Storyline

The Story Of Overlord Franchise[]

Overlord: Dark Legend[]

Young Lord Gromgard is the son of Duke Gromgard, a failure of a ruler and parent who always went off on some adventure, only to come back beaten and defeated. He also has to live with his two older siblings, Gerda and Grenville, who constantly bicker over who is supposed to be the heir of their family’s lands, Greenvale. Eventually, they leave Castle Gromgard for the domains of their favourite races: Gerda goes to the dwarves, while Grenville moves to the elves, leaving Greenvale and the whole Castle to their younger brother.

However, it is Lord Gromgard’s 16th birthday and he gets a strange gauntlet from his only friend, Chef Rollick, who also remarks that the old Black Baron ordered him to do so before he died. When his siblings’ loud departure uncovers a strange door with golden handprint on it, young Gromgard opens it and finds the old throne room of his uncle, the Black Baron, along with a teleporter and a suit of armour hanging above it. As he enters the room, he hears a voice telling him about his Evil legacy, or some such thing. When he touches the armour, he is immediately encased in it and becomes the spitting image of his uncle. After walking away from the teleporter, the voice comes back. Then an old iron maiden opens and out goes Gnarl, the Black Baron’s old advisor. Immediately, he assumes the same role for Lord Gromgard, introduces him to the minions and advises him to go and break his siblings’ rooms for some glorious petty revenge.

The now-Overlord Gromgard then proceeds to go on an epic adventure of his own, which involves pummeling a halfling invasion, saving Meadowsweet Town from wolves and Black Flame Bandits, banishing a local witch and finally culminating with him tricking dwarves and elves into a bloody war, while Gerda and Grenville eventually have to come and beg him to let them stay in Castle Gromgard. The Overlord proceeds to make them his servants. Gromgard then rules over Greenvale for a long time, eventually disappearing. Castle Gromgard is abandoned for some reason and replaced with the Dark Tower, while Meadowsweet Town presumably becomes Spree and the Illyrium Forest becomes Evernight.

Since Overlord Gromgard was not shown or implied to have any children, it is assumed that after his death, Gnarl went off to find a successor elsewhere, with the successor in question being the Second Overlord.

Overlord I[]

Overlord begins when Gnarl and the Browns wake up and drag the Overlord out of his crypt. They put on his armour and proclaim him their master in the old and dilapidated Dark Tower — the previous Overlord having been killed by the Seven Heroes. Ready to reconquer the land, the Overlord first goes to the Mellow Hills, where the halflings and their king Melvin Underbelly are using the townspeople of Spree and the Reds as slave labour. The Overlord storms the Halfling Homes, slays Melvin and reclaims the Red Minion Hive and Spree’s food (which he can either return or keep, depends on if the Overlord cares about their rage delight or disgust). However, Castle Spree comes under attack by raiders. After flushing them out, the castle’s mistress Rose offers her services to the Overlord, but only if he saves her luggage from a strange tentacle monster (women). The Third Overlord proceeds to slaughter through more raiders and kills the same monster that brought them there and guards Rose’s luggage. Mellow Hills are his and Rose becomes the new Tower Mistress.

In Evernight Forest, the roots of a tree where Oberon Greenhaze sleeps cover the elves' home, who are nearly extinct after being ransacked by dwarves and their women, along with many men, were dragged off by the rock-huggers to serve as slaves. Along with vanquishing corrupted unicorns and other mutated critters, the Third Overlord has to break the root-nodes of Oberon’s tree to disable the magical barrier protecting him. Once he finds the Greens, he goes to slay Oberon, which he does after several waves of his summoned nightmares. The elves’ sacred statue, however, has been stolen by the dwarves, angering Jewel, the Thieving Hero, who wanted to steal it for herself. The elf-ghosts beg the Third Overlord to get it back, offering their eternal thanks (not a good incentive by any margin).

