TEXT: ®
  
  M
  y dear friend Alcimedes — Forgive the briefness 
  of this note and the trembling hand in which it 
  was written. I can promise no true elucidation in 
  this scrawled note, for nothing I relate can convey the true 
  horror of what I have come to know, the uninhibited vistas 
  which have been revealed to me. The things that lurk, their 
  jaws slavering, just beyond this world, Alcimedes, only just 
  out of sight. Stretch out your hand and you might brush 
  against one, though you could not see it! It is enough to 
  drive one mad. Perhaps it has already driven me thus.
  I know I was sent merely to collect a few scant records 
  from the great library of Aquilonia, but the pages which I 
  found there… hidden, within that vast volume… they have 
  told me too much. If you ask why I have been absent these 
  past weeks, it is because I followed those strange and gnomic 
  hints, I ventured to that ancient tomb whose location I will 
  not reveal to you, and I delved into its darkness. I thought 
  that I could bring you something your other students could 
  not. I thought… ah! But you always said my ambition and 
  hunger for knowledge outstripped even your own, did you 
  not? And how true that has proved. In that tomb, I saw so 
  much, so much that language itself cannot possibly convey. 
  Even the shapes, the way in which that crypt had been built, 
  made me nauseous, unstable.
  Stricken thus, I continued, certain that something mar-
  velous lay just beyond the next serpentine undulation of 
  corridor. But those things… like snakes that had been bred 
  with the hyena and… no. No, I will write nothing more of 
  them, save to say I saw them. Their eyes saw me. There was 
  nothing human there, merely the cold implacability of 
  the spaces between the stars above us. This is all you shall 
  learn from my pen, Alcimedes. Please, do not seek out any 
  more. Let this knowledge die with me. My thanks for your 
  tutelage; the sad use to which it has been put is my own, 
  foolish doing. Do not fear for me… the sword against my 
  wrist feels almost comforting.
  Mitra protect my soul…
  AN UNHALLOWED VOLUME…
  Nameless Cults is dedicated to those things called gods in 
  the Hyborian Age. Some are close in conception to things 
  we might call gods — beings of vast supernatural power 
  who intervene in mortal affairs, for good or ill. Some are 
  nothing of the sort, being convenient, collective delusions 
  which, over time, have achieved the semi-life which all good 
  stories do. Others are deliberate hoaxes, conceived of as a 
  means of securing power and wealth for those who know 
  the true nature of the ‘god’ at its center.
  This sourcebook provides the gamemaster with insight 
  into the gods and cults of the Hyborian Age, offering evoc-
  ative details for how they might be inserted into games, as 
  NAMELESS CULTS
  INTRODUCTION
  “The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of 
  the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid 
  island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it 
  was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each 
  straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but 
  some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open 
  up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position 
  therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from 
  the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.”
  — “The Call of Cthulhu”, H.P. Lovecraft
  
  3
  INTRODUCTION
  both a means of abetting and bedeviling the player char-
  acters by turn. Certain gods come with full write-ups of 
  their cults — how the god’s worshippers enact the will of 
  the divine, organizing themselves in a way which ensures 
  that the god’s interests are pursued and protects the hidden 
  truths and inner mysteries from profanation by unbelievers. 
  Some gods are accompanied by rules, explaining the divine 
  blessings which those who perform the rites and rituals of 
  the god might receive. Others have no such rules — as they 
  offer nothing to their believers. Those who do offer fealty 
  to such creatures do so in the hope that faith will protect 
  them from the wrath which is to come. Perhaps it will.
  Chapter 1: Gods and Demons
  What does the average inhabitant of the Hyborian Age 
  believe in? Before we come to the specific gods to whom 
  they might pray or cults to which they might belong, this 
  chapter provides an overview of the cosmos in which most 
  JOURNAL OF THE WANDERERS CLUB
  GIVING NAMES TO 
  THE NAMELESS:
  AN INTRODUCTION TO FRIEDRICH WILHELM VON 
  JUNZT’S NAMELESS CULTS: AN ANNOTATED AND 
  UNEXPURGATED EDITION, 3RD REPRINTING
  By Prof. John Kirowan (PhD, FRS, FRAI, FRGS)
  Guest Lecturer, Department of Anthropology
  Miskatonic University
  Arkham, Massachusetts
  T
  he discovery, translation, and con-
  tinuing academic (and public) fas-
  cination with von Junzt’s Nameless 
  Cults, particularly in this recently published 
  and unexpurgated version, is a matter of 
  public record. Indeed, my esteemed col-
  league, Professor Albert Wilmarth, will 
  soon be publishing a concordance which 
  attempts to establish a narrative of response 
  and reception to the strange and marvelous 
  volume, the latest version of which you now 
  hold. For now, I will limit myself to a few 
  discursive remarks, about how that most 
  peculiar of books was penned. First pub-
  lished in Dusseldorf, in 1839, von Junzt’s slim 
  but dense volume immediately excited the 
  most violent reactions. A second, bowdler-
  ized edition was published a few years later, 
  many years after von Junzt’s unusual and 
  untimely death.
  For myself, to think that if he were alive 
  today, von Junzt would have been acclaimed 
  as a pioneer in archaeology, ethnography, 
  philology, anthropology, and several other 
  fields, and yet died little known and reviled, is 
  a profound sadness. I have spent a significant 
  portion of my life translating, assessing, and 
  corroborating the work of this most remark-
  able German. In doing so, I have come to 
  understand his achievement, as both historian 
  and visionary, as mystic and academic.
  Nameless Cults is not a book for the faint 
  of heart. It contains descriptions of the most 
  grotesque rituals, and the most barbaric and 
  ugly of gods. Von Junzt, for all his remark-
  able qualities as an author, was on the verge 
  of suffering some form of psychotic break. 
  While it is imprudent, despite what Dr. Freud 
  might have us believe, to speculate as to what 
  was on a man’s mind, it seems likely that von 
  Junzt had begun to believe in the reality of 
  those arcane and dreadful things which the 
  Hyborian Age supposedly contained. While, 
  of course, we do not doubt the veracity of 
  von Junzt’s historical and archaeological 
  assertions, it is not to be thought, for exam-
  ple, that the bloated monstrosity he describes, 
  and awards the appellation “Thog”, ever 
  truly stalked the earth.
  As to those dark and dreadful gods 
  which the German maintains exist just beyond 
  our ken, in the fashion of one of today’s more 
  hysterical Theosophist groups, we see there 
  the evidence of a great mind overthrown. If 
  such things were and could ever be true, well 
  then, madness would seem the most logical 
  of all possible responses.
  
  INTRODUCTION
  4
  men and women of the Thurian continent dwell. What 
  do concepts such as Heaven and Hell mean to those who 
  populate the cities of Brythunia or Kush? Here are answers 
  to those questions, as well as a brief glimpse of the strange 
  beliefs of the pre-Cataclysmic world which the Hyborian 
  Age replaced.
  Chapter 2: Cult Characters
  Playing a cultist might be an attractive option for some 
  players. Having access to a network of fellow believers, the 
  firm tenets of a god’s cult, a belief and direction which might 
  lead them to glory… all are strong reasons why someone 
  might want to join a religious order. This chapter will provide 
  players with the tools to make cultists fascinating charac-
  ters and strong contributors to any player character group.
  Chapter 3: Major Gods and Cults
  These are those gods whose name all men and women 
  beneath the sun utter with some measure of respect. Their 
  churches and temples can be found in nations throughout 
  the continent, their followers are almost beyond counting. 
  These are the deities with whom the player characters will 
  be most familiar, and whose devotees they are most likely to 
  encounter — whether as accidental allies or as obstructions 
  on the path of adventure and glory.
  Chapter 4: Things From the Outer Dark
  Beyond the tattered veil of this world, there is something 
  older, darker, hungrier. The Outer Dark. The substrate that 
  rests, immovable, and eternal, beneath the fragile shale 
  of this world. The creatures which reside there, or came 
  into being there, do not belong here. They are beyond our 
  capacity to understand, violent irruptions of the alien into 
  the world we know. Witnessing them, in their true form, 
  is enough to drive sane people to madness. Here they are 
  described in as safe a fashion as is possible.
  Chapter 5: Minor Gods and Cults
  If there are major gods, it stands to reason that there must 
  be minor gods. Those whose fame has passed, their power 
  waned. Those who may, in time, come to be worshipped 
  throughout the continent, but for now are worshipped only 
  
  5
  INTRODUCTION
  in a single corner, amongst a handful of believers. Who 
  knows what strange schemes and odd powers the player 
  characters may be called upon to face from this quarter?
  Chapter 6: Regional Cults
  There are incidences where it is not the god but the followers 
  who have attracted most attention and interest. Why this 
  might be — whether the bloodthirstiness of their rituals 
  or the strange forms which their devotion takes — is rarely 
  clear, but it is well to remember the names and practices of 
  such groups. They might lurk in any city, in any village or 
  in any out-of-the-way spot. Driven by the passion of their 
  belief, who knows what they might be capable of?
  Chapter 7: The Call of the Cultist
  Cults may take many forms and pose many different risks. 
  This chapter provides methods and approaches the gam-
  emaster might take to introduce these sinister, furtive 
  gatherings of fanatics and power-hungry opportunists into 
  the player characters’ lives.
  Chapter 8: Sacred Relics
  Many and diverse are the relics valued by the cults of the 
  Hyborian Age, whether onetime accoutrements of the god 
  or a renowned follower, items made sacred by proximity 
  to the god, or even things of mortal fashioning that have 
  divine significance. These various artifacts are described 
  in this chapter, presented for the gamemaster’s use as 
  potential rewards, goals, or as the cores about which grand 
  adventures might be coiled. 
  THE AUTHOR OF NAMELESS CULTS
  Von Junzt spent his entire life (1795–1840) delving into 
  forbidden subjects; he traveled in all parts of the world, 
  gained entrance into innumerable secret societies, and 
  read countless little-known and esoteric books and 
  manuscripts in the original; and in the chapters of 
  the Black Book, which range from startling clarity of 
  exposition to murky ambiguity, there are statements 
  and hints to freeze the blood of a thinking man. Reading 
  what Von Junzt dared put in print arouses uneasy 
  speculations as to what it was that he dared not tell.
  — “The Black Stone”
  The author of Unaussprechlichen Kulten (translated as 
  Nameless Cults), the eccentric occultist Friedrich Wilhelm 
  von Junzt was as enigmatic in life as his death was mys-
  terious. Born in Cologne, Germany, von Junzt attended 
  the University of Berlin, after which he embarked on 
  a lengthy tour of Asia. Returning to Germany to finish 
  his doctorate, he took up a teaching position at the 
  University of Württemberg, after which he again began 
  a series of travels worldwide in pursuit of his greatest 
  intellectual passion — secret societies, forgotten cults, 
  and dead religions.
  He published short works about vampires and were-
  wolves, but devoted much of his life to his magnum 
  opus, the “Black Book,” that would eventually become 
  Unaussprechlichen Kulten. After the volume’s completion, 
  and its publication in 1939, von Junzt embarked on an 
  unexplained trip, his destination unknown. After some 
  months away, he returned to Düsseldorf, arriving from 
  Mongolia. Shortly after, von Junzt locked himself in his 
  chambers, working feverishly upon a new manuscript 
  — its subject matter unknown to this day.
  Several months later, von Junzt was discovered dead 
  in his chamber under suspicious circumstances. Though 
  the door was firmly locked from the inside, his corpse 
  bore the marks of talons about the throat, and his new 
  manuscript was in tatters. Alexis Ladeau, von Junzt’s 
  best friend and the one who discovered the body, pieced 
  together the manuscript, then burned it and took his 
  own life. Due to this unsavory end, von Junzt’s work 
  gained an unwholesome reputation, and many copies 
  of Unaussprechlichen Kulten were burned by supersti-
  tious owners.
  Despite this, von Junzt’s masterwork has been 
  reprinted several times, translated into many languages 
  and remains an irreplaceable reference for the ancient 
  and mysterious cults that have flourished in secrecy, in 
  some cases outlasting all human history thus far.
  
  T
  he world is a place of vast plains and cramped, fetid 
  cities. It is a continent of thick jungle, of close pine 
  forest and colossal, ice-fanged mountain ranges. It 
  is a world of men and women with strength and savagery 
  as their only means of surviving an era ridden with danger 
  and dark magic. And it is a world in which the gods play 
  an ambivalent, unknowable role. Creatures of unnatural 
  proportion and sorcerers with abilities far beyond the ken 
  of mortal men render life a dangerous proposition for even 
  the hardiest and luckiest of adventurers. And still darker 
  things lurk beyond the thin façade of normalcy, things 
  which care nothing for mankind, nothing for the world 
  which brash barbarians inhabit and seek to conquer.
  This is the world as its inhabitants see it, surrounded 
  by omnipresent darkness, only ever held at bay, never 
  truly dismissed.
  THE COSMOS
  Even those who know nothing of sorcery understand that the 
  cosmos was not created for humanity’s benefit. Few, other 
  than the foolish or the desperate, believe in benevolent gods 
  who protect and care for humanity. Instead, most understand 
  that if the world was created for a purpose, this purpose 
  had little or nothing to do with human needs or wants.
  The world is a cruel and uncaring place and most of its 
  inhabitants care not whether anyone lives or dies. Everything 
  from the smallest worm to the most powerful god cares 
  first and foremost about its own survival and comfort. 
  Anyone with even a modicum of learning knows legends 
  of intelligences which inhabited the Earth long before 
  humanity arose from the muck. Just as civilizations rise, 
  fall, and are forgotten, many scholars suspect that entire 
  intelligent species suffer the same fate and that, in some 
  unimaginably distant aeon, strange beings may someday 
  stride amidst the crumbling ruins of the greatest and most 
  majestic Hyborian cities and wonder about the bizarre 
  creatures who once walked their streets.
  What little that scholars, seers, and sorcerers learn about 
  the structure of the worlds and realms beyond Earth is no 
  more comforting. The cosmos seems filled with countless 
  worlds and realms which are swiftly lethal to mortal visitors. 
  Many of these distant regions corrupt human minds as 
  readily as they slay human bodies. Some are inhabited by 
  vast and powerful creatures which humans call gods and 
  demons, as well as countless more creatures that no man 
  has ever encountered.
  Ultimately, the Earth is a tiny blue-green mote in a sea of 
  utterly alien worlds and realms, which either have entirely 
  different natural laws or where the only law is that of eternal, 
  mindless chaos. Some of these many worlds are actually 
  GODS AND DEMONS
  CHAPTER 1
  He had squatted for hours in the courtyard of the philosophers, 
  listening to the arguments of theologians and teachers, and 
  come away in a haze of bewilderment, sure of only one 
  thing, and that, that they were all touched in the head.
  — “The Tower of the Elephant”
  
  7
  GODS AND DEMONS
  distant planets inhabited by intelligent life, but others are 
  realms of nightmares and madness which exist in unknow-
  able realities that sometimes drift perilously close to Earth.
  There are a few planes of existence relatively close to 
  our world where entities with an interest in humanity 
  dwell. One of these is the realm that some mortals visit 
  when they dream. This may also be where the souls of the 
  dead dwell. None living know any details of these planes, 
  but most scholars agree that there are otherworlds where 
  gods and other entities who are not utterly hostile or alien 
  to humanity dwell, and that these beings sometimes contact 
  people, and send visions and blessings to those they favor. 
  However, some cynical scholars suspect that most visions 
  of realms inhabited by seemingly benevolent creatures are 
  nothing more than a combination of wishful thinking and 
  messages sent by entities who seek to exploit humanity.
  THE OUTER DARK
  Sorcerers and scholars of the dread creatures from beyond 
  the Earth speak of the spaces where these horrors dwell as 
  the “outer black” or the “Outer Dark”. This is an ancient and 
  unimaginably inhuman realm, or series of realms, beyond 
  the rim of space and outside of the esoteric, but somewhat 
  comprehensible, dream and nightmare dimensions. The 
  outer black is not the airless vacuum beyond the bounds 
  of Earth’s atmosphere, but a dimension or series of dimen-
  sions whose inhabitants can rend their way into our own 
  when summoned by a sorcerer or, in a few terrifying cases, 
  though their own inhuman power. It is a realm of magic 
  and primal chaos, where laws are arbitrary rather than 
  fixed, except for the single rule that the most powerful can 
  impose their will on any they can reach and even on the 
  fabric of reality itself.
  The outer black is home to entities that existed before 
  Earth’s sun first gave light and will exist long after the world 
  is a lifeless cinder. It lies far beyond the realms of Mitra, 
  Ishtar, and the other deities known to ordinary men, and is 
  instead the home of dread creatures like Yog-Sothoth and 
  Nyarlathotep, which only the most foolish or power-mad 
  sorcerers dare to contact.
  Visiting any portion of the outer black rips even the 
  bravest sorcerer’s mind to gibbering tatters, and any con-
  tact with its denizens is hazardous to both mind and body. 
  Barbarians and the uneducated who have had any contact 
  with the outer black or any of its inhabitants describe it as 
  a monstrous hell whose inhabitants hate mankind, but the 
  few scholars brave enough to study it suspect that this realm 
  and its inhabitants are not actively hostile to humanity but 
  are instead inherently inimical. Most of its denizens care 
  so little for mankind that they cannot be bothered to make 
  the effort to slay visitors, but even the strongest minds 
  and bodies go mad or die if in their presence for too long.
  There are no descriptions of the outer black beyond 
  the half-mad ramblings of seers and sorcerers who dared 
  to see or venture into its edges, because mortal minds 
  cannot comprehend it. However, on rare occasions, one of 
  its inhabitants, most often the being called Nyarlathotep, 
  takes an interest in a particular sorcerer or scholar and 
  provides knowledge in return for certain, often-terrible, 
  services that the creature finds either useful or amusing.
  HELL
  Peasantry and their ilk freely use terms like demons, devils, 
  and hell to refer to monstrously unnatural creatures and 
  their strange and terrible homes. For the most part, schol-
  ars of the esoteric realms agree with these designations. 
  However, while many people refer to the gods of other 
  nations and peoples as demons, the more educated under-
  stand that there is at least some difference between a demon 
  and a god.
  To a sorcerer, a demon is a creature they can summon or 
  take as their patron, while a god is a vastly powerful entity 
  who does little to interact with individual humans. Some 
  exceptionally cynical scholars claim that the difference 
  is obvious — demons exist, while gods do not. However, 
  some demons are worshipped: sorcerers and even entire 
  cults pray to demon-lords like Ammut, which are believed 
  to have at least briefly visited the physical world. Also, both 
  the worshippers of Set and many who fear him believe that 
  the god occasionally communicates with powerful sorcerers 
  and the few surviving pre-human serpent-men.
  A few scholars take the exceedingly pragmatic view that 
  the difference between a demon and a god is that demons 
  can be slain, but no one has ever been known to slay a god.
  The term “hell” is no less confusing. Although the 
  myriad realms beyond the bounds of the Earth include 
  many monstrous places where unprotected humans die 
  in an instant, those who study these matters believe that 
  Conan felt his soul shrivel and begin to be drawn 
  out of his body, to drown in the yellow wells 
  of cosmic horror which glimmered spectrally 
  in the formless chaos that was growing about 
  him and engulfing all life and sanity. Those 
  eyes grew and became gigantic, and in them the 
  Cimmerian glimpsed the reality of all the abysmal 
  and blasphemous horrors that lurk in the outer 
  darkness of formless voids and nighted gulfs. 
  He opened his bloody lips to shriek his hate and 
  loathing, but only a dry rattle burst from his throat.
  — “The Phoenix on the Sword”
  
  CHAPTER 1
  8
  hells are something different from both other planets 
  and also from the majority of the esoteric realms. Hells 
  are specifically inhospitable planes of existence which 
  sorcerers can contact. They contain malevolent inhuman 
  inhabitants, which typically can either be summoned 
  into the physical world or, on rare occasions or in specific 
  places, travel through the cracks in the fabric of reality from 
  their world to our own. By this definition, the kingdoms of 
  dream and nightmare are not hells, because humans can 
  comfortably visit them.
  The other common definition of hell is where the souls 
  of the dead go. This term is most often used by people to 
  refer to the fates of the souls of those who worship gods 
  other than their own, or by those who worship grim deities 
  like Crom, offering little solace in the Cimmerian afterlife. 
  Some say that all souls go to some dream-world such as 
  Kuth, as dreamers regularly encounter the dead.
  However, some who study these realms believe that the 
  idea that hell is home to demons is not incompatible with 
  the idea that hell is where at least some of the souls of the 
  dead end up. Some scholars believe that those who fervently 
  worship or seek the favor of demons are sometimes either 
  dragged into these demons’ realms to work as slaves or 
  that their souls are similarly enslaved. Similarly, some of 
  the valiant few who attempt to exterminate demon-cults 
  claim to have seen those who offended demons dragged 
  bodily down to the demon’s abyss.
  Sorcery
  Magic is inherently unnatural — it flaunts the stable rules 
  that hold the physical world together and does so by allow-
  ing the borrowed will of vastly powerful creatures or the 
  chaotic madness of other realms of existence to reach into 
  the physical world and reshape it. Most often, this happens 
  when a sorcerer calls a creature from another realm into 
  our world or makes direct contact with that inhuman realm 
  and allows a bit of its fabric to enter our world. Many of the 
  inhabitants of these potent realms regard mankind as little 
  more than cattle who can provide labor or food. Yet some 
  few willingly answer the calls of sorcerers and exchange 
  their knowledge for greater access to our world.
  Using these borrowed energies, sorcerers can break 
  physical laws. Creating earthquakes where none have 
  ever occurred, transforming a man into a snarling wolf, or 
  empowering lifeless corpses to become shambling undead 
  are all feats which are impossible by any normal means 
  and which defy both common understanding and natural 
  law. However, such horrors are possible in at least some 
  of the vast multitude of realms beyond the mortal world, 
  and a sorcerer’s magic briefly allows those alien laws to 
  replace our own.
  THE WORLD THAT 
  CAME BEFORE
  Before the rise of the children of Bori, and their domination 
  of the northern continent, there was an older world still. 
  While this is not the place for great and lengthy explanation 
  of such places, a few details are included here, to orient 
  those who might wish to know more…
  The world has seen many empires rise and fall, pushed up 
  by humankind’s desire to civilize and to build, and crushed 
  flat by the inexorable cycles of cataclysm and the descent 
  into barbarism. In many cases, aspects of these ancient 
  civilizations remain, whether as artifacts or ruins, smatter-
  ings of language, or in some cases through the bloodlines 
  of those bygone peoples.
  Before the Hyborian Age was another great era in human 
  history. Known by some as the Thurian Age, it was a period 
  in which human civilization thrived and reached its zenith, 
  attaining many of the same heights claimed by the Hyborian 
  Age. The Seven Kingdoms of this time were Farsun, Verulia, 
  Kamelia, Thule, Grondar, Commoria, and mightiest among 
  them was purple-towered Valusia, akin to great Aquilonia. 
  This magnificent kingdom was ruled by King Kull, a barbaric 
  outlander from Atlantis, a people whose bloodline remains 
  in the folk of Cimmeria.
  But these kingdoms and other countries, built atop the 
  ruins of still older kingdoms, were all of them swept away 
  by the great Cataclysm that engulfed the world, submerging 
  lands deep beneath the waves and raising the ocean floors 
  up to become new, fertile lands ready for settlement by the 
  woefully few survivors. Only the Picts escaped this apoca-
  lypse unscathed, a great colony inhabiting the mountains 
  of Valusia’s southern frontier, a region that became the 
  Pictish Wilderness in the Hyborian Age.
  Of that epoch known by the Nemedian chroniclers 
  as the Pre-Cataclysmic Age, little is known except 
  the latter part, and that is veiled in the mists of 
  legendry. Known history begins with the waning 
  of the Pre-Cataclysmic civilization, dominated 
  by the kingdoms of Kamelia, Valusia, Verulia, 
  Grondar, Thule and Commoria. These peoples 
  spoke a similar language, arguing a common origin. 
  There were other kingdoms, equally civilized, but 
  inhabited by different, and apparently older races.
  — “The Hyborian Age”
  
  9
  GODS AND DEMONS
  Through dim bits of recalled history, inscriptions on 
  forgotten tombs, clay tablets, and even scraps of lore gath-
  ered from arcane sources like the iron-bound volumes of 
  Shuma-Gorath, the following is known of the gods, devils, 
  and other cults of the Thurian Age — though scholars and 
  philosophers alike are reminded of the nature of truth: that 
  it is always elusive, and changes with the ages, and thus, 
  little can be absolutely certain of the beliefs and practices 
  of these long-vanished peoples.
  The World Before Humankind
  In the beginning was Ka, the Bird of Creation. It made 
  the Earth, though it did so over the ruins of an even more 
  ancient Elder World, a time of monstrous horrors and 
  primeval beings, long (and best) forgotten. It was a time 
  of the Black Gods, whose names are not spoken and about 
  whom little is certain. The world that was made by Ka was a 
  bountiful and wild place, untouched yet by humankind. In 
  this wide and arboreal world were the great animals such 
  as the Ape Lords, and in the vast and trackless deserts the 
  Great Scorpion held dominion.
  Most fearsome of all of these, however, was Great Serpent, 
  the sly one. One of his greatest creations from the time 
  before humankind is the Snake that Speaks, a terrible god 
  of fearsome mien, the likes of which had not been seen 
  since the Elder World. The Great Serpent was also father 
  to the Serpent Ones, a race of serpent-men who walked 
  and built cities and used all manner of magic, and these 
  serpent men were a plague to the Thurian Age, until they 
  were hunted almost to extinction by Kull and his allies. The 
  Great Serpent, however, thrives, and since this time he has 
  continued to bedevil humanity, known in the Hyborian Age 
  as the Old Serpent, Set.
  Demons and powerful entities of all degrees of power 
  wandered the Earth in the early days of humankind and did 
  great and terrible deeds. Philosophers, sages, and priests 
  continue to debate whether these were actual gods or some-
  thing other, perhaps primal or metaphorical concepts rather 
  than supernatural entities, but evidence cannot be ignored 
  that these beings left their stamps upon the world. Among 
  the most challenging of these entities was Silence, bound 
  into subservience in a moldering castle on the shore of a 
  Valusian river, where warnings bade any who read them 
  to let the vault of Silence remain untouched for all eternity.
  The Gods of Atlantis and The Seven Empires
  The principal god of Atlantis and the Seven Kingdoms was 
  Valka, the God of Gods, creator of humankind — respected 
  by most, his name was sworn upon by all, even the distant 
  and haughty Picts. Almighty Valka was a god of land and 
  sea, and temples were set up to him across the Thurian 
  continent. Most households had some sort of token sign 
  of Valka, from a small carved idol to an elaborate shrine.
  Other gods of the Atlanteans were Honen, Holgar (known 
  to some as Helgor), Helfara, and Hotath, often invoked or 
  beseeched, sometimes sworn upon as a lot, and Ka, Ra, and 
  Raama were also lumped together in oaths, though their 
  natures are uncertain as it is impossible to tell if the last 
  two were one and the same. As inheritors of the ancient 
  Valusian bloodline, the Cimmerians have dim memories of 
  these gods and others, and Cimmerian tales even refer to 
  heroes from these times, stalwart warriors like Kambra or 
  the adventuress, Zukor Na, though her true deeds are lost to 
  time and now she is little more than a comedic culture-hero.
  In a similar fashion, sages in Aquilonia discuss the 
  origins of the myths of Gonra of the Sword, not guessing 
  at his origin in long-vanished Valusia.
  Philosophies and Faiths
  Primitive people like the Picts and the savage Atlanteans 
  swore upon totems and held elaborate tambus (taboos), 
  restricting their actions lest some unimaginable doom fall 
  upon them for transgression. These practices later became 
  geases, which are known in the folktales of Cimmeria of 
  old. A common belief of the age was the death curse, a 
  powerful magic that could only be wrought by a dying 
  sorcerer or priest, using the last breaths of life to fuel its 
  arcane influence.
  The folk of the Thurian Age knew of worlds beyond the 
  Earth, believing in at least one paradise and multiple hells. 
  Demons of all manner inhabit these otherworlds, such as 
  the Lost Lands. Somewhere beyond the confines where 
  light has power, dwells the Black Shadow, also called the 
  Everlasting Darkness, a place where dark pacts are made 
  and from which creatures of the Elder World are coaxed 
  into the light.
  Long-forgotten and perhaps lost to time is the famous 
  Red Jewel of Pictdom, ancient beyond time, once worn in a 
  ring by Brule the Spear-slayer, brother-in-arms to King Kull 
  of Valusia — who gave it to him as a gift — and one of the 
  greatest warriors of that now savage people. Its whereabouts 
  are unknown — perhaps for the best, as the wielder of the 
  Red Jewel could use it as an emblem of the Picts, reviving 
  their past glories and their proud lineage, turning them from 
  a border concern into a force to be reckoned with. Such an 
  event, were it to come to pass, would likely be as apocalyptic 
  as the Cataclysm itself, washing away the civilizations of 
  the Hyborian Age under a tide of savagery and war.
  “More blasphemy!” cried Gor-na angrily. 
  “Man is Valka’s mightiest creation.”
  — Untitled Draft
  
  CHAPTER 1
  10
  RELIGION IN THE 
  HYBORIAN AGE
  Most faiths in this era are either the fearful propitiation 
  of entities which the worshippers fear or calculated bar-
  gains where the worshipper makes offerings in the hope 
  of obtaining divine luck or blessings in return. Even the 
  worship of the few relatively benign deities like Mitra is 
  typically self-serving, although some degree of reverence 
  may accompany prayers and offerings which attempt to 
  purchase the god’s favor.
  The manner of worship is equally diverse. Demon-
  worshipping cults almost universally practice human 
  sacrifice, as do many religions based on gods, but some 
  faiths, like that of Mitra, are less brutal, and instead sacrifice 
  animals or other less terrible offerings. Regardless of the 
  faith, offerings of wealth or fine food and drink are common, 
  a fact that some cynical individuals attribute more to the 
  earthly desires of the cult’s priests and acolytes rather than 
  the wishes of its god.
  Attitudes towards other faiths also vary widely. Most 
  barbarians either care nothing about how others worship 
  or only concern themselves with the religious affairs of 
  their family or clan. Many demon-worshippers belong 
  to small, well-hidden cults who have utter contempt 
  for those who follow other faiths. Members of the most 
  dedicated demon-worshipping cults see clear results in 
  return for their horrific sacrifices and frenzied ceremo-
  nies — their enemies suffer unnatural deaths, and the 
  sorcerer-priest who leads their cult supplies them with 
  valuable information.
  Some regard all stories of benevolent deities with bitter 
  cynicism. A few cults, such as Mitra’s, promise divine bless-
  ings and rewards to followers. Clear evidence of these divine 
  blessings is vanishingly rare, and these cynics, perhaps 
  correctly, suspect that such cults are nothing more than 
  pleasant lies that comfort the gullible and enrich priests.
  Worshippers of more benevolent entities must comfort 
  themselves with promises that their lives will be blessed in 
  some unclear fashion and their afterlife found comfortable. 
  As a result, most demon cultists see those who worship less 
  active entities as weak and deluded sheep. However, because 
  their rites are forbidden, demon-worshippers must keep 
  both their attitudes and their terrible devotions well hidden.
  Large religions in civilized lands often grow at the 
  expense of other faiths. Outsiders occasionally observe 
  that such conflicts are driven by the desire for the priests 
  to enrich themselves or to command the allegiance of a 
  greater portion of the populace.
  
