As I sat in the more affluent district near
the harbour parks where my family had its quiet and modest holdings, enjoying this new
bitter bean tea I was now quite fond of for some reason, I watched the hot morning bustle
of Athkatla, the city of coin, under a cloudless sky, the oppressive humid heat was ramping
up already, even before midday. Normally a simple cantrip would suffice to
direct a little puff of wind at my back to help cool myself, but I dared not use the
art in this city, lest one of the cowled wizards detect the use and accost me, I was quite
careful to make no mention of my association with Candlekeep here, the cowled wizards are
no friends of the Avowed, and although I am not technically a member of that order of
scholars or pay a lot of attention to the prophecies of Alaundo... I know, I hear them chanted all the time in
the keep, but, it is just so much background noise after a while, like the ringing of bells
at a monastery, I set the hours of my day by them, but I don't really ponder the words. Anyway, of all the places, so close to home
but even so, I keep a low profile when I am in Amn. I have even heard them openly refer to the
keep as the 'Citadel of Lies' here! Then, just before I left to join the wagon
convoy out of the city, now assembled in my families yards, I saw a prize example of the
very worst that Athkatla had to offer.. wheezing and coughing, a great sweating bulk of a man
appeared in a clump of servants and slaves, rather than riding in an enclosed and private
sedan carried by a couple of burly slaves as I had seen all too often, he was out in
the open, and actually riding three miserable, strained and sweat-soaked men who had his
ample ass pressed into their shoulders and faces. Not only was this merchant tyrant wearing
rich and expensive furs from the far north... FURS! He forced his servants to dress in such ridiculous
fashion as well, just for the sake of displaying his wealth, even at the expense of his own
comfort. I instantly loathed this man, this human,
of all creatures he reminded me that I was welcome in my family estates and homesteads,
but I was also half human as well as half Hin, and it was not they, but I who was the
halfling. The merchant bleated orders constantly, gesticulating
with his bejewelled hands and slapping at his exhausted slaves with a short rod with
leather lashes. Going by the parcels some of his servants
carried, he was out shopping around for samples of cloth, perhaps to buy in bulk, perhaps
to have a new suit of attire sewn for him. Display of wealth to revolting excess is just
part of the culture of Athkatla, unfortunately. Still, looking at that merchant, I knew for
a fact, without a shadow of doubt, that the man's soul was bound for the Tarterian Depths
of Carceri. No sooner did the thought cross my mind, across
the crowded street, for a moment his darting gaze locked directly onto my own, there was
a threat there, a mild one, he looked away again a moment later, no doubt I was gone
from his thoughts as quickly as I entered them, if I had at all. I pondered a very dusty and very dreadful
old, old work of lore I had read a few years before and knew that, if indeed he was going
to end up dead in the endless hells of Carceri, there was a slim chance he could return, some
distant day, and locking eyes with what he had become would be one of the worst mistakes
of my long life. The creatures that call Carceri home, the
Demodands, never forget a face, not so much as a glance in a market place, none of them
do, ever, and to make it even worse, once one of them knows you, anything about you,
they all do, forever. There is some horror to that, to know that
nobody is beneath their notice, no being is entirely safe from them, if they are so tasked
with the job, they can hunt you down anywhere in the entire multiverse, any one of them,
instantly aware of your change in status, all of them now desiring nothing more than
to drag you, body and soul, down to the worse pit of torment in the lower planes, there
to suffer for all eternity at their hands. I sometimes wish I didn't know such things,
but, it is entirely my fault that I do... I ventured into the forbidden depths of the
library of of the ancient lich lord, the shadow king Larloch with the intention of stealing
a book which would secure me a permanent place at Candlekeep, ah the folly of youth, I am
still amazed I lived, Larloch saw no threat in me, he let me go. To this day I worry about why he did that. I took nothing with me of his, except a hasty
impression of a dark stone, floating in his library with carved symbols, I placed paper
over it and rubbed waxed charcoal to copy them and stuffed the paper up under my shirt. It was only much later in study at candlekeep
with books of ancient languages that I understood what I had found. If the legends I decyphered on that ancient
Batrachi lore stone, itself claiming to be a transcription, largely of an even more ancient
text called "The Book of Derelict Magicks" are to be believed, I had found this history
of the multiverse, written by the Yugoloths themselves, probably before any of the mortal
races on Toril had ever existed. If the old saying, a burden shared is a burden
halved is true, I thank you for what I reluctantly tell you now... In the beginning, primal forces raged back