Next on the list is Heaven's Peak, a supposedly holy town. From Rose, the Overlord knows that it suffers from a plague of zombies. However, he has other reasons to be there: from Gnarl he knows that Heaven’s Peak’s surroundings are one big swamp, perfect for the water-loving Blues. He discovers the water-filled caves of Heaven’s Peak, but before he gets there, he is ambushed by a succubus. The bewinged wench dies, but the Overlord is now certain something is really wrong about this place. He enters the caves and here, after wading through water, killing Boombos, getting rust practically everywhere and killing a water serpent, the Overlord gains the Blues and their resurrective abilities. But the city’s gates are shut, so the Overlord enters it through zombie and Boombo-infested sewers. He fells another water serpent as well. After a confrontation with some of Sir William’s fallen knights, he learns about a forge from which they got their armour and retrieves it.

In the town's inn, Halfway to Heaven, the Overlord dicovers what seems to be a gathering place of redcoats. After he follows one, he finds the headquarters of the Order of the Red Dawn, a pleasure-cult Sir William, one of the Heroes and paladin-governor of Heaven’s Peak, joined. The Third Overlord slaughters the place to the last man and woman, since they’re a pack of degenerates and then kills the creature they worship, the Succubus Queen. After her death, the Overlord steals her Iron Maiden and unknowingly stops the zombie plague and banishes all succubi from the region.

Sir William’s time comes. With his succubi and knights gone from the entrance, the Overlord enters Angelis Keep unhindered and confronts the very unholy paladin. Strangely, William recognises the Overlord and mutters something about some "wizard." After the Lord of All Evil executes William, who seemed to have learned teleporting magic in the meantime, he breaks his staff in half and uses a piece to unlock the room with Velvet, Rose’s sister. Here he can choose between the titillating, but empty-headed Velvet, or the nagging, yet competent Rose.

The Overlord then enters the Golden Hills, home of dwarves and their leader Goldo Golderson, who has become obsessed with gold. The Overlord first destroys their village, then enters the Glittering Mine-or attempts it at first, as it’s guarded by a rock giant. After he dispatches the walking cliff-face, he can enter the Mine and his reward is lots and lots of beautiful gold. The Overlord is much wealthier and his Mistress is happy. Everything is right with the world. Here the remaining enslaved elves claim that the last of their women are being held in the Royal Halls as Goldo's concubines. Meanwhile at the dwarf construction site, Gnarl recommends that the Overlord stash a few minions inside the statue of Mother Goddess and allow Jewel to take it in order to follow her to her homeland, the Ruborian Desert. Back at the Royal Halls, where Goldo is defeated, the Overlord can either take his stash of gold or free the remaining elf women before the Halls collapse.

The Ruborian Desert is found and Jewel is captured and interrogated. An enraged Kahn the Warrior, protective of Jewel, strikes back and the Overlord now has to save Spree and Heaven's Peak from his wrath. After killing Kahn and dealing with the traitors in Spree, the Overlord is summoned back into the Tower by Gnarl, as something important is going on.

Back at the Dark Tower, the minions submit to the previous Overlord, who has secretly possessed the Wizard, originally father to Rose and Velvet and who now lays claim to his previous title. The old Overlord tells the current one that he was originally the Eighth Hero, who grabbed him and threw himself off the Tower and was left for dead by his companions while they stole everything that wasn’t nailed down. The Old Overlord then put him in the sarcophagus to heal his wounds in order to use him to defeat the other heroes. The Overlord battles the Wizard, during which the Wizard brags of being responsible for the corruption of the heroes. A tiring civil war between the Third and the Second's minions erupts, with the Third Overlord having to get all of the Hives back once again, culminating in a battle with the Wizard.

Upon the Wizard's death, the Overlord reclaims his Tower and minions. Depending on the Overlord's corruption and choices throughout, the ending will show 4 of 8 different ending cutscenes where either the Overlord is met with bliss and praise or he pillages and scorches the land and tortures the inhabitants. Regardless of the player's ending, Jester is shown performing some sort of ritual, with Gnarl narrating "Evil will always find a way", which is explained in the expansion Overlord: Raising Hell.

Overlord: Raising Hell[]

The expansion Overlord: Raising Hell continues the story of Overlord, when Gnarl informs the Overlord that his previously conquered lands suddenly show signs of strong "Evil." As it turns out, each domain has spawned a portal to an Abyss, where each fallen Hero is put through some form of ironic torture; Melvin eats until he pops, Oberon and the elves are forced to watch a terrible play of their forest falling over and over again, Goldo is transformed into a golden statue, William eternally burns with his cultists and is used to power a cleaning machine by the women of Heaven’s Peak and Kahn is turned into a motionless wall, which rids him of his rage. Jewel does not get her own Abyss, as she is still imprisoned in the Dark Tower nor does the Wizard, presumably because his soul was consumed by the Second Overlord.