  11
  GODS AND DEMONS
  REGIONS OF INFLUENCE
  Each entry in this book describes where the god or entity 
  is worshipped, but for convenience, these areas are 
  listed here.
  ■
  ■ DOMINANT entries are those where the cult is 
  either the sole religion or the god is worshiped 
  above all others.
  ■
  ■ PRESENT means the god is worshipped to some 
  degree and its cult can operate openly.
  ■
  ■ NOTE includes additional information, such as 
  when a god is only worshiped in secrecy.
  HYBORIAN AGE CULTS
  Cult
  Dominant
  Present
  Note
  Adonis (page 22)
  Shem
  Zamora
  —
  Ahriman (page 59)
  —
  Iranistan
  —
  Ajujo (page 60)
  Tombalku  
  (Black Kingdoms)
  —
  Recently revived
  Anu (page 23)
  Shem
  Corinthia, Nemedia, Zamora
  —
  Ashtoreth (page 61)
  Shem
  Zamora
  —
  Asura (page 63)
  Vendhya
  Aquilonia
  Outlawed in  
  Aquilonia and Nemedia
  Azathoth (page 47)
  —
  —
  Worshipped in secrecy
  Bel (page 24)
  Shem
  Zamora
  —
  Bori (page 25)
  Bossonian Marches, 
  Gunderland
  Border Kingdom, 
  Hyperborea
  —
  Cannibal Cult  
  of Zamboula (page 11)
  Zamboula
  Darfar
  Outlawed everywhere
  Crom (page 65)
  Cimmeria
  —
  Not worshipped
  Cthulhu (page 51)
  —
  —
  Worshipped in secrecy
  Cult of Alkmeenoon  
  (page 78)
  Alkmeenon  
  (Black Kingdoms)
  —
  Worships Princess Yelaya 
  as an oracle
  Derketa (page 29)
  Black Kingdoms, Kush
  Shem, Stygia, Zamora
  Also called Derketo
  Erlik (page 30)
  Hyrkania, Turan
  Ghulistan, Iranistan
  —
  Father Dagon (page 49)
  —
  —
  Worshipped in secrecy
  Gol-goroth / Tsathoggua 
  (page 50)
  —
  —
  Worshipped in secrecy
  Hanuman (page 67)
  Vendyha
  Khosala, Zamboula
  —
  Household  
  Gods (page 83)
  Any
  Any
  Can be found anywhere, 
  likely in ruins
  Ibis (page 68)
  Stygia
  Argos, Khauran, Khoraja, 
  Koth, Kush, Nemedia, Shem
  Outlawed in Stygia
  Continued on next page…
  
  Jhebbal Sag, 
  Jhil, Jullah
  Mitra, Bori
  Mitra
  Mitra
  Mitra, 
  Ibis, Ishtar
  Adonis, Anu, 
  Ashtoreth, 
  Bel, Derketa, 
  Ibis, Ishtar
  Set, D
  Thugra 
  Set, Derketa, Ibis, 
  Jullah, Jhil
  Jhil, Ollam-onga
  Ishtar, Mitra
  Mitra
  Ymir
  Ymir
  Crom
  Ishtar
  
  rketa, 
  hotan
  Cannibal Cult
  Hanuman, 
  Cannibal Cult
  Hanuman, 
  Asura
  Khosatral Kel
  Jungle 
  Cults of Khitai
  Yezud, Adonis, 
  Anu, Ashtoreth, 
  Bel, Derketa, 
  Ishtar, Tarim
  Tarim, Erlik
  Tarim
  itra, Anu
  Mitra, Bori
  Bori
  Ishtar, Mitra
  Mitra, 
  Ishtar, Ibis
  Bori, Mitra
  
  CHAPTER 1
  14
  HYBORIAN AGE CULTS (CONTD .)
  Cult
  Dominant
  Present
  Note
  Ishtar (page 32)
  Shem
  Argos, Khauran, Koth, 
  Ophir,  Zamora
  —
  Jhebbal Sag (page 14)
  Pictish Wilderness
  Black Kingdoms, Khitai, 
  Vendhya
  Only worshipped in primi-
  tive places
  Jhil (page 73)
  Tombalku  
  (Black Kingdoms)
  —
  See Jhebbal Sag
  Jullah (page 73)
  Black Kingdoms, Pictish 
  Wilderness
  —
  Also called Gullah
  Jungle Cults  
  of Khitai (page 86)
  Khitai
  —
  —
  Khosatral Khel 
  (page 87)
  Isle of Xapur
  —
  Dwells on Xapur
  The King in Yellow  
  (page 54)
  —
  Zembabwei
  Worshipped in secrecy
  Mitra (page 35)
  Aquilonia
  Argos, Border Kingdom, 
  Brythunia, Corinthia, 
  Khauran, Nemedia,  
  Ophir, Zingara
  —
  Nyarlathotep (page 52)
  —
  Set
  Worshipped in secrecy
  Ollam-onga (page 89)
  Tombalku (Black 
  Kingdoms)
  —
  Dwells in Tombalku, bound 
  in human form
  Set (page 40)
  Stygia
  Black Kingdoms,  
  Kush, Zamora
  —
  Shub-Niggurath  
  (page 53)
  —
  Pictish Wilderness
  Worshipped in secrecy in 
  civilized countries
  Tarim (page 43)
  Turan
  Hyrkania, Zamora
  —
  Thog the Ancient  
  (page 56)
  Xuthal (Black Kingdoms)
  —
  Dwells in Xuthal.
  Thugra Khotan 
  (page 89)
  Kuthchemes  
  (Shemite desert)
  Stygia
  —
  Yajur (page 75)
  Khosala
  —
  —
  Yezud the  
  Spider-God (page 44)
  Zamora
  —
  —
  Ymir (page 76)
  Nordheim  
  (Asgard and Vanaheim)
  —
  —
  Yog-Sothoth (page 58)
  —
  —
  Worshipped in secrecy
  Note that this table is not prohibitive, and the gamemaster can place any god wherever desired, as the Hyborian 
  Age is full of many secretive cults that flourish where unexpected.
  
  T
  he world is awash with strange and perverse religion: 
  degraded cults in shadowed temples hunt for new 
  sacrificial victims for the altar, men and women 
  afflicted by plague try to cure themselves by immersing 
  themselves in the waters of a lake sacred to their god, and 
  pious old men depict their curious visions in vast tomes 
  of prophecy and portent.
  Perhaps you wish to play a character who belongs to 
  such a community, faithful and true to the god or cult’s 
  beliefs and willing to sacrifice everything to preserve them. 
  Or perhaps you wish to play a character who co-opts those 
  beliefs to elicit alms from those gullible enough to believe 
  in the supernatural. Whether the former, the latter, or 
  somewhere in between, this chapter will provide you with 
  a range of new archetypes and abilities to do just that.
  CULT CASTES
  While most cultists might seem likely to be from the 
  Priesthood caste (page 20 in the Conan corebook), this is not 
  always the case. In fact, cultists can be drawn from any caste. 
  Remember, however, that this choice will impact upon the 
  level of the cult your player character can begin at. Almost 
  every cult has hierarchies and as a result Social Standing 
  is important. On the next page is a table to indicate what 
  kind of cultist or priest you can begin play as, depending 
  on your Social Standing.
  CULTIST STORIES
  When constructing a cultist character, you can roll on any of 
  the appropriate tales in the Conan rulebook or, alternatively, 
  roll on the following tables or pick the result that most 
  appeals to you. Once you have your result, build in some 
  additional details to make the result unique to your character 
  — why did this event happen to them rather than someone 
  else? Was it real, was it a hallucination? Has anyone helped 
  them to understand their experience in a religious context? 
  How has it shaped their beliefs? All of these are good starting 
  points, allowing you to gradually bring your cultist to life.
  CULT CHARACTERS
  CHAPTER 2
  Gorluga’s voice boomed eerily and hollowly in the great empty space, 
  framed in sonorous phrases unintelligible to the lurking listener; 
  then the high priest thrust open the golden door and entered, bowing 
  repeatedly from the waist and behind him the torches sank and rose, 
  showering flakes of flame, as the worshippers imitated their master.
  — “The Servants of Bit-Yakin”
  
  CHAPTER 2
  16
  CULTIST STORIES
  Roll
  Event
  Trait
  1–3
  Chosen at Birth
  Chosen One
  4–6
  This Birthmark on My Skin
  Marked
  7–10
  A Vision in the Darkness
  Reckless
  11–14
  Witnessed a Miracle
  Witness
  15–17
  Persecution
  Paranoia
  18–20
  Vindication
  Pride
  Chosen at Birth
  Soon after your birth, even while swaddled in the shawl of 
  your mother, the local holy man, priest or sage, pointed at 
  you and announced that you were special to the god you 
  have come to worship. Whether this story is true or not, you 
  cannot remember, but your parents always maintained that 
  you have been chosen by the god and will fulfill some great 
  destiny. It might not feel much like it, but you are certain 
  that, someday, you will achieve this great expectation.
  This Birth Mark on My Skin
  It is nothing to look at, in truth. Nothing to display. A small 
  patch of discolored skin. Perhaps it is on your thigh, beneath 
  your arm or covered by the hair on your scalp. But you know 
  it means something; in one of the holy texts or icons of your 
  faith, you have seen its exact replica. A small mark, a sign of 
  the god which both explains your belief and devotion to the 
  god’s cult. What does it mean, this strange correspondence 
  with your cult’s practices? Is this a blessing or a curse? And 
  do others around you hold to the same belief, or must you 
  keep your conviction silent to avoid accusations of heresy?
  SOCIAL STANDING AND CULT HIERARCHY
  Social Standing
  Position in the Cult
  Description
  0
  Rank and File
  Part of the undistinguished mass of believers, the player character is 
  expected to perform those functions demanded and not to complain. 
  This is likely to involve extremely dangerous missions where the true 
  purpose is not revealed and in which survival is far from certain or even 
  desirable.
  1
  Lower Tier
  Equivalent to Initiate (see page 98). At this level, player characters 
  are likely to be trusted with missions on behalf of the cult’s upper ech-
  elons, though they will be given few details of the broader context of 
  the work they are doing. They may be trusted with cult funds, or with 
  escorting more prominent cult members.
  2+
  Middle Tier
  Equivalent to Adept (see page 96). At this level, the player character 
  is likely to be expected to report regularly to higher-up cult members, 
  to conduct secret missions with highly valuable information, and to be 
  committed to carrying out the cult’s orders, perfectly, always. While it 
  is possible for cultists to rise higher, this is the highest a player charac-
  ter can begin after being created.
  GOOD AND BAD GODS
  A player character who chooses to become a member of 
  a faith group or cult is both an enormous opportunity and 
  a potential hindrance for gamemasters. On the one hand, 
  the internal politics of a cult or the struggles occurring 
  between one church and another are great start points 
  for a story, as is the interplay which a member of a faith 
  might have with a more irreligious party member. On 
  the other hand, there is a contradiction between the 
  sword and sorcery goals of most player characters and 
  those of a cultist.
  If you want to play a cultist, of one sort or another, dis-
  cuss it with your gamemaster and explain your character 
  concept to them. If you’re the gamemaster, let the player 
  know how this might affect the game both positively and 
  negatively. Not all the gods and cults featured in the book 
  have receivable boons for worship — this is because not 
  all the gods worshipped in the Hyborian Age are real, and 
  not all of them are interested in their worshippers or in 
  bestowing power. This is especially true of the gods or 
  creatures we might describe as being “bad”.
  Keep this in mind if creating a cult-based character. 
  Similarly, morality is not touched upon here. Whether you 
  choose to serve a putatively dark god, or one associated 
  with light and goodness, these descriptions are only 
  ever partly true — in this ancient epoch, the only truth 
  is that determined at the point of a sword. Good and evil 
  are concepts for children’s stories and the realm of the 
  gods is not for man to know or understand.
  
  17
  CULT CHARACTERS
  A Vision in the Dark
  At some point in your past, you were seized by paroxysms, 
  fits, and agonizing headaches. As you struggled, prostrate 
  and insensible, your mind was elsewhere. Granted a vision 
  of or by your god, you were able to see things as they are 
  yet to be or might one day become. Whether these were 
  visions of a heaven or of hell, only you are aware. What 
  these visions have given you is the truth of the world and 
  of your place in it. As a result, you can fling yourself into 
  battle without fear — either you will be saved, or you are 
  already doomed. What you saw exactly is for you to decide 
  but it was surely filled with other details which you have 
  yet to begin to unravel.
  Witnessed a Miracle
  The dead man lay, supine and broken, before you. Flies 
  had already started to settle on him, probing at his cracked 
  lips and irrevocably closed eyes. Until that woman pressed 
  her hands to the side of his face, opened his mouth and 
  with a flicker of hands and fingers, restored him to life. 
  Since that day, you have been especially alert to the spoor 
  of the unnatural, the aura which gods and spirits and 
  demons leave behind. Has this led you into danger as 
  you pursue secret knowledge? Do you hanker to possess 
  the same powers yourself? Was the miracle you saw even 
  sorcery, or merely the application of a science you do not 
  yet understand?
  Persecution
  Were you a member of the cult then, or merely in unfortu-
  nate proximity when the persecutions began in earnest? 
  It did not matter to the soldiers and priests who came to 
  your village or township, their weapons gleaming and their 
  torches burning brightly. Perhaps you lost friends and family 
  in that raid, perhaps it was only a sense of grievance that 
  such depredations could be carried out in the name of a 
  god or against a people so innocuous as those who belong 
  to the cult they attacked, but this fired your belief. Now you 
  are a member of the persecuted. Do you seek vengeance 
  and against whom? What will you do once you have it? 
  And how far will you go to secure it?
  Vindication
  Mocked, vilified, and maybe even cast out. You were 
  considered to have misunderstood a key element of your 
  cult’s belief system or religious texts. Others whispered 
  that you came close to blasphemy. But now, through 
  fate or fortunate circumstance, you have been proved 
  right! Whatever happens next, you have the satisfaction 
  of knowing that you are greater in learning than your 
  fellows, whatever they might have thought. What aspect 
  of your belief has been so thoroughly vindicated? What 
  does it mean for your relationship with other members 
  of your faith? And what will you do, now that you have 
  become a figure of note — attracting both followers and 
  dangerous enemies?
  CULT ARCHETYPES
  Many of the archetypes in the Conan corebook are entirely 
  suitable for a cultist to follow. It isn’t necessary for a player or 
  a gamemaster to substantially alter most of the core arche-
  types to make them suitable for a cultist player character. 
  After all, cults require soldiers and spies, a priesthood and 
  a lay population. However, for those who wish to become 
  true devotees of their god, to pursue their holy work how-
  ever and wherever possible, there are several specialized 
  roles they might adopt.
  There was a priest of Anu whose temple, rising 
  at the fringe of the slum district, was the scene 
  of more than devotions. The priest was fat and 
  full-fed, and he was at once a fence for stolen 
  articles and a spy for the police. He worked a 
  thriving trade both ways, because the district 
  on which he bordered was the Maze, a tangle 
  of muddy, winding alleys and sordid dens, 
  frequented by the bolder thieves in the kingdom.
  — “Rogues in the House”
  
  CHAPTER 2
  18
  CULTIST
  The cult is your home, your family, your reason for being. 
  Raised within the faith, you owe everything to your 
  fellow devotees and the priests that lead the temple. 
  Such is the strength of your belief in your patron deity 
  that it defines your life — you work within the cult for its 
  prosperity and strive to enact its precepts in the world, 
  whether benevolent or malign.
  CAREER SKILL: +2 Expertise and +2 Focus in the 
  Discipline skill
  CAREER TALENT: Courageous (see page 65 of the 
  CONAN corebook)
  MANDATORY SKILLS: +1 Expertise and +1 Focus to 
  Counsel, Insight, Lore, and Persuade
  ELECTIVE SKILLS: +1 Expertise and +1 Focus to two 
  of the following skills: Observation, Society, or 
  Sorcery
  EQUIPMENT:
  ■
  ■ A religious icon or symbol of your faith
  ■
  ■ A holy scroll or small devotional book
  ■
  ■ A ceremonial robe and a change of clothing
  ■
  ■ A dagger or knife
  ■
  ■ A riding horse
  ORACLE
  All your life you have had a sense for that which you could 
  not otherwise be aware of: you have seen into the hearts 
  of others, into faraway lands, back into a secrecy-veiled 
  past, or into the unknowable future. Obviously, one or 
  more gods are speaking through you. For this gift you are 
  lauded and feted within your cult, but this has set you 
  apart from humankind, an unbearable isolation. And 
  thus, you have fled the cult, going forth into the world 
  to experience life as others do.
  CAREER SKILL: +2 Expertise and +2 Focus in the 
  Insight skill
  CAREER TALENT: Sixth Sense (see page 68 in CONAN 
  corebook)
  MANDATORY SKILLS: +1 Expertise and +1 Focus to 
  Counsel, Discipline, Lore, and Observation
  ELECTIVE SKILLS: +1 Expertise and +1 Focus to two 
  of the following skills: Linguistics, Persuade, or 
  Sorcery
  SPECIAL ABILITIES:  See Visions (page 20 )
  EQUIPMENT:
  ■
  ■ A robe and change of clothes
  ■
  ■ A staff
  ■
  ■ A dagger or knife
  ■
  ■ A stolen horse
  
  19
  CULT CHARACTERS
  PILGRIM
  Not content to remain in your homeland within the 
  comforting embrace of your home temple and cult, you 
  have set forth across the continent — perhaps even 
  the world — on a spiritual journey. You may be seeking 
  enlightenment through experience, an encounter with 
  the divine, or you are on a path to visit one or more holy 
  sites. Your faith is unshakable, but can mere mortal flesh 
  carry you far enough?
  CAREER SKILL: +2 Expertise and +2 Focus in the 
  Survival skill
  CAREER TALENT: Born Wild (see page 86 in CONAN 
  corebook)
  MANDATORY SKILLS: +1 Expertise and +1 Focus to 
  Insight, Linguistics, Lore, and Parry
  ELECTIVE SKILLS: +1 Expertise and +1 Focus to two of 
  the following skills: Discipline, Stealth, or Sorcery
  EQUIPMENT:
  ■
  ■ Walking staff
  ■
  ■ Dagger
  ■
  ■ Religious symbol or icon
  ■
  ■ Riding horse or pack mule
  ■
  ■ Religious vestments
  ■
  ■ Comfortable travel garb
  PHILOSOPHER
  In others, spirituality is governed by emotion, but your 
  beliefs about the universe stem from reason. Though 
  your beliefs are as heartfelt as faith, you use your intel-
  lect to divine the higher world, attempting to answer 
  life’s ineffable questions through study and rationality. 
  Your theories, however, require testing in the cruci-
  ble of the real world, so you wander, seeking to prove 
  your philosophies.
  CAREER SKILL: +2 Expertise and +2 Focus in the 
  Counsel skill
  CAREER TALENT: Quiet Wisdom (see page 63 in 
  CONAN corebook)
  MANDATORY SKILLS: +1 Expertise and +1 Focus to 
  Discipline, Insight, Lore, and Persuade
  ELECTIVE SKILLS: +1 Expertise and +1 Focus to two 
  of the following skills: Alchemy, Linguistics, or 
  Sorcery
  EQUIPMENT:
  ■
  ■ Walking staff
  ■
  ■ Low wooden platform to stand upon
  ■
  ■ Comfortable robes
  ■
  ■ Selection of books, 
  scrolls, paper, and 
  writing implements
  
  CHAPTER 2
  20
  CULT NATURES
  The nature of belief, the things that produce the commitment 
  and tenacity of faith in one god or another, are common to 
  all peoples striding the Earth. Then, as now, certain people 
  and character types cleave more strongly to the words of 
  prophets and the letter of religious texts than others. The 
  unbreakable conviction of this faith makes the men and 
  women who possess it valuable allies and fearsome foes.
  You may pick one of the Natures from the Conan core-
  book, or use this one.
  FANATICAL
  Your commitment to the words and teachings of your cult is 
  total and unremitting. You brook no dissension from those 
  who also follow your religion. Those who do not believe, 
  you are prepared to tolerate for as long as they abet your 
  interests and those of your cult. You are prepared to endure 
  anything and do anything to ensure the survival of your faith.
  Attribute Bonus: +1 to Willpower
  Mandatory Skills: +1 Expertise and +1 Focus to Discipline, 
  Command, and Resistance
  Elective Skills: +1 Expertise and +1 Focus to two of the 
  following skills: Lore, Insight, or Survival
  Talent: One talent associated with any of the above skills
  CULT EDUCATIONS
  It is perfectly reasonable for a cult member to have received 
  an education of a similar variety to anyone else in this 
  ancient epoch of the world, so you may choose one from 
  the Conan corebook (page 38). It is also possible that they 
  received an education provided and controlled by the cult 
  itself. The following entry reflects this.
  CULT TRAINED
  From birth, until you were old enough to venture out into 
  the world on your own, your education was supervised 
  by the cult of which you are a part. You learned to read by 
  combing through strange tomes containing the secret his-
  tories that your cult maintains, while your numerical skills 
  were honed discovering the numerological significance of 
  the names of gods. You possess scraps of knowledge about 
  many arcane subjects but are woefully ignorant about the 
  world beyond the confines of your cult.
  Mandatory Skills: +1 Expertise and +1 Focus to Linguistics, 
  Lore, and your character’s career skill
  Elective Skills: +1 Expertise and +1 Focus to two of the 
  following skills: Alchemy, Craft, and Discipline
  Talent: Scribe (Conan corebook, page 72)
  Special Ability: The Difficulty of any Lore test about reli-
  gion is reduced by one step.
  CULT STORIES
  Player character members of a cult can roll on the standard 
  War Stories table (Conan corebook, page 41). However, to 
  reflect the more unusual experiences that those deeply 
  enmeshed within a committed, religious community might 
  have, they may instead choose to roll on the Cult Story table.
  OTHER CHARACTER 
  ASPECTS
  The table on the next page allows players to roll for or select 
  items that give a fuller sense of their lives as committed 
  believers prior to their embarkation on a life of heroic 
  brutality in the hinterlands of the Thurian continent.
  VISIONS
  Oracles are blessed and cursed with uncontrollable 
  visions. Occasionally, at the gamemaster’s discretion, 
  your god may cast the Astral Wanderings or Atavistic 
  Voyage sorcery spell upon you, whether awake or asleep, 
  as part of a ritual or completely outside your control. 
  This cannot be resisted in any way and is automatically 
  successful, with the Momentum spends paid by the 
  gamemaster using Doom. You may also use your god as 
  a Patron when learning either of these spells, but if your 
  god is already selected as a sorcerous Patron, the Resolve 
  cost for learning either of these spells is reduced by 1. If 
  you for some reason become estranged from your deity 
  (through choice or at the gamemaster’s discretion), you 
  will lose the use of these abilities until the relationship 
  is restored (to be determined by the gamemaster).
  
  21
  CULT CHARACTERS
  CULT STORY
  Roll
  Select War Story
  Skill Improvements
  1–2
  Mentioned in a Prophecy
  +1 Expertise and Focus to Lore and Discipline
  3–4
  Renowned for Preaching
  +1 Expertise and Focus to Persuade and Social
  5–6
  Saved an Unbeliever
  +1 Expertise and Focus to Command and Persuade
  7–8
  Preserved a Holy Text from Desecration
  +1 Expertise and Focus to Melee and Survival
  9–10
  Excommunicated and Hunted
  +1 Expertise and Focus to Stealth and Survival
  11–12
  Crafted Religious Symbols of Great Beauty
  +1 Expertise and Focus to Craft and Resistance
  13–14
  Touched a Holy Relic
  +1 Expertise and Focus to Insight and Sorcery
  15–16
  Survived the Slaughter of Your Community
  +1 Expertise and Focus to Resistance and Survival
  17–18
  At One with the Beasts of the Field
  +1 Expertise and Focus to Animal Handling and Persuade
  19–20
  Touched the Other Side
  +1 Expertise and Focus to Lore and Sorcery
  PERSONAL BELONGINGS AND GARMENTS
  Roll
  Personal Belongings
  Garments
  1–2
  A fingerbone belonging to a former sage, saint, priest, 
  mentor, or teacher.
  A set of hard-wearing travelling clothes with a 
  religious emblem on the back.
  3–4
  A beautifully painted icon, wrapped in oilcloth.
  A hooded robe, worn during ceremonies.
  5–6
  A book bound in tattooed human skin.
  A set of monastic robes, made of sackcloth and 
  extremely itchy.
  7–8
  A chalice once used in cult ceremonies.
  A pair of leather boots and a leather jerkin, gifted 
  to those who fight for the cult.
  9–10
  A medallion containing the secret words of your faith.
  A steel gauntlet which one belonged to a hero of 
  the cult, along with thick, warm, wool trousers and 
  cotton shirt.
  11–12
  A short staff with a symbolic miniature effigy atop it: 
  for example, a coiled serpent or a phoenix.
  Thin, woven garments with leather sandals.
  13–14
  A fragile ritual dagger, bright with a bejewelled hilt.
  A dyed cloak, adorned with ornate designs in 
  filigree.
  15–16
  A series of scrolls containing the teachings of the cult 
  that mean the most to you.
  Stamped leather tunic with ancient lettering 
  decorating its edge.
  17–18
  A figurine displaying a famous scene from a religious 
  text.
  The robes of a priest, taken from his tomb and 
  musty with the scent of the place.
  19–20
  A fragment of cloth which the god is supposed to have 
  once touched.
  Fine silken clothes, far too beautiful for the cult’s 
  belief in self-denial.
  
