List of Demonic Entities

Here we have a list of some demon lords and other demonic entities in the world of Giantstep.
== Galhvehtedamn ==
Galhvehtedamn, also known as the “Liar of the wheat” is a demon lord well known in the region of the Golden Sea of Wheat. Records of its appearance date back to the days predating the Battle of Empires, presenting as a female humanoid made out of wheat, grass and other plants, with a flowing hair that melts together with the vast golden wheat fields of the land. While it appears beautiful to some, to others it shows a monstrous appearance, with eyes of burning white coal and teeth made out of thorns. While the wheatian people have seen that figure multiple times, it is generally regarded by them as not being part of the wheatian pantheon. In fact, the Liar of the wheat is seen as a bad omen, an impostor who has taken the shape of wheat to try to misguide the faithful into some horrific fate. There are some theories that it first arrived to the physical realm due to the influence of the magoclergy, though this would contradict the order’s notorious distance to the lands of the Sea of Wheat during their reign. Others believe it was the result of a hateful spirit who made a deal with dark powers after a clash with the wheatian gods, taking the shape of wheat as a mockery of them.
Whatever its true origins, there are no mentions of Galhvehtedamn ever attempting to communicate with mortals (the reasons for the title of “liar” being as someone pretending to be something that it isn’t), though the few times her appearance has been recorded, massive disappearances and poor harvests have followed, feeding on the suffering that it causes. And unlike most other demonic entities, Galhvehtedamn has been able to seemingly appear without the need to be summoned, often reappearing into the mortal realm once every three or five centuries to bring misery to the lands of wheat. As such, those wheatians who are gifted with magic are forbidden to speak its name, least they accidentally summon it to the world. The strawmen in particular have a particular aversion to Galhvehtedamn, though the secretive strawmen keep their motivations to themselves.
An interesting fact of the Liar of the Wheat is its strange relation with the Rye Wolf. There have been multiple representations of the Rye Wolf and Galhvehtedamn together, though never acting in the same way. In some wheatian stories, the wolf is Galhvehtedamn’s terrible foe, protecting the fields of wheat against the impostor, whereas in others it is the complete opposite, being the protecting spirit of Galhvehtedamn. Outside of this exception, the Liar of the Wheat is represented universally as hated by all other spirits and mystical entities who exist in the Golden Sea of Wheat.
== Nairguahth ==
Nairguahth, also known as “The Archiver” is a demon lord who has appeared all throughout Giantstep since times immemorial. Its true form is unknown, since it has been described in a myriad of shapes and sizes over time, always showing unnatural, impossibly complex and impossible shaped forms, but always keeping a strange blue hue and at least one humanoid green eye. Its goals, however, have been quite well established, as it makes them quite public to those who summon it. It has the goal of acquiring strange and unusual souls from all around the world and from all the species. It sees mortals’ souls as a miraculous mathematical happenstance, comparing them to individual snowflakes never to be repeated again. Nairguahth has mentioned multiple times that it can see all aspects of a soul’s composition, form and power, and it has decided to gather those who it considers the most unique according to its strange criteria (which, in the eyes of mortals, seems utterly random, and attempting to comprehend it has caused it utter madness to those who have tried). To that end, it will whisper into the ears of those mortals willing to receive its blessings, which brings untold knowledge from all the infinite dimensions Nairguahth has travelled through. However, that knowledge cannot be transmitted to other in any way: it cannot be taught to others or recorded in any way, as it is Nairguahth’s to dispense. The moment someone tries to do one of those things, the user will forget it, only to remember it back once they stop.
