The Cadaverous Earth

[Kindling]

Haha, yes, Byzantium is a much better example than Czechoslovakia. Lol.

[Magnus Pym]

Gruesome, gorious, evil... These and many more seem like good adjectives for this setting.

I think this is well done and shows alot of creativeness, definitely something that has been thought out for some time than just a momentary inspiration.

I have a question though, during its designing, how could you not become insane (or did you?)? I mean, you have your own, more focused visions of all that and I can say they're not all pretty images. A constant stream of these must have gotten you near burf-status at some points didn't it?

P.S: Congratulaton at cutting my lunch-appetite. :)

[Steerpike]

With Pym's comment in mind I present these three new monstrosities, products of my ongoing derangement (disclaimer: these three grossed even me out):

Fleshtree

Thought by some arcanobiologists to be related to the morbid Bloodwoods of the southern swamps and linked by others to the warped experiments of the Cultivar Technocracy, the bizarre, unsettling beings known as fleshtrees are not plants at all but grotesque creatures of dubious intelligence usually encountered singly or in small 'copses,' or, more dangerously, in 'groves.'  In place of bark, fleshtrees have sickeningly human-like skin; in place of branches, they have a series of fully mobile, brachiating humanoid arms, each with long, claw-like nails; in place of roots, a great mass of writhing, pallid tentacles.  Covering the central trunk of the fleshtree are a number of 'knotholes': tiny, jawless mouths, round, like a lamprey's, that greedily consume almost anything thrust into them.  Though omnivorous, flesthtrees exhibit a clear preference for protein, and go out of their way to devour meat rather than vegetable matter.

Lacking eyes, noses, or ears, fleshtrees seem to hunt primarily by sensing tremors along the ground, seeking out vibrations.  They are also quite sensitive to changes in air currents: many an unwary bird or bat has been snared by the groping limbs of a fleshtree.  Rib-like bones form the central trunk (which houses a variety of organs, including multiple hearts), while the creature's limbs possess extremely flexible, many-socketed joints.  As a fleshtree grows it develops new 'branches' much as a normal tree might.  Though fleshtrees sweat they produce no other waste-matter, using all of their energy to grow new limbs.  They reproduce asexually: when a large enough branch of a fleshtree is removed it will eventually grow roots and become a new fleshtree.  Periodically fleshetrees will pull off their own limbs to produce such saplings, even bringing their 'young' food in the early stages of growth.  This disturbing practice has led many to speculate that fleshtrees are intelligent in some way, though they have no discernable brains, only crude nerve-bundles.

Though dangerous, fleshtrees are also highly useful.  In some areas '" particularly the hinterlands of Macellaria '" small copses of fleshtrees are tended by enterprising individuals known as treeherds.  Using percussive instruments they drive their copse from one location to another, always maintaining a safe distance, until ready to prune their gruesome livestock.  At this point paralyzing drugs or hexes are used to temporarily subdue the fleshtrees, at which point limbs or other meat will be shorn off.  This does little permanent damage to the fleshtree, which will eventually regenerate lost branches or roots with minimal scarring, though the creatures do seem to experience pain '" their many mouths moan dully and whimper when limbs are being pruned.  Treeherds will also typically collect blood during pruning.  The resulting harvest is usually sold to the Skin Markets, to either be eaten by the city's grave-spawn or else utilized by its fleshcrafters in the tissue-shops.

Banehulk

Also known as Plague Golems, the behemothic abominations known as Banehulks are fortunately extremely rare.  Believed to be the perverse creations of the Poxbringers '" rulers of the City of Creeping Flesh, a fell metropolis consumed by the shifting sands of the Firesong Marches many centuries ago '" Banehulks are living laboratories, hosts for multifarious diseases.  While many of the pestilences devised by the Poxbringers could be cultured in their vile cauldrons, others had to be inculcated in living flesh.  Banehulks are thus infected with hundreds if not thousands of diseases: they are the walking embodiments of sickness.  Though large in size by design the bodies of Banehulks grow rampantly and chaotically: while originally resembling tall, heavy-set humanoids, present-day Banehulks are now hideous, shambolic titans of immense size, distorted with tumorous aggregations and unlikely appendages, the appalling results of centuries of disease-inflicted mutancy.  Their recuperative powers mean that their bulk ripples with constant degeneration and regeneration, presenting a horrific, shifting mass of diseased tissues.