  W
  hile there are dozens of gods, deities and super-
  natural entities which populate the dark corners 
  of the Hyborian Age and the imagination of its 
  inhabitants, there are only a handful whose name all will 
  know. These form, to one degree or another, the major 
  pantheon of the epoch. While some of the gods and their 
  priesthoods engage in relentless battle — Ibis and Set, for 
  example — both in this world and in the myths whispered 
  through the ages, others care nothing at all for those things 
  which lie beyond their domain. None further south than 
  Cimmeria have ever witnessed the gaunt, brooding form 
  of Ymir, yet all in the Thurian continent whisper that god’s 
  name with tremulous respect. These are the great divinities; 
  there are some whose power is indisputable, some whose 
  godhood itself might be questioned, but none whose fame 
  or legendry has not spread throughout the known realms 
  of the Earth.
  ADONIS
  When one discusses the spiritual protectors and gods of the 
  Shemites, any traveler worth his salt would instantly call 
  to mind great Ishtar, the golden goddess who commands 
  love and yet wounds each heart that is promised to her. 
  Beyond that, the boisterous laugh and ever-changing face 
  of Bel, the sparkling god of thieves, sings from the lips of 
  Zamoran rogues and those who would dare foolish risk for 
  the promise of grand rewards.
  Other names, though, present more mystery. While 
  travelers may have heard of Adonis — sometimes called 
  Tammuz — and may even associate the name with the 
  image of that beautiful man, the concepts to which he is 
  connected, and the ideals for which he stands, are often 
  misconstrued. Adonis is far more than beauty and physi-
  cal perfection. His perfect body is the strength of muscle 
  hard-tested in the fields and, to his worshippers, he is not 
  just a god of desire; he is the personification of primal, 
  sexual attraction.
  It is little wonder that the fertile field and the sprouting 
  seed represent Adonis for he is, in his nature, both beauty 
  and atrocity — representing life in all its cycles. Said to be 
  born from a god-touched tree, he is the child of the earth 
  itself. Tied to the seasons as inexorably as the tides to the 
  moon, it is said that during the warm months, he oversees 
  all growth — in both field and family. When the seasons of 
  dying come, though, he stands guard over the hard workers, 
  favoring those who work the earth. He guards the faithful 
  and protects their fields, standing watch until the cold 
  seeps even into his own body. Each winter, Adonis dies in 
  his diligence, and with every melt, he begins anew, granted 
  life again by the Mother Tree.
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  CHAPTER 3
  The gods of yesterday become the devils of tomorrow. The Kothians 
  had long since abandoned the worship of Mitra, forgetting the 
  attributes of the universal Hyborian god. Yasmela had a vague 
  idea that, being very ancient, it followed that the deity was very 
  terrible. Ishtar was much to be feared, and all the gods of Koth.
  — “Black Colossus”
  
  23
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  Temples of Adonis prefer their holy structures as inte-
  grated with nature as possible. When safely enshrined 
  within cities, a temple’s outer walls may be made of good, 
  solid stone, but many will have an open garden area where 
  the faithful may come to worship. The nomadic tribes 
  of Shem may have only a temporary shrine, set up and 
  lovingly tended by an ordained priest. Such shrines are 
  almost always of a quick-growing herb called adoniseed, 
  often shortened to donseed.
  These herbs grow tall and strong, much like the god him-
  self, and are often braided into decorative shapes. Emulating 
  the very nature of Adonis, the plants are breathtaking in 
  their beauty as they grow, blessed with pods that swell and 
  gain color through the life of the plant. The day the seed-
  pods burst open is always cause for celebration but, once 
  its seeds are scattered, the plant is quick to wither and die. 
  Some especially dedicated Shemites take the withering of 
  the plant as a divine message, and thus move the tribe to 
  its next location.
  While the everyday worshipper may have their own ways 
  to honor Adonis, the actual priesthood itself is shrouded 
  in deliberate secrecy. Any man, woman, or child may make 
  offerings of fresh-grown fruits, grains, and vegetables to 
  the god, but only females have ever been welcomed into the 
  priesthood proper. The particulars of initiation and rituals 
  are never revealed to outsiders, as they are carefully-kept 
  secrets only made available to those who swear their lives 
  in service to the god. As Adonis has never been seen to walk 
  among or speak directly to his subjects, the priestesses take 
  their vows very seriously. While Adonis’s blessing sings in 
  the sun shining on the fields and in the rain feeding the 
  leaves, it is up to the priesthood to help the people see and 
  hear the wishes of their god.
  Priestesses of Adonis have a reputation for being both 
  visibly attractive and pointedly strong, whether apparent 
  through physical fitness or power of personality. As Adonis 
  rules over fertile fields, so too do his priestesses. Where 
  other religions might see its clergy as shepherds and fol-
  lowers as faithful flocks, the priestesses view themselves 
  as protectors and caretakers. The faithful are beautiful 
  seedlings that may grow to their full potential under the 
  love and guidance of the clergy.
  ADONIS AND THE 
  MOTHER TREE
  Each winter, Adonis is said to stand guard over the fields 
  until he can stand no more. While the horrors and the ugly 
  realities of his death are mirrored in the freezing of the earth, 
  these are not despised or feared by those who follow the 
  god. Each death is followed by rebirth, and as sure as the 
  winter melts away and feeds the earth, so too will Adonis 
  return each year to begin his work anew.
  As part of this endless circle of life, death, and rebirth, 
  the Mother Tree weeps when she feels her son die, and 
  throughout the cold and freezing months, she sings to 
  Adonis to lure his spirit home and to breathe life back into 
  him. The land in which the Mother Tree resides is held as 
  an ideal; a place of love and magic, with soil that is forever 
  fertile and ground where no blood may ever be shed.
  The Mother Tree’s love is so pure that she regrows Adonis 
  from her own body and from the fertile ground in which 
  she thrives. Each year, she grows a single, golden fruit 
  that, when eaten, brings Adonis’s new body to its former, 
  full strength and rejoins his newly-awakened spirit to it.
  The location of the Mother Tree, if it indeed exists, is 
  unknown to man. If it is real, it may be one of the many 
  secrets held by Adonis’s priestesses. Or perhaps it is a symbol 
  and a mystery that is meant only to be respected but never 
  found. Certainly, some may wonder what power might be 
  found in such a fantastic land or from the tree and its fruit, 
  if such an incredible, life-restoring fruit truly exists.
  ANU
  There are temples of Anu throughout the world. There are 
  even more who number themselves amongst the priests 
  of Anu. But how many truly worship the god? Can you see 
  any votaries huddling in those colorful places, praying for 
  comfort? Of course not! That is not what the Temples of 
  Anu are for!
  VOICES OF THE HYBORIAN AGE
  The more one learns about the strange and stormy 
  people of Shem, the more one begins to understand the 
  very nature of their customs and faith. As the lands stretch 
  and shift from vast, green plains to sudden, arid deserts, 
  so, too, do the protectors of their tribes and cities. From 
  life to death and life again, Adonis’s name is invoked to 
  protect the fields that feed. And just as there is a beauty to 
  the set and balance of crops, so, too, Adonis embodies that 
  very beauty, mixed with an undeniable, primal need.
  — “Lectures in Hyborian Religion and Ecology”, 
  Prof. John Kirowan (PhD, FRS, FRAI, FRGS)
  
  CHAPTER 3
  24
  A temple of Anu, in any of the hundred cities and towns 
  where they sprout, is always found on that ill-defined bound-
  ary between the areas where the rich make sport amongst 
  the gardens and elegant chambers of their insulated world, 
  and those areas where the poor, benighted, and destitute 
  make their meager livings. This liminal space, neither of 
  one world nor the other, is where Anu’s followers make 
  their homes. Initially, any temple of Anu is a small for-
  gettable place. Often, its only feature is that it is made of 
  stone, whereas those dwellings closest to it are made from 
  reeds and mudbrick. But, should a temple of Anu survive 
  only a few months, it will suddenly begin to prosper and 
  grow; the external architecture of what was, originally, a 
  small humble place is suddenly festooned with expensive 
  flowers. Next statuary begins to decorate the street nearby 
  the temple, much of it elaborate and festooned with jewels 
  and precious metals. Soon, the temple grows, new rooms 
  are added and, before long, an enormous edifice rises where 
  once a rough shrine stood.
  Priests of Anu are, unfailingly, cheery, good-natured 
  men and women. Or, at least, so they appear. Friendly 
  to any who enter their temple and always polite, the 
  priests of Anu might be the favored fathers and moth-
  ers of a neighborhood’s many orphans and, at the same 
  time, greeted by the baron or satrap riding past on his 
  muscular steed.
  This is the nature of a priest’s status. Even in the bloodiest 
  periods of internecine strife which regularly tear apart every 
  kingdom from Nemedia to Iranistan, a priest is granted an 
  exalted position — above the fray, beyond the ugly material-
  ism of those striving for gold and power. Which is, of course, 
  precisely what the priests of Anu rely upon. Throughout all 
  the ages of the world, those that have passed and those still 
  yet to come, there will never be a more scheming, duplic-
  itous, and brilliant group of thieves and criminals than 
  the priests of Anu.
  From their temples, the priests of Anu make themselves 
  the indispensable mediators between the wealthy and 
  the poor, between the criminal and legitimate, between 
  the stolen artifact and its new owner. In any city where 
  a temple of Anu has been built, there is almost nothing 
  which cannot be found out through the greasing of an Anu 
  priest’s palm; nothing which cannot be procured with a 
  priest’s word in the right ear. A criminal who needs to sell 
  a recently stolen chalice or reliquary goes to the Temple of 
  Anu where he knows the priest will sell the precious item 
  and take a percentage, but that the thief will receive his 
  fair share. And, most importantly, the priest will not reveal 
  his name to the watchmen investigating the crime. For the 
  priests of Anu are nothing if not practical, and they know 
  that their existence purely as a criminal enterprise would 
  not long be tolerated, even with the apparent sanction of a 
  god. So, the whispered rumors and calumnies which reach 
  the ears of the priests’ many messengers are relayed to the 
  authorities — along with the names and locations of any 
  burglar, cutpurse, or gang lord who conducts his business 
  without consideration for the temple of Anu.
  And as for Anu — what of the god these masterly middle-
  men pretend to worship? It is difficult to say what he or she 
  is meant to look like. For the sake of consistency and their 
  own sanity, the priests have never delineated any physical 
  features or characteristics. All of these are left mysterious 
  and known only to the initiated. There are stories of strange 
  rites conducted in the depths of an Anu temple or peculiar 
  dolls found hidden beneath untouched altars. Does some 
  darker worship lie beneath the greed of the priests? Few 
  would care to know; the priests are far more useful alive, 
  brokering the endless power struggles of the underworld 
  and politicking the aristocracy, than they would be if dragged 
  into daylight and their secrets exposed. Who knows what 
  else a priest of Anu might have to confess?
  BEL
  The hands of the gods reach far and wide, stretching over 
  the worlds of the faithful with power and grace. Their 
  strengths and their weaknesses inspire and protect, even as 
  their rage and adoration are sung, studied, and worshipped. 
  It is whispered, though, that even all-loving Ishtar, even 
  all-encompassing Mitra, and even the mighty Crom atop 
  his mountain equally cringe at the insistent sound of Bel’s 
  burbling, hearty laughter. Bel, the greatest of all gods, the 
  finest of all thieves, and the first to remind everyone of it.
  Bel values all the fineries in life. The sweetest wines, 
  the freshest food, the most extravagant clothing, the most 
  beautiful jewels — these are all cherished by the thieves’ 
  god, and thus make excellent offerings. Bel, even if he had 
  cared to, could not deny his Shemitish blood. Like many 
  born from that land, the promise of such shining splendor 
  draws the god to giddy need.
  I saw nothing behind the eyes of that statue, the 
  statue of Anu which I saw in that dreadful room. 
  All I felt was the cynicism of a thousand men and 
  a thousand women. All I witnessed in the blank 
  stone of that idol’s eyes was the willingness of 
  mankind to deceive itself. Ah! The statue of Anu. 
  A testament to how little man has changed, no 
  matter how many eons separate us from each other.
  — Unaussprechlichen Kulten, 
  Friedrich von Junzt
  
  25
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  Bel is rumored to be many things, many people, and to 
  have had many adventures within his life. Stories insist that 
  he began a mortal man and, at the culmination of not only 
  discovering each god’s weakness but stealing from each of 
  them their most powerful artifacts, they were forced to grant 
  him godhood. Since then, the tales tell, the other gods are 
  at odds with Bel — and Bel’s answer is, of course, to laugh 
  all the harder, all the louder, and continue bestowing his 
  blessings to rogues both brave and foolish enough to follow 
  in his footsteps.
  In fact, some have wondered if Bel’s name, an ancient 
  word originally meaning, “lord”, was just another step in 
  the trickery of the god of thieves, an alias or disguise — a 
  lesson for those who follow him, and a trick to nag at the 
  insecurities of the outsider. Some swear this is true and insist 
  that if any mortal might somehow discover the true name 
  of the god, they will be granted any one wish they desire.
  Such small, meaningless mysteries seem to be some-
  thing Bel takes joy in witnessing. If there is risk, Bel will 
  reward. The riskier the endeavor, the more likely Bel grants 
  his blessing — either in amazing, miraculous success, or 
  in spectacular failure. In fact, when the priests of Zamora 
  tried to build the finest temple to Bel, he was amused. When 
  they made no attempt to disguise that they wanted Bel for 
  themselves — essentially stealing the god of theft — he 
  laughingly went, and to this day is considered Zamora’s 
  god of thieves.
  Bel’s laughing, life-loving, reckless attitude hides other, 
  darker facets, however. Beneath the carefully-constructed 
  diversions and his playful joys, Bel hides the shaking and 
  unquenchable thirst for new property. He is theft for theft’s 
  sake. He is malicious distraction, trembling greed, and evil 
  intent. He is power and wealth at any cost. This duality may 
  be seen in his temples — so long as one knows where to 
  look. Bel’s temples are openly well-furnished and shining 
  on the surface, all the while hiding secret doors, rooms, 
  and shadows in which the true thieves of this world may 
  hone their craft.
  Initiation into the priesthood is a strange and secret 
  affair, mostly held in the remote rooms and passages out 
  of the public’s awareness. While Bel’s priests are flashy and 
  boisterous when in the main temple, they do not appreciate 
  indiscretion where Bel’s secrets are concerned. If the rites of 
  priesthood are leaked, retribution is harsh and immediate.
  The master of the art of distraction, Bel rewards those 
  who are clever. Special adoration is heaped upon those 
  who use their skills to show off or otherwise teach lessons 
  through playful theft. In fact, it is rumored that if a thief 
  can worship at Bel’s altar and not only leave the temple still 
  holding all his belongings, but to also have smuggled one 
  of the many gemstones from within the walls, they should 
  immediately be given not only the jewel they pilfered, but 
  their own weight in gemstones.
  Of course, this task is nearly impossible, and to date 
  has never been accomplished. Temple walls have eyes, and 
  any person within the temple could be, and probably is, 
  working for the clergy. Some even like to say Bel himself 
  visits the temple from time to time to give advice to those 
  worthy of great things — or great failure. His appearance 
  varies, here sporting ivory, wrinkled skin, there sporting 
  youthful, vigorous cheeks set upon olive skin. One thing 
  remains a constant, though, his grand, curling beard and 
  always-amused tone. One can never really be sure if one 
  is speaking with Bel — for indeed, any speaker will always 
  admit to it — or if one is speaking with an imposter, a trick 
  which would most certainly please the god of thieves.
  BORI
  In the time since the oceans swallowed Atlantis and washed 
  away kingdoms such as Valusia, Lemuria, and Mu, no man 
  had a greater mark upon the world than Bori, a barbarian 
  chief whose fame made him a legend and then a deity, with 
  a people and even an age named for him. Since King Kull 
  of Valusia, few individuals have had so great an impact on 
  the world, but Bori transformed an age, creating an empire 
  out of the sheer force of his will, and altering the course 
  of history forever.
  “But the gods are real,” she said, pursuing her own 
  line of thought. “And above all are the gods of the 
  Shemites — Ishtar and Ashtoreth and Derketo 
  and Adonis. Bel, too, is Shemitish, for he was 
  born in ancient Shumir, long, long ago, and went 
  forth laughing, with curled beard and impish wise 
  eyes, to steal the gems of the kings of old times.”
  — “Queen of the Black Coast”
  These people are called Hyborians, or Hybori; 
  their god was Bori — some great chief, whom 
  legend made even more ancient as the king 
  who led them into the north, in the days 
  of the great Cataclysm, which the tribes 
  remember only in distorted folklore.
  — “The Hyborian Age”
  
  CHAPTER 3
  26
  THE FIRST GREAT CHIEF
  Born into one of the small tribes of tawny-haired folk that 
  had barely progressed beyond the state of ape-like savagery, 
  decimated by the massive upheaval of the Cataclysm, Bori 
  was the elder-most son of Buri, another chief. Though they 
  possessed only the rudiments of society and expressed 
  themselves with a language that was rude and ill-defined 
  by the standards of the later age, the other chiefs — scarce 
  more than pack leaders — respected Buri as the most 
  powerful of his tribe, but it was his son Bori who would 
  change everything.
  Caught in the massive upheaval of the Cataclysm, Bori’s 
  folk struggled to survive. They were one of many small tribes 
  fighting desperately to hold territory, to find hunting lands 
  that had not already been claimed or emptied, and forage 
  that which was not already picked clean, in a world that had 
  become desperately uninhabitable. However, like wolves 
  snatching and biting at one another for meager scraps of 
  meat, these chiefs warred against one another when the 
  hardship of winter struck them all. Buri could not unite 
  them towards preservation, and he met his end in these 
  battles. His son rose to assume the mantle of leader among 
  his tribe, but unlike his father, Bori’s sight was great, and 
  he imagined a world that extended far beyond that of the 
  day set before him.
  Faced with the utter extinction of his people, Bori saw 
  that the only means of survival was to forge a new united 
  tribe out of many, and it was his force of will that forged 
  these ragged remnants together. Many would not join 
  him willingly, and for a time the battles between these 
  tawny-haired tribes was every bit as destructive as that 
  between their darker-haired rivals. Through conquest, 
  personal challenges, or through the sway of his wisdom, 
  Bori soon brought all the scattered peoples together under 
  his rule, and for the first time they had a king.
  The Greatest of Questions
  Threatened with extinction, caught between the clash 
  of great empires and recognizing only a fragile sense of 
  peace, the folk of this newly united people turned to their 
  new king and called upon him to answer that greatest of 
  questions: “How are we to live?”
  Grappling with this mighty issue, the king saw far beyond 
  his experience, the future of an entire people depending 
  on his shoulders. Knowing as a surety that his folk’s fate 
  would be to be ousted, enslaved, or at best subjugated by the 
  greater numbers that surrounded them, he put aside the 
  savage pride which told him to stay and fight, and recognized 
  that the wisest course was in flight, and a transformation 
  from their existing way of life as wanderers and villagers 
  into a kingdom. To do that, they must leave the only land 
  they had known and venture into the wild.
  Exodus to the North
  Under Bori’s guidance, this union sought a new place to 
  settle and to make their home: the relatively unclaimed 
  territories to the south, the only direction left to them. And 
  so, Bori’s tribe-of-tribes went forth on a great exodus. The 
  way was long and difficult, fraught with battle at every step, 
  harried by enemies to the west, to the east, and then from the 
  south. They warred against the Picts and the descendants 
  of the Atlanteans when they met them, and they veered 
  ever-south — and east-ward, and laid claim to the lands 
  they found, forests and foothills of relative plenitude, a 
  sprawling region that ranged from what is now known as 
  Gunderland all the way to Hyperborea.
  THE MAN AND THE LEGEND
  Of the man himself, little is remembered, but much is 
  mythologized. Bori’s lineage is only known as far back as 
  his father Buri and his grandfather Bur, the names of his 
  mother and any brothers or sisters lost to time. When Bori 
  sought to unite the largest and most powerful of the tribes 
  opposed to his own people, he made a pact with the chief of 
  that tribe, a mighty warrior named Bolthorn. To join their 
  peoples in peace, Bori took Bolthorn’s daughter Bestla as 
  his bride, a union that brought their two tribes together. 
  Bestla gave Bori many sons, one of which took his name 
  and continued his rule, and in turn Bori the Younger gave 
  birth to a son, Borr, and thus their great lineage continued 
  for many generations, across the span of centuries, his 
  offspring as distinct as they were widespread.
  The Rise of The Hyborians
  Bori’s descendants — tall, tawny-haired, grey-eyed and fair 
  of complexion — spread rapidly across these regions adja-
  cent to their newly-established homeland. Over thousands 
  of years, these “Borians” lurched into civilization, learning 
  cultivation and farming, forging alliances beyond those of 
  kin and clan, and they spread throughout the north. Across 
  the rest of the continent, other civilizations began to form 
  — the predecessors of countries that would become Koth, 
  Corinthia, Ophir, and even Acheron. The Borian spread 
  to the west was met with the spears of the Picts, and they 
  would progress no further, and to the east they met with 
  the ancestors of the Hyrkanians and stayed where they 
  were. Grown in strength and number, the tribe of Bori 
  pushed into what would eventually become the greatest 
  of the middle kingdoms, Aquilonia.
  Others called them “Hyborians” (“of Bori”), a name they 
  eventually embraced and used to describe themselves. This 
  title would echo across the lands and define the entire age 
  but, as these Hyborians spread across the globe, they took 
  on new names to define the new kingdoms they founded: 
  Aquilonians, Nemedians, Brythunians. The Hyborians 
  
  27
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  intermingled with the Zhemri and the former Lemurians 
  and their offspring populated countries like Corinthia, Koth, 
  Ophir, even parts of Argos and Zingara. In Hyperborea, their 
  descendants lurched into civilization with the building of 
  the first true cities.
  However, despite the Borians’ prevalence across the 
  north, they were not able to hold onto all of their territory, 
  and they ceded the lands to the north to the blonde, blue-
  eyed barbarians who formed the two kingdoms that make 
  up Nordheim — Asgard and Vanaheim, and they were 
  never able to make any meaningful incursion into the 
  miserable lands held by the descendants of lost Atlantis, 
  the Cimmerians.
  Always though, no matter how far they spread or how 
  thin their Hyborian lineage was stretched, Bori’s folk 
  remembered their ancient chieftain, the man who had 
  brought them out of certain extinction, and honored him 
  through devotion and ancestor-worship, acknowledging 
  him primary among their predecessors. This continued for 
  centuries before his cult was eventually set aside in favor 
  of new gods, most particularly Mitra, now patron deity of 
  Aquilonia and the most widely worshipped god across the 
  Hyborian kingdoms.
  THE CULT OF BORI
  As a patron to the Hyborian peoples, a deified mortal man, 
  the worship practices of Bori are far humbler than those 
  of the southern gods. No churches or temples are built 
  in his name: instead, among his followers, his worship 
  is conducted within each home and at each hearth, and 
  in some few spots thought sacred to him, places where 
  it is said he fought great battles, or even places where he 
  spoke, where he dwelled, and where he saw the future of 
  his people. These fanes are scarcely marked, if at all, and 
  bear simple runes or glyphs indicating their provenance.
  Their ways were ruder and more primitively 
  Hyborian than those of the Aquilonians, their main 
  concession to the ways of their more civilized southern 
  neighbors being the adoption of the god Mitra in 
  place of the primitive Bori — a worship to which 
  they returned, however, upon the fall of Aquilonia.
  — On Gundermen, “Notes on Various 
  Peoples of the Hyborian Age”
  
  CHAPTER 3
  28
  Few who pay Bori heed believe in his divinity. Unlike 
  deities like Mitra or Ishtar or Set, Bori is not, and never 
  has been, a true god in the way that other gods are known. 
  Few would dispute his mortal existence, and none of the 
  remembered tales of Bori ascribe to him anything other 
  than mortal abilities, though tales often exaggerate his 
  battle-prowess and his lifespan, as well as his physical 
  attributes. There is no tale of any passing from mortality to 
  godhood, and his influence beyond the grave is as a spirit 
  and a symbol, present in the land and the people who bear 
  his name, rather than inhabiting some mythic otherworld 
  or ascending upon death to a divine state.
  Bori’s Worshippers
  In Conan’s time, Bori is not openly worshipped overmuch, 
  and the cult of Bori has dwindled almost to the point of 
  extinction. Though the Gundermen are nominally Mitra-
  worshippers, the strong Aquilonian yoke forcing them 
  to adopt the southern god in place of their own, they 
  nonetheless pay discreet homage to the old chieftain and 
  founder of their line. The only visible signs of his cult are 
  in the Gunderland, where emblems of the god are still 
  fashioned out of straw and hung above doors or carved 
  into the wooden frames at the peaks of halls and homes. 
  However, his presence looms strongly in the consciousness 
  and identity of those of Hyborian lineage, and though Bori 
  is viewed as a rustic god, less dynamic than Mitra or Ishtar, 
  he is nonetheless still venerated to some degree.
  The Bossonians were quicker to abandon Bori as a patron, 
  but in the western reaches of the Border Kingdom there 
  are those who still pay him heed, and spill ale to him as a 
  sign of respect. Villages and small settlements within the 
  western reaches of the Border Kingdom still pay homage 
  to Bori openly, particularly in the mountains that sepa-
  rate Nemedia from Aquilonia. In those remote places, the 
  practices and beliefs of the Bori cult have gone unchanged 
  for centuries, but variant strains of Bori worship have 
  emerged over time, in some cases taking on darker aspects 
  or requiring a more bloodthirsty appeasement in the form 
  of outsiders and trespassers.
  There are still festivals to Bori in some remote parts of the 
  Gunderland and the Bossonian Marches, where old dances 
  and rites are still performed in his honor, sometimes with-
  out any memory of their true meaning. Faces are painted 
  with ash and woad, offerings are burnt, and ale or wine 
  are spilled. Births stemming from these fertility-oriented 
  festivals are thought to be blessed, and firstborn male 
  children are sometimes named “Bori” (or some derivative), 
  after their ancestral chieftain.
  Though Bori’s worship began and spread from the lands 
  immediately south of Cimmeria, the Cimmerians pay him no 
  heed and do not count him among the ranks of their gloomy 
  gods. North of Cimmeria, though, Bori was subsumed into 
  the elaborate pantheon of the Nordheimers as a “foreign” 
  god, more concerned with agriculture and fertility than 
  with war-making and glory-seeking.
  Artifacts and Sacred Items
  All manner of war-gear said to have been wielded by Bori, 
  from flint knives to bronze axe-heads, is brought out and 
  venerated in fertility festivals, ritual blessings, and invoca-
  tions for success in war. More than one age-browned skull 
  topped with a crown of rough bronze is displayed and said 
  to be Bori’s, while other parts of his legend state that at the 
  time of Bori’s death he was decapitated, his head preserved, 
  and taken into a place of hiding so that he might watch over 
  his descendants and assure them of prosperity.
  Despite these claims, Bori’s true burial place is lost to 
  time, either willfully obscured to prevent such grave-rob-
  bery or long since plundered and overgrown. If it remains 
  undisturbed, Bori’s burial mound would surely be warded 
  well, perhaps guarded with his war-band, men who would 
  gladly have followed him into the grave.
  It may be that one or more of these items is real and 
  was used by the man himself. Perhaps a heavy bronze 
  axe of ancient make, seemingly humble yet deadly sharp, 
  was once used by Bori, or a bronze peaked helmet, with 
  slight ornamental flourish, indicates the mighty brow it 
  once sat upon.
  Likeness and Depictions of Bori
  Idols or statues of Bori are either primitive or intentionally 
  crude, depicting Bori as a man with a long, forked beard 
  and a peaked helmet, wearing rough clothing, yet bearing 
  the torc of a chieftain or king. Sometimes he is pictured 
  clasping his beard, while other times his arms and legs are 
  spread-eagled, bent at the elbows and knees. Some ancient 
  bronze swords pilfered from burial mounds bear hilts cast 
  in the likeness of primitive chieftains, likely Bori himself.
  Older ornamental items of types no longer commonly 
  worn — such as torcs or arm-bands — bear Bori’s head, 
  though sometimes the depiction is so abstract it is not 
  identifiable as the god. Similarly, cloak-disks and circular 
  belt ornaments also depict him, though in crude fashion. 
  Some ruins depict Bori at the apex of an immense column 
  of figures, representing his influence as the unifier of the 
  Hyborian tribes. He is also occasionally depicted in a more 
  heroic fashion, on the battlefield or vanquishing the wild 
  beasts of the untamed frontier he led his followers into.
  Sacred Items and Sacrifices
  Bori is associated with the axe, one of the earliest weapons 
  and a symbol of agriculture and civilization, a tool by which 
  trees and wilderness can be cleared and turned into shelter. 
  Cattle and bulls are considered sacred animals and are 
  sacrificed to Bori, their throats cut and bled into bronze or 
  
  29
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  wooden bowls, horns severed and turned into ceremonial 
  drinking vessels or as adornment for ritual helmets. In 
  earlier, more savage eras, sacrifices to Bori included cap-
  tured warriors and other enemies, decapitated and their 
  heads preserved as trophies and their bodies burnt. Some 
  scholars speculate that Bori’s tribe learned this behavior 
  from the Picts, who have always had a special respect for 
  severed heads and skulls.
  Other, less grisly offerings to Bori include sheaves of 
  wheat or woven baskets of grain, wooden drinking cups, 
  bronze or clay vessels filled with ale or beer, baked loaves of 
  bread, and similar gifts to emphasize prosperity and Bori’s 
  connection to the land in which the Hyborian people dwell. 
  These offerings are placed in now-dry wells, buried deep 
  within mountain caves, or within the hollowed stumps of 
  great trees, sealed against theft and concealed to avoid notice.
  Bori and Magic
  As a barbarian chieftain of a race not overly prone or 
  well-disposed towards magic, it is rare that any sorcery is 
  cast in Bori’s name or invoking him as a patron. Witches 
  and healers may call upon him as a patron of fertility, and 
  old-timers among the Gundermen may still swear by his 
  name in defiance of the omnipresent Mitra-worship, but 
  Bori is not a figure to be used in magic, and rare are the 
  blessings, enchantments, or spells which invoke his name.
  DERKETA
  Derketa is the goddess of fertility, sensuality, and death 
  throughout Kush, Zembabwei, the Black Kingdoms, Shem, 
  and Stygia. She is not usually worshipped exclusively. 
  Instead, Derketa is paid homage through explicit birth-
  ing and funerary rites designed to ensure the deceased 
  is put to proper rest. It is the belief of the Kushites that a 
  spirit at peace joins the protective ancestors and, once the 
  ceremony of death is concluded, Derketa grants the living 
  the protection of the dead, and celebration can commence.
  Correct burial is very important, for Derketa is very 
  aware that bitter souls make for poor warriors. Those she 
  rejects become ghosts that haunt the Kushite people, so for 
  those who have lived improper lives extra attention is paid 
  to ensuring that elders engage in the proper purification 
  rituals and that deviants are buried in places from whence 
  they find it hard to return.
  Throughout the Black Kingdoms, Derketa is worshipped 
  under many guises and, as such, proper funerals vary by tribe 
  and region. In the home of the dead person, all reflective 
  surfaces are covered with cloth or ash. The bedding used 
  by the dead is removed and burnt and, for a period of two 
  days, a vigil is held so that the community can come and 
  pay respects to the family. One or more members of the 
  family may publicly mourn with an exaggerated keening 
  so that all are aware of the death.
  Once the wake is over, the body is blindfolded and taken 
  out of the home feet first through a hole in the wall. A 
  crooked, circuitous path is taken from the home to the 
  burial place, and obstacles such as thorns branches or 
  barriers are thrown up behind the body. Depending on the 
  tribe, there may be singing and dancing along the way. All 
  these measures are to prevent any lingering ghost from 
  returning to plague the tribe.
  The body is buried quickly with symbols of its intended 
  role in the afterlife. Warriors are buried with weapons and 
  protective animal hides. Leaders are buried with symbols 
  of wealth and authority. Common farmers are buried with 
  the head of a particularly prized specimen from their herd. 
  After the funeral, the celebrants ritually cleanse them-
  selves with aloe and water before enjoying a great feast to 
  honor the dead. Derketa is asked to remove the blindfold 
  from those she finds worthy and allow them to join her in 
  protecting the tribe.
  But all of this assumes that times are not hard. In times 
  of famine or war, morality cults have been known to rise in 
  worship of Derketa. These cults cleanse their community of 
  the immoral by dressing as demons or tribal enemies and 
  kidnapping the immoral. Typically, gluttons and cowards 
  are afforded this treatment.
  Once taken from their home, the immoral victim is 
  treated as if they were already dead. They are bound and 
  left in a covered pit for a day and a night. The victim of the 
  cult is later unearthed and given a chance to repent by a cult 
  member dressed as an ancestor. If the victim repents, they 
  are given a chance to prove themselves by slaying a tribal 
  enemy. This enemy might be a captive from a neighboring 
  tribe or a dangerous animal. Typically, the enemy is thrown 
  in the pit and the pit is then recovered. The next night, the 
  cultists return to see who Derketa has blessed.
  If the penitent dies, the captive is kept for use against 
  other deviants. If the penitent survives, they can rejoin 
  the tribe. Often, they are drugged and return home with 
  no idea who had claimed them. It is very rare that the cult 
  “If we ate that we wouldn’t need the bite of a 
  dragon,” he grunted. “That’s what the black people 
  of Kush call the Apples of Derketa. Derketa is 
  the Queen of the Dead. Drink a little of that juice, 
  or spill it on your flesh, and you’d be dead before 
  you could tumble to the foot of this crag.”
  — “Red Nails”
  