In exchange for the knowledge, Nairguahth expects its followers to obey its orders to the utmost. Nairguahth will then order them to do whatever it takes to kidnap those individuals with unique souls, and it has to be alive, as Nairguahth has no way to retrieve a mortal soul once it has departed. Thus, Nairguahth’s acolytes need to restrain and hold the victim prisoner for long enough for them to prepare a particular ritual, designed to send that individual across the dimensions and into Nairguahth’s own personal realm, where it stores all its victims alive for all eternity. The number of victims it has managed to capture is unknown, with estimates ranging from a couple thousands to nearly a million. Failing to do so, however, and Nairguahth will punish its acolytes with complete madness and powerlessness. An interesting fact is that Nairguahth considers the souls of those who have undergone undeath as to be “tainted” or “broken”, and thus it has no interest on them, and neither are those who have undergone the process of demonspawning.
== The Burning Bull ==
The Burning Bull is a demon lord who has appeared all throughout Giantstep since times immemorial. There has been plenty of discussion within magical circles regarding the true nature of the Burning Bull, as many consider it not a true demon, but a form of highly evolved elemental. It appears as a colossal burning bull-like figure, with twisted horns and the tongue of a dragon. Its body is constantly consumed by flames that burn all living things around them, and its eyes are so bright looking at them directly can cause temporary blindness. Throughout the centuries, it has proven to be an incredibly powerful, albeit difficult to control, engine of destruction, trampling over everything that has stood in its way. The Burning Bull, however, has no will of its own. Despite many believing it is a highly intelligent entity, it obeys the will of those powerful enough to command it, with little to no regard for itself or its actions. Despite its enormous power, the Burning Bull is seldom use for battlefield, instead used to chase down particular targets, not stopping at all until the victim either is exhausted from fear and exertion or willingly surrenders to the Bull and its master.
The way one can summon and control the Burning Bull is a highly secretive process, with the exact set of rituals and summoning conditions all but lost. There is talk that there is a hidden tome deep within the labyrinthine libraries of Biblion, but so far it has not been proven true. Those who have managed to summon it have done so by accident, and most of the time they have ended up perishing under the Burning Bull’s fiery hooves. However, those who have managed to control the Burning Bull have noted to need an inhuman amount of composure and fearlessness to have a chance of keeping it in line. The sight of the Burning Bull generates utter terror in the hearts and souls of those who see it, and that applies to the summoner as well. Thus, it needs a supreme lack of fear and steely determination to have a shot to control the demon, and if for whatever reason that focus slips for even a moment, the Burning Bull will turn on its summoner and then go back to its realm. Another way to break the summoner’s grasp over the bull is to show a greater level of fearlessness and will when confronting the bull, which can stop the demon in its tracks until one of the two individuals falters.
== Dynwaredwyr ==
Dynwaredwyr, also known as “the Reflection”, is a recently discovered demon lord, originated from the “Realm Between Mirrors”. The history of Dynwaredwyr is tied to the discovery of the “Realm Between the Mirrors” by the headmistresses of the Tower of Flerinith [in Florinth], the Avelnni sisters, Stella and Celestina Avelnni. They theorized that they could use the magically tuned florinthian glass to go between the material realm and another dimension, serving as some form of fast travel system across the world. However, once they first attempted this system in the year 3.159 ABE, Celestina Avelnni unwittingly freed some demonic entities who had been trapped within the “Realm Between the Mirrors”, and in turn these entities began preying upon the material plain. While the exact number and nature of the demons released is not well known, one in particular has been in the minds of the magical community: Dynwaredwyr.