and forth across the unformed mass of being, which I have come to think means the Ethereal
realm perhaps the first world, or the land at the center of the multiverse. The many divisions of the planes of existence
are the result of their warfare, with weapons that warped reality itself in space and time. Their goal was to become to dominant force
that guided all that was. Good wrestled with Evil, and Law with Chaos. Neutrality held the lands over which they
fought, concerned only with the act of balance, drawing equal amounts of all to create the
prime material plane. That in itself is considered high blasphemy
in so many places, I only dare relate it to you in this private journal, that the ultimate
creators of the prime material plane cared nothing for good, evil, law or chaos, only
the balance of matter and energy, the perpetuation of existence itself. The forces that raged were, almost ironically,
too evenly matched, balanced so that neither could gain an advantage over its foes. Law became an ally of Good, Evil joined the
ranks of Chaos and the conflict entered a new stage, as each raised their power in new
combinations, but still it was not enough and the war rolled on. Only then did they pause long enough to create
things, finally, for themselves, and thus the minions of law, good, chaos and evil were
born; Creatures that could serve Them and work as agents in the primordial struggle. One force, I suspect this was pure evil, created
the baernaloths, creatures of sagacious wisdom and unbridled cunning. The baernaloths consulted among themselves
for a long time seeking a way to triumph over the rest of the first world. The majority decided to create the yugoloths,
setting up the entire cast system and structure of the creatures so that their patron force
would gain ever more adherents, followers who could act with power to carry out the
edicts of the baernaloths and seek true perfection... according to the yugoloths of course - this
is a text written by them and their towering egos- but ask any yugoloth, they will tell
you to this day that true perfection requires acts of evil in order to achieve its creation,
that perfection has no place for the weakness of compromise. As I said, not all the baernoloth's agreed
with this creation of the yugoloths, one in particular, named Apomps, decided to act on
his own, but more on that in a moment. The baernaloths saw that the perfection of
the yugoloths was threatened by the meddlesome hand of law and chaos. The early yugoloths had to contend with warring
natures and questions of ethics in their pursuit of perfection. One of the first yugoloths to achieve the
rank of ultroloth devised a solution: it would expunge all law and chaos from it's race,
forcing these base corruptions into the lesser creatures of the Gray Waste. After much experimentation, the ultraloth
finally found an answer in the creation of a magical stone called the Heart of Darkness,
and summoned it's fellows. When the ultraloth explained it's plan it
was hailed as a hero for its clear thinking ability, and ruthlessness. And thus it began to remove all trace of law
and chaos from its cohorts, passing the purged energies into the massive heaps of Larvae
it has collected from the grey wastes. Now, according to this account, some yugoloths
refused the Hearth of Darkness; they fled deeper into the glooms of the Waste (and beyond)
their fate unknown. When the ultraloth had finished, its brethren
stood tall and pure. The larvae grew and mutated, the forces of
law and chaos twisting them into impure mockeries of the yugoloths, and so they were driven
from the waste. Those who had received threads of chaos journeyed
to the Abyss and those infused with law made their way to the nine hells of Baator. This Ultraloth who transformed their kind
is known now as the General of Gehenna and it is said it has spent all the eons from
that time collecting secrets that will drive the multiverse to its knees in the final days. It should be noted, also, that the Yugoloths
are almost the only fiendish race that is not spawned from the souls of mortals who
have passed on from their lives elsewhere. This doesn't do a single thing to put a check
to the unbelievable egos of the Yugoloths, who consider themselves the only true fiendish
species in all the lower planes, aside from the Baernaloths of course. There is another though. One Of the baernaloths named Apomps, attempted
to duplicate the creation of the yugoloths. He did so by simply taking the bodies of dead
yugoloths and breathing new life into them from his own power, which naturally made them
fanatically loyal to him as their creator and source of their power. The process was extremely risky, and it exacted
a terrible toll on Apomps, he became a horribly twisted and deformed monster. Nonetheless, he was extremely proud of what
he, just one Baernaloth, had achieved and he showed off his new creatures, called gehreleths,
to the other Baernaloths... they were absolutely outraged of course. The new Gehreleths were infested with the
affliction of chaos, an afront to the sacrifice so many had made to become pure the pure source
of evil they now were and together, all the baernaloths and yugoloths combined forces