  CHAPTER 3
  30
  tries to recruit them. When the penitent is killed, the cult-
  ists take the body and unceremoniously dump it in view of 
  an enemy village, deliberately trying to stir the ghost into 
  attacking their enemies.
  Another strange variation of Derketa worship happens 
  during the death of a child. When a child dies, it is a time 
  of profound grief. The full potential of the child has not 
  had a chance to grow, and the child will grow to adulthood 
  only in the afterlife. Derketa is often petitioned to become 
  the foster parent to the baby. As a part of this arrangement, 
  the mother carries an effigy of the lost child and nurses it 
  as if it were sick for a period of a month.
  During this time. the mother prays regularly to Derketa 
  that any food given to the effigy is transferred to her dead 
  offspring. After a month, the mother looks for a sign from 
  Derketa. This sign is uniquely personal and only the mother 
  can say whether the agreement has been sealed and the 
  child adopted by the death goddess.
  While for the most part these rites are a solace to grieving 
  families, legends tell of vile sorcerers who murder their own 
  children so that Derketa will train them as witch-ghosts. The 
  bodies of the dead often have an ear taken by the sorcerer 
  so that they can speak to the dead and demand service.
  In Zembabwei, she is worshipped alongside Dagon (see 
  page 49), her squat golden idol displayed alongside his, 
  and often she and the fish-god are identified as wife and hus-
  band. In this form, she is mermaid-bodied, and a giver of fish.
  In Stygia, by contrast, she is a sensual goddess, wor-
  shipped alongside Set, and her priestesses (for her cult is 
  exclusively female) are taught all manner of erotic acts 
  and dance as part of the mysteries of their cult. Temples to 
  Derketo (for such she is called there) are located throughout 
  Stygia, but the heart of the cult is in Luxur, capital city of 
  Stygia, and noble daughters and peasant girls alike are all 
  recruited into the cult. Many are said to be used as agents to 
  further the cult’s goals, installed in harems, royal households, 
  and even on the pleasure boats that offer unearthly plea-
  sures off Stygia’s coasts. Temple prostitution is commonly 
  practiced, and when used outside the temple, Derketo’s 
  priestesses are often equipped with a dose of the juice of 
  Derketa (see above) to use when threatened.
  The Shemitish worship of Derketo is more focused on 
  her role as goddess of fertility, and she is worshipped at 
  times when pregnancy or safe birth are desired, or even at 
  times when a pregnancy is unwanted. She accepts offerings 
  of fish and grain in return for her blessing, though she is 
  associated with fishing and the sea in this guise. Shemitish 
  legends claim she was once human in semblance. She fell 
  in love with a young Shemitish fisherman on the coast, and 
  despite her divine nature, she became pregnant with his 
  child. In shame for this indignity, she threw herself to the 
  earth and landed in the water, becoming half fish. The fate 
  of the child is greatly argued about by Shemite philosophers.
  ERLIK
  Erlik is a god brought from the east, by Hyrkanian invaders 
  around the Vilayet. But Erlik does not originate with those 
  nomads. Rather, his worship extends even further back to 
  an ancient race called the Naacal. The method by which 
  Erlik transferred to the Hyrkanians is not immediately 
  clear to scholars of the day, but some feel Erlik predates the 
  Cataclysm. Regardless, Erlik is a grim, unforgiving god for 
  a kingdom, for he is the god of death and sin and disease. 
  He sits upon his Black Throne, deep under the earth where 
  he gathers the dead.
  I am a daughter of Luxur, and before I had 
  known fifteen summers I had been led through 
  the temples of Derketo, the dusky goddess, 
  and had been initiated into the mysteries.
  — “The Slithering Shadow”
  
  31
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  However, this was not always so. Before the earliest 
  proto-Hykanians took to the horse, Erlik was the first man 
  on Earth, created by a still older god called Ulgan. Yet Erlik 
  had no soul, in anima, and was therefore imperfect. To 
  rectify this error, Ulgan created mankind, imbued them 
  with his own breath, and therefore gave souls to this new 
  race of beings. Thus, humanity would walk the Earth for 
  all time — immortal and full of elan.
  Erlik, in rage and jealousy, taught man the most sin-
  gular of lessons — how to die. He brought death unto this 
  species, and the race would forever be haunted by this 
  knowledge. Furious, Ulgan cast Erlik into the pits of the 
  Earth for all time. No myths say why Ulgan did not remedy 
  man’s new mortality, but some ancient texts suggest he 
  created a third race, though that species is neither given 
  name nor description.
  Somehow, Ulgan vanished, though theologians debate 
  why, and left humanity entirely to the hands of Erlik. So 
  now, in his frozen Hell under the mantle of the world above, 
  Erlik collects the souls of those who die above. He sits on 
  his Black Throne as judge of each of the newly dead.
  Sometimes depicted as a human figure with the head 
  of a bull, more recent icons of Erlik show him simply as 
  a man, though a perfect one. Yet scholars remind us he 
  has no soul, and he covets those of humankind. Perhaps, 
  he thinks one day he might find the perfect soul to fit his 
  form and steal it. Perhaps Ulgan intended all along that 
  his fate be bound to the perfect creatures he ruined with 
  aging and mortality.
  Erilk’s realm is one of snow, ice, and gloom. Deep under 
  the Earth, the world becomes hollow, a frozen icescape 
  to strike fear into even the stoutest of Hyperboreans. 
  Turanians, by and large, worship Erlik daily, though there 
  is grim fatalism to their devotion. Theirs is a god of death 
  and sin, disease and fear. He is soulless, and therefore has 
  no mercy. One is judged not by the virtues of being good, 
  or the blackness of being evil, but whether one served 
  Turan well, whether one gave offerings and sacrifice to 
  Erlik, whether Erlik believes any given man or woman 
  would have, in the final summation, been a disappoint-
  ment to Ulgan.
  Ulgan wished eternal perfection. Erlik revels in the 
  transitory and fractious. While he did not breath a soul into 
  man, he did kiss man on the lips and whisper secrets in his 
  ear — how to lust and want, how to conquer and rule. One 
  does not throw themself upon Erlik’s mercy, but instead 
  invokes his name in pursuit of being human.
  THE CULT OF ERLIK
  Erlik’s priests wield great influence throughout Turan, 
  and even Turanian kings must sometimes cow to the will 
  of the cult. Whilst the king is, by the divine right of Erlik, 
  entitled to the Peacock Throne, the priests maintain the 
  conditions by which a man or woman can truly call them-
  selves a true believer. Though it has not happened in more 
  than a century, a king was once deposed for failing to meet 
  Erlik’s standards. He was beheaded and his brother took 
  the Peacock Throne in his stead. Even Yildiz and Yezdigerd, 
  with all their power, are aware that the priests of Erlik 
  have such power.
  The cult preaches fate. Every living person has a des-
  tiny, a series of forking paths. With Erlik’s guidance, one 
  chooses a life along these branches. In the end, however, 
  all paths converge in Erlik’s frozen hell. Ultimately, all men 
  and woman will come before the Black Throne, towering 
  above them. There life ends and what comes after… only 
  the dead and Erlik can say.
  Erlik’s Offspring
  Long ago, when man had barely begun to understand his 
  new gift of death, Erlik produced nine sons and nine daugh-
  ters. Each was given a secret name that only Erlik’s priests 
  may know. These eighteen children walk among men. In 
  any suk or tavern, you may have come upon one of these 
  offspring. They watch, they note, they report to their father. 
  Besides ultimate judgment, priests believe and teach that 
  these sons and daughters have further purpose in their 
  observation of mankind.
  ERLIK AS AVATAR OF 
  NYARLATHOTEP
  Going back millennia, even eons, the Great Old One 
  known as Nyarlathotep walked the earth, peering not just 
  from the void, but from avatars of 1,000 gods and twice 
  as many cults. Before humankind rose from nothingness, 
  creatures too alien to comprehend genuflected before 
  this Great Old One.
  Many millennia later, Nyarlathotep continues his 
  multitude of masquerades. Among the Naacal, a race 
  dating to pre-Cataclysmic times, he became known as 
  Erlik. The stores that began to surround this Erlik provided 
  yet another iteration of Nyarlathotep and another eans 
  by which he can infect human minds.
  The Nacaal were eventually put down by their 
  Lemrurian slaves in open revolt, but Erlik’s cult con-
  tinued, taken by the surviving Naacal to other humans, 
  fledgling people barely out of degeneracy. From their 
  ancient redoubt of Yahlgan, it is said the reclusive and 
  long-thought-extinct Naacal still monitor Erlik’s wor-
  shippers. Those who are wise claim that these secret 
  few Nacaal know the true identity lurking behind the 
  façade of the death god on his Black Throne.
  
  CHAPTER 3
  32
  Erlik and Tarim
  Erlik’s priests and those of Tarim (see page 43) have 
  an uneasy relationship. For there exists a central tension 
  between their two systems of belief, each with a radically 
  different interpretation of the other’s god. Those who follow 
  Tarim believe that certain virtues are anathema to Erlik, and 
  those who practice them are rejected by the god and sent 
  back into the world, their souls wiped of all knowledge of 
  their previous life. Instead, they are born again into a new 
  body where Erlik hopes, they will better understand death 
  and destruction. Why the more powerful Erlik cultists allow 
  Tarim worship is a matter of speculation. Highborn folk, 
  even rulers, swear by both Tarim and Erlik.
  One theory holds that Tarim is a false god, one used to 
  test Turanians and spread by Erlik though dream. Therefore 
  his priests do not stamp out Tarim worship, but tolerate 
  it. Others mutter that the uttermost mysteries of Tarim’s 
  worship is that the two gods are one in the same, two faces 
  for the same deity. For this reason, it must always be kept in 
  check, lest the god’s other nature overcome the first. Over 
  the course of the last century, however, Tarim worship 
  gained considerable traction, for it combines aspects of 
  Mitraism with eastern beliefs about reincarnation. Overall, 
  a Tarim believer’s view of the world is more far-reaching 
  than a single life. One day, the two cults might openly war.
  ISHTAR
  Of all the beauties in this world, and of all the many gods 
  and goddesses who embody love, Ishtar is certainly one 
  of the most well-known and worshipped in the world 
  today. While lesser names and smaller gods may touch 
  upon greatness, none might ever be as universally adored 
  as Ishtar, she who is love and beauty, fertility and sex, 
  passion and war.
  One of the great equalizing and inclusive aspects of the 
  goddess is that there is something within her that speaks to 
  every person, regardless of status, age, gender, or nationality. 
  While her name may be heard sung throughout the world, 
  her passions stir the greatest number of hearts in her native 
  lands: those of Shem and  Koth. There can be no argument 
  that Ishtar may be called an eastern goddess, though her 
  fierce love both tantalizes and unquestioningly conquers 
  more western hearts with each day. Even Koth, many gen-
  erations ago, used to swear their loyalty to ascetic Mitra, 
  until their hearts were opened, freed, and sworn to Ishtar.
  Most large cities west of the Vilayet Sea have at least 
  one temple dedicated to Ishtar. While they do not insist 
  that Ishtar’s priests have any say in the rule of a nation 
  or its people, many high priests are often consulted in 
  the sight of the goddess, if not outright given status as 
  a counselor.
  Know a temple of Ishtar by its shining beauty. It revels 
  in its excess, and it is said that the fineries and lavish dis-
  plays of wealth rival even the temples dedicated to Bel, the 
  laughing god of thieves. While other, lesser temples have 
  a sparse aesthetic to them, Ishtar’s shrines challenge that 
  outright with shining, luxurious, and colorful displays.
  Ishtar’s temples are also identified by their beautiful and 
  protective gates. The ironwork protecting her temple swirls 
  decoratively up to the sky, painstakingly engraved with the 
  spiraling staff, the eight-pointed star, and the lions that 
  she claims as her sigils. Each entrance through her gates 
  is guarded on each side by an intricately-carved, oversized 
  lion, and at aesthetically-pleasing intervals, another great 
  cat will break any visual monotony of the gate.
  Reflective of the duality of the goddess herself, however, 
  those trained in the art of war might begin to suspect that 
  the gate is both beauty and careful defense. The swirling and 
  interlocking bars of the gates are tight enough to make it 
  difficult for outside projectiles to penetrate, though certainly 
  would allow archers on the inside an abundance of murder 
  holes. The giant lion statues, with their mouths open, may 
  in fact have hollow bellies, within which multiple chemical 
  vials might be destroyed and poison gasses blown into the 
  faces of potential invaders.
  THE CULT OF ISHTAR
  To the everyday people of the world, Ishtar stands primar-
  ily as a symbol of beauty and love, just as much as she 
  is strength and passion. The priests of Ishtar insist that 
  there is a balance to all things. For while the great goddess 
  may bestow her blessings upon the common folk, there is 
  always a price. One cannot give without taking, and conse-
  quences must always be honored. A very commonly-heard 
  expression, both inside and outside her temples, is “Ishtar 
  gives.” It is a shortened version of “Ishtar gives and takes 
  with equal passion, and we are blessed to receive and give 
  in turn.” It is a constant reminder that in all things there 
  is a fierce and sometimes frightening balance. And while 
  some may agree, for example, that it is better to have felt 
  love and then lost, others would prefer not to feel this. Of 
  course, those too fearful to love fiercely are perhaps better 
  suited for the plainer, less stimulating worship of Mitra.
  Each temple is usually constructed following a set pattern 
  and, while there will certainly be some variation from city 
  to city, one can expect the surroundings and experience to 
  be familiar. There is a large common room for mass worship, 
  resplendent in its beauty, with pews kept plush and luxu-
  riant. Typically presiding over the common hall is a large 
  statue of Ishtar herself, seated at the head of the room, her 
  swirling staff set gently upon her lap as she watches over her 
  faithful. As ever, she is guarded on either side by two lions, 
  each intricately carved and with fierce, snarling mouths.
  
  33
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  Her faithful believe that Ishtar is everywhere, and her 
  presence may be felt in all things. This is especially true in 
  the statues of the goddess, however. While Mitra’s priests 
  may insist that their absent god speaks to them — outright 
  folly and lies, certainly, for all it takes is one drunken priest 
  speaking through an echoing chamber to ruin the lives of 
  many — Ishtar does not speak directly to her people. She 
  is everywhere, and she listens and watches, but only her 
  priests, through daily devotions and rituals, may claim the 
  honor of speaking for the goddess.
  While this mass worship is typically enough to satisfy 
  the day-to-day living of the everyman, special circumstances 
  may require a deep and personal connection with the 
  goddess, or silent, secret judgment before her. Very often, 
  these private rituals are reserved for very momentous occa-
  sions — weddings or special trials, for example — or, more 
  commonly, for private worship paid by wealthy merchants 
  and royalty, who cannot fathom sitting among commoners.
  For these people, set to have the goddess’s full attention 
  before her true idol, there are a new set of rituals and rites, 
  as beautiful as Ishtar herself. The worshipper, no matter 
  his or her station, is taken to a cleansing room where they 
  are to strip every article of clothing. A sworn priest of 
  the faith then bathes the worshipper and anoints them 
  with sweet-smelling oils, to avoid offending the goddess. 
  There is a communal cleansing room for larger parties, 
  but again, it is common for the very wealthy to offer 
  up a heartier tithe in return for privacy considerations. 
  This is also very likely the source of the horrible rumors 
  Mitra’s followers like to spread: they accuse Ishtar’s priests 
  of sacred prostitution. Of course, the faithful all know 
  better. The worshipper is then clothed in a set of seven 
  ceremonial garments. Their worldly clothing remains 
  behind, tended by one of the faithful, until the worshipper 
  is ready to leave.
  It is said that Ishtar, in her love, dedication, and fury 
  fought her way to the very underworld itself to protect 
  and redeem her lover, but there, she was barred until she 
  showed wisdom and humility. Seven great Gates barred 
  her way, and only by sacrificing a piece of her armor and 
  finery was she allowed past each Gate. Once stripped of 
  all clothing, she brought herself before the other powers 
  of heaven and hell to humbly kneel.
  So great was her determination and her love, so touching 
  was her humility that it became a tenet of the faith itself. 
  As such, the true idol of Ishtar may only be reached in fol-
  lowing her example. Once the worshipper dons the holy 
  garb, they are brought before the first of seven Glorious 
  Gates. Following in Ishtar’s footsteps, they ritually remove 
  one piece of ceremonial garb, as a guiding priest leads the 
  supplicant in prayer. Only after the prayer is complete and 
  the ceremonial “sacrifice” is made, will the gate be opened, 
  and the process repeated at the next Glorious Gate.
  Only after the last piece of clothing is shed, and the 
  worshipper is completely naked, is that last Glorious Gate 
  opened and the Chamber of the True Idol made plain. A 
  golden-domed chamber, with walls and floors of marble-
  and-gold, welcomes the true supplicant to the home of 
  the goddess.
  Ishtar’s true idol is here, an enormous statue made of 
  ivory that dominates the far wall. She is beautiful, and she 
  is terrifying. The goddess is ancient and powerful, as many 
  of the eldest gods are. True to her very nature of duality, it 
  THE SEVEN CEREMONIALS
  “… fourth, dress thyself in holiest garb:
  A crowning band with Her star to guide your way.
  An earmuff of lion’s fur to silence the world outside 
  and allow Her to lead you.
  A chain-of-eight, to shield your heart.
  A robe of soft silk, emblazoned with Her sigil, that 
  you may walk in Her beauty and love.
  A girdle of leather to walk also in Her strength 
  and protection.
  Bracelets and anklets of shining, swirling metal, fash-
  ioned as Her staff, to empower you, one to each limb.
  A loincloth, to strengthen and remind you that even 
  when all is lost, you still have dignity.”
   
  — The Teachings of Ishtar, IX:xvii-xxiv
  VOICES OF THE HYBORIAN AGE
  Of Koth, of Shem, of many dissonant histories and 
  tales comes Ishtar, she who is love and passion and beauty, 
  and whose ivory skin and sweet-scented hair are quick to 
  enchant. To some, she began as a mortal, and through the 
  treacheries of black magic, was cursed to an eternal life. 
  To others, she sprang, singing and naked and beautiful, 
  from the soft sighs and the final, gasping shudders of the 
  Kings of Heaven as they created the world. To all who 
  worship her, though, she is love. Blindingly and achingly 
  resplendent, whose heart is given and whose adoration is 
  bestowed in passion and in the erotic act of love, and whose 
  blessings inevitably wound each heart that promises itself 
  to her… for we must never forget that she is War, just as 
  much as she is Love.
  — “Lectures in Hyborian Religion and Ecology”, 
  Prof. John Kirowan (PhD, FRS, FRAI, FRGS)
  
  CHAPTER 3
  34
  is expected that she is to be feared just as much as adored. 
  Her lessons come fierce and fast.
  Her lions guard her well, marble-and-gold statues that 
  stand sentry over this room. Again, those trained in the 
  art of war might realize that this temple is tremendously 
  defensible, and this room especially. One might wonder 
  what is hidden here, to warrant such extreme protection.
  THE INNER MYSTERIES
  To dedicate one’s life to the service of Ishtar is generally con-
  sidered to be a good and honorable path to walk. While the 
  goddess is omnipresent, only her sworn priests understand 
  her well enough to help guide her beloved worshipers, to 
  love and reward the good, and to violently correct the evil.
  It is not a life of luxury. While the uninformed — gen-
  erally the Mitran accuser — may suspect that her priests 
  have nothing to do save lounge around on Ishtar’s fineries, 
  eating the finest food, enjoying the sweetest wines, nothing 
  could be further from the truth.
  Throughout the stories and the scriptures studying 
  Ishtar’s life, it has been proved time and again that the 
  price of the goddess’s favor is cruel and harsh. This seems 
  heightened in those who are sworn to her service.
  The ranks of priesthood are kept simple within the temple: 
  initiates are first introduced to the scriptures and songs of 
  Ishtar’s histories. For a year, initiates spend their lives study-
  ing her texts, being tested at all hours. Each day, the initiate 
  makes the holy trek through the Glorious Gates, to kneel 
  exposed before Ishtar’s true idol, to sing her songs back to 
  her, to share the day’s lessons with her, and to withstand any 
  challenges presented by her, usually in the form of physical 
  trials or punishment. While some might consider this a 
  form of mesmerism, the priests of Ishtar know better. This 
  is their proof of dedication to the goddess, to follow in her 
  steps, to love her shamelessly and receive her balancing ire.
  The second year of an initiate’s training begins to include 
  physical mastery. As Ishtar is both love and war, so her 
  priests are taught to guide and protect. As daily hours 
  dedicated to the study of scripture are lessened, so physical 
  training is heightened. A fact that few outsiders know: 
  though they do not openly carry weapons, every priest of 
  Ishtar is able to fight.
  At the end of the second year, the initiate is again brought 
  before the true idol. This time, though, the sworn brothers 
  and sisters have joined the initiate to welcome him or her 
  into their circle. Before Ishtar and all her sworn protectors, 
  the initiate promises their life in service to her. The initiate 
  is welcomed into the folds of priesthood, branded over 
  the heart with Ishtar’s eight-pointed star. It is horrible 
  pain and beautiful joy, and the night is spent in wild and 
  private celebration.
  The priesthood is led by a high priest or priestess. Every 
  five years, the high priest is brought before Ishtar’s true 
  idol and makes his case to remain in power. Any ordained 
  brother or sister of the faith may question the high priest, or 
  otherwise challenge them, although this is not often done. 
  Such a venerated priest commands the love and attention of 
  all their brothers and sisters, and it is rare to find someone 
  holding this position that was not openly welcomed to it.
  There have been whispers of secrets, however. Accusations 
  that behind Ishtar’s all-too-protective gates, her priests buy 
  and sell human favors, commit acts of gross blasphemy, and 
  make dark deals with darker spirits in exchange for power 
  and position. Mortals frequently forgive past trespasses 
  in the name of love, or omit evils, so what do the priests 
  deny or forgive in the name of the embodiment of love?
  Horrible rumors, denied fiercely by some, a little too 
  quickly by others, suggest that the “truest” priests of the 
  faith, having made bargains with necromantic spirits, may 
  overtake a person’s mind, charm even the wildest creature, 
  or suck the very life essence from those they touch. None 
  of these rumors have been substantiated, of course.
  NEW TALENT
  Ishtar’s Favor
  PREREQUISITES: Personality 9+; Lore Expertise 2; 
  must be a priest of Ishtar (gamemaster’s discretion)
  EXPERIENCE POINT COST: 200
  Sworn and branded priests can call down Ishtar’s blessing 
  to strengthen themselves, but at a deep cost later. With 
  this talent, the worshipper may invoke Ishtar’s Favor up 
  to three times per day, each attempt generating 3 Doom. 
  A priest that blesses themselves gains only one of the 
  following per use of this ability.
  One Fortune point to be used immediately. This imme-
  diately provides the gamemaster with the equivalent of 
  two Complications, specific to your character.
  A pool of up to 3 extra Momentum. These may not be 
  given away, and are only for the player character, and 
  must be used in the same encounter. For every point 
  of Momentum the priest takes, the gamemaster adds 
  equal points to the Doom pool. The Momentum does 
  not last beyond the current encounter, but the Doom 
  persists until spent.
  A temporary +1 to any one attribute the character 
  deems necessary, reflected in adjusted TNs for all rel-
  evant skills. The bonus only lasts until the end of that 
  encounter. The price paid is to suffer a −1 to that same 
  attribute (with adjusted TNs) for the next full day.
  
  35
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  Perhaps one of the most worrisome of these rumors is 
  to be found in the early texts of Ishtar’s journeys, known 
  only to the studied priests. While it is true that her journey 
  through the seven great gates formed the basis of her tem-
  ples, truly signifying her love and her need to now protect 
  her people, Ishtar’s scriptures also contain a darker truth.
  Ishtar’s arrival at the first of the seven great gates was 
  bloody. With her path barred, the furious goddess spat 
  threat and command at the gatekeeper:
  “If thou openest not the gate to let me enter,
  I will break the door, I will wrench the lock,
  I will smash the door-posts, I will force the doors.
  I will bring up the dead to eat the living.
  And the dead will outnumber the living.”
  Therefore, Ishtar was barred until she showed wisdom 
  and humility. She was required to remove one piece of 
  clothing and armor at each gate, not only to be bare before 
  the powers of heaven and hell, but to ensure that she had 
  no further weapons to attack or other methods to make 
  good on her promise to animate the dead.
  The priests are instructed, of course, to only promote the 
  positive messages of the goddess, and so this passage is usu-
  ally acknowledged in passing. One might wonder, however, 
  what other ties Ishtar has to the gods of necromancy. Is there 
  an alliance between gods? And what might happen should 
  those secrets be made light, or those horrible powers invoked?
  MITRA
  Though not the original god of the Hyborians, Mitra is 
  now pre-eminent, worshipped throughout the Hyborian 
  kingdoms. As patron of cities, Mitra’s following has grown 
  and widened in parallel with the spread of civilization. 
  Centered in Aquilonia, the religion has spread into Nemedia, 
  Brythunia, Zingara, Argos, Ophir, the Border Kingdom, and 
  Corinthia. Mitra’s aspects are perfectly suited for the rise 
  of civilization, as he is a god of contracts and binding word, 
  and of opportune meetings.
  Though the cult of Bori was synonymous with the 
  Hyborian people, the Bori cult has more or less been entirely 
  displaced by the Mitran religion. While Bori is (or was) a god 
  of clans, tribes, and villages, Mitra is better suited for the 
  expanse of civilization. His worship arose more than 1,500 
  years ago, and his early cult was instrumental in driving 
  the Set-worshipping ancestors of the Stygians back south, 
  out of the north and western lands.
  The earliest legends associated with Mitra have him 
  born out of the heart of a great stone — a mountain some-
  times identified as Mount Golamira in Aquilonia, which 
  is sacred to the religion. One of the god’s greatest feats 
  was the defeat of a titanic bull that brought great misery 
  across the countryside, and bulls were once used in ritual 
  sacrifices to Mitra, but the practice that has fallen out of 
  favor. Mitra is also a god of the sun, having displaced an 
  older sun god whose name is lost to time.
  Mitra is a protector of truth, all-knowing, ever-present, 
  supreme above all other gods. He is called upon for blessings 
  and protection against evil influences, even by nonbelievers. 
  Mitra is a god of friendship and alliance, though his earlier 
  aspect was more military, with wars aplenty fought in his 
  name. Once a patron to lords, generals, and soldiers, now 
  his aspect is that of a peacemaker and diplomat, a god of 
  scholars and sages, teachers and scientists, bureaucrats and 
  court officials. His emissaries are encouraged to convert 
  others to the cult through right action and the compelling 
  truth of his teachings.
  IMAGES OF MITRA
  Many are the likenesses of Mitra the All-Powerful. They 
  range from a serene bearded man of great wisdom and inner 
  tranquility to a beautiful youth radiant in glory; a mightily 
  muscled man slaying a fearsome bull empty-handed; a 
  lion-headed, winged warrior with sword in one hand and 
  staff in the other; and a youth of seemingly perfect mien 
  Behind an altar of clear green jade, unstained with 
  sacrifice, stood the pedestal whereon sat the material 
  manifestation of the deity. Yasmela looked in awe at 
  the sweep of the magnificent shoulders, the clear-cut 
  features — the wide straight eyes, the patriarchal 
  beard, the thick curls of the hair, confined by a 
  simple band about the temples. This, though she did 
  not know it, was art in its highest form — the free, 
  uncramped artistic expression of a highly esthetic 
  race, unhampered by conventional symbolism.
  — “Black Colossus”
  FROM THE NOTES OF JOHN KIROWAN
  The legend is identical to that of an existing 
  myth. I found the same text in From the Civilization 
  of Babylon and Assyria by M. Jastrow. Written in 1915, 
  this is but one more bit of evidence that the gods of 
  our own antiquity arose not wholly unbidden from the 
  minds of those cultures but were instead echoes of that 
  lost era I term the Hyborian Age.
  