Eventually, after the Overlord conquers each Abyss, he confronts their master: the Forgotten God, ex-husband of Mother Goddess, who cursed him after he cheated on her so that his name will be forgotten by everyone, which is a death sentence to a god. The Forgotten God desperately tries to kill the Overlord, hoping that this will somehow make others remember him, but is slain by the Overlord after a long and hard battle.

However, just as he tries to leave, the Jester escapes and collapses the Abyss Gate, leaving the Third Overlord stuck in literal hell. However, by killing the Forgotten God, he has become the new God of the Infernal Abyss, which is demonstrated by the wraiths kneeling before him.

Back on surface, Gnarl and the minions are lamenting the loss of another master, but then the Overlord’s mistress steps forth and fondles her bulging belly, leaving them with a hope of another Overlord coming soon...

Overlord II[]

After the untimely seclusion of the Third Overlord in the Infernal Abyss, the lands are without a master. Minions flee to the Netherworld and an event called the Great Cataclysm destroys the Dark Tower and causes the rise of the Glorious Empire. Gnarl and the minions search the lands for a successor, and find the Overlad in the sleepy, snowy town of Nordberg. After Overlad demonstrates his magical abilities and ruins the local celebrations, the Empire arrives and demands Nordberg to surrender their magical beings. As Overlad didn't exactly give them a reason not to, the town's mayor throws Overlad from the battlements. The young seed of evil has to flee with the help of minions, eventually being frozen into a hunk of ice after a brief battle with the imperial legions.

The minions bring him to the Netherworld and raise the boy to become their new Overlord.

Overlord II begins with our new Overlord set before the task of reclaiming all that was lost after his father’s imprisonment. Much has changed and the Glorious Empire has become strong, but decadent and lazy. The Fourth Overlord starts his destruction of it by conquering Nordberg, saves the Red Minions from a Sanctuary under Nordberg (and also meets Queen Fay, a powerful fairy sorceress, who promptly collapses the ceiling on him) and takes his childhood friend Kelda as his first mistress. He sets sail for Everlight, an elven tropical escape. However, the Empire has gotten there as well and the Overlord gets shipwrecked by the combination of a Spider Queen and "admiring the local sights" (i.e, staring at a woman’s buxom chest). The Fourth Overlord proceeds to conquer Everlight and recovers the Green Minion Hive during a complex infiltration of the local imperial fortress, all the while gaining another mistress, Juno (and the one who indirectly caused his crashlanding).

Because of a suggestion from a mysterious woman, the Overlord proceeds to visit the Wasteland, remnants of his father’s domain. There he finds the shards of the Tower Heart and Gnarl deduces that it had to explode. However, the Wasteland is filled with a strange ooze, one that turns any minion who steps in it into an uncontrollable monster. Gnarl advises to find the Blues, as they might have the power necessary to clear it.

With Juno's help, the Overlord enters the Empire Heartlands and infiltrates the Empire City by sneaking into the Slums with his minions disguised as guards. After a brief chase after the Blue Hive through sewers below the Arena, the Fourth Overlord is incapacitated by the Sentinels and made to fight in the Arena, without having his equipment taken away and his magic still active, as the Imperials were arrogant enough to not switch their anti-magic shield on. The Overlord fights through numerous waves of slaves and captured magical creatures, eventually wrecking the Arena and slipping away with the Hive in resulting chaos. He also gets the choice between dominating or killing his old friend, the Yeti.

Now with the Blues in tow, the Overlord makes his way through the Wasteland unimpeded, collecting Heart shards and discovering that the Glorious Empire has turned the Wasteland into a dumping ground for their undesirables. However, Queen Fay, the leader of the Elven Resistance, gives him an offer: she will provide the help of her lieutenant Florian Greenheart with recovering the shards of the Tower Heart, as she is getting desperate. Not one to refuse making his job simpler (and he can always kill the annoying elf later), the Overlord accepts Fay's offer. Then, after gaining all the shards, imperial legions ambush the Overlord and he has to flee into the Wasteland Sanctuary, leaving Florian to the dogs.