to banish the wretched but still very powerful Apomps. He retreated to the prison plane of Tartaris
and his Gehreleth went with him, every single one of them vowing eternal and bitter genocidal
war against all the other baernaloths, their proud creations the yugoloths, even the Night
hag allies and new lords of the Nine Hells and abyssal depths, they pretty much-declared
war on everybody. Gehreleths have finally made an appearance
again in the 5th edition source book titled "Minsc and Boo's Journal of Villainy, which
feels to me like its a collection of all the stuff that got left out of Mordenkainen's
Tome of Foes, I mean, the Gehreleths, also known as Demodands, are one of the main factions
of the lower planes, and most importantly, they stand in direct opposition to all the
other evil factions. They absolutely should have been in Mordenkainen's
tome and they really, really need more lore than Minsc's Journal provides, this is the
major species of an entire planar environment, they are also a force to be reckoned with
across the entire multiverse and have been involved with every step of the Blood War
and countless other fiendish plots for eons and eons. They most certainly have a very heavy connection
to the amphibian creator race, the Batrachi, who once ruled the planet Toril in a massive
transdimensional empire that constructed an extensive, very durable planar portal network,
later this was used to great effect by the human Imaskari empire to move produce and
their armies and artificer wizard force great distances almost immediately across the entire
continent, giving them unparalleled military might. The Gehreleths ancient monuments and prison
cities littering the landscape of the many brooding, red glowing worlds of Carceri are
strikingly similar to the most ancient portals on Toril, and they do happen to have an almost
toad-like appearance, the Gehreleths are also known to make themselves a bit more easily
available for the sort of random fiendish summoning spells and rituals, so there is
a very good chance they were some of the first extra-planar creatures the Batrachi ever encountered. Which I think also explains why the Batrachi
didn't seem as heavily involved with the forces of hell or the abyss as some of the other
ancient creator races... I could be wrong, it was an extremely long
time ago after all. So, let me fill in the blanks left by Minsc's
Journal, which neglects to even describe what one of the three types of Gehreleth looks
like, granted the one bit of art provided is very good, in this case, one picture is
not going to make up for cutting one thousand words of lore and just pasting three stat
blocks and two pointless, space-eating NPC quotes in the gap where the Lore should be. Demodands are native to the planes of the
Tartarian depths of Carceri, in Greek mythology Carceri is the prison of the underworld (the
entire plane is one of confinement and punishment, it is, if you ask me, the real plane of total
damnation. Not only does it contain countless souls being
relentlessly tortured, it also contains an unknown number of the very first, most powerful
and wicked primordial planar powers. These are referred to by many names, the Greeks
called them the Titans. The Gehreleths are the self-appointed prison
keepers of Tartarus, they amuse themselves by coming up with the most terrible forms
of punishment. One famous Greek myth speaks to Tantalus,
Son of Zeus and a mortal nymph, he abused his invitation to sit at the table in Olympus
with his father, he stole secrets of the gods and gave them to mortal beings, and most famously,
Tantalus offered up his son, Pelops, as a sacrifice. He cut Pelops up, boiled him, and served him
up in a banquet for gods in order to test their omniscience. The gods became aware of the gruesome nature
of the menu, so they did not touch the offering; only Demeter, distraught by the loss of her
daughter, Persephone, absentmindedly ate part of the boy's shoulder. Zeus ordered the boy brought back to life
and his shoulder was replaced with one of made of ivory. Tantalus's punishment for his act, now a proverbial
term for temptation without satisfaction (the source of the English word tantalise), was
to stand in a pool of water beneath a fruit tree with low branches. Whenever he reached for the fruit, the branches
raised his intended meal from his grasp. Whenever he bent down to get a drink, the
water receded before he could get any. The word Tantalizing is derived from this
myth, a thing of desire just out of reach. I have an older video detailing some of the
broad features of the plane of Carceri, in a nutshell, it appears as a black void with
an endless string of planets, stretching away into infinity in the sky, the planets are
very close to each other, there is no sunlight or stars and the planets in the sky give off
a red glow, the true light source of this plane are the planets themselves, they glow
red, its not bright on the surface, it just serves to make the place look oppressive and
volcanic when actually there isn't much volcanic activity at all. Everything on these planets is going to hurt
you, one way or another, these are nightmare worlds of punishment, let your imagination
run wild as to what horrors can be found in every random segment of your wilderness map..