  CHAPTER 3
  36
  arising, wreathed in flames as if a phoenix born out of the 
  uppermost peak of a mountaintop. In other lands Mitra is 
  represented in semblance to the folk of that place, empha-
  sizing his role as a universal god of all humankind, rather 
  than a purely Hyborian god.
  MITRA’S COHORTS
  Older depictions of Mitra show him with two cohorts — 
  Cautes and Cautophates — lesser demigods who serve him 
  faithfully, likely deified representations of his earliest high 
  priests. These two are depicted with torches or shepherds’ 
  crooks to emphasize their role in spreading Mitra’s light and 
  as shepherds of his flock. Centuries ago, lesser prayers to 
  Mitra were directed at them, to keep from troubling Mitra 
  with minor concerns. Priests of Mitra now interpret this 
  as denying Mitra’s all-powerful and all-knowing nature, 
  so the practice is largely obsolete. Nonetheless, represen-
  tations of Mitra’s cohorts are still visible in older temples, 
  and the inner Mysteries discuss their significance. Cautes 
  and Cautophates are often carved into columns at the 
  entrance, doormen whose names are long forgotten by 
  any save the priests.
  ENEMIES OF MITRA
  Some depictions of Mitra have him encircled by the coils 
  of a gigantic, constricting snake, representing his eternal 
  struggle against the Old Serpent Set. This is a critical part 
  of the Mitran religion, and his followers have opposed 
  Set for at least 1,500 years. Though the religion co-exists 
  comfortably with the followers of other gods, Set is the god 
  it cannot tolerate. As such, Mitran priests will sometimes 
  work together with the priesthood of Ibis, another enemy 
  of Set, against the Old Serpent.
  In times past, however, the religion was less tolerant, 
  and it fought the cult of Asura, working to stamp Asura’s 
  worship out from the Hyborian lands, seeing to it that 
  Asuran priests were persecuted, their temples destroyed, 
  and their cult outlawed. Asura is described on page 63.
  Mitra and Sorcery
  Few Mitran priests practice sorcery, and those who do use 
  it for only the most benevolent of purposes. Spells the 
  religion tolerates (or in some cases, favors) include Astral 
  Wanderings, Atavistic Voyage, and Favor of the Gods, but 
  only when used through meditation and prayer. Their intent 
  only to enlighten or to combat the insidious influence of 
  Set, Set’s followers, and others of that ilk. Astral Wanderings 
  and Atavistic Voyage are necessary in attaining the highest 
  level of the Mysteries (see below).
  Use of black magic — particularly when aimed at harm-
  ing others, requiring human sacrifice, summoning demonic 
  THE BLESSING OF THE PHOENIX
  Though the phoenix was associated with Mitra long cen-
  turies ago, the emblem itself is relatively obscure now, 
  with no ritual or magical significance to the lay members 
  of the cult or to nonbelievers. To those acquainted with 
  the Mysteries, the phoenix symbol is a potent enchant-
  ment, used by Mitra’s favored priest Epemitreus to impart 
  Mitra’s blessing upon the item it is inscribed upon.
  Use of this spell is wholly at the gamemaster’s discre-
  tion and can only be used by Epemitreus himself, or to one 
  who has selected Epemitreus as a sorcerous Patron. This 
  spell can be gained instead of the talent, Barter the Soul.
  If etched onto a weapon when one Fortune point is 
  spent, this blessing does not make the weapon any more 
  resilient or aid the wielder in using it, but the weapon 
  is able to bypass any magical Soak possessed by any 
  creature either of the Outer Dark or in Set’s service and 
  does an additional 3§ against it. This enchantment 
  continues even if the item is broken, though destroying 
  the sign of the phoenix itself will remove the blessing.
  
  37
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  entities, or curses — is forbidden to the priesthood. Anyone 
  within the Mysteries discovered using such sorcery is 
  instantly banished, their name stricken from records, and 
  their presence becomes unwelcome in any temple or place 
  of Mitran worship.
  THE CULT OF MITRA
  As the pre-eminent god of the Hyborians, Mitra’s religion is 
  the largest and most widespread across the continent, save 
  perhaps that of his rival Set, worshipped in various forms 
  in the South, the East, and even Pictland. Mitra’s priests are 
  everywhere and are always ready to debate the virtues of 
  their god and to proselytize to nonbelievers. In cities where 
  the worship of Mitra is a state religion, the temple is either 
  part of a palace rather than a distinct building or there is a 
  smaller, private temple to Mitra within palace grounds, and 
  used exclusively for the royalty and their court.
  Temples to Mitra
  Mitran temples are common throughout the cities of the 
  Hyborian kingdoms, fashioned in stark contrast to the deca-
  dent or baroque styles favored by other cults. Mitra’s priests 
  instruct their architects and artisans to follow classic simplic-
  ity and an elegant, understated method of expression that 
  bespeaks dignity and functionality, stating clearly to others 
  that Mitra is a god of practicality and of directness. His tem-
  ples have high, vaulted ceilings and wide meeting rooms, are 
  open to the public, and give off every indication that nothing 
  is concealed; nothing is withheld from the worshippers.
  However, unbeknownst to most worshippers, each Mitran 
  temple boasts a secret at its heart; hidden, underground 
  chambers where those within the Mysteries meet, using a 
  characteristic hand-clasp to identify one another. Passage 
  from one section of these chambers to another is permitted 
  according to the degree within the Mysteries themselves.
  Some temples have Mitra depicted in a great statue or 
  idol along one wall, arrayed behind the altar, or inhabiting 
  an alcove near the vaulted ceiling, high above the ground 
  level, symbolizing the god’s unreachable yet all-observant 
  nature. This is the oracle, prayed to for advice in matters 
  great and small. Worshippers believe that Mitra will give 
  insight, counsel, or even clear instructions. Some have 
  received such guidance, while others go unheard.
  One way the religion finances itself is through the sales 
  of votive coins, the obverse stamped with the likeness of 
  the god and the reverse with an image of one of his feats 
  or the temple itself. Worshippers purchase these outside 
  the temple and place them at the feet of the oracle inside, 
  accompanied with a prayer. These prayers are thought rather 
  than said aloud, as Mitra the all-knowing is well able to read 
  the minds of the faithful and know what it is they desire.
  Missionaries of Mitra
  Mitra’s priests are encouraged to travel amongst the unen-
  lightened and preach his word, spreading the faith through 
  example and wise counsel, with bare feet and empty hands, 
  showing humility and peaceful intent. Unfortunately, many 
  are the tales of Mitran priests meeting gruesome ends at the 
  hands of savages and those sworn to other gods. This is not 
  viewed as failure, but as an affirmation of the importance 
  of their work, galvanizing them further.
  Feasting and Worship
  Services to Mitra often end in feasts. The food is supplied 
  and prepared by the temple, brought by the followers, or 
  purchased by wealthy donors. This cements the fraternity 
  between members — one is better-disposed towards another 
  when bread has been broken — and spreads Mitra’s faith 
  among the poor and needy. Mitra’s priests serve the homeless 
  and lost, distributing food to the hungry, and use offerings 
  of food to get nonbelievers to sit and listen while they wax 
  rhapsodic about Mitra.
  Feasts are often arranged along different schedules, with 
  those of different levels of achievement in the Mysteries 
  served separately, so that they may reaffirm their privileged 
  status within the religion as well as being able to speak 
  freely about Mitra’s secret teachings and the innermost 
  activities. In larger and more elaborate temples, these feasts 
  are held in different dining areas; lay members eat in the 
  public worship space and the innermost circle within the 
  Mysteries eat together in concealed chambers deep beneath 
  the temple, forbidden to all but the initiates, whose walls 
  depict the greatest secrets of the cult and a depiction of the 
  “truest” likeness of Mitra.
  Each major temple of Mitra has its own hierarchy of initi-
  ates within the Mysteries, a pyramid seemingly culminating 
  in the high priest. When traveling to other cities and Mitran 
  temples, priests can present themselves and identify their 
  level of initiation within the Mysteries, revealing specific 
  information and lore known only to those at their level. 
  Such an introduction allows them access to that temple’s 
  inner sanctums and labyrinths at an equivalent level to 
  that from their own temple.
  Like most orthodox followers of Mitra, she had an 
  intuitive horror of the followers and cult of Asura, 
  instilled in her infancy and childhood by wild 
  tales of human sacrifice and anthropomorphic 
  gods shambling through shadowy temples.
  — The Hour of the Dragon
  
  CHAPTER 3
  38
  Rarely are outsiders denied a place at Mitra’s table. To 
  do so would be to refute the very nature of Mitra’s faith of 
  fraternity and alliance, but the punishment for falsifying 
  or misrepresenting one’s own status within the Mysteries 
  is severe, ranging from excommunication or even impris-
  onment within the temple, depending on the degree of 
  the deception.
  THE MITRAN MYSTERIES
  At the heart of the religion are the Mysteries, secret bodies 
  of sacred knowledge and influence within the faith. A priest 
  wishing to progress in the Mysteries must undergo a series 
  of tests described in the Mitran Mysteries table (following). 
  Passage from one rank to the next requires a sufficient 
  donation of Gold (or an equivalent worth in service or 
  goods, to be determined by the gamemaster) followed by 
  a ceremonial interrogation where the aspirant confronts a 
  group of higher-ranked priests and must answer honestly 
  and correctly a series of questions calculated to reveal the 
  amount of knowledge the aspirant has about Mitra, the 
  depth and sincerity of their devotion, and the quality of 
  their soul. The character must have spent years equal to the 
  Gold donation at the current rank before advancing to the 
  next. Some temples require physical ordeals or challenges, 
  but these are rare.
  Those who fail are considered unversed in Mitra’s lore, 
  to lack sufficient piety, or are of questionable character, 
  and they are denied passage to the next Mystery. They are 
  encouraged to renew their faith through service, prayer, 
  and self-reflection. It is not permitted to “skip” any of the 
  Mysteries, though on rare occasions an honorary title is 
  bestowed upon someone who has performed extraordinary 
  service to the temple and god.
  Once earning a new rank within the Mysteries, the 
  applicant receives a ceremonial item as a gift from the 
  high priest of the temple and is allowed access to the next 
  of the sacred chambers beneath the temple. Now begins 
  the study of a new and secret doctrine regarding Mitra 
  and his ineffable nature. There is a welcoming feast, and 
  it is expected that the applicant will continue to meditate, 
  pray, and learn more of the nature of the god, serving 
  the temple and the Mysteries unreservedly, as well as 
  ministering to those of lesser ranks, all the way down to 
  mere worshippers.
  Names of the upper-rank members of the Mysteries 
  are carved upon the walls of the sanctum, whether on the 
  foundations within the secret chambers or upon the bases 
  of idols depicting Mitra, a distinguished roster dating back 
  to the formation of the temple. In some cases, names may 
  be stricken from these hallowed spaces, an indication that 
  the person has fallen out of favor or been excommunicated. 
  Offences bring no reduction in grade for membership 
  in a Mystery; someone cast from the religion is forever 
  unwelcome, and if they wish to continue they must go to 
  another temple and attempt to join it, hoping that their 
  perfidy will not follow.
  Benefits conferred by the Mysteries are wholly concerned 
  with advancement within the cult of Mitra. They confer no 
  magical aptitude or unique abilities and are confined to 
  knowledge of aspects of Mitra’s ineffable nature and guid-
  ance of the temple activities. Mitran priests may add their 
  rank in the Mysteries to Renown when dealing with other 
  priests, and the gamemaster may even allow an additional 
  d20 when rolling for sorcery concerned with Mitra and his 
  interests. These should be adjudicated on a case-by-case 
  basis, and entirely at the gamemaster’s discretion. Some 
  temples — such as in Tarantia — are storehouses for mag-
  ical artifacts confiscated by the religion, and access to the 
  Mysteries means access to these items, as well as grimoires 
  or other sources of now-forbidden occult lore.
  Mount Golamira and Epemitreus the Sage
  One of the greatest Mysteries is the true nature of Mount 
  Golamira, near Tarantia in Aquilonia. As the center of 
  the Mitran religion, this is the mount where legends say 
  Mitra sprang forth into the world, emerging from the rocky 
  mountaintop and bringing enlightenment to the rest of 
  the Hyborian nations. Though the mountain still figures 
  prominently within these legends, few worshippers know 
  of the extensive network of tunnels and caverns within 
  the mountain, in which are carved an untold number of 
  sacred spaces — burial chambers, shrines, archives, and 
  other significant locations of use to the religion.
  “My lord, this is a matter beyond human 
  understanding. Only the inner circle of the priestcraft 
  know of the black stone corridor carved in the black 
  heart of Mount Golamira, by unknown hands, or 
  of the phoenix-guarded tomb where Epemitreus 
  was laid to rest fifteen hundred years ago. And 
  since that time no living man has entered it, for his 
  chosen priests, after placing the Sage in the crypt, 
  blocked up the outer entrance of the corridor so that 
  no man could find it, and today not even the high-
  priests know where it is. Only by word of mouth, 
  handed down by the high-priests to the chosen 
  few, and jealously guarded, does the inner circle 
  of Mitra’s acolytes know of the resting-place of 
  Epemitreus in the black heart of Golamira. It is one 
  of the Mysteries, on which Mitra’s cult stands.”
  — “The Phoenix on the Sword”
  
  39
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  MITRAN MYSTERIES
  Rank
  Title
  Gold
  Ritual Item
  Description
  First
  None
  1
  Beaker
  Lay members, as opposed to those who merely attend 
  services. Often the offering is provided at a child’s birth, 
  automatically making the infant a member. If joining is 
  attempted later in life, it is automatic with a donation.
  Second
  Bride or Groom
  3
  Veil or Diadem
  Novices and servants, performing various labors and assist-
  ing in worship services. Entry requires a successful Average 
  (D1) Society roll and time spent serving the religion and temple.
  Third
  Soldier
  6
  Belt Pouch
  Neophyte priests, functionaries such as treasurers and 
  scribes, and low-level missionaries. Generally charged with 
  the upkeep and maintenance of the temple and minister-
  ing to the sick and poor. Requires successful Challenging (D2) 
  Society and Lore rolls and demonstrated service to the religion 
  and temple.
  Fourth
  Captain
  9
  Laurel Wreath
  Senior priests and officers charged with low-level temple 
  administration, organizing worship services, collecting 
  dues, and serving as envoys to city officials and authorities. 
  Members at this rank can serve as missionaries in places 
  where Mitra’s worship has yet to find purchase. Entry to 
  this rank requires successful Challenging (D2) Society, Lore, 
  and Persuade rolls and an exemplary history of service to the 
  religion.
  Fifth
  Commander
  25
  Dagger
  Priest-administrators, overseeing temple activities, wor-
  ship services, and civil matters. Generally, one member of 
  this rank serves as the de facto high priest for the temple 
  and represents its public face. Achieving this rank requires 
  successful Challenging (D2) Society, Command, and Insight 
  rolls, and demonstrated aptitude towards leadership and 
  administration.
  Sixth
  Emissary
  36
  Torch
  Diplomats, sages, and counsellors with considerable 
  power within the religion, as well as serving as prominent 
  figureheads in royal courts across the continent, advising 
  kings and queens on spiritual matters. Additionally, they 
  must devote a measure of time to counselling those of the 
  prior rank(s). Attaining this rank requires successful Dire (D4) 
  Society, Counsel, Persuade, and Insight rolls, as well as demon-
  strated skill at diplomacy.
  Seventh
  Shepherd 
  Father or 
  Shepherd 
  Mother
  49+
  Flat-bottomed 
  Bowl
  Sometimes high priests or priestesses, these are more 
  likely to be mystics and oracles, sheltered from the 
  distractions of temple activity, spending hours and days 
  in prayer and communion with Mitra, his cohorts, and 
  past sages such as Epemitreus. It is rare, but not unheard 
  of, for there to be more than one of these at any temple. 
  At this rank, the applicant has access to all secrets of the 
  religion, including any confiscated magic artifacts or lore. 
  Requires successful Epic (D5) Lore, Persuade, and Discipline 
  rolls, and the applicant must have learned some divine secret 
  only achievable through the Astral Wanderings or Atavistic 
  Voyage spells, its nature determined by the gamemaster.
  
  CHAPTER 3
  40
  The highest within the Mysteries know that deep within 
  Mount Golamira the greatest priest of Mitra, Epemitreus 
  the Sage, instrumental in the religion’s founding, is interred 
  in an eternal slumber, his ghost sallying forth across the 
  world in service of the god, often in direct opposition to Set 
  and the Old Serpent’s agents. Player characters may find 
  themselves the subject of such a mysterious visit, where 
  Epemitreus comes to them in dreams or sendings, bringing 
  their souls to his tomb within Mount Golamira to offer 
  counsel and support against evil.
  SET
  Set is the bloody-fanged god of Stygia. Although his cult 
  has spread across the world, it is in Stygia where his name 
  is incanted with the greatest fervor and where humans 
  are thrown, still living, to the mighty pythons who guard 
  his temples. Unlike some gods whose worship in 
  the Hyborian Age is a mistake made by the 
  credulous or the desperate, Set is much 
  more than his worshippers understand. 
  He exists far beyond the limits of the 
  nation which has made him their 
  patron, far beyond the Hyborian 
  Age itself. He is known by many 
  names — Yig, Quetzalcoatl, the 
  Great Dragon — but behind 
  them all lurks the same slavering, 
  hungry form.
  To those who care about such 
  human concepts as “morality”, Set 
  is a monstrous, ravening evil thing, 
  preying on those who serve him. This is 
  not true, or at least, not entirely. Set exists 
  beyond such tedious definitions, such limiting 
  binaries, as does anything which could properly be called a 
  god. Some have said that Set is a creature of the Outer Dark; 
  a being whose physical state is anathema to the world he 
  visits, twisting reality about himself.
  It is for this reason, these scholars argue, that certain 
  relics which have been touched or blessed by Set possess 
  startling powers — they are not wholly of the physical 
  world as we understand it. Those priests of Set who draw 
  on this power do so at enormous risk, as the forces they 
  unleash gnaw away at their minds and corrupt their flesh.
  Others argue that Set is a puppet, a manifestation of 
  the strange mystical connection which all serpents share 
  with each other and which can be projected at times of 
  need or great danger. Apostate Stygians have been heard 
  to mutter that Set does not exist at all — save in the heads 
  of his priests who use the threat of great Father Set’s power 
  as a means of retaining their throttling grip on the nation.
  Those who speak such blasphemy do so quietly, however, 
  for it is not wise to speak ill of Set. Some who have done so 
  have been found hideously murdered, apparently by the 
  most inhuman means. Some have simply disappeared. The 
  most unfortunate have continued to live, their skin slipping 
  away from them, their eyes yellowing in their sockets, 
  beginning to resemble the dreadful ophidian races who 
  once occupied the earth. Is this truly Set’s power working 
  on his enemies or simply the tricks of a skilled sorcerer? 
  None know but it is best, they say, to be cautious.
  The reason for Set’s power and long-standing worship 
  in Stygia is the presence of endless serpents in that dark, 
  blighted land. Whatever Set may truly be, he is certainly 
  connected in some way with the snake, and those who 
  tend carefully to the creatures, loathsome as they may be, 
  seem in some way to earn his blessing — whatever that 
  may be worth. His cult dedicates many sacrifices to the 
  Great Serpent, nearly all of which involve the spilling of 
  human blood or rites too mysterious to be named.
  These rituals are known only to the most 
  powerful initiates of Set’s cult, but the god 
  seems to require these regular dedica-
  tions of blood and suffering, glut-
  ting himself on the flayed corpses 
  suspended from temple walls, or 
  the bodies of those eaten by the 
  pythons which slither through 
  Stygian streets. All of this is 
  manna to Set — is he then a Great 
  Old One, sustained by blood? The 
  cosmic snake whose undulations 
  ensure that the universe continues? 
  None of it matters to the Stygians as 
  they lock their doors and pray that Set’s 
  servants do not fasten their reptilian eyes 
  upon their flesh.
  Set is one of the most powerful gods of the Hyborian 
  Age but, as with all things which are called gods, this is 
  as much to do with the number and dedication of his 
  votives as it is with the miracles the god might perform. 
  Set’s cult is as dangerous and volatile as the great serpent 
  it names its god.
  THE CULT OF SET
  To those who inhabit Stygia, a nation dedicated to the 
  worship of the Old Serpent, the cult of Set is the central 
  element of their lives. It prescribes the time at which they 
  must awake, to assume the positions of obeisance before 
  the serpent. It dictates feast days and plucks those who 
  are to be sacrificed from the unfortunate prisoners and 
  criminals and slaves, readying them for the strike of the 
  knife or the envenomed fang.
  
  41
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  The priests of Set also tend to the thousands of snakes 
  who slither, unmolested, through the streets of every Stygian 
  city. The cult of Set is responsible for preserving the life 
  and wellbeing of these serpents, and to harm one in any 
  way is to invite an especially gruesome, though holy, death. 
  Even outside of Stygia, the Set cult presents a dogmatic 
  front, committed to its beliefs and to its god, unswerving 
  in dedication and hostile to non-believers, heretics and to 
  those who place their faith in a less worthy god.
  The Inner Mysteries
  Behind the officious, orthodox face which the cult of Set 
  shows to the world lies a ruthless hierarchy of initiates and 
  elder priests, within which the only sure means of ascension 
  is via the undetected assassination or the political maneu-
  vering only possible in a monolithic entity like Set’s cult.
  Set’s priests come to understand the inner workings of the 
  cult, the rites and rituals which the Great Serpent demands as 
  his obeisance, through induction into the Mysteries of Set. But 
  only after lengthy study in the Temples of the Snake in Stygia, 
  and years of preparation and training in the handling and com-
  mand of the snakes which the cult serves to breed and care for.
  The Mysteries of Set are heavily shrouded and are said 
  to allow the practitioner to contact Set himself, praying for 
  strength and the ruthless serpentine logic which the god 
  possesses. Certainly, those sufficiently learned in the arts 
  of Set’s cult can draw upon formidable powers.
  Cult Structure
  The cult of Set is highly segmented and hierarchical. There 
  are strict delineations of rank whose occupants zealously 
  protect their position, constantly alert to the ambitions 
  of those young priests below them, just as they scheme 
  to move upwards into more senior and more venerated 
  positions.Despite these strongly defined strata of power, 
  the cult of Set has never truly experienced any divisions 
  along theological lines. Certainly, the constant upheavals 
  as one high priest is replaced by another, and his followers 
  are purged from high-ranking positions to be succeeded 
  by followers of the new exalted priest of Set, leaves little 
  time for theological niceties.
  Center of Power
  Unlike most cults and religious powers spread throughout 
  the kingdoms of the Earth, Set’s followers have, as their 
  base, an entire nation: Stygia. The country is dedicated to 
  the worship of the Father of Snakes. Every road is thronged 
  with shrines, dedicated to the Serpent God. All those who 
  inhabit the cities and villages of the vast, sandy country 
  of Stygia are followers of Set and obliged to attend rituals 
  in his honor.
  Stygians are also obliged to pay a tithe to those who inter-
  cede with Set on behalf of the populace. This is considered 
  by visitors to be exorbitantly high compared to almost any 
  taxes demanded in any other civilized nation, and they are 
  amazed that the Stygians offer their goods and gold up so 
  willingly. The truth is that the Stygians know two things 
  which outsiders don’t.
  First, the tax is worth it, for the nation of Stygia is perhaps 
  the safest in the world. The streets are kept clean and plague 
  in Stygia is almost unheard of. Even in the hottest and most 
  desultory parts of the realm, crops grow, and harvests are 
  good. The tribute to Set, so the priests say, ensures that 
  this will continue. Amongst the war-ravaged kingdoms 
  of the Hyborian Age, no price is too high for such security.
  And, of course, the second thing that Stygians know is 
  what happens to those who don’t pay their tithes.
  Foreign merchants must also pay much higher taxes 
  than they might have to when seeking to trade in Shem 
  for instance, but Stygia produces cloths and fabrics of 
  surpassing quality and jewelry of impressive beauty, and 
  a clever trader can easily sell on Stygian work at twice 
  the price he paid for it. And robbery in Stygia is punished 
  most harshly — meaning that merchants are unlikely to 
  be attacked and have their wares stolen. Again, in a world 
  and time as uncertain as this, such guarantees are worth 
  the gold they cost.
  The cult of Set is unique in its control of a whole nation; 
  the priesthood is virtually a noble class, save for the fact that 
  anyone with talent and intelligence may join its ranks and 
  aspire to lead it. The organization may be secretive and far 
  from a guarantee of a long life, but it does not require one 
  to have been born into a lineage of kings and noblemen, or 
  to be strong enough to kill a king and take a kingdom from 
  him. The cult of Set is a civilizing influence, making Stygia 
  one of the most formidable nations in the known world.
  None of this is to say that Set’s influence, and the influ-
  ence of his cult, has not spread further through the world. 
  The cult of Set seeks power and further riches for its god. 
  Small shrines and splinter temples of the Serpent can be 
  found throughout the western world, and major centers of 
  cult activity can be seen in many of the nations of the South. 
  Set is treated with suspicion and, occasionally, enmity by 
  the Aquilonians, Gundermen, and other nations of Bori 
  descendants, and is detested by the northern barbarians 
  Lo! Fear Father Set for his eyes see through flesh and 
  through time! The venom from his fangs drips on to 
  those who worship him and they writhe in ecstatic 
  torment! Go not to that bone-bleached land beneath 
  ancient sun! Set! Yig! The Serpent God who is eternal!
  — Unaussprechlichen Kulten, 
  Friedrich von Junzt
  
  CHAPTER 3
  42
  who little trust the labyrinthine politicking and magical 
  rites of the serpent worshippers. Nevertheless, Set con-
  tinues to insinuate his influence throughout the world, 
  accreting power and waiting for the moment when his cult 
  will dominate every land beneath the sun.
  The Temples of Set
  The places where Set’s followers gather to conduct the rites 
  of his worship are spectacular places, complete with strange 
  but magnificent architecture. Serpentine columns sprout 
  from the floor and sinuously stretch towards the ceilings, 
  all of which are beautifully decorated. Some are painted 
  with intricate frescoes of snakes swallowing one another 
  in an endless array, until finally consumed by the vast form 
  of Father Set. Other temples have their ceilings sculpted so 
  that they seem to resemble the dry, scaly skin of snakes, to 
  try to convince the attendants solemnly intoning the rituals 
  of Set that they are within the stomach of a vast serpent.
  Most temples of Set are designed in this way, stretching 
  underground in a series of lengthy tunnels and occasional 
  circular chambers in which votive offerings are left upon 
  altars for the snakes which slither along the passages, feast-
  ing on whatever they can find. There is no central altar in 
  a temple of Set. Instead, there are dozens of small marble 
  RITES AND RITUALS
  RITE OF THE WALKING DEAD: Snakes slither through 
  the streets of every Stygian city. Often these are vast, 
  bloated creatures of huge size. Anyone who wanders the 
  streets at night and is attacked and consumed by one 
  of these serpents is considered a sacrifice to Set. This 
  means that each city of Stygia is a deep pool of magical 
  energy, available for any sorcerer or priest of Set to use. 
  Any spells attempted in a Stygian city automatically 
  generate one Doom for the gamemaster. A sorcerer born 
  in Stygia or dedicated to Set receives 1 free Momentum 
  when casting a spell when in such a city.
  INVOCATION OF THOTH-AMON: One of the most 
  powerful and deadly of all Set’s high priests, Thoth-amon 
  has had many rituals and incantations attributed to him, 
  regardless of their true origins. This is one of the most 
  effective magics employed by the priests of the Great 
  Serpent. A priest of Set may summon and command 
  one giant constrictor snake (CONAN corebook, page 
  329) at any time at the cost of 1 Doom. If the priest is a 
  player character, they can attempt to summon the snake 
  at the cost of 2 Momentum and a successful Daunting 
  (D3) Discipline test.
  RITUAL OF THE SLOUGHED SKIN: Set’s immortality 
  is, in some way, passed down to those he brought into 
  being. The ability of the snake to shed a skin and become 
  renewed is just one secret the priests of Set have sought 
  to make their own. This ritual is the nearest they have 
  come. It requires a priest of Set and a single live snake 
  of any variety which the priest can hold in their hand. As 
  a Standard Action, the priest may spend 1 Fortune point 
  and attempt a Challenging (D2) Discipline test: success 
  instantly restores all lost Vigor and Wounds. This is 
  transferred into the snake, which then dies immediately. 
  The gamemaster may have a non-player character priest 
  utilise this rite at the cost of 3 Doom.
  