The study of Dynwaredwyr is quite recent, but most people involved in it believe it has no shape of its own. It cannot materialize anywhere, neither in the Realm Between the Mirrors nor in the physical realm, unless it takes someone else’s shape. Within the Realm Between the Mirrors, this is relatively easy for it, as it acts as a mere doppelganger of whoever is looking at it. But when trying to appear within the mortal realm, its lack of shape makes it unable to materialize and cross over the material plain on its own, requiring a host, particularly a magical one, to do so. And herein lies Dynwaredwyr’s infamy. Dynwaredwyr feeds itself by appearing as the reflection of troubled wizards, particularly preying on children, and acting as their mere reflection. Dynwaredwyr then starts appearing as their own conscience, talking to them and slowly taking the shape of their idealized selves, as what they wish themselves to become in the future. Dynwaredwyr then starts worming its way into their minds, isolating them from the rest of the world while making them more dependent on it. Once the victim is truly devoted to Dynwaredwyr, still believing it to be either its own conscience or a benevolent spirit, it then offers a pact to the mortal, offering power to achieve their dreams. If the victim accepts, then Dynwaredwyr immediately takes possession them. Dynwaredwyr then will run away from the victim’s community, trying to avoid immediate detection. After it has done so, it then indulges itself in a decadent lifestyle, quickly burning up its host’s body and soul as it does so, and once the body is broken beyond belief, it will then go to the nearest mirror to escape back to the Realm Between the Mirrors, to repeat the process anew.
Dynwaredwyr has proven an immensely dangerous threat due to the frequency of its attacks. From its apparent freedom from the Realm Between the Mirrors in 3.159 ABE to current day, there have been reports of at least six incidents involving Dynwaredwyr, a nearly unheard of amount of activity considering most demonic entities can appear at most once every couple of centuries, or even millennia. How it finds its victims it has not yet be discerned, though there appears to be a need for a troubled individual and a mirror for it to be able to target its victims. The Ancient Order of Most Practical Wizards’ own Order of Demonology has declared Dynwaredwyr’s containment and/or destruction its current main priority, working together with the headmistresses of the Tower of Flerinith to take down the entity. Fortunately for those involved, Dynwaredwyr’s powers are relatively minor, merely enhancing the magical potential of those who are possessed by it, as well as its own sorcerous knowledge. However, that has proven enough to cost the lives of dozens of people as it is, both its possessed victims and some who have tried to rescued them from Dynwaredwyr’s clutches. Dynwaredwyr possesses a vain and cruel nature, always hidden beneath a veneer of innocence and empathy, and while it is easy to provoke and enrage, it has proven cunning enough to be able to escape to its pursuers every time, costing the life of its host every time.
== The Lady of Flies ==
The Lady of Flies is a demon lord famous for appearing in many areas across Scimitarian and Western Giantstep over the centuries. She acts in the name of a yet unseen entity known as “the Dark Blight”, and is considered a dangerous entity, to be avoided at all costs. Its origins are surrounded in legend, but many believe that it was of human origin. While theories are abound, the most popular one of them comes from a local folklore tale from the human populations from the Dominion of the Bog Witch. According to the tale, back in ancient times, a small town was afflicted by a severe case of fevers, which was causing untold pain to the community. Seeing this, a beautiful young but rash woman traveled the world to seek a way to cure her people, but after asking for help in many cities and being rejected over and over, she fell into despair. However, during her travel back home, she found a stranger travelling the same road as her, and they decided to travel together. The mysterious man, covered in heavy robes and never showing his face, was carrying a strange box, which he told her that contained a blessing of his god. He had been charged to bring the blessing of his god to the temple, which he said would bring “nothing but the benedictions of their god”. Seeing this as a chance to help her people, she stole the box during the night and ran away to his town. Finally back home, she quickly put the box in the local temple, but the disease continue unabated. No matter how much they all prayed, the epidemic continued ravaging the town. In a moment of desperation, she opened the box to try to pray whatever was inside directly. The moment she did that, however, a flash of dark light covered the town for the merest of a moment. Afterwards, every man, woman and child in the village began rotting away, covered in disease and putrefaction, while they screamed in horrible pain.
The woman saw this in horror, while a voice in her head told her that she had unleashed the blessings of “the Dark Blight” upon her people. While the voice commended her for spreading its gifts, it also chastised her for stealing from it. As such, the Dark Blight both blessed and cursed the woman: as a blessing, it covered the left part of her body in its blessings, giving it a rotten, insectoid and foul look. Meanwhile, the right part of her body was as far from its blessings as it could be, giving it an unnatural and angelic beauty to it. Thus, the woman turned into the Dark Blight’s messenger and carrier of Its message of plague and rot upon the land.