jungles of carnivorous plants, swamps of acid and parasites, both in the steaming liquid
and buzzing in great clouds in the air, in each place, I would locate an encounter where
the player character meet some poor soul that the environment seems specifically tailored
to torture them personally in the most horrible ways, and, if I can relate a legendary form
of execution used long ago in ancient persia... prisoners were placed in a boat or hollowed
out log, force fed milk and honey until they uncontrollably voided their bowels, at which
point their skin was smeared with more milk and honey and they were left strapped to this
boat full of their own feces and vomit... then the swarms of flying and crawling insects
would start to devour them, the prisoners were fed a ration of water, milk and honey
every day to ensure they didn't die of hunger or thirst, they would also smear the infested
slop in the bottom of the boat or log into the open wounds of the prisoner so, Instead,
they succumbed to tortured madness, experiencing the agonizing, nightmare crawl of thousands
of insects on their skin, burrowing into their eyes, ears, nose and every other orifice,
filling their mouths, while worms and parasites bred in the filth at the bottom of the boat
and squirmed up into their bowels. Eventual death caused by exposure and massive
infection could take a couple of weeks. The Gehreleths would consider this a somewhat
artless and lazy method, and also far too quick. There are unique, native horrors of Carceri,
for example the Odopi, hailing from 3.5 editions third volume of the monster manual, they are
24 feet in size with rust red, rough and scaled skin, they look like nothing more than a great
twitching and rolling ball or demonic arms, with the yellow clawed hands at the end of
each arm inset with a glaring yellow eyeball. They are entirely vicious, roaming around
like nightmare tumbleweeds, gurgling and clapping messages to each other in what passes for
their own language. Not only are they able to rip along at 60
feet per round, they are smart enough to shift tactics in a basic sort of way, with an intelligence
of 6, such as picking up anything at hand to hurl at flying creatures with the pinpoint
accuracy hundreds of eyes looking in every direction provides. They are huge, can climb at 40 feet per round,
have the ability to survive pretty much any fall from height thanks to spell-like abilities,
they beat the living shit out of victims in a flurry of blows that would shame a high-level
monk and, if a rolling group of them hunting for victims is not scary enough, they also
come in Elder form, pretty much the same but gargantuan in size, oh, and the cherry on
top? They have the ability to regenerate damage. Carceri is not a nice place, you can also
locate some versions of the monsters of Greek myth and legend here, such as the Hundred
Handed giants, cyclops, medusas and so on. It is rumored that there are a set number
of Gehreleths, a number still under the control of Apomps, most of the time it is ten thousand,
but in times of conflict with other forces it can double, I think this is probably not
true though, considering how many planetary spheres there are in the many layers of Carceri,
it would spread their total population very thin indeed, and we know that is not the case. Many observations have pointed out that Demodands
chaotic taint is reflected in a lack of society among their own kind, they are not loyal to
anyone, including each other. Gehreleths will cut each other down without
a moment's hesitation, after all, there is always more of them thanks to the method by
which they come into existence. The three main types of Gehreleth all look
corpse-like because they are all derived originally from the dead, the power of Apomps originally
infused the corpses of dead Yugoloths, these days, its mostly the great heaps of corpses
that form rolling hills of slaughter in carceri. Picking a relatively intact corpse from some
rack constructed out of the bones and gut straps of the dead, a Demodand will infuse
it with power and it will transform and rise to life as a loathsome Farastu, the lowest
intact form of the Gehreleths. There are rumors of many other types of gehreleth,
all exclusively found in carceri, aside from the foulspawn offspring of Gehreleth and mortal
life.. this is not a naturally conceived union, I should point out, gehreleths don't have
the required equipment for that act, mercifully. Farastus stand about seven feet tall, they
are emaciated with elongated limbs and talon tipped, long fingers, some have stubby wings
of no practical use except very low gravity and dense air. Their heads are large and oblong, a mix of
corpse and toad with massive jaws loaded with jagged fangs, they are thin, but extremely
strong, able to tear a normal human apart very quickly, coupled with abilities practically