  43
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  altars of varying sizes spotted throughout the extent of 
  the temple itself.
  These altars represent the stages of a serpent’s life, its 
  growth, and its ability to shed its skin, renewing itself. 
  The tunnels throughout which these altars are found also 
  echo the eternality of Set and his serpent brood, twisting 
  onwards and onwards before eventually leading back to 
  the temple’s entrance. These entrance halls themselves are 
  usually sparse, with many passages leading off them. While 
  deeper into the temple complex sumptuous decoration 
  can be found, those areas accessible to non-believers are 
  austere, decorated with only the serpentine columns which 
  proliferate throughout the temple proper.
  The Great Temple of Set in Luxor is the archetype from 
  which all other temples of Set draw their influence. The 
  external form is impressive and imposing but not gaudily 
  decorated. Indeed, only as one penetrates the deeper por-
  tions of the temple will the titanic, bizarre architecture reveal 
  itself. Quartz, granite, marble and other, unknown minerals 
  are carved into elliptical, flowing shapes which fluctuate 
  in size and dimension as the torchlight shifts and flickers.
  The altars here are hideously beautiful — decorated with 
  obscene images of men and women entangled with snakes 
  in positions which seem at once violent and debauched. 
  Throughout the endless miles of tunnels which stretch 
  beneath the temple — a maze of catacombs of unfathomed 
  depth and extent — vast serpents wriggle in their dozens, 
  some monstrous in proportion. Chambers of Set’s priests, 
  luxuriously appointed, sprout from the tunnels, and these 
  priests plot and negotiate in the shadows. Set’s temples 
  are filled with treasure. They are also just as full of danger 
  and death.
  TARIM
  Most widely known and worshipped in the growing empire 
  of Turan, Tarim does in fact predate the rise of those ambi-
  tious Hyrkanians. In Turan, Tarim is a measured, temperate 
  god who leans to the side of light. In this way, some theolo-
  gians of the West compare him to Mitra. The comparison 
  is apt as far as a western mind cares, though in Hyrkania, 
  and the even older cultures beyond the Vilayet, Tarim is 
  less like Mitra than the scholars of Nemedia would write 
  in their voluminous tomes.
  In truth, Tarim seems to have derived from Lemurians 
  who, after the Cataclysm, were enslaved by a race known 
  as the Naacal. These were Erlik worshippers and eventu-
  ally brought that grim god to Hyrkania, but Tarim was the 
  lord and master of their slaves. For this reason, the Naacal 
  rejected Tarim and actively oppressed his worship. Many 
  were the Lemurians who wound up crucified for fealty 
  to this god.
  Whether Tarim comes from pre-Cataclysmic Lemuria 
  or after is unclear, at least in the west. He is the sun and 
  the sky and a man who walks the earth. Once called the 
  Three-Faced God by the Lemurians, Tarim was both the 
  cosmos and its manifestation all in one. According to the 
  Lemurian slaves he stood in direct opposition to Erlik. In 
  Turan, the two coexist and are worshipped by both peasants 
  and nobles.
  The Lemurians, of course, vanished into history, their 
  bloodline thinning with each generation that mingled with 
  other stock after they freed themselves from the Naacal. In 
  time, they simply assimilated into the blood of those who 
  walk the world today, all but forgotten save in scripts no 
  living man can read.
  The freedom of the Lemurian slaves was attributed to 
  Tarim. So fervent became their worship of him that a prophet 
  rose up and led them in revolt against their oppressors. 
  Many were martyred before their shackles were cast off 
  but, in the end, the Three-Faced God led them to freedom.
  Due to the forcible suppression of Tarimism under the 
  Naacal, little early record of the religion remains. But when 
  the Lemurian slaves toppled their enslavers they brought 
  Tarimism with them as they migrated. This Tarim, the one 
  these nomadic people worshipped under forgotten con-
  stellations, was a monotheistic deity, somewhat unusual 
  in the Hyborian Age, in which most cults were pantheistic 
  or at least acknowledged other gods.
  TARIM AND ERLIK
  In Turan, Erlik and Tarim are both gods. For the Lemurians, 
  Tarim was the only god. Erlik was a false deity, a trick created 
  by men to rule over other men. The Lemurian refugees 
  portrayed Tarim as a liberator and light-bringer. The latter 
  appellation is likely one reason the west conflates him 
  with Mitra.
  What the west does not know, what few know, is that 
  Tarim was not merely lord of all men and the firmament, 
  he was also imbued in the soul of each human being. To 
  “How can an ordinary human understand 
  the motives of a Seer?” returned the Master 
  calmly. “My acolytes in the temples of Turan, 
  who are the priests behind the priests of 
  Tarim, urged me to bestir myself in behalf of 
  Yezdigerd. For reasons of my own, I complied. 
  How can I explain my mystic reasons to your 
  puny intellect? You could not understand.”
  — “The People of the Black Circle”
  
  CHAPTER 3
  44
  a Tarimist of Lemurian strain, man literally possesses 
  the spark of divinity within and, somewhere in the far 
  corners of the world, he walks the Earth as does a man. 
  The so-called Hyborian Age is but a brief pause before 
  another great cataclysm, say the Tarimites, one which will 
  not only reshape the continent again but forever alter the 
  destiny of men.
  Tarim prophets speak of man achieving technological 
  wonders which put old Kosala to shame. They will fight wars 
  that encompass the whole of the Earth and even leave this 
  world for the heavens above. Such thoughts are dangerous 
  to the divine right of kings, and true Tarim worship occurs 
  now largely in secret.
  THE PUBLIC FACE OF TARIM
  In Hyrkania, some tribes worship Tarim as a sky god who 
  sits in opposition to Erlik in his icy, underworld hell. Yet 
  the majority of Hyrkanians worship Erlik over Tarim, and 
  those believers are the ones who founded Turan. There, as 
  the first roots of the kingdom began to take hold, Tarim 
  became combined with Erlik worship, at least publicly.
  In Turan, the public face of Tarim is that of companion 
  god to Erlik. In Turanian faith, Tarim may even work on 
  Erlik’s behalf. To true Tarimites, however, Erlik is an illusion 
  brought on by men who see not the Tarim inside… those 
  who fear the death which Erlik represents.
  THE CULT OF TARIM
  Humanity as divine, as having within it the semblance of 
  a god, is a dangerous idea. It thus runs only in the under-
  currents of society, primarily Turanian. Yet the influence of 
  these cults ranges beyond Turan and infects its neighbors 
  with thoughts of cosmological revolution. Man becomes 
  the center of things, common man. No ruler or king can 
  tolerate this. Thus, the cults of Tarim are hunted, exiled, and 
  even put to death. From Aghrapur to Sabatea, they meet in 
  lone houses, in caves outside the cities, and in the cracks 
  of the world where ideas ferment and, so the Tarimists say, 
  grow to change the world.
  To date, the cults are troublesome but not directly threat-
  ening. However, the harder authorities press them, the 
  more fervent they seem to become. It is said even Stygia 
  has a “Tarimite problem”, though Father Set is wise enough 
  to let it be. In Turan, underneath polite society where even 
  Yezdigerd’s name holds little sway, Tarimite cults begin to 
  appear again.
  The faith of these cults is predicated on the divinity of 
  the common man, the coming end of the Hyborian Age, 
  and the move into a new age whereby humankind shall 
  achieve heights even the gods could not aspire to. Typically, 
  a self-proclaimed prophet of Tarim leads small cells of 
  worshippers. Their symbol is three angled lines. These may 
  be hard to notice, but such marks reveal locations where 
  Tarimists meet and discuss their futures.
  The Black Seers of Yimsha have spies within Turanian 
  Tarimism. These agents work only for the Master of Yimsha, 
  fronting entire portions of the Tarimite church. None but 
  the Master can say what their ultimate goals are. Perhaps 
  the open face of Tarim is entirely a plot of that immortal 
  creature’s machinations.
  THE FUTURE OF TARIMISM
  The greatest quest for any Tarimite is to find Tarim himself as 
  he walks the world. When Tarim is found, this age will end 
  in another great flood which will “drink down the whole of 
  the world”. This cannot arrive soon enough for some, and 
  it is highly possible some fraudulent “Tarim” might pass 
  themselves off as the god to the foolish. However, true 
  believers know Tarim only looks like a man. He cannot be 
  injured or killed. Thus do hoaxers meet their fate.
  Yet the possibility that Tarim is walking somewhere 
  exists for the Tarimites. To them, it is a real proposition. 
  Their faith is not casual, at least not for the cultists.
  YEZUD THE 
  SPIDER GOD
  Atavistic terrors lurk in the racial memories of man. When 
  bronze, and iron, and steel were not gifted by the gods 
  to protect us, fire alone kept serpents, raging bears, and 
  spiders away. It is the spider, though, which preoccupies 
  the mind of Zamorians. In form, it is like a demon — many-
  eyed, many-legged, venomous. In behavior it is an alien, 
  creeping from one end of its web to the next like the sun 
  spans the horizon, only the sun traps less prey in its rays 
  than Yezud in its web.
  The hunger of the North is in him, vast and untamed 
  and devouring. He is the wind and the ice and 
  the hatred of those who would profane it with 
  their swords and their torches and their dreams 
  of stone cities and wooden roofs. He is always 
  hungry, always free, always running through 
  the dark winter. Ymir, giant-father, star-bringer, 
  cold-claimer. Always restless. Always hungry.
  — Unaussprechlichen Kulten, 
  Friedrich von Junzt
  
  45
  MAJOR GODS AND CULTS
  Sometimes merely called the Spider-God, sometimes 
  Yezud, this entity has temples throughout Zamora but none 
  more than in the city supposedly named for it. The god is 
  sometimes said to have sprung from the earth where its 
  temple in that city now stands. Though it lays eggs, the 
  god is only sometimes assigned a gender.
  Spider worship predates the Cataclysm. It goes as far 
  back as those atavistic memories can travel. It originated as 
  a fertility cult. The spider’s eggs gave birth to the universe 
  and stars. Each star was another egg which in turn gave birth 
  to whole galaxies. When the stars all connect, they form a 
  web, a circular cocoon which encompasses the whole of the 
  cosmos. Rude men, degenerates really, left paintings of their 
  spider gods and their cosmos in caves around continents 
  older than the Thurian Age. Some of these places survived 
  the Cataclysm and are considered sacred and many of those 
  burrow through the hills of Zamora.
  To extant primitive cultures, and even to a degree in the 
  Spider-God’s cult, spiders represent oracular divination, 
  particularly about rain, for spiders come out before it rains. 
  To any settlement dependent on agriculture, the spider is 
  easily seen as a good omen.
  Today, the cosmology of Yezud connects more to the 
  Outer Dark than the stars above. At the center of that end-
  less void lies Yezud, great spider, manipulator of gods older 
  than time itself… or so worshippers believe. They do not, 
  however, conflate Yezud with the Great Old Ones, though 
  some of the high priests may recognize Yezud as an aspect 
  of one of those foul beings.
  Yezud appears to man in two forms: as the many spiders 
  of the world and as a black stone statue. The statue, it is 
  said, is Yezud itself — trapped by other beings in the Outer 
  Dark or perhaps lying in wait to give birth to a host of new 
  worlds. Only initiates know the mysteries of the cult.
  Yezud is also the god of spies and assassins, that which 
  lurks in the dark corners where shadow reigns and webs 
  are spun. Yezud’s web is no longer the cosmos, but rather 
  the connections of all people on Earth. By tapping one 
  person, a nodal point in the web, a priest can affect other 
  persons along the web. This sympathetic form of magic 
  allows Yezud’s priests to act on not only individuals but 
  the world at large.
  Black spheres, which may also be the eggs of Yezud, 
  allow priests to communicate with one another at great 
  distances. These globes also serve as tethers between 
  which the strands of the Great Spider’s web are strung. 
  Lesser versions of such globes turn into venomous spi-
  ders which strike their intended target. Few such vic-
  tims survive.
  Yezud the Spider God is also discussed in Conan the 
  Thief, pages 73–76.
  MOTHER SPIDER AND FATHER SET
  In the mythology of Yezud, and perhaps Set as well, there 
  lies a story which binds the two deities. When the world 
  was young and men were but a thing imagined in the 
  eyes of the serpent and the spider, Yezud ruled the north 
  and Set the south
  They were enemies, and the pre-human creatures 
  that worshipped them were enemies as well. Wars were 
  fought and untold numbers died. One day, Old Set offered 
  peace, should the Spider-God marry him (for in these 
  tales the Spider-God was female, the Mother Spider). 
  The two territories would become one, and the whole 
  of the Earth would belong to them.
  Now, Mother Spider was wise, and knew that Father 
  Serpent was also the Father of Lies. She did not expect 
  him to keep his word. Yet she agreed to marry him and 
  produce offspring that would rule the Earth. They met 
  at the border of their two worlds where servant priests 
  waited to join them.
  Set struck first, attempting to bite Yezud, but she 
  danced out of the way, an action re-enacted in dance 
  by all initiates before one of the stone idols. Set struck 
  again, for he was quick. Yezud spun a web to hold him, 
  but he was too sly to be caught. For seven days and nights 
  they fought this way.
  On the final night, Yezud conceived a great plan. When 
  next Set struck, she allowed herself to be swallowed 
  whole. The serpent declared victory and marched his 
  forces north. Yet Mother Set was no fool. In the belly of 
  Set she spun her web and laid her eggs.
  His armies were halfway through Yezud’s demesne 
  when the eggs ruptured giving birth to one thousand 
  thousand spiders who ate Set from the inside. In the 
  end, only his bones remained, and they formed the great 
  mountain on Zamora’s eastern border. Set had lost.
  Yet Stygia persists, and Yezud priestesses, believe 
  he found a way to resurrect himself. When this age is 
  done, they say, the two will fight again — one final time.
  
  CHAPTER 3
  46
  THE CULT OF YEZUD
  The current cult of the Spider-God, also known as the cult 
  of Yezud, centers itself in the city of the same name. There, 
  a giant temple to the spider god looms over the city as the 
  stone effigy of the Great Spider looms over its worshippers. 
  Murals in that temple, and lesser ones, often depict webs 
  strung with decapitated human heads. This represents 
  not only sacrifices to Yezud, but the aspect of the hunter 
  which it represents.
  Indeed, the libidinous nature of man is oft exploited 
  in recruitment to the cult as well as in drumming up sac-
  rifices. Sacred prostitution takes place in Yezud and other 
  Zamorian cities. These women are carefully selected and 
  bound to their god by webs stronger than mere lust. Every 
  priestess was once a sacred prostitute for the Great Spider. 
  An acolyte begins as a dancer, then enters the holy sale of the 
  body for Yezud, then becomes a member of the priest class.
  For male acolytes and priests, a different ladder awaits. 
  First, they serve for an entire year in silence and chastity 
  to the women of the cult. Then, at the end of that year 
  they are once again allowed to give in to lust. Huge orgies 
  take place in the temples after which each man is brought 
  before giant spiders who invariably haunt the towers and 
  caverns of these temples.
  There, the men are bound, already in a stupor of wine 
  and sex. The spiders cocoon those who are unworthy. The 
  next day, the women return and those left alive become 
  novices in the cult. However, as they are men, they never 
  rise to the upper tiers of zealotry, nor are they initiated in 
  the deepest of the Great Spider’s secrets.
  The Great Web
  As noted, Yezud’s priestesses and priests practice a kind 
  of sympathetic magic, but this is merely an aspect of their 
  larger contemporary cosmology. As each person on Earth, 
  and each being, is connected by invisible strands of webbing, 
  a vibration from any one point cascades through the entire 
  web. This is called the rule of connection.
  Picture a spider at the center of its web. Even the slight-
  est disturbance of any thread causes it to notice. This is 
  the view of the Great Spider and the illumination which 
  its worshippers seek. Not only could one know what was 
  happening anywhere at any time, one could directly affect 
  events in remote places, perhaps even in remote times. So 
  goes the theory of the spider cult.
  However, just as a single vibration disturbs the entire 
  web, so too does a single interference disturb the invisible 
  strands which bind all things on Earth. Priestesses are 
  therefore careful when implementing such magic, for they 
  realize they lack the wisdom of the Spider-God and cannot 
  predict the final outcomes. Tug too hard on any part of the 
  web, and one may find the center at which the priestess sits 
  becomes unstable. For Yezud’s magic, like the magic of the 
  Outer Dark, there is always a price — everything is connected.
  The Eyes of the Spider-God
  Everything alive is an eye of Mother Spider, humans espe-
  cially. The highest tier of priestesses can tap into the web of 
  Yezud and see through other eyes. While it does not always 
  work as intended — trying to see through the eyes of some-
  one in Nemedia may result in watching a warming fire in 
  the center of a Pict village — but the information obtained 
  is valuable. Unbeknownst to most, the cult of Yezud supplies 
  information to the guilds of Zamora, Hyborian kings, and 
  even Stygian priests. For a price, legend on the streets of 
  Yezud says, anything can be known.
  Allison looked at him curiously. “Did you ever read the ‘Unausprechlichen Kulten’?” 
  “What the devil’s that?” 
  “A book called ‘Nameless Cults,’ by a crazy German named Von Junzt — at least they said 
  he was crazy. Among other things he wrote of an age which he swore he had discovered — a 
  sort of historical blind spot. He called it the Hyborian Age. We have guessed what came 
  before, and we know what came after, but that age itself has been a blank space — no legends, 
  no chronicles, just a few scattered names that came to be applied in other senses.”  
  — Untitled Fragment
  
  B
  eyond the confines of this world, behind the thin 
  veneer of what we call reality, there lurks something 
  else. The vast darkness of the universe, the rolling 
  undercurrent of space and time which seethes and teems 
  with malignant life, utterly inimical to everything which we 
  have come to believe sane and truthful. In this vastness, we 
  are crawling parasites, latched onto the backs of ants. We 
  are even less, in truth, than this. We are nothing. Even the 
  strongest, most formidable and most daring of warriors is 
  helpless in the face of such power. Or so many would have 
  you believe. Whatever lurks in this Outer Dark, whatever 
  dread intelligences linger, waiting and ravening, in that 
  impossible blackness beneath all we know to be actual, they 
  are beyond our ken. But that does not mean one should 
  keep their steel any less sharp.
  AZATHOTH
  The Outer Dark is the truest beyond. It is the vastness 
  of space, the illimitability of time; it is the cosmos, the 
  wheeling suns, and the shrieking gulfs between them. 
  It is the raw stuff of the universe, before matter, before 
  form, and long, long before thought. And in the teeming 
  corruption of the Outer Dark, in its very center, there 
  exists Azathoth.
  In “The Nemedian Chronicles”, he is called the “Demon 
  Sultan” and is usually depicted surrounded by hideous 
  creatures; malformed jesters playing instruments to placate 
  Azathoth and ensure his endless slumber. In the fragments 
  of Valusian texts that have survived, in moldering tomes 
  owned by those whose grip on reality has become tenuous 
  enough to snap in an instant, Azathoth is called “the blind, 
  idiot god, at the center of the universe.”
  Azathoth is these things, and the crazed, reeling universe 
  itself. All that exists in space and time are merely flakes 
  from his vast unconsciousness, tumbling away from their 
  source and becoming less and less real as they do so. Soon, 
  the Hyborian Age will give way to another epoch and eons 
  later, the world and the cosmos in which it exists will rupture 
  entirely. Then it will become just one more failed reality; 
  for Azathoth is the only entity in existence not subject to 
  I glimpsed that terrible end once. The end into which 
  we are all condemned. Keep your false Hells and your 
  tawdry Heavens. There is only Azathoth. What a 
  jest is life! To pretend that we are not already his!
  — Unaussprechlichen Kulten, Friedrich von Junzt
  THINGS FROM THE OUTER DARK
  CHAPTER 4
  Beyond the worlds vague ghosts of monstrous things; half-seen 
  columns of unsanctified temples that rest on nameless rocks beneath 
  space and reach up to dizzy vacua above the spheres of light and 
  darkness. And through this revolting graveyard of the universe the 
  muffled, maddening beating of drums, and thin, monotonous whine of 
  blasphemous flutes from inconceivable, unlighted chambers beyond 
  Time; the detestable pounding and piping whereunto dance slowly, 
  awkwardly, and absurdly the gigantic, tenebrous ultimate gods.
  — “Nyarlathotep”, H.P. Lovecraft
  
  CHAPTER 4
  48
  the laws of entropy. There is no element of Azathoth which 
  is ever fixed; merely infinite, unending chaos.
  Only those who have penetrated the mysteries of the 
  Outer Dark to the fullest degree can even approach such a 
  realization and, even then, it cannot be truly put into words. 
  Every description of Azathoth is futile, for how does one 
  describe everything?
  The most learned sorcerers have on occasion claimed that 
  all magic stems from Azathoth himself; that to manipulate 
  the world as do the Seers of Yimsha or the priests of Set is to 
  draw on Azathoth’s essence. Could this be the case? And, if 
  it is, what does it mean for those whose magical workings 
  wreak such terrible effects upon flesh, bone, and dark earth? 
  Does it mean that they risk drawing Azathoth’s power into 
  themselves, even for the merest second?
  Those who loathe both magic and its practitioners claim 
  that this is indeed the case; that all magic stems from the 
  mad god, and that using it risks awakening him. What this 
  means, what it could possibly mean to awake a being who 
  is at one and the same time a god and the universe itself, is 
  beyond even the most maddened prophet to describe. But 
  perhaps this explains why certain texts — The Book of Eibon, 
  the Pnakotic Manuscripts, and Unaussprechlichen Kulten 
  itself — all refer to Nyarlathotep as being the messenger 
  of Azathoth. Perhaps the vindictiveness with which the 
  Black Pharaoh toys with magicians is because he seeks to 
  keep Azathoth whole. Or simply dormant.
  And who knows if any of this is true? Azathoth. The 
  name for the inevitable end of all things?
  Some have pointed to obscure texts whose meaning 
  was lost centuries hence. They claim Azathoth is merely 
  a symbol. Like the phoenix is the symbol of Mitra, so is 
  Azathoth the symbol of the apocalypse.
  This does not explain those seers who, in seeking to cast 
  their minds into the past, drove themselves mad — they all 
  mutter the name “Azathoth” again and again to themselves 
  as though it were the only word they have ever learned. 
  They have seen something in the immensity of the past, 
  just as those sorcerers who would draw upon the Outer 
  Dark must confront the eddying darkness of the universe in 
  all its untamed infinity. Those sorcerers who are powerful 
  enough to grow old describe hideous dreams in which the 
  abyss from which they draw their power draws upon them 
  in turn; all to feed some vast, loathsome intelligence which 
  waits, invisible and impatient.
  Who is there to worship Azathoth? Only those whose 
  minds have long been lost to them, who gibber and scrape 
  at themselves on the dust-choked streets of Vendhya or in 
  the overflowing markets of Shadizar. As they huddle into 
  themselves, bones jutting upwards from beneath paper-
  thin flesh, sometimes they howl the name. Sometimes they 
  smear it on to walls in blood and excrement. Sometimes, 
  when spurned by a merchant they implore to give them 
  coin, they level a curse at the one who kicked them from his 
  
  49
  THINGS FROM THE OUTER DARK
  path and claim his soul for Azathoth. Perhaps then, some 
  theologians offer, Azathoth is merely a god amongst the 
  beggars. A half-remembered legend, sustained only among 
  the lost, the broken, and the maimed.
  All these things are possible. All of them are true.
  FATHER DAGON
  Dagon. It is a name without origin. The etymologies which 
  even the subtlest linguists apply to the name do not stretch 
  nearly far back enough to approach the true antiquity of the 
  term. Dagon was used to describe something long before 
  the land split asunder, long before the rise of the Sons of 
  Aryas. It is a name that causes even men of the hardiest 
  and most resolute nature to feel a thrill of atavistic fear 
  at its utterance.
  Sometimes Dagon is the name of a place — a stretch 
  of dank water wherein dreadful things lurk and ancient 
  treasures might be found. Sometimes it is the name of a vast, 
  sinuous water creature which drags itself on to the ships 
  of merchants and pirates alike and wreaks bloody carnage 
  upon any who stray too near to the obelisk which it seems 
  to protect. Sometimes, it is a name invoked by croaking 
  voices, filled with the terrible ecstasy of dark worship. And 
  the truth? Dagon is all these things, all these things and 
  more. For Dagon is the essence of the water, the choking, 
  sucking darkness which lurks within the sea, always hungry, 
  always seeking to resume its dominion of the land and draw 
  everything back into itself, dragging the world, and all of 
  history, back into the endless depths.
  It is for this reason that when Dagon’s favored children, 
  the dwellers of the deep, gather in their shoals, they call 
  upon “Father Dagon and Mother Hydra”, the twin aspects 
  of the spirit of the sea. For it is through the interbreeding 
  of the dwellers of the deep with humankind along the 
  Argossean and Zingaran coasts that Dagon seeks to draw 
  the world beneath the waves, just as Dagon and Hydra gave 
  birth to the batrachian horrors which seethe in the vast 
  underwater places of Y’ha-nthlei.
  But the dwellers of the deep are not Dagon’s only progeny. 
  He also spawned the great sea lizards which pirates have 
  spoken of for many years in the hushed, frightened tones 
  of those who have seen death incarnate stand before them. 
  For sometimes, when the oceans themselves are parted 
  by the upheavals of the earth, the secret contents of the 
  sea are thrust into the harsh light of the sun. What exists 
  to protect such things, then? Dagon’s sentinels are those 
  enormous water-lizards, with vast scaly arms and a tail 
  tipped with serrated barbs. Dangerous, savage and capable 
  of dragging ships into the depths with all the effort a trained 
  archer requires to hit a charging enemy at a dozen yards, 
  the water-lizards are so powerful that they are frequently 
  mistaken for Dagon or Mother Hydra. But these creatures, 
  vast and potent thought they may be, are nothing but thralls, 
  worshippers at the altar of their submerged god.
  In the far distant past, Dagon’s children sometimes lived 
  above the water, in beautiful cities in sight of the water. 
  Storied Sarnath was one such city, until the early races of 
  “All in the band of the faithful — Order o’ 
  Dagon — an’ the children shud never die, 
  but go back to the Mother Hydra an’ Father 
  Dagon what we all come from onct —”
  — “The Shadow Over Innsmouth”,  
  H.P. Lovecraft
  LOVECRAFT AND HOWARD
  As has been noted in the Howard and Lovecraft sidebar 
  on page 282 of the CONAN corebook, Robert E. Howard 
  and H.P. Lovecraft were longtime friends and corre-
  spondents, even collaborating briefly on a round-robin 
  writing experiment with other pulp authors of their era. 
  Lovecraft generously encouraged other authors to freely 
  incorporate elements of “Yog-Sothery” (later dubbed “the 
  Cthulhu Mythos”) into their stories, and he reciprocated 
  by doing the same with their own literary contributions. 
  After a fan letter to Lovecraft, Howard became a member 
  of the group known informally as “The Lovecraft Circle”, 
  and their worlds became united in print.
  Howard’s contributions to the Cthulhu Mythos were 
  manifold, with Lovecraftian stories such as “The Black 
  Stone”, “The Haunter of the Ring”, “The Cairn on the 
  Headland”, “The Children of the Night” and “The Fire of 
  Asshurbanipal”. His contributions made their way into 
  Lovecraft’s own fiction — elements of Unaussprechlichen 
  Kulten and its doomed author, Friedrich von Junzt; the 
  serpent-men of Valusia; and the monstrous god Gol-
  goroth — ending up as vital parts of the Cthulhu Mythos.
  This influence spread to Howard’s Conan stories, taking 
  on the shapeless horrors of the Outer Dark or subterra-
  nean hells such as Thog, the haunter of the dreaming 
  city of Xuthal, and, for all intents and purposes, Howard 
  treated Lovecraft’s universe as writ, placing his Hyborian 
  Age wholly within it. For this reason, more than any other 
  author, the gamemaster is encouraged to utilize the crea-
  tures and entities of the Cthulhu Mythos freely within 
  Conan games, in the spirit of Conan’s creator himself.
  