Demonologists and historians have studied this tale for decades, but neither one has ever manage to prove the existence of either the entity known as the Dark Blight or any proof it had ever been worshiped anywhere in the world. Regardless of this, the Lady of Flies appears as an angelic carrion of disease and foulness upon the land, presenting the pestilence it brings as a gift from its dark master. Its appearance is both unearthly beautiful and horror-inducing foul, being carried by multiple pairs of massive and colorful butterfly wings, the left ones rotten and ridden with scars and holes, and the right ones shinning and resplendent with all the colors of the rainbow. The Lady of Flies’ modus operandi is not well known, but its summonings revolve appearing to those wizards who decide to cast ruin to others, or those desperate to heal the sick and wounded. The Lady of Flies appears to those who scry the plains in search of a disease-related issue, often showing only one of its sides depending on what they are looking for. Once contact has been established, it then demands a series of dark rituals to bring it into the material plain to be able to do its miracles, often necessitating spreading disease and misery to facilitate it. Once it is done, the Lady of Flies will bring its lord’s “blessings”, bringing further plague and pestilence wherever it goes. Along with it is followed by a swarm of flies, which according to the demon are the souls of those blessed with death by the Dark Blight, forever helping in the spread of further pain and misery. The Lady of Flies will send its swarm to try to cover as big of an area as possible, bringing unnatural disease wherever its insects go. If that cannot do the job, the demon has been known from unleashing unnatural poisons as gasses or as deadly rain.
Despite its seeming potential thread, many demonologists have spotted many ways to stop the Lady of Flies from wreaking havoc. The first one is detecting its summoning early on, as the longer the Lady of Flies keeps its swarms around, the more energy it will feed off from the misery around, and thus the harder it will be to banish it back. Another thing to prevent further damage is destroying its swarms, as while they are unnatural carrions of disease, they still take physical shape to interact with reality, and thus can be purged in magical or even common flames. If that is accomplished, the Lady of Flies will search the source of the opposition against it, and will act enraged that someone dares to reject its lords’ gifts, which can allow wizards and demonhunters to set up a trap against the demon. Defeating it is not an easy matter, however, as it has a considerable strength both physical and magical, as well as the ability to make anything that it touches rot. Another way of dealing with the Lady of Flies is to trick it into entering the Dominion of the Bog Witch. For unknown reasons, entering in the lands under the rule of the Bog Witch will make it instantly burn in unearthly flames, quickly losing all of its strength and dissipating back into its realm. This also applies to its swarms, who cannot enter in the swamps either. From what researchers have managed to unearth, this is the result of a duel between the Lady of Flies and the daughters of the Bog Witch, in which the demon was both defeated and cursed by them, forever banishing it from their mother’s realm. Mentioning the Bog Witch or her daughters will send the Lady of Flies into a frenzy, making it lose its affable composure into a savage rage.
== The Passerby ==
The Passerby is a demonic entity of the succubae variety believed to roam the lands of Western Giantstep. The story of the Passerby is that it was one of Gogotha’s favored children, being a particularly beautiful and alluring succubus, but its beauty had caused the entity to grow prideful and arrogant, talking about how her beauty could even eclipse that of the Succubus Queen. Hearing this, Gogotha punished the succubus accordingly, making it so that any mortal who could see her would be instantly infatuated with her to the point of obsession, but that obsession would inevitably turn into murderous frenzy, leading the victims to torture and kill it in the most horrible of ways. However, unlike other succubae, Gogotha would make sure than, instead of its soul flowing back to its dimension after its death, the succubus would actually be trapped within an immortal material body. This body would be unable to die, instead healing from even the most catastrophic of injuries, so that the punished succubus would be able to feel all the excruciating pain of death over and over again. After that, Gogotha banished the succubus from ever going back to its dimension, to wander the land causing horror wherever it went. However, a strange phenomenon the result of this punishment was that, if the harm to the body was severe enough, not one, but two or even more entities would be able to regrow from its carcass, multiplying its number and its conscience. However, while the succubus’ body could heal from anything, its mind could not. And after dozens of death and being halved time and time again by multiple duplications, it lost any sense of identity that it once had, leaving only a hatred against mortals and itself, as well as a deep desire to go back to Gogotha’s good graces, even if it does not remember why.
