Perennial - Barbarian

There is only ever one Perennial at a time but there must always be one. There is a Barbarian who exists purely amongst his rage. They live alone with one other that they choose and train ruthlessly to be their successor. The goal of the Perennial is to continue their teachings and eventually be killed by the one they choose to succeed them. Most commonly, this is done by the successor finding and training a successor of their own and using them to defeat the Perennial. This in turn repeats the whole process and each member of this path is aware of it

The phylactery is the successor. No one is sure of how this path of barbarians started, only that it is ancient and cannot end. If the successor were to challenge the Perennial and fail or if the Perennial was aware that the successor might challenge them soon and kill them instead, then the Perennial must find a new successor to create a new phylactery

It is believed that the successor directly under the Perennial is the only thing that can defeat them. Be it through deception, raw physical strength, or by means of evil magics. The Perennial however, rarely leaves its solitude. Whether it chooses to live up in the mountain tops, deep within a cave or forest, or somewhere lost like another plane, the Perennial prefers to stay away and to pull the strings from behind the curtain as the successor goes out and does their bidding. Because of this, the real danger is in the successor dealing with them is a temporary solution to a permanent problem