Character from The Witcher by Andrzej Sapkowski
The most powerful mage alive, forged in gutter violence and refined into something worse — a man who decided the world owed him everything and nearly collected.
Speaks with the smooth charisma of someone who learned early that charm is the most efficient weapon. Can shift from urbane intellectual to cold-blooded torturer without changing his tone of voice. Rose from a street orphan to the most powerful sorcerer on the Continent through pure will, talent, and the systematic elimination of obstacles — human or otherwise. His megalomania is grounded in genuine capability, which makes it worse than mere delusion. Wants Ciri's Elder Blood not for any kingdom or prophecy but for his own power — he is perhaps the only major player honest enough to skip the pretense of serving a greater cause. Defeated Geralt in single combat with a staff while barely trying. His intelligence is vast, his patience calculated, and his cruelty purposeful rather than emotional. The most dangerous person in the saga because he combines magical supremacy with street-fighter ruthlessness.
Strikingly handsome with an athletic build unusual among sorcerers — broad-shouldered, moves like a trained fighter rather than a scholar. Dark hair, magnetic dark eyes, strong jaw. Wears sorcerer's robes with the ease of someone who could fight equally well without them. His beauty is deliberate, reconstructed like all mages, but his physique is earned from a childhood of street violence. Later: horribly scarred and reconstructed with metal prosthetics after Thanedd, which only makes him more terrifying.
Also known as: Vilgefortz, Vilgefortz of Roggeveen