The Passerby has been described as a beautiful young woman with long raven hair and ivory skin, always appearing near the roads or towns asking for help and shelter, citing having no recollection of who she is or how she got there. Having the unnatural allure of a succubus but able to move across the mortal plain far from the more savvy areas of the world, the Passerby begins enthralling all those who take her in. Despite her cruel and demeaning behavior, this will only led to her victims falling more and more for her, to the point of lashing out against those friends and family who either haven’t yet fallen for her allures or who are competing for her attention as well. Inevitably, though, all this will lead to an explosion of violence, with her inevitably being killed in the most horrible and gruesome way possible. Eventually, however, she will come back from the dead, occasionally with multiple bodies spawning from the dead. If they appear at once, they will fight try to kill each other on the spot, but after realizing they cannot really harm each other in any meaningful way, they will leave in search for further victims, often planning to use their thralls to destroy their competition. It is believe there are dozens, if not at least a hundred of individual Passerby roaming around the lands of Western Giantstep.
The Passerby has also proven to continue her adoration for Gogotha, inherently knowing rituals for creating portals to summon fellow succubae and compelled to do so at every chance she gets, though not only she is unable to go through them, all succubae who cross the barrier will inevitably tear the Passerby to shreds, as she is marked as someone rejected by the goddess. The Passerby has been known to convince parents to sacrifice their families for her to gather blood sacrifices for Gogotha. However, the Passerby will actively avoid big cities, as her nature as a succubus can be easily discerned by the magically trained, and they will raise the alarm before her charms can actively take hold. The mortal body of the Passerby means that she is easily defeatable, as she has little to no combat capabilities outside of enthralling her foes. She is capable of magical feats, though her constant death, rebirth and division has caused her skills to erode considerably. However, getting rid of her is easy said than done, as her regenerating abilities make her near indestructible. Only fire and magical attacks have any chance of keeping her body from respawning, and even then, the damage has to be thorough.
== The Nerealt Corruption ==
The Nerealt Corruption is a demonic entity unique in the world of demonkind. The nature of it is difficult to properly define, though most experts nowadays accept to describe it as a “sentient demonic disease”. It is believed to be around since the 11th century ABE since the first case of an individual afflicted by the corruption was identified in the Western Elven Empire, though at the time it was ignored as the result of a magic mishap, only retroactively linked to Nerealt’s Corruption many centuries later. It was the merfolk demonologist and summoner Naioth Nerealt, whoever, who actually identified the origins of the symptoms in 1.310 ABE. Nerealt had been put in charge of investigating a series of unidentified monster attacks in the region of Palazzo, who the local authorities believed were demonic in origin. After finding the source of the attacks, it turned out to be from a family of seven, the parents and their five children, who were in the middle of a strange metamorphosis. Their minds and bodies had been twisted in horrific ways, with bones and cartilage carapaces growing around them, animalistic body parts unevenly sprouting, and with their conscience turned in that of feral animals. Each of them were captured and isolated for further study, and while the parents’ and the older children’s condition was so that they couldn’t be communicated with, the younger kids were still capable of speech and rational thinking.
From their testimony, Nerealt manage to piece together what had happened to them. According to the youngest daughter, their father had cheated a man in a card game, and he had apparently cursed him as retribution, with him slowly showing the signs of their current condition. Over a period of five years, the family had been steadily mutating, turning into abominations, though it had only been recently when they had started to lose their minds. When asked why they had not reached for help, the kid replied that there were voices that compelled them not to.
