Gargoyles

Ignore that her wings are a different color.

## Culture

### **Personality**

Gargoyles are defined by their hate and defeatist attitudes. Angry at a world that had abandoned and cursed them to an eternity of damnation, most are driven mad simply by their very nature. Gargoyles generally seek some semblance of meaning to their lives in exacting revenge on humanity. They raid and kill when human settlements and in recent years, the settlements of other races as well. They are an intelligent race with a capacity for empathy and kindness, but they are blinded by their rage and hate at the fate they have been given.

### **Religion**

Most gargoyles feel no bond or connection to the gods, as they recognize themselves as outsiders in the natural world, and even from the natural cycle of death.

There are some exceptions however. Some gargoyles are known to pray to Caedes, god of death, in hopes of him taking their souls when they die, and escaping the damnation of the stone curse. This small offshoot of the religion is mostly comprised of mass killings and rituals in hopes of drawing the crow gods attention. They believe they have been forsaken because Caedes cannot see them, due to their unnatural origins, and they must cause death in order to make him see them.

## Traits and Abilities

### **Gargoyle's Curse**

The defining trait of the gargoyle race is their bizarre curse. Placed on them by their creator, the curse transforms their flesh into stone. The gargoyles must spend effort and energy to maintain their true forms while they wake. Its said to be painful, but not agonizingly so, like a paper cut. At night, when they sleep, they transform into stone, not being able to sustain themselves while unconscious. The greatest fear of all gargoyles is growing so old that when they wake up, they will lack the strength to transform back and be trapped in stone. It is not nearly as difficult to maintain sight and hearing in stone form as it is to return to flesh. The scariest part about the stone form is that there is no escape, not even in death. Smashed stones are said to still contain the consciousnesses of old gargoyles, trapped for all eternity.

### **Secrets of Lightning**

The race of gargoyles was formed by Senyin, who could control the power of lightning. Senyin was able able to learn the secrets of the clouds, and steal their power for himself. When Senyin created the gargoyles, he shared these secrets with them, granting them the power of flight without wind, and the power to conjure lightning in their bare hands.

What the gargoyles lack in their ability to cast traditional magic, they more than make up for in their talents in the elemental arts.

## Origins

The Prime gargoyles were created by Senyin, a powerful human wizard who cracked the secrets of life and immortality. He created the gargoyles to be his companions, and intellectual equals, but attempted to destroy them when he discovered they were far more human than he anticipated.

Senyin placed a curse on the Gargoyles that transformed most of them to stone, but some, namely, the Grey Mother, were able to escape and have children. These children were not free of the stone curse though. The new beings were filled with an intense hate for mankind that twisted and corrupted Senyin's perfected sculptures into monsters with horns and claws.