Ekronic Priests

**Ekronic Priests** are the four men at the top of the Congregation of Flies, serving as figurehead Ekron's advisors and as the true leaders. They allegedly worship Ba'al through Ekron.

## History

About 60 years ago, even before the plague began to gain a worrying traction in the population, the cult was started by the first generation of priests. As the death toll rose, more and more vulnerable people were led into the Congregation and starved to halt the apocalypse. A community was founded with a tent structure in the southeast outskirts of the city.

Starting with the second generation, the priests do not wholeheartedly believe their fathers' doctrine and use the ritualistic binging and purging to hoard supplies in their private tents.

44 years ago, the second generation of priests sought a way to further indoctrinate their community and decided they needed a singular charismatic figure. Using the youngest child in the Congregation, they drove him to exhaustion via waterboarding and left him in the altar place for Ba'al to take him as a host. After fostering the proper personality, total indoctrination, and obedience within the newly christened “Ekron”, they revealed him to the cult and installed him as the unquestionable leader while using him as a mouthpiece. His equally indoctrinated mother was also exalted to a Virgin Mary or priestess status.

Soon, they had also claimed a few blocks of buildings in the southeast part of the city and obtained access to some technology, such as photography cameras and printing presses, which they use to create pamphlets and advertisements with their figurehead's likeness, handed out by missionaries.

Recently, during the Week of Ba'al in April, Ekron escaped the camp, which the priests covered up by explaining that he was meandering like the Greek god Dionysus and would return of his own accord.

The to-be third generation of priests have been born and are currently being raised within the cult, but schooled in private about their fathers' deception and how to continue it.

## Generations

### First Generation

The dead quartet of priests who began the Congregation of Flies. They were philosophers who formulated the doctrine the cult continues to follow and fully believed in their findings. However, their children were raised aside from the cult by their largely uninvolved mothers. The fathers then put their sons in their place as they aged and died.

### Second Generation

The current generation of Ekronic priests. Not being exposed to their fathers' doctrine as intensely as they did their unrelated followers, they became opportunistic skeptics who accepted the potentially lucrative positions they had been handed. Going along with their image, they encouraged the binging and purging even as the plague worsened. Thanks to the need of surplus food to be purged, this allowed them to skim the collected goods for themselves and live a guaranteed well-fed life even during general famine.

The four sons were also willing to mentally break a 10 year old to sculpt him into an ideal eccentric but charismatic, an impressive but manipulable cult “leader”. Throughout their and Ekron's reign, they also mutilated him and waterboarded the panic out of him when he had rare breakdowns.

The sons have had their own sons already, living onsite with them but being properly educated behind closed doors.

Despite the skepticism, the second generation of priests do somewhat buy into their fathers' philosophies on souls.

### Third Generation

The incoming generation of priests, still in training. Despite being raised in the cult and around other cultists, they are taught in private that the doctrine they hear is false and they must continue the charade. They are told how to “take care” of and manage Ekron, what to do if Ekron or his mother go missing or die, and how to replace them if need be.

## Trivia

* There have been no female Ekronic Priests yet.
* Though being considered a priestess, Faustina is not considered to be one of the Ekronic Priests.