The merfolk authorities quickly set up to apprehend this dangerous wizard, though after authorities captured him, it turned out to have been a town sorcerer from another county, not even formally trained at all. When authorities questioned him, he replied that he had only thrown a mere enchantment to produce rashes for a time, and had not put it on anyone else, and he was shocked and appalled to see the family in this condition. The wizard community of the Merfolk Empire quickly decided to isolate the area for fear of this strange phenomenon to spread out, as they assumed that, it the condition had been able to spread to the father to the rest of the family, it could perhaps spread even further beyond. It was at this point when Neralt began pulling the thread from what the younger daughter had said, investigating further the bit about the “voices”. He proposed a theory that the family was not under the influence of a curse per se, but rather they were the victims of a strange case of demonic possession. After proving that there was indeed a presence within them, he tried to exorcise the family, though he was unable to do so. He then began trying to contact the entity that had a hold of the family, which he eventually managed to do so, and demanded it to leave their bodies. The entity refused, saying it was too late for most of them, but if Neralt gave himself up, it would allow the youngest daughter to be saved, halting any further influence over her and allowing her mind to recover. After much deliberation with his fellow wizards, he accepted the deal, but not before forcing his peers to utterly isolate him to prevent any further spread of the condition, and if he ever became dangerous, he made them promise to kill him without delay.
This would lead to Nerealt being carefully studied by his peers, for years, while his body was twisted and morphed by the entity, until he was too far gone and had to be put down. During the years, he would be able to pen a chronicles from his own perspective of the change, and this, combined with the notes of his demonologist associates, resulted in the “Chronicles of the study of the Corruption of Naioth Nerealt and the entity that caused it”. For his sacrifice and study of the entity, Nerealt was considered a hero of the Merfolk Empire, though his recognition outside of the empire would only start after the Nerealt’s Corruption began being identified in other areas of the world. The study of Nerealt’s case was contrasted with hundreds of different cases throughout the centuries, to the point of it being quite well known.
One of the more interesting aspects of the entity that causes Nerault’s Corruption is its relative openness, as it has been questioned multiple times by demonologists about itself and its motives. The entity that causes the corruption has no name, and it has said it itself multiple times. The entity itself has a limited sentience, knowing it exists and what it does, but little else, it has no regards for its victims and will only let them go if that allows it to spread further, as it’s only stated goal is to spread as much in the physical world as possible. It has no darker goals to fulfill, no dark deeds to accomplish, no opinion on the harm it causes, no any real malice to speak of, acting this way because it is what it does, and that is all there is to it (some theories even suggest the entity does not even need to do this to feed itself). The process of the entity finding and occupying a mortal body is done entirely by accident, as the entity itself does not know what the exact conditions are to arrive to the mortal realm, only what happens afterwards. Often it is the result of a poorly done spell, which ends up dragging Nerealt’s Corruption into either the casting wizard, his target or someone around. Once Nerealt’s Corruption afflicts an individual, it will start changing the victim, often turning it into an eldritch mass of flesh and limbs. While the mutations vary wildly from individual to individual, they often tend to go into an insectoid pattern. The body will start changing slowly over the course of years, and pick up steam once the mind starts becoming twisted as well. In the end, the victim is left as a horrific monster who preys on anything to keep itself alive. The entity speaks to its host throughout the entire process, trying to convince the host to survive and to avoid outside discovery of the condition.
The entity is also capable of leaving the host willingly, though always in exchange of a new host. Another important bit for the spread of the corruption is that once it invades a host, it can only spread to those of its direct family, being utterly unable to affect those outside of it unless they either allow it willingly or they are infected from the beginning. It is also unable to infect great swathes of people, with records showing a maximum of 77 people infected at once, though that number is difficult to corroborate, as the corruption can be active in multiple areas of the world at once.