Queen Fay then provides him with the means of recharging the Heart by draining the energies of four shrines in the Sanctuary. However, after draining the last one, the Heart is nearly eaten by a Salamander King, forcing the Overlord to once again fight an overgrown critter. The fight ends with an epic scene of the Fourth Overlord cutting the King's head off.

After solving that particular bother, the Overlord takes the Tower Heart upwards, where Queen Fay sorrowfully tells him that the energy of the shrines was insufficient and so she decides to dramatically sacrifice herself for the recharge by offering her vast power. However, thanks to the stupidity and soft hearts of the Good creatures, this takes longer than planned, as they carry her all around the Sanctuary, while imperials are digging their way inside.

Eventually, Fay is drained of her power and the Overlord gets the chance of either corrupting or killing her. Either way, he gets a third mistress.

Finally, there comes the assault upon the Empire City itself. The Overlord teleports into the Heartlands with the Tower Heart and the minion mounts he gets after he chooses his First Mistress; either wolves, spiders or salamanders. The Fourth Overlord proceeds to build three trebuchets to destroy the legions, with the final one being used to loose the Tower Heart onto the anti-magical shield, breaking it. Then Marius, Emperor Solarius' spokesman, appears and boasts about the Tower Heart's energies being absorbed into the magical vat in the Imperial Palace.

The Overlord finally enters the city proper and sweeps up it's remaining defenders. He also meets the woman who advised him thus far and who reveals herself to be none other than Rose, who took him from the Dark Tower right after he was born and left him in Nordberg, due to believing that life of a backwater peasant would get the Evil out of him. She was wrong.

Breaking into the Palace after he slaughters the citizens mutated by Solarius' "divine nectar," he meets a strangely intact Florian, who starts explaining the history of the Great Cataclysm and that he was, in fact, it's catalyst: in an effort to gain his own magic, Florian touched the Tower Heart, but since he was not an Overlord, it did not accept him and exploded instead, with the elf barely escaping. Then the greatest twist comes out: Florian Greenheart was Emperor Solarius the whole time, harvesting magic from creatures all over the world and gathering it into a great vat in an effort to ascend as a god. Florian then jumps into the vat and transforms into a hideous monster simply called "the Devourer."

The final battle starts. The Overlord has to chase the booger-looking abomination all over the ruined city, pop it's ulcers and kill the creatures it spews out, while draining energy from Florian when he emerges out of it. Eventually, the Overlord drains him enough and the uppity tree-hugger explodes. Good riddance overall.

The Fourth Overlord then becomes the ruler of the whole world and the ending plays out according to his deeds, whether he was a Dominator or a Destroyer. It is also implied that the Third Overlord might be preparing a comeback...

Overlord: Fellowship of Evil[]

The Fourth Overlord was killed by a trio of Heroes: Sir Cedric, Lady Clarissa and the unicorn Sparkle. They establish their own reign of Good with their order, the Shining Justice. Minions flee to another layer of the Netherworld, the Netherdeep, under the Wasteland. Under the reign of Good, a plague named "the Golden" touches the world, threatening the existence of minions and all of Evil as well. Netherworld is also turned into a tourist attraction, which is unacceptable.

Gnarl, who found the "Big Book o' Evil," learns a ritual that becomes the last chance for minions to escape the Golden. He sends his minions to seek out Evil creatures, and they spot four champions, bringing their bodies to Gnarl for the ritual.

The four Champions of Evil are resurrected by Gnarl’s ritual, and become candidates for the throne of the Overlord, the Netherghuls. The Fellowship of Evil is gathered.

Some time after a Netherghul candidate was chosen as an Overlord, the Wasteland has recovered from the magical plague including some wildlife. Former citizens of the Glorious Empire had started to move back into the land, using Tower remains to create forts and villages throughout this domain. The Tower Heart was lost thanks to being used as catapult ammo and the ooze from the Wasteland disappeared shortly after.

However, it is important to note that Rhianna Pratchett, one of the main writers for Fellowship of Evil, has announced that it stands as it's own storyline and is a separate entity from the main Overlord lore^[1], therefore Fellowship of Evil along with the fall and demise of the Fourth Overlord is all non-canon.