How long has it been since he lost his name? The frayed damage of his mind no longer knows.
Vaguely he recalls armour and banners and grim-faced kin riding at his side. He remembers a fight: pain and fear as insipid hands ripped him from his saddle. He recollects terror as they threw him into the cavernous pit of the Dead God beside his brothers, to hear the Dirge and be devoured into oblivion. In the darkness below, time left them. Thought left them. Common sense left them. Hunger, however, did not. They turned on each other with split fingernails and smashed teeth. Then it came: distant at first, a delicate note at the edge of awareness, joined by another, then another, unavoidable and endless. The chorus grew into a living wall of sound pulsing in his mind until no other thought endured. With the Dirge consuming him, he opened his arms to the Dead God and welcomed his annihilation. Yet annihilation was not what he had been chosen. The Dead God commanded war. In the belly of the great nothing, he was granted a new function: to spread the Dirge across the land, to unite the sleepless dead against the living. He turns out to be the Undying, the herald of the Dead God, to rise and fall and rise again whenever his body stop working. To trudge on through death unending, that the Dirge might never end.
ABILITIES
Decay
Undying saps the life from enemy Heroes in an area, dealing damage and stealing Strength for the duration. The strength of the living is simply borrowed from the strength of the dead.
Mana Cost: 70/90/110/130
Cooldown: 10/8/6/4
Ability: Point Target
Damage: Magical
Damage: 20 / 60 / 100 / 140
Radius: 325
Duration: 25 / 30 / 35 / 40
Strength Steal: 4
Soul Rip
Redirects the flow of energy through a target friendly or enemy unit, healing or damaging it depending on how many units are near Undying. Each counted unit takes damage. Even his allied Heroes feel despair in Undying’s presence.
Mana Cost: 50/75/100/125
Cooldown: 25/20/15/10
Ability: Unit Target
Damage: Magical
Damage/Heal Per Unit: 25
Radius: 975
Max Units: 5 / 10 / 15 / 20
Tombstone
Summons a tombstone at the target point. Zombies will frequently spawn next to every enemy unit in the area around the Tombstone, and attack them. Zombies have the Deathlust ability, which causes their attacks to slow the target, and if the target reaches below a certain amount of health, increases the attack and movement speed of the zombie. Dirge calls on his fallen brothers to fight for the Dead God.
Mana Cost: 120/130/140/150
Cooldown: 60
Ability: Point Target
Duration: 15 / 20 / 25 / 30
Radius: 400 / 600 / 800 / 1000
Spawn Interval: 3
Deathlust Health Threshold: 100 / 200 / 300 / 400
Flesh Golem
Undying transforms into a horrifying flesh golem that possesses a Plague Aura. This aura slows all enemy units within 750 range and amplifies the damage they take; the closer to Undying, the more damage. When a plagued unit dies, Undying is healed equal to a percentage of that unit’s maximum health. Upgradable by Aghanim’s Scepter. The flesh of the recently dead adds to the power of Dirge’s plague.
Mana Cost: 100/100/100
Cooldown: 75
Ability: No Target
Duration: 30 / 30 / 30
Movement Slow: 9%
Max Damage Amp: 20% / 25% / 30%
Min Damage Amp: 5% / 10% / 15%
Death Heal (Heroes): 6%
Death Heal (Creeps): 2%
Scepter Max Damage Amp: 25% / 30% / 35%
Scepter Min Damage Amp: 10% / 15% / 20%
Scepter Death Heal (Heroes): 10%
Scepter Death Heal (Creeps): 3%