Eternal Champion

A character in a series of books by Michael Moorcock. The Eternal Champion is a soul caught in an eternal struggle throughout the Multiverse, constantly reincarnated to fight the same battle over and over again, sometimes fighting to save humanity, sometimes to destroy it. He (or sometimes she) is ultimately forced to serve the Cosmic Balance in one way or another, although the Champion is eventually allowed to rest (for a short time) by choosing his own path. Some people feel that this character is a metaphor for our lives, such that regardless of what choices we are pushed toward, the only way we can be truly happy is by striking out and making our own destiny.

Examples of Moorcock's Eternal Champion include:

• Alerik
• Konrad Arflane
• Asquiol
• Earl Aubec
• Oswald Bastable
• Clovis Becker
• Jherek Carnelian
• Jerry Cornelius
• Corum Jhaelen Irsei
• Elric of Melnibone
• Erekose
• Dr. Faustaff
• Prince Flamadin
• Dorian Hawkmoon
• Queen Ilian of Garathorm
• Michael Kane
• Jack Karaquazian
• Muldoon
• Urlik Skarsol
• Von Bek

The incarnations of the Eternal Champion can sometimes be summoned outside their own world. Within the Elric Saga he is twice so summoned, each time meeting other incarnations of the Eternal Champion, and joining with them to form The Three Who Are One and The Four Who Are One to fight some great enemy too powerful for one Eternal Champion alone.

Interestingly, the same events are related in the stories of Corum, but for him they happen in the opposite order as they do for Elric.

A brief note regarding the Eternal Champion:

1) an interesting wrinkle is the introduction in 1994 by Tad Williams of Shemei Uendrijj, a black man with a white sword named Cloudhurler. Introduced in White Wolf Publishing's Tales of the White Wolf, the first anthology of non-Moorcock Elric stories. Moorcock notes in the introduction that he has contacted Williams and asked if he could write about the Gypsy Prince.

Another piece of information:
There are three objects of power in the Multiverse.

• The Black Sword, the souleater, slayer of innocents.
• The Runestaff. This object can only exist under certain specific conditions, and so it creates a zone of these conditions around it. If you have the Runestaff you can survive in Chaos-filled places.
• The Grail. The von Bek family are custodians of the Grail. Although von Beks can be the Eternal Champion, they can also be his partners, companions, or adversaries.