Rumour has that in later days the Poxbringers unleashed Banehulks in battle against their foes, using them as war-machines, shock troops, and siege-breakers.  Rage-inducing phages were introduced into the brains of the normally docile titans, transforming them from gentle giants into slavering monstrosities bent only on destruction.  Fortunately the resulting conflicts greatly decreased the Banehulks' numbers.  Those few that linger on are solitary creatures, shunned by all living beings.  Bred to be ageless, Banehulks cannot be killed by the diseases that riddle their enormous, foetid bodies; the miasmic clouds of disease that swirl about them cause those beasts that venture too close to sicken and die, providing them with ample food-sources.  Some remain locked in combat-mode, still feverish with the implanted desire to desolate their surroundings: these frenzied horrors can lay waste to whole settlements before being destroyed.  Others seem to have overcome their battle-lust and become solitary hermits, or else seek to somehow end their perpetual suffering.  The Poxbringers endowed Banehulks with supreme regenerative capabilities so that even the worst wounds heal very swiftly: while insufficient to fight off the tumult of infections that afflict them, this ability makes it very difficult for Banehulks to die.  Fire is notably effective against them, and some Banehulks have journeyed to the volcanic magma-pools of the Shadowglass Steppes and thrown themselves in to end their agony; others have sought the briny embrace of the sea, drowning themselves in the Fevered Ocean.  Most, however, live reclusive and lonely lives, when they aren't rampaging across the countryside laying waste to all they find.

Mori

Though commonly believed to be the reanimated heads of decapitated murderers, the grave-spawn known as mori are actually a species of parasite that utilizes human heads much as hermit crabs adopt empty seashells.  Physically vulnerable unless possessing a humanoid head, mori resemble naked brains, pinkish ganglia without obvious visual or aural sense organs.  A clutch of flexible tendrils sprouts from beneath their central mass, allowing for locomotion and the manipulation of objects; these tendrils surround a beaked maw.  Mori also possess the ability to levitate, and thus often appear almost jellyfish-like when hovering without their usual outer shell.  Upon finding a humanoid corpse, mori break the mandibles and enter through the enlarged mouth, gnawing through the roof of the mouth to enter the brain cavity.  From here they devour the brain and ensconce themselves, tucking their bodies into the cranium.  The head then detaches and floats away, tentacles trailing beneath it like ropy entrails.

Though lungless, mori can shriek hideously, a powerful attack that literally freezes the blood of those that hear it, often killing or incapacitating them.  The floating mori will hover over the heads of dead or crippled prey and thrust out a mass of tendrils from its host's broken jaws, as if sticking out a series of rubbery tongues.  These flexible, questing tentacles are forced down the throat of the mori's victim in awful parody of a lover's kiss.  Secreting a flesh-dissolving mucus, the tongues begin to digest the internal organs of the grave-spawn's prey, then scoop semi-liquid morsels of viscera up into the mori's beaked mouth (located at the base of the neck).  Occasionally, a mori will lay its eggs in a hollowed out corpse.

For obvious reasons, mori are feared and greatly abhorred.  Though they exhibit clear signs of intelligence they do not speak.  They do sometimes form packs or larger flocks, called choruses or choirs respectively, which seem to have some variety of non-hierarchical, alien social structure.  In the Twilight Cities they are considered dangerous pests and are often found lingering in catacombs or crypts, or in cemeteries.  Nocturnal by nature like most grave-spawn, they dislike sunlight but do not seem to be actively harmed by it.

[ooc]The mori are a kind of mash-up creature based in equal parts on the mind-flayer, intellect devourer, and vargouille.  I love all three monsters but as I don't want to outright steal anything directly from D&D I decided to fuse the three abberations into one revolting and terrifying monstrosity.

Now, to decide which of these beasties to unleash on my players first...[/ooc]

[Nomadic]

All 3 of those were sick and twisted. I love it! Also for some reason the first one made me think of the redneck tree when I read the name (after I read the description that thought went away, those things are far more perverted and disgusting than the redneck tree).

[LD]

I fear to run across those in the IRC game... except for the treeherders- that seems about as amusing as it is frightening.

