Baron Klaus von Wulfenbach
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Baron Klaus Wulfenbach is a character in the Girl Genius comic book written and drawn by Phil Foglio and Kaja Foglio.
He is a "Spark," or mad scientist, with a particular interest in the workings, origins and nature of the "Spark," an inborn quality which makes some people able to intuitively make huge advances in the sciences, but is all too frequently conjoined with megalomania and a lack of common sense. He is also, as of the beginning of the current Girl Genius series, the uncontested ruler of much of Europe, having battled down many quarrelling Sparks and imposed order.
He has many people in his employ, drawn from a wide array of backgrounds, including the staffs of conquered Sparks, as well as various types of "constructs" (artificial people, something like Frankenstein's monster), and "clanks" (steampunk-styled robots). He is particuarly willing to employ his enemies' personnel if they are reliable enough; one prominent employee is Bangladesh Dupree, a former pirate queen, now serving as an airship captain, and he 'inherited' the Jagermonsters from the Heterodynes themselves. Other Sparks, such as Doctor Beetle, enjoyed a semi-feudal relationship with the Baron, being given considerably leeway in most local matters as long as they follow the Baron's orders for broader concerns. He has the children of many local rulers, Sparky and non, under his care to receive an education and serve as hostages for their parents' good behavior. His headquarters is a huge dirigible-like airship called the Castle Wulfenbach, which gives him the advantages of security, privacy and mobility. Prior to the events of the comic, it is possible the Baron has died and been revived as a construct. This is evident from the stitching that is on his torso.
While he is considered a ruthless tyrant, his motives are more complex than simple tyranny. In his youth, he adventured with Bill and Barry Heterodyne, the father and uncle of Agatha Heterodyne, the heroine of Girl Genius, and shared their goals of putting down evildoers. After their disappearance, and his own absence of several years, he came back only with his very young son to find things worse than ever, with Sparks fighting among themselves and chaos everywhere as the aftermath of the Heterodynes' war with 'The Other', a mysterious, ruthless and extremely powerful evil Spark. Utilizing his own resources, as well as those of the Heterodynes and the Sparks he defeated, he put down the fighting and restored order with an iron fist. The current state of affairs in the comic is a situation in which the Baron maintains order by force not so much out of his own desires, but out of a sense that someone must keep order by whatever means necessary. This applies particularly to any matters pertaining to the Heterodyne Boys and the Other
He dislikes ruling and politics, much preferring adventure or research, but recognizes that he is needed in his current role. His subjects do not note the discrepancy between their perception of him and his actual actions — among other things, he does not do anything to prevent himself being portrayed as a ruthless villain in popular entertainment.
He has also recently developed a weasel-like creature that can detect Revenants, those who have been turned into slaves of the Other.
