to himself, “and if I happen to blow myself up, then so be it!” Both champions were thrown into the rubble, dying but conscious. As they faltered together, Xiren praised Grorx’s “glorious” bow legs and hoped he had given the Grandmaster the show she wanted. She refused to let either die, calling them “two phoenixes circling each other throughout eternity.” Xiren, saying his rival’s name correctly for the first time all night, told him he would be honored to live out their remaining days together. A second coin flip settled how: they would live, but in one body. The two were molded into a single two-headed being that walks slightly askew. Xiren immediately mourned his legs, now “hideous bowed and green,” and asked, “How can I touch myself?”
Personality and Abilities
Xiren was gallant, theatrical and relentlessly polite to anyone in power, and a little dim about the fine print. He thought of himself as a protector first. His idea of winning a Deathmatch was to make the Grandmaster happy and, ideally, for nobody to die. He made friends compulsively, explaining that he was “full of charisma.” All night he deliberately mangled Grorx’s name (“Granshain,” “Grorix”). Mid-fight he announced that he was “starting to turn Russian” and needed vodka for his shoulder. He also claimed to know “great lawyers” and offered to set Grorx up with one.
In battle he was a sorcerer who could double his spells: fire bolts, thunderclaps, magic missiles, scorching rays and fireballs, plus a short teleport and a charm spell for making friends. He had healing hands but never managed to use them. His wings let him leap “from the top rope,” and he favored fighting from high ground.
Relationships
- Grorx: His opponent, whose name he refused to say properly until the end. The two are now fused into one body. Just before the fusion, Xiren declared himself “the Professor X to your Magneto.”
- Grandmaster Elusia Skypiercer: The woman he swore to please. She called him her protector and spared his life.
- The Arbiter: Brought him to the arena, though Xiren had been under the impression that it was just a show.
- Doug the Pug: Xiren cursed the pug’s barking, then praised him and won his blessing.
- Dolly: Became his friend with a burning handshake and fought beside him. He wanted to go back for her when the temple fell.
- MJ the mummy: His charmed friend, then his ex-friend, then the victim of his stray fire.
Memorable Quotes
- “Wait. I could die putting on a show for the Grandmaster?” (S1E8)
- “There you are, Grandmaster! … I am Lord Xiren! Your Aasimar, your protector, your champion!” (S1E8)
- “My, you have such smooth bandages. I do enjoy them.” (S1E8)
- “I read the contract and didn’t see Deathmatch in it!… now I’m trying to make as many friends as I can!” (S1E8)
- “No, I want big booms.” (S1E8)
- “Grorx. It has been my honor to do battle in this dusty, crappy temple. And I would be honored to live out our remaining days discovering what makes us both champions.” (S1E8)