[Magnus Pym]

wow. Great beasts, very creative yet again!

I especially like the Banehulk

[LD]

Ezekiel Khaan

An eccentric (some would say deranged) witch who lives on the outskirts of Macellaria, Ezekiel Khaan is a wealthy and obsessive individual. Outwardly he appears human, though rumors persist that he has forged infernal contracts or else preserved himself with alchemical treatments, unnaturally prolonging his life. His physical semblance is chameleonic, to say the least. Round and excited eyes peer out from his ageless face, often adorned with elaborately sculpted whiskers '" Ezekiel is prone to growing long, gaudily dyed beards (usually blue, green, or violent orange) and then shaving them without warning. He wears a shifting garment with sewn-in sigils that fluctuates in hue according to some inscrutable pattern, possibly its wearer's own whims, possibly at random. A hunched familiar something like a hairless monkey and something like a giant toad, addressed by Ezekiel as 'the Primeval Warbler,' can constantly be found in the witch's company, usually perched on his shoulder and babbling obscure and nonsensical gibberish that sounds sometimes like poetry and sometimes like a complex mathematical theorem.

Ezekiel's manse is located on a hill southeast of the Eel's Gate, ringed by a tall, solid wall of writhing maggots, constantly squirming, erupting from the ground in a quivering profusion of pallid larval flesh. The 'gate' of the manse only parts for welcome visitors, those who can prove that they have an appointment with Ezekiel to the demon gatekeeper Nybias '" a tall, svelte figure with a beard of tentacles, a nest of red insectile eyes, and a barbed tail, habitually clad in a pristine white suit, Ezekiel's chosen livery, paid for his services rather than compelled into subjugation (though the terms of this arrangement are known only to Ezekiel and Nybias). Most of these visitors are outlandish themselves: mysterious men and women with odd grafts or lurid garb, adventurers and scoundrels and fellow hexers with stitched servitors or chained familiars or hulking bodyguards armed with unwieldy weapons. The manse itself is visible beyond the hideous living walls, a rambling and whimsically constructed edifice with many unlikely cupolas, spires, and wings, lavishly ornate and adorned with faceless statues like spindly mannequins, carved in animalistic and often sexual postures. Few reliable descriptions of the manse's interior have emerged. Reports have mentioned a mad chaos of clockwork and steam, furnaces and crucibles wreathed in sulphurous fumes, glass forests of beakers and test-tubes; an array of living furniture fashioned from monstrous limbs and skins; a room whose walls are covered in murmuring wallpaper that speaks with a thousand loquacious mouths.

Ezekiel's income is generated principally from his ingenious inventions and his alchemical concoctions, sold in the Hexwarren district of the City of Bodysnatchers. The Splicing Guild considers the witch a threat to their business but have been unable to infiltrate his manse; they would pay a small fortune to any willing to do so and return with Ezekiel's secrets.

Ah, just noticed this. Guess Wispy needs to locate the Splicing Guild to sell his extra partial map. :)

More information on them would be appreciated (I only noticed one other mention of them above).

[Steerpike]

[blockquote=Light Dragon]More information on them would be appreciated (I only noticed one other mention of them above). [/blockquote]The Splicing Consortium are basically the big fleshcrafters' guild, a trade association that oversees grafting, glyph-scribing, and soul-binding in the city; alchemists and apothecaries are also frequently members.  Though there are dozens - even hundreds - of freelancers throughout Macellaria, the Splicing Consortium disapproves of them, and actively harasses them if they become profitable, pressuring them to join the Consortium (Ezekiel is a rare case, as he's powerful enough to hold his own against the Consortium).  In exchange for dues and the like the Consortium provides loans and other resources such as training, equipment, and discounts on raw materials (arranged primarily with the Fleshmongers, the slavers, brothel-keepers, and graft-peddlers association) to its members.  It also provides pensions and the like to supplement retired masters, who generally take a role in the Consortium's administration.  While no official charter specifically requires fleshcrafters to join the Consortium, the benefits of joining generally outweigh those of independent operation.  Members get access to certain secret libraries, esoteric alchemical forumlae, and similar arcane knowledge.

