His soul is bound to his skeleton and he will always come back from oblivion when a ritual is made.
Also I have to ask, when thief stole the skull, why didn't they destroy it? Wouldn't it cause absolute death for Mordekaiser? He needs his entire skeleton as we know.
I don't believe he is a lich in any sense of the word. We have two lich-like characters already who follow the different paths of what a lich is, but Morde doesn't follow either.
Based on how the black mist of the Harrowing treats corpses it seems likely the souls of the dead reside within the corpse in Runeterra, meaning if Mordekaiser's armored wraith form is destroyed his soul would return to his remains. If his skull was destroyed the list of remains he has left would be smaller, and so his skull would no longer be needed. With that said if part of the total remains was still in existence, but not present, the ritual would be impossible to complete.
Destroying all but one piece of the skeleton would make it far easier to keep track of his remains, however it would also make it far easier to fully destroy him. While not specifically mentioned my guess is that the mages who raise Mordekaiser when he dies each take care of a portion of his remains, so that even if one is found there are still pieces left for the ritual elsewhere.
He doesn't have to worry about this on the Shadow Isles, of course, but it seems like something someone willing to build an enormous, fortified tomb would do. If true it's possible the thief also only found a fraction of his remains.
I think he actually IS a revenant, aka a ghost who possesses his own remains. Sure, the 'remains' here are his armor, rather than his physical leftovers, but i think it remains accurate
Not exactly. His soul leaves his body and goes into battle clad in Iron and not the other way around. A Lich seals away his soul to become immortal, Morde's simply brought back as a wraith wrapped in a metal shell.
My guess about the skull (along with the rest of his skeleton) is that it's kinda like a horcrux, not just in that it provides the key to its owner's resurrection but also that it's very difficult to destroy, requiring powerful magic to actually be able to destroy it.
The definitions of lich vary from fantasy-world to fantasy world.
Generally liches are simply undead spellcasters,the soul-jar-thing isn't always required to be a lich.
Karthus for example is conisdered a lich,despite the fact that he seems to lack a soul jar. Mordekaiser could be considered a lich,since he is a magic-using undead,but he isn't even close to being a typical lich.
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It's one of those words that can be defined in a ton of ways depending on fantasy universe, so it's a pretty solid "maybe".
