Dr. Karl Ildgaard

Dr. Karl Ildgaard was one of the former owners of Ashington Manor that fell victim to its curse, thereby helping to cement its reputation as a haunted place of tragedy to be avoided. Born in Lamordia and trained in Dementlieu, Dr. Ildgaard was a doubter and a skeptic that disavowed the existence of curses prophecies; he believed their supposed effects were not powered by supernatural forces but rather of self-fulfilling prophecies and human superstition. As an illustration of his point, Dr. Ilggaard moved his practice from Ludendorf to Ashington Manor, where he operated his asylum for a number of years without any any incidents of curses.

Although he held a preoccupation with keeping his own personal quarters clean, Dr. Ildgaard showed less concern for the well-being of his patients. Although he always held the tendency to cut corners in the pursuit of profit, Dr. Ildgaard became increasingly callous in the treatment of his patients, eventually coming to treat all but the richest of his patients as nothing but animals. He even allowed the most incurable (in his estimation) of his patients to perish from starvation inside their barren cells. When a noblewoman threatened to expose Dr. Ilgaard's malpractices, Dr. Ilgaard manipulated some violent inmates to murder her.

A few days after the murder, Dr. Ilgaard would find his world come to an end thanks to the Ashington curse and the manipulations of the evil Maekon. Maekon sewed chaos and freed inmates to run amok, ultimately leaving the manor as it was consumed by fire. Unlike her direct murders of Lord Herod Ashington and Jack Sallow in the previous Ashington Manor cycles, Maekon allowed Dr. Ilgaard to meet his doom to the effects of the curse.

In Ashington Manor's temporal echoes, Dr. Ilgaard's role is assumed by Lord Herod Ashington.