EDIT: I envision them as quite conniving and ruthless, a sort of sinister necromancer's cabal run a bit like a bullying corporation and/or a particularly obnoxious, aggressive union: greedy, vicious, and self-serving.  At the same time they represent one of the few bastions of order in an otherwise anarchic city, and they do genuinely help a lot of craftsmen set up shop and stay in business.

And yeah, Carver's go-to fleshcrafter, Needlefingers, is a member.

[LD]

Hm. Sounds like people that Mr. Carver would be involved with in some fashion.

[Superfluous Crow]

yeeees. If I get discounts.
LD, what happened during your small trip to Hell (and back)?

[LD]

You can either find out in-game if you dare ask for Wispy's take on events; or, if you can wait-- I think that Steerpike is going to post up the story. :evil: :)

[Steerpike]

The story should be up on the log thread, as is the rest of Carver's jaunt.

[Nomadic]

Steerpike I had a weird dream the other night that I think would actually make for an awesome disease in your setting. Basically a type of fungus that slowly takes over the body replacing the insides with fungus until it is so clogged up that internal organs fail and the person drops over dead. At which point the fungus uses the body as a sort of home until someone is foolish enough to disturb it. They then all burst inside the body releasing a form of free moving maggot-like larva that swarm quickly towards any living things nearby, burrowing into their skin (and through any thin armor and clothing between them and skin) and infecting them.

The most striking thing about the fungus is how it alters the body. Hairs fall out, the skin yellows, from where hair fell out long thin stalks grow out of the skin with feathery or rounded tips. Other pores on the skin start to grow and elongate connecting with those on the other side of the body creating holes that pass clean through arms and legs (when this starts happening to the torso the person is close to death). Within these holes one can look in to see the fungus themselves. Small round purple-gray pods with what almost look like craters on them from the center of which sprout long stalks with feathery or rounded tips. They don't seem to do much more than this to the body and a person will continue living a largely normal life other than the shocking change in appearance for awhile. However the fungus rapidly multiply and at some point all these spheres blocking arteries and clogging lungs, heart, liver, and more will kill the subject (in the case of creatures that can largely live without organs they slowly turn into walking fungus before falling apart). The only cure for the fungus is an immersion in a bath that has been prepared with certain herbs and hexed by a skilled witch as the fungus itself is an arcane creation. However it multiplies rapidly and so must be treated very quickly. Once the subject has died the only thing to do is to light the body on fire from a safe distance.

Anyhow I had a dream about this and woke up and went... hell that would be awesome for cadaverous earth as a sort of eldritch plague left over from time long since passed. Thought I'd share it with you.

[Steerpike]

Very cool disease, Nomadic.  I must ponder fungi more.

Another vegetable monstrosity in the meantime:
[ic=Ghostgrass]Ghostgrass is a type of vegetation found principally in the Mewling Moors east of the Gloom Coast, though some has crept up into the south-easterly Slaughter-lands.  Drawing energy in part from the aether, ghostgrass is sometimes classified as a 'grave-spawn plant.'  It is immune to many diseases and, most importantly, to the putrefying Rotmists common in the regions it flourishes.  Arcane winds in the aether cause ghostgrass to rustle, producing a whispering noise that uncannily mimics the sound of voices: in particular, the voices of the dead.  A group of individuals moving through ghostgrass will all hear distinct and different voices identical to those of departed loved ones.  These voices begin by simply muttering familiar phrases or names, but gradually grow more and more disturbing, urging those near the ghostgrass to acts of extreme violence against their companions, or themselves, or else taunting an individual with shameful secrets.  During eldritch 'gales' this murderous susurrus has been known to drive travelers quite mad, forcing them to set upon one another.  In other cases it is merely unnerving.  Witches seem especially susceptible.  It is suspected that ghostgrass feeds on the dissipating life-energy ('soul') of dying creatures, and so encourages killing as a method of subtle predation.

Physically, ghostgrass is extremely pale, almost translucent; in moonlight it acquires an eerie greenish or bluish tinge, depending on subspecies.  It is extremely hardy and difficult to kill, being highly resistant to toxins or physical damage.  Fire is effective, but the damp of the Moors makes it difficult for flames to spread.[/ic]

[Ghostman]

Can't help myself. My first thought reading that was that someone must have tried smoking the grass. :D