identical to the Barbarian character class, they are creatures full of rage and hatred
who suffer endlessly under the spiteful commands of the superior demodands who get the Farastus
to do all the really shitty tasks, really humiliating, long-suffering, disgusting and
mentally taxing jobs that supercharge the seething hatred burning in the heart of every
farastu, just waiting for any excuse to unleash it in murderous fury. They are capable of tracking down victims
by scent along, experts at navigating the various layers of carceri and each of the
planes different native dangers, their body is famously slick with a black and noxious
tar-like slime which oozes out of them constantly, it serves to protect them from many of the
planes native conditions, but like all Demodands, they are completely immune to acid, fire and
poison, including most diseases of a non-magical nature, they take half damage and effect from
cold, all gehreleths have resistance to magic and all of their physical attacks count as
attacks from an enchanted weapon, they typically have excellent senses, they are predatory,
though they don't need food to survive, they crave meat and gorge themselves on it when
they can. They take half damage from non magical attacks
and all have a hefty bonus to all saving throws involving strength and constitution, they
are hard to kill. Drawing on the work contained in the GM's
Guild source book titled "Minsc and Boo's Journal of Villainy" we have some stat blocks
for the three main types of Demodand. The Farastus have an armor class of 16 and
an average of 71 hit points, their adhesive slime is composed of concentrated, noxious
corpse goo, it secretes this stuff constantly from every orifice and it coats their body
in thick globs. The Farastus, also known as Tar demodands
or Tar Geth, are experts in using it in combat and for climbing up sheer surfaces. They can grapple opponents and are +7 to all
athlethics checks, they have a strength of 19. Oddly, the adhesion of the tar is totally
under their control, they can choose to release specific objects or victims and all objects
are released if they are killed. They are also berserk fighters, sprinting
at enemies and gaining advantage on all melee attacks, but, opponents also have advantage
in their attacks on the farastu at the same time. They make two claw or bite attacks, are +7
to hit an opponent within 5ft and inflict1d6+4 slashing damage, plus, on a hit, the victim
of the claw attack will be held fast by the tar, the escape difficulty is 15 and the farastu
can only grapple one victim at a time. Their bite attack inflicts2d6+4 piercing damage. The adhesive hide of the farastu has another
special property that makes them ideal creatures to pair up with other monsters, if the farastu
takes damage from a melee weapon they can spend their reaction to take that weapon,
the attacker must pass a DC 15 Dexterity saving throw or be disarmed. Prying it back off the demodand requires an
action and a DC 15 Strength check. I know the damage from the claw and bite seem
a little low, but remember, there is absolutely no reason a Farastu, which is created from
the corpse of another being, could not or would not be equipped with weapons and armor,
this is optional of course, everything is optional, your table, your rules. Also, this version of a Farastu is a bit low
on the intelligence score, normally they are about as smart as an average human. Unlike the other, more advanced forms of Demodand,
the tarry farastus are particularly aggressive towards summoners who rip them out of Carceri
to other planes of existence, so they will be very hard to control, willfully disobey
if it is possible for them to do so, and they always plot revenge on that summoner or at
least the world that summoner brought them to. When a farastu is killed, anywhere in the
multiverse, a new farastu is spawned from one of the corpses of Carceri or even nearby
if there happen to be some handy corpses around, they are more common in the infested swamp
jungles of the second layer of carceri called Carthys and for some reason, they are forbidden
from the non-jungle grasslands, all of which, jungle and grass alike, secrete powerful acids
that eat metal in minutes. As they rise from the dead, demodands have
no need of sexual reproduction, hence why you don't see half demodands, however, there
are ways to put some of their foul energy into other life forms, it is pointless describing
a result, the creatures that are born that way are chaotic in form and ability, and very
rare, so, there will be a reason why the DM is putting one of them in the game. Even the lesser Gehreleths possess an Obsidian
Triangle, a simple but powerful artifact created and bestowed on each farastu at the time of
their creation. These objects serve to give gehreleths access
