Gracklstugh.
This city was not particularly famous in the Underdark. Compared with this rather magnificent duergar city, the people of the Underdark were perhaps more familiar with its lord.
—Graybeard!
He was an exceptional figure who appeared only once in a century.
Every race produced a few outstanding heroes, such as Yugin among the orcs, Drizzt Do'Urden among the drow, and the Griffon King among humans. Graybeard was one such figure. He came from humble origins, and reportedly both his father and mother had been slaves controlled by mind flayer elders. Throughout his childhood, he had been controlled and tortured by mind flayers as an experimental subject. That torment changed his mind. While inflicting immense suffering on him, it also allowed him to advance into a powerful psion.
Perhaps there was something tragic about it.
The duergar had always suffered a troubled fate. They had been enslaved for a long time, and although they eventually rebelled and defeated the mind flayers, that tragic history still left their race with many wounds. Many duergar had their minds completely warped by this treatment, to the point that evil lunatics frequently emerged among their kind.
Graybeard was a product of precisely that.
Yet his talent was astonishing, and that painful experience ultimately made him everything he was!
Graybeard endured under the mind flayers' control for a long time. Once his power was strong enough, he freed the enslaved duergar and led them into open war against a powerful mind flayer nest.
A single battle made Graybeard famous!
Not only did he destroy that evil mind flayer base, but he also successfully killed its mind flayer elders.
Of course.
The price was also extremely steep.
Graybeard's mind suffered severe damage, and he occasionally descended into a terrifying state of madness. Two permanent scars remained