  CHAPTER 4
  50
  men tore it down and cast the great statue of Bokrug — 
  the first and greatest of the water-lizards — into the deep 
  lake in which, ancient folklore states, Dagon and Hydra 
  were first spawned. The vengeance which was wrought 
  on Sarnath and its blasphemous population was swift and 
  terrible — the city itself was destroyed in a single night of 
  fire and slaughter as Dagon’s children swarmed from the 
  lake to take back all that they had offered to the land as a 
  gift. Some bards, when recounting this ancient tale, claim 
  that the enmity which Father Dagon feels towards the land 
  is the result of these prehistoric events.
  But there are other stories that explain the creation 
  of Dagon. Some say that Dagon is a servitor of Cthulhu; 
  something the great priest brought with him from the 
  stars to the city of R’lyeh, to guard the place where he lies, 
  asleep, waiting. To others, Dagon is merely a myth dreamt 
  up by sailors to explain the hostility of the sea to their 
  flimsy ships and tattered sails. But those who have seen 
  the maddened devotion gleaming in the bulbous wet eyes 
  of the dwellers of the deep at prayer know better than to 
  doubt the existence of Father Dagon. For, one day, the 
  seas will eventually consume the land again and Dagon 
  will emerge from the depths to prowl the earth which has 
  been made his domain.
  GOL-GOROTH AND 
  TSATHOGGUA
  It is said that there is an ancient book in which one can read 
  of many strange and wondrous things; of ancient Lemuria 
  which sank into the covetous embrace of the ocean; and 
  of a time when Hyperborea was covered, not in ice and 
  not in sand, but in thick, impenetrable jungle. This book 
  was written by a man long dead who, so legend says, had 
  only one hand. Within this strange volume, the pages of 
  which are made from the skin of an animal which no longer 
  strides the earth, one can read the name of an ancient and 
  terrible being, Gol-goroth. The great, black, monstrous, 
  tentacled, winged, and scaled form… a repulsive demon 
  whose cult was ancient when the continents upon which 
  men and women now stride were inchoate, scarcely free of 
  the churning waters of the primal earth. Worshipped with 
  blood and with pain and with degradation. Fed with the 
  corpses of children in the sight of the towers of obsidian, 
  the god is glutted on pain and terror and the pandemoniac 
  howling of cultists, human and not.
  And yet, this can be said to be only one aspect of the 
  creature. For there are other tales about it — tales which 
  refer to a stranger, more peculiar legendry. In these, the 
  god’s name is different and its taste for blood fluctuates, 
  yet it is never as desperate for the stuff as when it is called 
  Gol-goroth. The strangeness of those creatures which we 
  only know of in the gibberings of men, whose minds could 
  not comprehend the things which their pen-scratchings 
  sought to circumscribe, go by many names. Sometimes, 
  they are unrecognizable as themselves, so divergent are the 
  descriptions and qualities ascribed to the things. But in this 
  case, we may safely aver that the same thing is spoken of in 
  both cases. How else could one explain the parallels? Gol-
  goroth and Tsathoggua, two creatures of ancient, blackest 
  myth are in truth the same.
  Of what is Tsathoggua a god? No one knows. What does 
  he seek and desire? Impossible to divine. What is it that his 
  worshippers, scattered and deluded as they may be, offer 
  him in their mad rituals? None can say. The only thing that 
  can be said for Tsathoggua is that he endures. There are, of 
  course, rumors as to the behavior and desires of the strange, 
  squat creature which crawls from the bowels of the earth 
  to receive the bloody tributes of deranged devotees. The 
  first of these rumors concerns Tsathoggua’s nature — is he 
  a god, a creature of the Outer Dark, or a demon?
  Some have opined that, in fact, Tsathoggua is all these 
  things simultaneously. It is why his name is given as that of 
  an impossibly ancient deity in a version of the Hyperborean 
  landscape which, as any who have travelled that snowy 
  And have I not seen that squat, blasphemous 
  thing atop the ancient pillar and listened, ears 
  bloodied, to the noise of drums and the shriek 
  of the whip. Animal faces in furious array, 
  screeching worship to that black form which 
  watched over everything… imperturbable and 
  eternal… a vast toad, a bat, I cannot tell, save 
  that it surveyed the carnival of horror conducted 
  beneath it, in its honor, with the disinterest of 
  a God. Only later did I learn the thing’s name, 
  Gol-goroth, which some men dub… Tsathoggua.
  — Unaussprechlichen Kulten, 
  Friedrich von Junzt
  
  51
  THINGS FROM THE OUTER DARK
  wasteland can attest, is impossible to conceive of. It is 
  why a fat, bloated toad-thing upon an obsidian pillar is 
  acclaimed by that implausible name in an age yet to be 
  detailed in the most far-reaching prophet’s visions. It is 
  why strange men in cities buried deep beneath the earth 
  offer their souls in sacrifice to Zhothaqquah; one of the 
  many names the vast toad-thing is known by as it smiles 
  to itself in the darkness. Tsathoggua is merely the name 
  for a thousand different entities who lurk in unhallowed 
  places and receive the sacrifices of degenerates as their 
  due. A thousand mouths, a million teeth, all part of the 
  same malevolent intelligence.
  It is this, of course, which makes Tsathoggua so different 
  from those other ravening things which have emerged from 
  the Outer Dark. The flabby mouth from which the creature’s 
  thick, leathery tongue protrudes is often drawn into a 
  malign smile. For that is Tsathoggua’s great pleasure — or, 
  so we must at least presume — to watch mankind contort 
  themselves, knowingly or not, in pursuit of ends they will 
  never understand. Men will spill blood and never know 
  why, but somewhere in the unravelling threads of life will 
  lie buried a plan that the strangely furred god has sought 
  to bring about for reasons impossible to fathom.
  And while it is true that Tsathoggua does not, apparently, 
  seek to lay low Koth or Shem, or secure the obeisance of 
  the Hyrkanians, his influence on the world is as great as 
  any god. If the strange actions of the assassin who kills a 
  child apparently on a whim were to be thoroughly unfolded 
  and understood, it would be the sloppy grin of Tsathoggua 
  at its ultimate point.
  Tsathoggua is impossible to understand, impossible 
  to reason with; he is the fattening, slothful god watching 
  as mankind slaughters itself for his pleasure. He is the 
  watching god; the endless observer. As blood and battle and 
  rapine is enacted, Gol-goroth simply smiles and relishes 
  the scent of blood tinging the air. However docile he may 
  seem, Tsathoggua’s presence stirs the demoniac lusts of 
  those who stumble into his presence, or else will unleash 
  the capacity for violence in the very substance and matter 
  of those things too close to the god’s ugly, misshapen form.
  Tsathoggua revels in the shedding of blood, the shrieks 
  of suffering, the breaking bodies of the innocent. This is no 
  moral depravity — Tsathoggua, or Gol-goroth, is beyond 
  such petty considerations. He is a creature devoted purely to 
  the cultivation of his pleasure. A universal epicurean. The 
  god of debauchery. He will grant power to the most vicious 
  and savage of sorcerers who invoke his name or else reach 
  blindly into the Outer Dark in search of power, knowing 
  he will be able to gorge on the suffering left in their wake, 
  tongue lolling like a wolfhound about to fasten its teeth on 
  the throat of its quarry.
  GREAT CTHULHU
  What dread things linger in the interstices of men’s dreams 
  and the tangible world into which they awake? What impos-
  sible creatures have survived cataclysm and destruction, 
  waiting for their time to recur and for the world to be made 
  ready for their coming? The age of the Hyborians is a glim-
  mering candle surrounded by the vast, overwhelming 
  darkness of epochs past and eras to come. Within that 
  darkness of time and space Cthulhu waits, as he has always 
  waited and as he shall continue to wait until the stars align 
  in those strange constellations which no man or woman 
  has ever witnessed above the Earth but which some have 
  glimpsed in dreams.
  It is the world of dreams in which Cthulhu lives and 
  weaves the impossibly elaborate threads of belief, horror, 
  and power which will one day result in his return. Then he 
  will rise from the vast deeps beneath the oceans where his 
  hideous city of R’lyeh sank millions of years before man’s 
  basest ancestors dragged themselves on to the shorelines 
  which would become Atlantis and Thule and then Acheron 
  and beyond.
  R’lyeh, the city of madness which only those sensitive to 
  Great Cthulhu’s dreams have seen since it vanished beneath 
  the waves, remains submerged, but fragments of it have 
  occasionally been found by those pirates and brigands who 
  sail the eastern seas. These strange fragments, of no known 
  earthly mineral, are sometimes found floating upon the 
  surface of the water itself and sometimes washed along the 
  shoreline. Sorcerers prize these fragments highly, paying 
  vast sums to obtain such a potent material. Of course, many 
  ships that have found these slivers of eldritch masonry have 
  been found weeks later, beached on the Zingaran coast, 
  with the entire crew slaughtered or else missing, without 
  any sign of where they might have gone.
  “I saw its bloated, repulsive and unstable outline 
  against the moonlight and set in what would have 
  been the face of a natural creature, its huge, blinking 
  eyes which reflected all the lust, abysmal greed, 
  obscene cruelty and monstrous evil that has stalked 
  the sons of men since their ancestors moved blind 
  and hairless in the treetops. In those grisly eyes were 
  mirrored all the unholy things and vile secrets that 
  sleep in the cities under the sea, and that skulk from 
  the light of day in the blackness of primordial caverns.”
  — “The Black Stone”
  
  CHAPTER 4
  52
  In the recesses of ancient temples where the most blood-
  thirsty cults once worshipped, dark things dwell. Creatures 
  with tentacles which seek to ensnare and feast upon the flesh 
  of men. It is said that these sinister things are themselves 
  facets of Cthulhu’s restless dreaming; psychic slivers that 
  slough off the dormant god beneath the waves. So fecund 
  with power is Cthulhu, even in his sunken prison, that his 
  thoughts can insinuate themselves into the fabric of real-
  ity, taking physical and deadly form. Some invoke these 
  creatures deliberately, attempting to bind them to their 
  will and wreak dreadful vengeance on those who might 
  have spurned them or taunted them or caused them pain. 
  To do so is dangerous not simply for the pact-maker, but 
  for all who live upon the land and would breathe free air. 
  For Cthulhu is the great priest whose final ritual will end 
  the world of men and bring it again under the sway of the 
  Great Old Ones. To draw upon his power is to hasten the 
  moment that the stars will become right, and Cthulhu shall 
  at last stir in the deeps.
  Among his degenerate cultists, it is said that all that 
  occurs in the world is merely another sacrament in this 
  inevitable rite. Even as Mitra seeks to assist those who 
  pray to him, Cthulhu dreams of slaughter and fire and 
  destruction. Even as Set’s priests slice hearts from chests 
  and cast them into the maws of ravening serpents, Cthulhu 
  dreams of Stygian temples tumbling into the dust. What 
  matters an individual man in dreams which can shift 
  continents and rearrange the stars themselves? What 
  matters the victim on the sacrificial altar to the knife 
  poised above their breast?
  Cthulhu is that doom which haunts all mankind, even 
  its greatest warriors and heroes. Even as the mightiest 
  edifices of Aquilonia will one day be ruins and then even 
  less than that, so too does Cthulhu perceive the world on 
  which men take their life. And yet, men persist in living 
  and dying and loving and fighting. Cthulhu’s children 
  might creep through the hidden corridors of abandoned 
  palaces and yet, even these, these fragments of raw dream-
  ing can be subjected to the sharp bite of steel; this, then, 
  is the truth of it. Cthulhu’s servants may try to raise their 
  dark god from his slumber and bring about the ending of 
  the many empires of man. And yet man may still prolong 
  himself and his world via the sweat of his brow and the 
  trueness of his sword.
  NYARLATHOTEP
  The Black Pharaoh… the Messenger of the Old Ones… the 
  Black Man… the Haunter of the Dark… the Thing in the 
  Yellow Mask… Nyarlathotep has too many names and 
  too many forms to list them, or to even think of doing so. 
  The messenger of the Gods is infinite and his true form — 
  the one which lies buried beneath the thousand external 
  masks — is impossible to guess at, although those wizards 
  who have dared to penetrate furthest into the Outer Dark 
  and returned with their tongues still in their heads, have 
  gibbered about the “living night” or the “infinite wyrm”. 
  The most unfortunate have screamed the words ‘the Pharos, 
  the Pharos and the glinting light!’ before their minds sever 
  the last, tangible thread of sanity and their hearts cease to 
  beat entirely. What these words might mean, what they 
  might be trying so desperately to describe in a language 
  which cannot encompass such things, it is futile to guess.
  The figure, which was finally passed slowly 
  from man to man for close and careful study, 
  was between seven and eight inches in height, 
  and of exquisitely artistic workmanship. It 
  represented a monster of vaguely anthropoid 
  outline, but with an octopus-like head whose 
  face was a mass of feelers, a scaly, rubbery-
  looking body, prodigious claws on hind and 
  fore feet, and long, narrow wings behind.
  — “The Call of Cthulhu”, H.P. Lovecraft
  
  53
  THINGS FROM THE OUTER DARK
  The Hyborian Age has seen many visits by Nyarlathotep. 
  Pictish shamans, when recounting the ancient memories of 
  their tribe, sometimes speak of the Black One who appeared 
  in the land of Valusia, in the months before the sea drank 
  Atlantis and split the continent in two. In Zamboula, the 
  oldest and most venerable crime lords still mutter of the 
  wanderer who began to remove his face — repeatedly — 
  while men went insane all about him and began to claw 
  out their own eyes. Were these apparitions Nyarlathotep 
  himself or one of his avatars or servants? For the Haunter 
  of the Dark has servants.
  Nyarlathotep’s servants are legion and many do not 
  realize the true nature of the entity they deal with. Creatures 
  whose civilizations are alien to the soil of this earth have 
  fallen under his sway. Half-vegetable things whose neglected 
  cities fester and crumble at the inaccessible poles of the earth 
  have made pacts with his avatar known only as “the Black 
  Man”. When witches howl their prayers and incantations 
  beneath a moon stained crimson, it is to Nyarlathotep that 
  they offer themselves. Those rats with the face and hands 
  of men, chittering with laughter as they vanish into unre-
  ality — these are also the servitors of Nyarlathotep, flitting 
  between the vertices of the universe to offer power to those 
  who crave it. Of course, this power is not given freely. The 
  price which the recipient must pay changes, according to 
  Nyarlathotep’s whims, but all must make their sign in the 
  black book held by their faceless god.
  Those who offer themselves up to Nyarlathotep must 
  be prepared to step into the Outer Dark and travel to the 
  unseen places where the fringes of thought and time and 
  space have begun to unravel, unspooling into the infinite 
  night. None return from this unchanged. And what do 
  these desperate men and women gain in return? Sometimes 
  it is immortality, but of the most squalid kind, sustained 
  through the sacrifice of children and the exercise of terror. 
  Some have become kings and queens under Nyarlathotep’s 
  patronage, but these gifts seldom last long. And typically, 
  they end in slaughter and fire. Nyarlathotep is a fickle god 
  and, most terrifyingly for those who have seen the results, 
  the possessor of a sense of humor.
  The capriciousness of the Messenger of the Old Ones is 
  legendary. In those Pictish myth-cycles which vaguely recall 
  the sinking of Atlantis and the death throes of Lemuria, it 
  is said that the Black One whose arrival heralded the great 
  upheaval of the earth was offended by a courtier of Valusia. 
  The courtier refused to throw dice with the Black One — a 
  tall, thin stranger, swaddled in black robes and with skin 
  the color of night, no skin tone at all. The stranger’s luck, 
  said the courtier, could only be the result of falsehood. The 
  Black One cursed the courtier, claiming that his luck did 
  not have to be forced; that Valusia had finally run out of 
  luck and those within the city would soon learn the truth 
  of this. Within a month the oceans rose and dashed the 
  world to pieces. It is not known how the Picts came to learn 
  this strange tale, but they are an ancient race, and some 
  have been companions to kings in scarcely-remembered 
  epochs of the world.
  Nyarlathotep is more than can be recounted here. More 
  than can be encompassed by the simple minds of men, no 
  matter how willing a man or woman might be to fracture 
  theirs in pursuit of such knowledge. Nyarlathotep is that 
  thing which lurks far beyond the clash of civilizations and 
  the ferocious liberty of the barbarian, far beyond human-
  kind’s meager apprehension of the cosmos, far beyond the 
  petty ambitions of those who would rule and those who 
  would subjugate. If Nyarlathotep takes an interest in the 
  affairs of mortals, it is for some dark purpose impossible to 
  imagine. Those who fall under his gaze should simply hope 
  they amuse him enough to be spared, and not so much as 
  to become his playthings.
  SHUB-NIGGURATH
  A god of fertility also known as the Black Goat of the Woods, 
  the Mother of a Thousand Young, the Ram of the Bursting 
  Womb, and many other names, Shub-Niggurath has been 
  worshipped in many lands and under many different names, 
  as a representation of unnatural, terrifying fertility and 
  abundance in all its forms.
  She may appear as a woman in a yellow cloak, an earth 
  mother, a woman with three heads, a white heifer, a satyr, 
  a giant fungus, a swarm of flies, or even as a great, fecund 
  mass of boiling matter that ceaselessly spawns and reab-
  sorbs heads and appendages in a multitude of forms. Shub-
  Niggurath usually manifests as female, but may also appear 
  as male, as hermaphroditic, or as a fluid gender.
  The cult of Shub-Niggurath is widespread and can be 
  found in many cultures. She is usually worshipped in secret 
  as part of the mysteries within a cult of another god such 
  Woe! Woe! For when Nyarlathotep emerges from 
  the desert… then shall all things crumble, then 
  shall the night be stricken with the raving of men 
  and women and children. Then shall the earth 
  itself tremble with revulsion at his passage. 
  Nyarlathotep! Great God, lord of misrule, I have 
  heard the trump of doom echo in the syllables of your 
  murmured name. I have seen the crazed darkness 
  from which you step. Nyarlathotep! Hear me!
  — Unaussprechlichen Kulten, 
  Friedrich von Junzt
  
  CHAPTER 4
  54
  as Derketa, Ishtar, Adonis, and other fertility gods. She is 
  known by the Picts and other savage tribes as part of their 
  fertility cults.
  Rites to Shub-Niggurath are usually held in sacred groves, 
  and her altars abound with emblems of fertility and fecun-
  dity such as sheaves of grain, baskets of fish, cornucopia, 
  yellow lotus, ivy, young animals, and dolls or statues of 
  infants. Her major celebrations usually take place in the 
  spring to coincide with planting and in the fall following 
  the harvest. Her worship often includes orgiastic revels 
  fuelled by wine of the Black Lotus, psychedelic mushrooms, 
  or other intoxicants. Sacrifices to Shub-Niggurath are of 
  animals or humans in which the offerings are bound to 
  trees and then cut or whipped.
  She is said to reside in the underground city of Harag-
  Kolath, somewhere beyond Stygia, where she awaits the 
  return of Hastur, the Unspeakable One.
  THE KING IN YELLOW
  In the depths of Zembabwei, at the extreme south of one 
  of the great savannahs which form that nation’s sweeping 
  terrain, there is a canyon. The canyon is protected from the 
  wind and the rain, and immune to the desultory beating 
  of the sun. Within the canyon, time has stayed still; there 
  is nothing to disrupt the air, nothing to erode the bones of 
  the animals who have staggered here and died. Few people 
  will venture to the canyon for it has an evil reputation, 
  with a dozen or more stories of vanishing children, and of 
  ethereal voices drifting from the parched earth. But some 
  scholars will make the long journey, the pilgrimage, to this 
  secluded little spot.
  Generations ago — though how many it is impossible to 
  tell — some ancient artist drew something here, something 
  which the canyon has preserved, immaculate and complete, 
  though it would have been better had time effaced these 
  images completely. There are dozens of pictograms, unmis-
  takably painted by the same hand, an obsessive sequence of 
  symbols. And in the center of this wall of symbols, there is 
  a single humanoid figure. A masked man, wearing a crown, 
  and wrapped in a yellow robe.
  The King in Yellow. A plague which has not spread itself 
  through the myriad kingdoms of the Hyborian Age. Not 
  yet, anyway.The King in Yellow, the masked regent of lost 
  Carcosa, requires language to truly manifest himself, and 
  there are not enough literate minds in the world today. Too 
  much was lost in the previous age — too much knowledge 
  which the Valusians hoarded and which ultimately caused 
  their downfall — for any such arcane wisdom to be handed 
  down in any but the most adulterated and eroded forms.
  In cryptic hints which the few remaining manuscripts 
  contain, some scholars believe that there was once a drama 
  enacted in the court of the last king of Valusia — a drama 
  whose content is not recorded and whose reception seems 
  to have been rapturous — and yet, the play was never per-
  formed again, all who saw it were butchered and, soon after 
  its great enactment, Valusia was destroyed and the world 
  reshaped. It was this drama that brought the specter of the 
  King to the world — that gave him and his ilk a foothold, 
  here, in this realm. How much of this is true and how much 
  the delusions of men and women whose minds have been 
  whittled away by endless studies of musty papyri, it is 
  impossible to tell.
  Speak not the name, glimpse not the face, 
  remove not the mask. What lies beyond them 
  must not be known! Let all who seek to hear 
  that dread whisper know only the despair of 
  the endless night! Go from them and do not 
  listen to their words for they are abomination! 
  The Yellow King: look for his coming, for 
  the signs shall show you, right enough.
  — Unaussprechlichen Kulten, 
  Friedrich von Junzt
  
  55
  THINGS FROM THE OUTER DARK
  Some of these scholars, those few who have dedicated 
  themselves to this bizarre idea of what spelled Valusia’s fall, 
  speak of the King as the puppet of an older, more dreadful 
  entity still. The Nameless God. This dread thing, they insist, 
  whose true name can never be spoken and never disclosed 
  but which men have come, in their petty, insubstantial 
  knowledge of the cosmos to call Hastur. And it is Hastur, 
  the black heart of the black star that is Carcosa, who spreads 
  himself throughout reality, like a cancer, in the form of the 
  King in Yellow, drawing all things to him, drawing them 
  down into the black lake of Hali. The black lake, on the 
  black star at whose black heart lies Hastur, He Who is Not 
  to Be Named.
  Is there a cult, still living in the age of the Hyborians, 
  dedicated to the Yellow King? There may be, perhaps, some-
  where. A wretched thing, degenerate and ruined, scarcely 
  comprehending the magnitude of the blasphemy it might 
  bring into the world. These cults pose little threat to those 
  who might meet them, too degraded and broken to pose 
  much threat to any but the most naïve and ill-trained of 
  adventurers and mercenaries. Very occasionally, a sacrificial 
  victim might be taken, a young cowherd from a small village 
  for example, or a straggler from a merchant’s caravan. But 
  even this is rare and done only as a reflex; too much activity 
  might result in mercenaries being hired to hunt down the 
  kidnappers and the extermination of the cult would not 
  be hard to achieve.
  The Yellow King’s power lies not, as that of so many other 
  terrible creatures, in the cult that worships him. Those 
  who are poisoned by the Yellow King’s whispering, drawn 
  to him and distorted by his will, are typically individuals; 
  those same individuals who pore through the wisdom 
  of lost civilizations, who piece together truth from the 
  palimpsests and abraded codices of fallen libraries, torched 
  archives, and repositories of secrets which should have 
  been left alone. As their fingers trace the loops and whorls 
  of forgotten alphabets and syllabaries, the King in Yellow 
  infects them. As they mutter the words to themselves to 
  try to form the unfamiliar consonants, to make sense of 
  the noises which dead people uttered as articulate speech, 
  the Yellow King bleeds into their mind.
  Once this infection has taken hold, these men and 
  women have become the pawns of Hastur, dedicated to 
  the proliferation of his message, to the dread gospel of the 
  Yellow King. And there is only one means to spread such 
  madness; any whose minds are consumed by the words or 
  the signs of Hastur will soon after attempt to draw their 
  version of the Yellow Sign. The nature of the Sign is diffi-
  cult to identify precisely, for it changes depending on the 
  individual who is to make it. The Yellow Sign is merely a 
  focus for the Yellow King’s influence — it can be formed via 
  a drawing etched into a wall, a dramatic piece of writing or 
  music or painting; it can be a totem made from rocks, or a 
  robe woven from yellow silk. All it requires is the focus of 
  the creator and the investiture of their life energies. The 
  forging of the Yellow Sign will always claim the life of its 
  maker — though they will not die immediately; instead, the 
  maker of the Yellow Sign will linger, a slowly decomposing 
  husk, trying to ensure that the Sign is passed on. Once this 
  has occurred, the maker will crumble into dust, its task 
  complete, the parasite which animated it passed on. The 
  Yellow King spreads — a maddening plague, consuming 
  the minds and souls of those who seek him and his true 
  master, lying beneath the black lake; the black heart of 
  the black star.
  THE FELLOWSHIP OF 
  THE YELLOW SIGN
  There are, as noted above, a few cults who are dedicated 
  to the Yellow King and to the god of Carcosa, but these are 
  populated entirely by the mad and the truly broken. Those 
  who are unable to create a Yellow Sign, or those whose 
  minds were dangerously unhinged before they encoun-
  tered the unique linguistic chaos of the Yellow King, do not 
  become bearers of the message. Those who do, however, 
  are referred to as the Fellowship of the Yellow Sign. While 
  the corruption of the Yellow King will bestow few physical 
  benefits on those subjected to it and will use the same base 
  statistics they would have had prior to exposure, there are 
  a few things worth noting.
  Speaking with them or attempting to engage in pro-
  longed conversation with them is equivalent to touching 
  or handling a Yellow Sign (see The Yellow Sign, page 56, 
  for more detail on its effects). If passed on the street, or 
  encountered huddled in the corner of a mud hut, a member 
  “I saw the moon dripping with spray; and beyond, 
  the towers of Carcosa rose behind the moon.
  Death and the awful abode of lost souls, whither 
  my weakness long ago had sent him, had changed 
  him for every other eye but mine. And now I heard 
  his voice, rising, swelling, thundering through the 
  flaring light, and as I fell, the radiance increasing, 
  increasing, poured over me in waves of flame. 
  Then I sank into the depths, and I heard the King 
  in Yellow whispering to my soul: “It is a fearful 
  thing to fall into the hands of the living God!”
  — “In the Court of the Dragon”, 
  Robert W. Chambers
  
  CHAPTER 4
  56
  of the Fellowship will utter only one sentence, “Have you 
  found the Yellow Sign?” Hearing this sentence will not 
  trigger any special effects. However, any extensive query 
  or discussion about the Yellow Sign initiated by the player 
  characters, or their participation in such conversations, 
  is equivalent to encountering the Yellow Sign. The game-
  master is discouraged from doing so without warning to 
  the player characters, perhaps by spending Doom to inflict 
  minor maladies or profound discomfort (Resolve or Trauma) 
  upon them. By this point, the Fellowship are merely hollow 
  vessels, carrying the spore of the Yellow King until they 
  know the disease has been passed on.
  If the player characters interrupt the member of the 
  Fellowship while crafting their Yellow Sign, they will be 
  entirely ignored, unless they attempt to interfere in which 
  case they will be violently attacked. At this point, the Yellow 
  Sign will not be able to infect the player characters and 
  the member of the Fellowship will not be able to speak to 
  them. This is the only point at which the player characters 
  would be safe to engage with the Yellow Sign without risk 
  of contamination.
  THOG THE ANCIENT
  Born in a remote and twilit plane where the laws of matter 
  hold no sway, Thog was driven by unimaginable lusts and 
  deplorable hungers; raw needs beyond any hope of fulfill-
  ment. Seeing no means to sate these desires, Thog swam 
  up from that cold, bleak place and into a grotto far beneath 
  the surface of the Earth, a place existing in two worlds at 
  once. From there, it discovered Earth. Time and again over 
  the millennia Thog crawled forth, up to the lighted surface 
  in search of something to quench its fiendish appetites.
  Eventually Thog discovered humankind, and in these 
  frail vessels, Thog found sustenance.
  The passage of aeons is nothing to one such as Thog, 
  and it remained unaware of the changes that transpired 
  in the surface world — the cataclysmic shift of landscape 
  and the rise and fall of civilizations. Time and again Thog 
  climbed up to the surface from its dark pool, first arriving 
  at a simple oasis in the desert and later to the city that been 
  built around that oasis by the folk of Xuthal, who came 
  from the east. Soon, but not soon enough, the people of 
  Xuthal learned the terrible nature of what lay below them.
  THE YELLOW SIGN
  A creation of black sorcery, madness and obsession, the 
  Yellow Sign may conceivably be anything. A player char-
  acter may accidentally pick up an object, or witness some-
  thing, which has become a Yellow Sign without anyone 
  having realized it. This will only become apparent when 
  its effects begin to take hold. The gamemaster should, 
  however, indicate that this is something profound and 
  potentially harmful, perhaps by immediately inflicting 
  1§ Mental damage at the cost of 1 Doom.
  If one or more of the player characters come into close 
  contact with a Yellow Sign and does not reject it or get 
  out of sight of it, they must make an initial Daunting 
  (D3) Discipline test.
  ■
  ■ Failing this causes 6§ mental damage. The 
  player character is also rendered effectively 
  immobile; they cannot look away from the 
  Yellow Sign, in whatever form it has taken.
  ■
  ■ In the next round, the player character must 
  make a Dire (D4) Discipline test or take a further 
  8§ mental damage. Failing this test will mean 
  that the player characters are now fully in the 
  thrall of the King in Yellow. Should a companion 
  attempt to distract them from the Yellow Sign, 
  the player character ensnared by the influence 
  will immediately attack them until left alone 
  to continue contemplating the Yellow Sign. A 
  Daunting (D3) Counsel roll may snap them out of 
  the enthrallment. Rendering them unconscious 
  will also serve the same purpose.
  ■
  ■ The player character will then have one final 
  chance to throw off the effects of the Yellow 
  King’s spell; an Epic (D5) Discipline test. Failing 
  this will result in the player character becoming 
  a pawn of the Yellow King. They are effectively 
  soul-dead and entirely devoted to the propaga-
  tion of the Yellow Sign.
  This is potentially a fatal encounter for any single 
  player character or even the entire group, and the gam-
  emaster is discouraged from using it casually. Such an 
  encounter might be used as a tantalizing prelude to 
  an adventure, such as hearing about — or even better, 
  beholding — a non-player character’s reaction to the 
  Yellow Sign, or as a desperate move by the Fellowship 
  after the player characters have committed some act 
  against them.
  