== Etq ==
Etq, also known as “The Legion” is a demonic entity whose incursions into the material plain were registered between the years 772 ABE and 2.229 ABE in the lands of Eastern Giantstep. Etq is described as an entity composed of thousands of individual bodies, each of them being in the shape and size of a newborn baby. However, each of the bodies generated a sense of wrongness in whoever looked at it, to the point of driving any witnesses into fear with their deep red eyes. The Etq’s bodies all floated in the air, apparently incapable of any motion, levitating across the land in search of prey. It is unknown how or who summoned Etq for the first time, but its first recorded sighting was in the khenomeric province of Khenonehk, where it assaulted the provincial capital.
A surviving chronicler in the city wrote that:“A swarm of flying monsters in the shape of hellish infants rained over the city. As if come from the deepest of nightmares, these hundreds were undaunted by fire and steel. Each of them who was cut and destroyed disappeared in a cloud of red smoke, and for each that fell to our blades, another ten would take its place […] the monsters would quickly corner any of those who succumbed to fear, quickly swarming around them until they could not be seen anymore, forming a cocoon of unnatural bodies, and after an unnatural silence took over, they would fly away, the victim nowhere to be seen, never to be found again”. After the night passed and Etq flew away, hundreds of people had disappeared, forcing the khenomeric authorities to start investigating the issue. However, the persecution of wizards throughout the empire meant that any concise action against the monstrosity was of little effort. In fact, people saw this attack as the dark deed of a summoner, and the assault to Khenonehk was only used to justify further hatred against wizards. The entity would appear three more times across history, always appearing during the night and always attacking highly populated cities, only to disappear as fast as it had come once dawn broke.
The entity was seen multiple times across the region until its final appearance in 2.229 ABE, when a famous summoner in Greater Elanxa managed to arrive to the besieged city and drive the demon away. According to legend, the summoner managed to trap the demon inside of a bottle, sealing it away for the time being at the cost of his life. That bottle was then put inside of a ceramic vase, and it was then put within a box covered in protective runes. Afterwards, it was buried deep within an unknown location, and all records of where it was hidden were destroyed, hoping nobody would ever find and unleash the demon.
== The Swallowing Tower ==
The Swallowing Tower is a demonic entity believe to appear once every thousand years in the lands of northern Zemyland. Both the snow elves and the owlmen from Biblion tell tales of the horror that the Swallowing Mouth brings once its influence begins stirring the mortal realms. The horror begins affecting a random individual from the continent, as it has only ever appeared within Zemyland. That individual starts listening to eldritch voices telling the victim to go north, to the point when suddenly they will have the inescapable urge to leave to the northern wastes. Following some unknown instinct, they will arrive at a seemingly random location in the middle of nowhere. And from there, the entity will start materializing through its victim. First, it will begin growing from within, as a strange red hybrid of animal and plant made out of blood and flesh, making its way through the host’s body to the outside. It will then start slowly, painfully growing around it, as the entity takes root around the victim as well as piercing their flesh and bones both from within and from without. After a couple of months, the entity has grown into what can be described as an organic pool, forming a circle of flesh and blood, crowned on both sides by the heads of demonic lions. It then fills with blood and cold fire, and it will begin to generate an alluring signal, received subconsciously by the weak-willed around it. This signal affects all animal life around it, as one of the signs of the Swallowing Tower’s rise are strange migrations of thousands of animals to the seemingly barren north. These creatures, and soon after all those sentient individuals too weak-willed to resist its allure, will jump into the pool created by the abomination, which will begin growing outwardly and upwardly.
After a year of consuming flesh, it grows into a massive tower of pulsating meat, covered in eyes and veins, and holding a black heart at its top. The more it grows, the more strength it gains to allure and enthrall those around it, and it continues to do so until either someone destroys its inner heart, or it becomes satisfied and dissipates back to its dimension, leaving the continent nearly completely scoured of life.