to their racial, collective memory. With their triangles, gehreleths can learn
the identity of summoners and create generation-spanning schemes, as well as gather general knowledge
about the multiverse. Because of this, killing a gehreleth is almost
useless, a new one rises and takes up the Triangle and remembers everything the last
one knew. The obsidian triangles have other abilities,
such as causing the gehreleths physical attacks to be counted as magical. Most fearsome of their suspected abilities
was the idea that the triangles gave Apomps access to every gehreleth's senses and experiences,
allowing him to exist wherever his creations were. Both Apomps and the shators were said to command
their inferiors through the triangles, the extent of that is unknown. Killing a gehreleth is thought to cause a
triangle to lose its magical properties, making it worthless outside of being a trinket. Similarly, the gehreleths greedily hoard the
triangles and do everything in their power to retrieve a stolen triangle. Kelubars or Slime Leths are the middle class
of the Demodands, they appear as wide-bodied, grossly bloated demon corpses with acid slime
oozing and dripping out of them all the time, they are very corpulent and have wings, they
are about 8 feet tall and weigh around 500 pounds or 230 kilograms, so, very big while
still being just barely medium-sized. Don't let all that bulk fool you though, they
have a strength of 20, +9 to Athletics checks and a dexterity of 13, they can move at 30
feet per round on foot and fly at 60 feet per round, they are also much more intelligent
and cunning than the Farastu. Granted, they are lazy, there is an excellent
bit of artwork in the Journal of Villainy depicted a Kelubar being carried around by
a team of wretched Farastu, they are the most willing to have a chat rather than a fight,
but, they have no problem engaging in violence and are sadistic bullies that gain the most
pleasure from breaking the spirit of their victims. They supervise the Farastu and spend almost
all their time torturing prisoners of Carceri, making the place even more miserable and scheming,
plotting and fighting against their own kind. The stat block in the journal is an interesting
take on their abilities however it seriously needs some acid effects, the Kelubars are
experts in the brutal and the subtle use of their noxious acid, it reeks like exploded
corpses and just getting close to these monsters is enough to incapacitate a sensitive adventurer
with uncontrollable nausea. Kelubars have an armor class of 17 and an
average of 97 hit points, they have a supernatural ability to avoid being slowed down by difficult
terrain, they are also immune to being paralyzed or otherwise restrained, it needs only spend
five feet of its movement for the round to escape any non-magical restraints and is not
slowed down by being completely underwater, so its movement speed is also its swim speed. They also have the supernatural ability to
just swerve out of harm's way, spending their reaction for a round to automatically take
half damage from any attack they can see coming. They are versatile opponents, they have a
range of spells they can cast, including acid arrow at will, which they make heavy use of,
as well as fear. Their stench causes any non-gehreleth creature
that starts its turn within 30 feet of the kelubar to make a DC 16 Constitution saving
throw or be poisoned, suffering disadvantage on all attacks and ability checks, which leaves
them wide open to the kelubar making sneak attacks against them, dealing an additional
4d6 damage on whatever attack it makes. Successfully making the saving throw vs the
stench only confers immunity to it for one hour. They have the same reckless attack option
as the Farastus, they also attack with two claw or bite attacks, or swap those out for
spell attacks, they are +9 to hit, their claws inflict 2d8+5 piercing damage and an additional
2d6 acid damage, their bite inflicts 2d8+5 piercing damage and an additional 2d6 acid
damage. I would add something like a poison spray
spell-like effect every time someone hits the Kelubar with a magical slashing weapon
attack. As mid-ranked Demodands they can summon reinforcements,
rolling a six-sided die, on a result of 1 or 2 they summon two farastus, on a result
of 3 or 4 they summon one other kelubar. Usually, Leths don't get along well with each
other but summoned Demodands will obey their suggestions in combat for the most part. They can't summon the higher rank of Gehreleths,
the Shator. Shators are the most massive of the Demodands,
standing up to ten feet tall, weighing as much as 700 pounds or 320 kilograms, they
are bloated like festering corpses. They are also known as Shaggy Leths as they
have ragged folds of skin hanging off their huge body. Being so bloated makes them seem squat, from
