The Mooncult

The Mooncult is a religion within the world of Strathrand that is predominantly practiced by witches, warlocks and other creatures of the night. The God whom they believe in goes by the name of Morgazuzu, The Goat God.

The Mooncult has nothing to do with the religion of the Man in the Moon, the name comes from the fact that nearly all of its practitioners prefer or thrive during night time. The witches of Horga are not damaged by sunlight but they are much more connected to their magical capabilities during night and are safer from humans that tend to favour hunting them during daylight.

Even though Morgazuzu is The Goat God of the Mooncult and he and his followers use a form of magic called Occulti-Morgarna, often referred to as simply Morgarna. He still managed to step into the Cryptid God Felial's sphere of influence when creating the Unsleeping which angered Felial. These two Gods do not tend to clash with each other but this event stirred up bad blood between the two Deitys.

### The Treacherous and The Unsleeping

During The Fourth Crusade when Baron Thrandouin, a field Marshal of the Carmen Monastery marsched with a big army into the lands of Horga. With the goal, to rid the land of witches and other heathen-scum. The Hexxwitch Allesaijna managed to get in contact with Morgazuzu. The God knew very well who she was and had some sort of respect for her, at least somewhat, in a way a powerful God can respect a simple mortal being. He knew she was amongst the most powerful mortal beings who practiced his Occulti-Morgarna magicia and was very interested to hear what she had to say.

Morgazuzu knew about the crusade but payed little interest to it or the fate of the witches, however, Allesaijna explained to him, through a ritual, that Neverroth's sergeant, Grand Demon X'i'ellsphethoth'Tchaar, had a plan to convert as many Mooncult practitioners as possible to the cunning faith, more specifically, to The Neverroth Order. And that only she could persuade her sisters that this would be a bad idea and that Morgazuzu had not abandoned them in a time of desperation.

Afraid to lose his grip and power to the growing threat of The cunning Gods, Morgazuzu did what he could do without offering too much Occulti-Morgarna powers to Allesaijna. He disguised himself as a a cloaked Fauna, shadowported himself inside The Lair of The Sons of Felial Despair-Commander, The Corpse King Grimbrukk and ambushed him. After a seemingly even fight Morgazuzu managed to slay the Corpse King. Stealing a gift The Cryptid God Felial himself, had granted Grimbrukk decades ago. The gift was nothing less than the treacherous-Necrocrythera mechanism. The treacherous-Necrocrythera mechanism was a box containing an ancient scroll with a secretly crafted spell, written in Felials Cryptid tongue, that held the keys to eternal life. Specifically, the foundation and the explanation on how to resurrect the dead.

Many cultists, magicians and spell-casters knew a spell or two that could resurrect a few dead beings. But this was the explanation behind the spell, how the spell was created and how it could be created. Up until now, it was only The Corpse King Grimbrukk and Felial who knew that secret. As Felial was the one who created it from his Cryptid magic.

Morgazuzu studied the scroll and adapted it to his Occulti-Morgarna magicia before casting the spell, unleashing it into the world of Strathrand. For Morgazuzu this would be a one time use, even He could not fully understand Felial's demonic Cryptid tongue. But it proved to be more than enough to deal with The Fourth Crusade and Baron Thrandouin.

The spell managed to resurrect every single dead corpse on the whole planet of Strathrand that had recently been killed or died, belonging to a formerly intelligent species such as; orcs, dwarves, humans, faeries and werewolves etc. All these dead souls stood up to fight once again with complete loyalty to Morgazuzu and Allesaijna. It did not take long for them to find their way to Horga. Driven by instinct and hunger they assaulted the Carmen Monastery's army, coming from every direction. At first, the Carmen Monastery's templars and zealots fought back, slaying all skeletons and zombies that appeared in front of them. But the dead grew more and more, the land of Horga was soon invaded by thousands upon thousands of walking corpses, each larger, more terrifying or skilled than the one before. The Carmen Monastery's men and Baron Thrandouin retreated after losing more than 70% of their newly captured land. Eventually giving up all the territory they had gained and sailed back to Sunkenholm, shocked and in disbelief over what they had just witnessed.

This gift, given to Allesaijna from Morgazuzu, created the faction of the Unsleeping. Brainless and instinct driven zombies that had complete loyalty to the Hexxwitch and The Goat God. Their only weakness was that they could not reproduce or grow in numbers. They were a few hundred thousand zombies and skeletons, and they would be loyal to The Mooncult until the day of the last slain Unsleeping.

As mentioned earlier, this angered The God Felial extremly as Morgazuzu had interferred with Felial's magical influence and killed his greatest Commander. Felial resurrected Corpse King Grimbrukk, it would have been the first time Felial had ever resurrected one of his own followers before, by himself. The planet now had two factions of undead warriors, Felial's undead horde called The Roth'gaard and Morgazuzu's horde of The Unsleeping.

Until this day, Felial has not yet retaliated on The Mooncult and Morgazuzu. But one thing is certain, he is waiting and planning his revenge in a devious way. Ready to strike when Morgazuzu least expects it. Felial is not someone who forgets, nor forgives. For in his eyes, only he, as The Lord of Cryptid, may control the dead.