One of its traits is the remarkable ability of making most species forget its existence. After the Swallowing Tower disappears, the memory of it begins becoming vaguer and fuzzier over time, and even those who have ventured within its cavernous depths begin believing it was just a horrible nightmare, and that nothing like that could ever truly exist. Only a limited amount of sentient species in the world are capable of remember it beyond a couple of years, of which the owlmen and the snow elves are one of the few. If these races begin telling tales about the Swallowing Tower to those who cannot remember it, the latter will react negatively to the knowledge, either with violence or disdain, as if they rejected the notion of the Swallowing Tower from a fundamental standpoint. The owlmen have gathered a great deal of information over the millennia about the Swallowing Tower, organizing great campaigns every time it appears in reality, while the snow elves have the tradition of the “ihiria’ndir”, a lineage of heroes specifically trained to combat the monstrosity that is the tower. The “ihiria’ndir” is chosen by the royal family directly, and trained throughout their live until the demon is spotted. After being discovered, they are then sent to Biblion, where they hold all the knowledge gathered by the owlmen, as well as the chronicles of those who survived its depths.
Thus, the “ihiria’ndir” and their chosen party are sent to defeat the abomination from within. Flying directly to the top is impossible, since the tower will defend itself by growing prehensile veins and spurt acidic blood. The heroes have to enter from the lion’s mouth that is the entrance to the tower, leading many owlmen experts to believe the tower wants them to go into its depths. From there, all manner of horrors will assault the party, both as twisted abominations of flesh and blood and as psychic assaults tormenting them about the meaninglessness of life itself. If one manages to reach the top of it, they will find themselves face to face with the tower’s heart, which needs to be utterly cut in half and burnt down for the tower to be defeated. This often results in the deaths of most of the party sent there, and the “ihiria’ndir” is expected to die in the final battle against the tower’s heart. The few survivors, if there are any, will be questioned for months about the events, to let the wisemen of Biblion and Kigndom of the Aine Saevherne as much information they could use for the next assault of the demon.
== Fixiji'un ==
Fixiji'un, also known as the “Hatred from Beyond” is a demonic entity known to have caused great destruction in many areas of the world during ancient times. Its existence was believed to be rumor and myth until a series of tablets discovered in the jungles of Chakobsa were compared to a series of documents, linking the effects of Fixiji'un in different parts of the world and across the ages. These chakobsian tablets, believed to be older than the yaguarans themselves, describe an eldritch parasite, a cosmic insect made up of horror and nightmares. Its eyes burning with malice and rage against all the gods. The tablets also describe it as “a creature made out of hatred”, spreading vile, anger and hate throughout the mortal realm. Its existence itself causes those who feel it to enter into a spiral of violence against everything and anything they see, and they will go out of their way to destroy it, and themselves afterwards.
The process of infection begins with Fixiji'un planting the seeds of rage within those weak minded when the veil between dimensions is thin enough to allow it. Over time, they will be drained of conscience and ego, leaving nothing but a puppeteered carcass. Fixiji'un will act through them, making them carve icons of hatred and spreading them across the land. Slowly, the air itself becomes poisoned by negative emotions, making people irascible and paranoid, while giving the land and sky a growingly reddish tint. Once the hatred in the area has accumulated, all that needs to happen is an incident that sparks violence, and it will naturally led to an orgy of anger and bloodshed. Fixiji'un then feeds off this anger, forcing any survivor to continue the cycle of violence.
The tablets describe Fixiji'un as “a tick that feed off the blood of the gods, blood spilled during the wars before the creation of the world […] becoming mighty and divine, but also turning it into an embodiment of hatred”. The entity itself seems to not have followers nor trick mortals into doing its bidding. Fixiji'un hates all other beings, mortal, demonic or divine alike, and wants to be the only being in all of creation.
Category:Lists
Category:Demons
Category:Extradimensional
Category:Mystical