Dveorg

The dveorg are a race of “dwarfs” (Germanic “zwerc,” Norse “dvergr,” Saxon “dveorg”; original meaning “twisted” or “bent”) that serve the Magnum Innominandum. Twice a year the dveorg follow barbarous rites, lighting pale bonfires on remote hilltops, beating drums, and fetching humans to feed the Magnum Innominandum and “what lies within.” The dveorgs are generally encountered in groups of ten or more.

Legend says the dveorg originally lived off the corpses of dead gods (possibly Mythos beings). The dveorgs’ true shape remains a mystery as they only survive by living as parasites inside dead bodies (some texts ~ like the *Apocalypse of Paul* ~ suggest their true form is that of an oversized, two-headed maggot, probably 1 to 3 feet long). Although the host remains dead and continues to rot, a dveorg can animate it into a parody of the living. Before the host decays into incapacity, the dveorg will find another body, even if currently occupied. The dveorgs are effectively shape-shifters and despite customary belief, they are not small.

On earth, dveorg often seek the corpses of dead humans that were mummified before burial. They consequently hide in the cool and dark underworld of burial mounds, tombs, and caverns that preserve their bodies best (legend wrongly assumes that daylight turns dwarves into stone). Otherwise, dveorg can be found in peat bogs or near glaciers. The dveorg have an unexplained bond with horses and can apparently ride them.

Lacking any recognizable form of emotion, fear, or sanity, the dveorg cannot perform magic. Instead, the dark folk seem to be able to forge all kinds of ominous artifacts, allowing them to open Gates without spells, to animate lifeless machines, and to modify living beings in terrifying ways. To Dark Ages humans, the science of the dveorg appears as magical and utterly frightening. How the dveorgs’ inferior intelligence can account for such rarities is yet another mystery, unless one adds Nyarlathotep in the balance ~ the dveorg may very well be among his Million Favored Ones.

The myth of Germanic and Norse dwarves living under the hills and hoarding treasures can easily be explained by the modus operandi of the dveorg. Still older myths seem to suggest that the dark folk and the old ones (or the tomb-herd) may be related or even complementary. “Ancestor,” “He-who-enters-the-tomb,” “Buried-under-the-cairn,” and “Dead-man-of-the-mound” are typical names given to dveorgs.

Dveorg parasites inhabiting corpses, use the dead host’s statistics as defaults, with INT 0 and POW 0, and add the dveorg’s following characteristic points and hit points:

STR host’s STR+5 5

CON host’s CON+50–55 3D6 ×5

SIZ host’s SIZ+5 (weight) 5

DEX host’s DEX+5 5

INT 35 2D6 ×5

POW N/A N/A

Move: as host +1

Hit Points: as host +6\*

Av. Damage Bonus: as host + modified

Av. Build: as host + modified

Av. Magic Points: 0

\*The Keeper may rule that the decay reduces the host’s characteristics over time, forcing the dveorg to find another host.

Combat

Attacks per round: 1

Fighting 75% (37/15), damage as per weapon.

Dodge host's skill

Skills

Ride 75%, Stealth 90%, and any number of appropriate skills.

Armor: none.

Spells: none, but may possess non-magical artifacts to open Gates, to contact Mythos creatures, to invoke mist, winds, etc., at the Keeper’s discretion.

Sanity Loss: 0/1D2 Sanity points to see a dveorg, unless it has inhabited the body of someone the investigator knows to be dead, in which case Sanity loss is 1/1D6+1 points. Host bodies in latter stages of decomposition may call for Sanity loss of 1/1D8 or 1/1D10 points.