a distance, but up close, you can see that these creatures are simply massive and powerful,
with a strength of 24, constitution of 20 and dexterity of 13, ground speed of 30 feet
and flight speed of 60 feet, they are much more agile and far more formidable in combat
than countless unfortunate victims have given them credit for. Underestimate the Shator at your peril, they
have some of the most formidably wicked intellects in the lower planes outside the nine hells
and their sadistic cruelty has absolutely no rival. They are the worst situation you can find
yourself in, the buck stops with them, they are the end of the crime spree, they are the
punchline to the multiverses sick joke, they are the worst-case scenario, they are the
contagion of woe, the mouth of the river of suffering. They know this, of course, and have the towering,
insufferable egos that go with it. They revel in the death and despair they create,
their dread palaces are made from the remains of their countless victims and fresh tortures
await in every unimaginably grim nook and cranny both inside and out, they find the
sounds of desperate screams to be music to their ears while they ponder the true nature
of the multiverse. If anyone is familiar with The Hitchhikers
Guide to the Galaxy and the Vogon aliens with their poetry so awful it can literally kill
you? The Shator are the fiendish version of them,
in a nutshell. They go a big step further than the vogons
in that, they deliberately craft poetry and philosophical arguments that are designed
to create a sense of the pointless, cruel joke that intelligent life is.. there is no
reason to the multiverse, nothing has any meaning, all happiness is only possible due
to ignorance and self-deception.. that sort of thing. The Shator's amuse themselves through eternity
by travelling to the prime material plane, when there on business usually, and finding
mortal poets and philosophers to use as unwitting mouthpieces for their ideas. They are immortal, if one falls another rises
in its place, so their amusements could see an entire nation of simple mortal farm folk
rise up to incredible wealth, just so the overindulged, hedonistic nobility fall prey
to ennui and depression. Where a noble believes they have every right
to abuse those who are lesser than themselves, out of boredom and a lack of empathy, the
shator chuckles, when a megalomaniacal tyrant burns thousands of innocent people at the
stake, the Shator laughs.. soon enough, they will be just another mewling wretch decorating
their walls, eventually, another hate-filled farastu serving them as nothing more than
a footrest. Shators have an armor class of 17 and an average
of 189 hit points, they have all the same abilities as the kelubar plus they are highly
toxic, their body oozes with poison slime that causes anyone who touches it to save
or become paralyzed, they spit globs of poison in a 20-foot line almost like a black dragon's
acid breath weapon. They have a much more comprehensive knowledge
of arcane spellcraft and they are able to summon a larger number and a wider assortment
of Gehreleths to fight for them, one trick they use is to force lesser gehreleths into
transforming into the liquid tar or acid slime states and then storing them inside breakable
bottles the shator can hurl into the battlefield, overcoming most opposition due to their superior
numbers of minions alone, well, not exactly minions, more like an instant army of released,
savage killers, reforming out of their splattered liquid state. The other mission of Shators, given to them
directly by the essence of Apomps within them, is to spread distrust and hatred of all the
yugoloths in the multiverse, which they most certainly do, with a passion. In fact, deep within an asylum in the planar
city of Sigil, a shator named Xideous decided to compile the true and public names of all
the Yugoths he could, giving himself a great deal of control over those he recorded in
his journal, control and power to negotiate deals the yugoloths would normally refuse. While Xideous was doing this, the powerful
shator was also seeking the legendary four 'Books of Keeping" which contained all the
true names of the Yugoloths, written down by the duplicitous Night Hags way back when
the yugoloths were first being created. If Xideous manages to attain these books,
his power in the lower planes and the machinations in the background of the blood war will probably
be enough to transform the Tartarian Depths of Carceri forever and instigate the end of
not only the blood war, but possibly the end of the balance of law and chaos in the multiverse. Who knows? You never know exactly what is true and what
it not when it comes to the fiends of the lower planes. I am AJ Pickett, this was your deep dive into
the lore of the Demodands of Carceri, thanks for listening everyone and I will be back
with more D&D lore for you, very soon.