  57
  THINGS FROM THE OUTER DARK
  At first, those of Xuthal struggled against Thog, using 
  all manner of devices and artifacts of incredible power. But 
  even armed with such wonders they could not prevail against 
  the god-monster’s might. Over its oasis they built a dome 
  to appease it, and allowed Thog to prey upon them, even 
  going so far as to make sacrifices from their own numbers, 
  lest it run rampant throughout the city and slay them all.
  Faced with this existential horror, the people of Xuthal 
  became resigned to it, escaping into a lotus-drugged dream 
  life, sleeping as much as they are able while Thog creeps 
  through the city and takes them, one by one, to feed its 
  insatiable, ghoulish lusts. Xuthal’s population has dwindled 
  from tens of thousands to mere hundreds, and eventually 
  Thog will devour the last of them, and it will be forced to 
  leave this forgotten place in search of new sustenance.
  THOG THE ANCIENT 
  (NEMESIS, HORROR)
  ATTRIBUTES
  Awareness
  Intelligence
  Personality
  Willpower
  12
  6
  6
  12
  Agility
  Brawn
  Coordination
  12
  15 (3)
  12
  FIELDS OF EXPERTISE
  Combat
  5
  Movement
  3
  Fortitude
  5
  Senses
  1
  Knowledge
  2
  Social
  2
  STRESS AND SOAK
  ■
  ■ Stress: Vigor 23, Resolve 15
  ■
  ■ Soak: Armor 5 (Viscous Form), Courage 4 (Eldritch 
  Horror)
  ATTACKS
  ■
  ■ Barbed Tentacles (M): Reach 3, 11§, Knockdown
  ■
  ■ Loathsome Writhing Mass (T): Range C, 6§ 
  mental, Area, Piercing 1
  SPECIAL ABILITIES
  ■
  ■ Dread Creature 5
  ■
  ■ Extra-terrene: Thog’s body distorts light and 
  distance. Observing and describing the beast 
  accurately are difficult. The difficulty of all 
  Observation, Insight, and Ranged Weapons tests 
  against Thog is increased by one step.
  ■
  ■ Extradimensional Monstrosity: Thog is not 
  bound by the normal limits of space and time, and 
  thus gains two Standard Actions every turn.
  ■
  ■ Fear 3
  ■
  ■ Flight: It is unknown whether Thog walks, wrig-
  gles, flies, or creeps, Thog is exempt from gravity 
  and effects reliant on gravity, such as Knockdown.
  ■
  ■ Huge Shimmering Slimy Mass: Thog’s ever-shift-
  ing body of tentacles and dripping jelly makes it 
  difficult to land telling blows; Thog has 4§ Cover 
  Soak to all physical attacks.
  ■
  ■ Inured to Cold, Disease, Poison
  ■
  ■ Roaring, Snarling Beast: See Conan corebook, 
  page 322.
  ■
  ■ Unnatural Brawn 3
  DOOM SPENDS
  ■
  ■ Many Biting Mouths: When Thog hits a character 
  with its tentacles, Thog can spend 1 Doom to make 
  an additional attack with Many Biting Mouths 
  (melee): Reach 1, 9§, Vicious 1.
  ■
  ■ Phosphorescent Blood: If Thog suffers an Injury, 
  it bleeds a horrible sticky glowing blood. This can 
  illuminate more of Thog’s horrible form, which 
  allows Thog to spend 2 Doom to immediately 
  make a Loathsome Writhing Mass attack.
  ■
  ■ Venomous Whip: Some of Thog’s appendages 
  are razor-sharp flexible spines, like the tails of a 
  jellyfish. If Thog takes damage from melee, Thog 
  can spend 1 Doom to make an immediate melee 
  attack with Reach 3, 3§, Piercing 2, Toxic 3 
  damage. Thog cannot spend Doom to increase 
  this damage.
  HITHER CAME CONAN…
  When Conan and the slave Natala arrive in isolated Xuthal, 
  they encounter Thalis, a Stygian who has made Xuthal 
  her home, joining the sleeping folk in their ceaseless 
  dream-journeys. Seeking Conan for her own, Thalis 
  attempts to sacrifice Natala to Thog, but is taken in 
  Natala’s stead, suffering the brunt of Thog’s indiscriminate 
  tastes. When the god-monster returns to claim Natala, 
  Conan attacks it, sword in hand. He battles Thog unto 
  the point of near-death, causing Thog to plunge into the 
  abyss, returning to the dark pool from whence it came. 
  It is unknown whether Thog survived or if it was merely 
  one among many, perhaps even bearing offspring that 
  might plague humankind in other places.
  
  CHAPTER 4
  58
  YOG-SOTHOTH
  Beyond the ken of man there are other things. Yes, there 
  are those monstrous entities who tear at the fringes of the 
  Outer Dark, striving to break through into the universe in 
  which this world lazily rotates. But even here, beyond the 
  peripheries of normal vision, the very air itself is choked 
  with life we will never see nor understand. They occupy 
  the atmosphere we breathe in, struggle across the earth 
  on which we tread and yet we cannot sense them. They 
  do not occupy our dimension and yet they live alongside 
  us, even though, if we were detectable to them for even the 
  merest moment, they would consume us with the frenzy of 
  crocodiles fighting over the remnants of a kill.
  It is Yog-Sothoth that maintains the boundaries of the 
  universe and the boundaries of time, keeping them separate 
  or letting them bleed into one another, as it sees fit. This is 
  the nature of the entity whose name — a strange assortment 
  of vowels and consonants — seems to be some form of 
  human language. Even the wisest cannot guess the origins 
  of the words or their meaning, though it is said amongst 
  a peculiar cult in the depths of Shem to mean “Son of the 
  Strangler”. What this might tell one about Yog-Sothoth, 
  there is no guessing — and as to where the Shemite cult 
  found this information, the answer is even more mysterious, 
  especially if this translation is accurate.
  Like Nyarlathotep (page 52), Yog-Sothoth is regu-
  larly importuned by those who pursue sorcery and dark 
  magic as a means of slaking their earthly desires. Unlike 
  Nyarlathotep, who may appear to those who invoke him, 
  Yog-Sothoth remains distant, intangible and unknowable. 
  Stories are told of Yog-Sothoth begetting children on its 
  worshippers, insinuating some hideous corruption into 
  those unfortunates born of a blasphemous union between 
  the universe itself (for what is Yog-Sothoth save for the 
  cosmos’ own laws made manifest?) and human flesh.
  This strange heritage is almost impossible to obscure. 
  Whatever tainted union produced the child, the mark of 
  Yog-Sothoth is always upon them, warping and twisting 
  flesh into hideous parodies of earthly life in all its forms. 
  Ophidian flesh, mixed with insectile feelers and the spastic 
  fluttering of vestigial wings or fluctuating skin which alters 
  color, sometimes ceasing to exist entirely and revealing dark 
  abscesses in which loathsome parasites swell, waiting to 
  burst from beneath the flesh and crawl through the dark 
  places of the Earth.
  Yog-Sothoth is. That is the only thing that can be said of it 
  reliably. What form does Yog-Sothoth take? It is impossible 
  to say. Sometimes, the manifestation seems to be a series 
  of glittering, interlinked spheres manifesting a relentless 
  energy. Sometimes, Yog-Sothoth is simply a billowing cloud 
  of steam and abyssal vapor. Sometimes, an impossibly vast 
  spider the color of chalk. Yog-Sothoth is. In the darkest 
  books of prophecy, it is said that the Old Ones will return 
  to claim the earth, wiping away the remnants of mankind, 
  but is this merely Yog-Sothoth’s function, or its desire?
  Yog-Sothoth is the gate, the membrane through which 
  time and space must pass and through which all of time 
  and space is accessible; in Yog-Sothoth waits the inevitable 
  demise of the Hyborian Age, the collapse of Gunderland, 
  the swarm of the Picts over the border, the eruption of the 
  Earth to drive apart the continents and isolate man in new 
  nations. But with the right rituals, Yog-Sothoth can be 
  persuaded to offer glimpses of lost epochs and forgotten 
  kingdoms. If the direst rituals are carried out, then the 
  bonds of death themselves may be undone in Yog-Sothoth, 
  and ancient warriors may walk again among the living, 
  fearless and unbowed.
  For it is true, that all is one in Yog-Sothoth.
  The line between the vast gulfs of space, who keeps it? What thing draws the boundaries of 
  the universe? They name it Yog-Sothoth, those strange men who lurk in the mountains and 
  the hills. And he dwells between the darkness of this world and the darkness of a thousand 
  others. They say he lurks unseen between the twirling spheres of the cosmos, in hideous 
  splendour. He is, they murmur in their trances, the way through and the way beyond…
  — Unaussprechlichen Kulten, Friedrich von Junzt
  
  J
  ust as there are gods whose names are familiar to every 
  person alive beneath the Hyborian age sun, so too there 
  are deities known only to a few. Sometimes, these beings 
  are known only to certain classes of people — Asura, 
  worshipped in secrecy within the dreaming west, and 
  Crom, acknowledged but not worshipped in his land — or 
  to individual nations. Other gods will become better known 
  as the earth ages and the beliefs, and terrors, of those who 
  occupy the Earth also begin to shift and mature. Humankind 
  will know the name of the god Ymir, perhaps, without ever 
  remembering the barbaric rites performed in his honor in 
  the distant past.
  Who can truly tell what renders a god great and what 
  consigns them to a state of subordination in the grand 
  theologies of the world? Perhaps, in those entries listed 
  below, one might be able to determine some answer to 
  this question that has stood throughout human history…
  AHRIMAN
  Who, or what, Ahriman was is consigned to history; any 
  knowledge or certainty has been eroded by time and filched 
  by the accretion of myth and legend. Ahriman is a cipher, a 
  half-recalled figment, a name conjured with by those wishing 
  to render their petty magic tricks portentous. And, to those 
  few who still truly recall the stories and whispered fragments 
  of lore learned in the sanctums of strange, ancient cults, 
  the name Ahriman is one treated with reverence and fear.
  The Heart of Ahriman is the clearest trace left behind. 
  This strange article — rumored to be literally plucked from 
  the stars, or from between the ribs of a divine being — is 
  a source of almost limitless power. A black stone, pulsing 
  with cosmic potency, the Heart of Ahriman is capable of 
  turning aside even the blackest and most evil of sorceries. 
  For this reason, it has been sought after by all those who 
  would defeat the machinations of cruel, despotic men 
  and women, scheming in their chambers. It has also been 
  “No. His power is drawn from the black gulf. 
  But the Heart of Ahriman came from some far 
  universe of flaming light, and against it the 
  powers of darkness cannot stand, when it is in 
  the hands of an adept. It is like a sword that 
  might smite at him, not a sword with which he 
  can smite. It restores life, and can destroy life.”
  — Hadrathus, The Hour of the Dragon
  MINOR GODS AND CULTS
  CHAPTER 5
  “Well, I’m damned!” muttered Conan. “A priest who honestly 
  believes in his oracle, and can not be bribed. Crom!”
  — “The Servants of Bit-Yakin”
  
  CHAPTER 5
  60
  sought by these same plotting creatures, thoughts bent on 
  the assumption of power, seeking to contort the powers 
  congealed within the Heart to their own ends. Or, saving that, 
  preventing anyone else from accessing those same powers.
  How and why the Heart works as it does is a mystery far 
  beyond even the most brilliant and dedicated scholars of 
  the mystical to deduce. Some have proposed that it is one 
  of a dyad and that somewhere there is a stone, identical in 
  dimension, which performs the opposite function to the 
  Heart. Where the Heart of Ahriman quells the power of dark 
  sorcery, this hypothetical stone (called, in some treatises 
  the Soul of Ahriman) amplifies them. But, should such a 
  thing exist, it is likely to be found well beyond the limits 
  of this world and realm of reality.
  The fact that such a theory exists, and has such pertinac-
  ity amongst those who pore through the forgotten texts of 
  sunken lands, speaks to the fragments of knowledge which 
  still remain concerning Ahriman. In one such text, found 
  amidst charred bones and a series of weapons made of a 
  material not of this earth, Ahriman is referred to as a demon. 
  What is clear, however, in this peculiar text, is that the term 
  “demon” means something other than might be expected. 
  It does not refer to a dark, voracious beast drawn directly 
  from hell. It means something more or beyond human. It 
  means something vast and strange and puissant, but beyond 
  the narrow confines of human morality.
  Those versed in the religion of Iranistan claim that 
  Ahriman is a sliver of the great presiding spirit, Mahzdha; 
  that, where Mahzdha is the being which birthed the universe, 
  Ahriman is a fragment left over, a remnant of a previous 
  cosmos in which there was no life, no stars teeming in the 
  wheeling sky, no planets idly turning through rotations. 
  Only the pure darkness, a memory which all life attempts to 
  return to. Others make this apparent dichotomy even bolder 
  in contrast — stating that Ahriman is the dark reflection of 
  Mahzdha; that where Mahzdha is the progenitor of the earth 
  and the universe and all things lying within it, Ahriman is 
  the death of all things. The great nothingness into which 
  everything will one day pass.
  Who can say what is true and what is mere whimsy, 
  dreamt up by the deranged? Ahriman, if such a being has 
  ever existed, is beyond the feeble constraints of the human 
  mind to circumscribe. He is a being of vast power, and 
  if this being has ever meddled in the petty goings-on of 
  humankind, it is impossible to know. Certainly, in Iranistan, 
  Ahriman is treated as a god. Though rarely spoken of aloud, 
  he is sometimes prayed to in secret, and, though no temples 
  stand to him, all those who still recall the name of Mahzdha 
  as the creator of all things, revere Ahriman as his brother 
  — though none are clear on what that relationship might 
  truly mean.
  All that is truly known of Ahriman is the fact that his 
  Heart is still an object of awe and veneration. When Conan, 
  the King of Aquilonia, used it to defeat Xaltotun’s usurpation 
  of his kingdom, its legend was secured forever. Whether 
  the item in question truly is the heart of Ahriman, it is 
  impossible to divine. Perhaps the being, the demon, called 
  Ahriman has been dead for millennia, this artefact the 
  only thing remaining. Or perhaps Ahriman will one day 
  return to install it within his chest. Or perhaps it fell from 
  the stars, a lump of molten rock, at Ahriman’s behest, for 
  sometimes things from beyond our world intervene in its 
  affairs for reasons none can guess. Perhaps, where beings 
  of such vast power are concerned, ignorance is our most 
  precious asset.
  AJUJO
  An old god once fallen out of favor within the Black 
  Kingdoms and Tombalku. The dominant Aphaki ruling 
  class and priests worship Jhil and drove any other gods 
  out of the country. In Conan’s time, however, Ajujo’s 
  worship has enjoyed a resurgence among the common 
  people of Tombalku, through the direct intervention 
  of the new king, Sakumbe, and his witchman Askia. 
  When the two arrived, Askia’s display of sorcerous might, 
  granted by Ajujo, humiliated the priests of Jhil in front 
  of the common folk, and now Ajujo’s cult has become 
  more popular.
  Ajujo, the Dark One, is a god of magic, and his priests 
  are all accomplished witchmen and sorcerers, able to inflict 
  curses upon their enemies and disbelievers, and to accom-
  plish a great many feats of necromancy and alchemy.
  “Aphaki worship Jhil, but the blacks worship 
  Ajujo the Dark One, and his kin. Askia came 
  to Tombalku with Sakumbe, and revived 
  the worship of Ajujo, which was crumbling 
  because of the Aphaki priests. Askia made 
  black magic which defeated the wizardry of 
  the Aphaki, and the blacks hailed him as a 
  prophet sent by the dark gods. Sakumbe and 
  Askia wax as Zehbeh and Daura wane.”
  — Untitled Draft
  
  61
  MINOR GODS AND CULTS
  ASHTORETH
  Ashtoreth, or the Horned Lady, is revered by the Shemites as 
  a guardian, fiery warrior, and fierce lover. Where Adonis is 
  the beauty, strength, and primal need that rules over vegeta-
  tion and its corresponding circle of life, and where Ishtar is 
  the blindingly resplendent, all-encompassing erotic love and 
  passion, Ashtoreth is the ferocity of the protective mother. 
  She is fertility, hard-fought and aggressively defended.
  Statues and paintings of the Horned Lady often depict 
  the goddess as a naked warrior with midnight skin, belly 
  swollen with child, piercings in both nipples and nose. Her 
  bovine horns, strong and curved, are often sculpted with 
  tribal patterns. The Horned Lady is typically armed with 
  a bow — the preferred weapon of the Shemites — and is 
  often posed as if surveying her lands for threats. She is 
  beautiful in her watch, all at the same time a defender and 
  a symbol of ferocity, sacrifice, and the sustenance of human 
  life. Typically, she is joined by several lionesses; Ashtoreth 
  treats them as her sisters. Together, they hunt, they fight, 
  and they protect their children. While never outright seen 
  or heard, it is widely believed that in moments where fear 
  is crushed by a sudden and passionate resolve, Ashtoreth 
  has granted a sliver of her bravery.
  As part of their vows of priesthood, those sworn to the 
  service of this goddess will often match the Horned Lady 
  in her piercings, as well as mark their bodies with tattoos 
  like the ancient patterns on her horns. Whether male or 
  female, priests are usually just as fierce as Ashtoreth herself. 
  They encourage strength and self-reliance. Their chants 
  of praise are usually sung to the frantic beat of drums and 
  wild dancing which often turns to wild orgies. Everything 
  her priests do, they do with enthusiasm and passion; they 
  rarely look back on past mistakes, and instead choose only 
  to acknowledge what fate lies before them.
  As her legends were originally born of Shemite nomads, 
  it is perhaps unsurprising that many of the Horned Lady’s 
  stories are kept through song and story — an oral tradition 
  instead of a written one. Ashtoreth would likely have it no 
  other way. Why spend your life reading about her, when you 
  could face the wind and join her in her freedom?
  While Ashtoreth is usually depicted as the aggressive 
  warrior-mother among the nomadic tribes of Shem, it is 
  not uncommon to find that city temples dedicated to her 
  worship tend to focus more on her motherly aspect. The 
  lions are given more of a protector’s role, with the focus of 
  the goddess being that of a mother. The entranceways to 
  Ashtoreth’s temples are usually guarded by at least two lion 
  statues with gaping jaws and sharpened teeth.
  This change of personality creates strife within the faith. 
  The more traditional worshippers are known to demand, 
  “Why remove the Horned Lady’s power and turn her into 
  a cow to be milked?” At the same time, it creates tension 
  between those faithful to Ashtoreth and those who choose 
  to worship Ishtar. Where, they argue, did Ashtoreth get 
  her lions, her ferocity, her passionate love? Even the horns 
  Ashtoreth boldly sports are stolen from the swirling, magical 
  staff Ishtar wields, the accusers cry. Ishtar was the mother of 
  all long before Ashtoreth existed. Is her existence another 
  failed attempt from Ishtar’s ancient foe, Mitra, to erase her?
  It is ironic that this gentler, more maternal version of 
  Ashtoreth is the one that must constantly show strength due 
  to being under near-constant verbal assault. Or perhaps it 
  is with the Horned Lady’s own strange and silent approval, 
  for, if they have the strength to withstand this, then are 
  they not closer to her?
  APISH STYGIAN GODS
  If Stygia is remarkable in any way, it is in its memory. It is said 
  that Stygia never forgets, and nowhere is this truer than in the 
  worship of its gods. To understand this is to look before Set 
  took ascendancy in the pantheon of Stygia. Before Lemuria 
  granted its pantheon to the slaves of the elder races; to see 
  when humankind rises from its knuckles to stand ascendant. 
  For even then, humankind had gods. In this time, humans 
  were ugly and brutish, half-forged creatures of meat, bone, 
  and melancholy. The gods worshipped by humankind in this 
  dimmest recess of history are the dark reflections of human-
  kind’s basest appetites made holy by the virtue of their power.
  Who can say for how long these gods danced under 
  moonless nights? So vile was their turpitude that even the 
  demons of hell were shocked at their baseness. In rites too 
  tainted with animal lusts to aspire to profanity they were 
  humanity’s gods, and were worshipped heartily!
  But as man stood upright, it blasphemed against these 
  holy monsters and their bastard demigods. Humans 
  One of the most interesting concepts in a living 
  religion is that several gods may share the same 
  ideals or claim control over the same concepts 
  and followers. Let us look at the gods of the 
  Shemites as a prime example. No less than three 
  of their primary gods claim power over love 
  and fertility, but the aspects within those very 
  concepts is what establishes a difference — or 
  in some cases, forcibly drives them apart.
  — “Lectures in Hyborian Religion 
  and Ecology”, Prof. John Kirowan 
  (PhD, FRS, FRAI, FRGS)
  
  CHAPTER 5
  62
  imagined, invented, and summoned new gods more per-
  fect in form. As they struck down their grunting votaries 
  and burnt them from their forests, they recast them in 
  holy idols, who bore many names in the centuries to come. 
  When humanity could, it butchered the gods, feasted upon 
  their corpses and enslaved the loveliest of their children.
  As the red mist of savagery cleared from humanity’s 
  sight with the coming of civilization, they forgot these dark 
  days and deluded themselves with myths of holy war and 
  monsters defeated by righteous hand. But Stygia remembers. 
  Under the guidance of Set, those few gods that remained 
  were shackled deep beneath the ground to guard the dead 
  and give birth to horrors. Their very names were blasted 
  from existence, forgotten to all but Set’s chosen priests. 
  These few remain clad in shadows, entrusted with the horrid 
  rites needed to contain the menace of these fallen gods.
  Though most of their names are forgotten or have been 
  willfully stricken from human records, a few persist. Their 
  names are A’ani, Aanait and Asheb (goddesses), Bebon, 
  Djehuti, Hapi, Mesen, and Saa, and in southern Stygia, 
  Ghekre is remembered.
  STYGIAN APE-GOD (NEMESIS)
  ATTRIBUTES
  Awareness
  Intelligence
  Personality
  Willpower
  9 (1)
  7
  9 (1)
  10 (1)
  Agility
  Brawn
  Coordination
  13 (1)
  16 (2)
  10 (1)
  FIELDS OF EXPERTISE
  Combat
  3
  Movement
  3
  Fortitude
  3
  Senses
  3
  Knowledge
  —
  Social
  —
  STRESS AND SOAK
  ■
  ■ Stress: Vigor 21, Resolve 14
  ■
  ■ Soak: Armor 3 (Horrible Shaggy Hides, Courage 4 
  (Prehistoric God)
  ATTACKS
  ■
  ■ Tearing Paws and Teeth (M): Range C, 8§, 
  Grappling, Intense, Knockdown, Vicious 1
  ■
  ■ Thrown Stone (R): Range C, 7§, 1H, Knockdown, 
  Stun
  ■
  ■ Horrific Inhuman Visage (T): Range C, 7§ 
  mental, Stun
  ■
  ■ Hideous Screech (T): Range M, 6§ mental, Area
  SPECIAL ABILITIES
  ■
  ■ Brachiating: Though the ape god is too heavy for 
  most trees and branches, it can brachiate around 
  temple interiors, seizing upon columns and archi-
  tectural detail, usually causing them to crumble or 
  break as it passes.
  ■
  ■ Dread Creature 3
  ■
  ■ Fast Recovery (Resolve and Vigor) 4
  ■
  ■ Fear 2
  ■
  ■ Fecund: While their partners are liable to be 
  killed and eaten, the apish gods can produce 
  demigods. These demigods are dim-witted but 
  powerful. Apish demigods are Nemesis foes with 
  the Inhuman Brawn 1 and Inhuman Agility 1 special 
  abilities. Most demigods are human in semblance, 
  but not necessarily so.
  ■
  ■ Feed Upon Fear
  ■
  ■ Feed Upon Pain: An apish god gains 1 Doom every 
  time a character within Medium range suffers 
  physical damage.
  ■
  ■ Inured to Cold, Disease, Fear
  ■
  ■ Night Vision
  ■
  ■ Monstrous Creature
  ■
  ■ Patron: Those few apish gods not bound within 
  Stygian tombs can be utilized by sorcerers as 
  Patrons. They demand live slaves for food and 
  entertainment and will teach the Form of a Beast 
  spell. Approaching the god safely requires a sac-
  rifice of no fewer than ten slaves and a Dire (D4) 
  Animal Handling or Sorcery test.
  ■
  ■ Primal Beast: Gains Inhuman Attribute 1 to all 
  attributes except Intelligence and all its senses 
  count as Keen Senses.
  ■
  ■ Savage Endurance: An ape god only ever suffers 
  Wound penalties for the first Wound it suffers. It 
  gains the Inured to Pain ability after suffering the 
  first Wound but still suffers a penalty from this 
  first Wound and any Wound inflicted by prim-
  itive weapons or fire. Additionally, the ape god 
  regains 4 Vigor and Resolve every time such a 
  Wound is inflicted.
  Grim and horrific it brooded there, like the shadow cast 
  by one of the apish gods that squat on the shadowy 
  altars of dim temples in the dark land of Stygia.
  — “The Phoenix on the Sword”
  
  63
  MINOR GODS AND CULTS
  DOOM SPENDS
  ■
  ■ Sorcery: An apish Stygian god can change shape 
  as per the Form of a Beast spell. It can automati-
  cally assume the form of its chosen beast without 
  the need of a test and if it so desires it can spend 1 
  Doom (Repeatable) to achieve a 1 Momentum 
  spend. Apish Stygian gods are usually held behind 
  multiple heavy stone doors and dire incantations 
  to prevent their escape.
  ■
  ■ Acts of Depravity: A Stygian ape-god is capable 
  of displays that would turn the stomach of even 
  the most debauched Zamoran slaver. If a Stygian 
  ape-god is given opportunity to prepare such a 
  scene of depravity, it can spend 2 Doom to add the 
  Intense Quality if successful.
  ASURA
  Where Yajur is the cold reality of death, Asura is that which 
  sees beyond states to a larger whole. Some say Yajur herself 
  parts the veil because that veil is death. The faithful of Asura 
  know that death, too, is an illusion. Early texts often blur the 
  line between Asura and Yajur, even suggesting they were 
  once an androgynous god, and that they gained genders 
  upon being ripped apart by the Wheel of the World. Other 
  sects believe they were man and wife, and their separation 
  formed the world from the primeval chaos of their parting. 
  For many Asurans, however, the very notion that the two 
  were ever related is anathema. Asura sees through the illu-
  sion that is the world, and Yajur is merely an aspect of that 
  mirage. His priests tend toward openness but are not easily 
  fooled. His temples are open to those willing to likewise 
  open their eyes. He is without wrath, but those who ignore 
  his wisdom find the cosmos makes its own doom for them.
  In Vendhya, Asura is the chief deity of worship, but 
  he is also worshipped to some degree in many eastern 
  nations. Asuran priests hold political power in Vendhya 
  in a way largely unknown outside Stygia or Iranistan. To 
  the western mind, there are a host of gods, and one may 
  be readily traded for another. In the east, this is not the 
  case, and the priesthood gains power by using the name 
  of Asura to further their ends. Sometimes, this leads to 
  corrupt priesthoods who create more illusion and gather 
  more cobwebs than they ever clear away.
  Asura’s cults operate as far west as Aquilonia, but they 
  must do so in secrecy, as the cult was targeted by the follow-
  ers of Mitra, and accused of demon — and serpent-worship, 
  human sacrifice, and the blackest of sorceries. As such, they 
  practice in great secrecy and do not openly display signs of 
  their faith. They will not acknowledge their beliefs to those 
  who are not of the faith, and their temples are concealed 
  and often underground, adding credence to the charges 
  of diabolical practices.
  Due to the immense secrecy around the cult, it has devel-
  oped a considerable web of informants, spies, messengers, 
  and others who carry messages across vast distances and 
  share clandestine knowledge that might assist the cult 
  in its survival, as well as its divine purpose, which is its 
  opposition to the Stygian serpent-god Set. Many priests 
  within the cult are in fact sorcerers and have infiltrated 
  courts across the dreaming west and in other major cities.
  The most visible sign of the cult’s presence in the civi-
  lized west are the funerary boats, long vessels supposedly 
  containing the remains of priests and worshippers on the 
  final pilgrimage to the west, somewhere over the Poitainian 
  mountains. These craft, black and adorned with white skulls, 
  are rowed by giant, silent slaves, and are said to be cursed 
  and warded with dark magic that will be visited upon any 
  who interfere with their grim voyage.
  HADRATHUS, PRIEST OF 
  ASURA (NEMESIS)
  High priest of the cult of Asura, Hadrathus must minister 
  in secrecy, for his faith is forbidden in his native Aquilonia, 
  driven literally underground by the priests of Mitra, who 
  have cast Asura as a demon-god and his followers as 
  human sacrificing devil-worshippers. Born in Aquilonia 
  and raised as a scholar of not-particularly-distinguished 
  noble birth, Hadrathus ventured widely about the dream-
  ing west before embarking on a lengthy voyage to the 
  east, to far-off Vendhya. In search of knowledge, he found 
  instead faith, and joined the cult of Asura, quickly rising 
  within its ranks and becoming privy to its innermost 
  mysteries. As a faith of the east, he learned sorcery at the 
  feet of wizards whose power and knowledge outshone 
  any within the humble west.
  His return to his native Aquilonia saw him quickly 
  become a figure of influence within the Asura cult, and in 
  time, Hadrathus became the high priest of the cult. With 
  this role he grew in influence and perception, extending 
  his awareness throughout the empire as one becomes 
  aware of the weight of a garment, and now there is little 
  he does not know of what transpires in his homeland.
  When the door closed, Conan saw only one man standing 
  before him — a slim figure, masked in a black cloak 
  with a hood. This the man threw back, disclosing a pale 
  oval of a face, with calm, delicately chiseled features.
  — The Hour of the Dragon
  Continued on next page…
  
  CHAPTER 5
  64
  While the Asura cult has been harried and hunted for 
  generations, under King Namedides this persecution 
  reached a fever pitch, and the Aquilonian king allowed 
  the followers of Mitra to exterminate the cult almost 
  entirely, or so they thought. This changed when Conan 
  took the throne, and the barbarian king quickly ordered 
  a stop to the persecution of the Asura cult, saying that 
  they should be free to believe what they want.
  As depicted in The Hour of the Dragon, Hadrathus has 
  a debt of gratitude to Conan for his intervention. Thus, 
  when the Acheronian sorcerer Xaltotun was brought 
  back to life by a conspiracy against Conan, Hadrathus 
  went to incredible lengths on Conan’s behalf, allying with 
  the witch Zelata to provide sorcerous aid and counsel, as 
  well as smuggling the Cimmerian out of Aquilonia under 
  the eyes of his pursuers.
  If encountered, Hadrathus’ priorities are primarily to 
  serve his faith and his cult, and secondly to the kingdom 
  of Aquilonia itself, his homeland, and he will assist any 
  who share those motivations. He will not allow himself 
  to be put at disadvantage and will use his allies and 
  resources to ensure his and his followers’ safety. If any 
  player character seems worthwhile as an apprentice or 
  potentially a worshipper, he will take it upon himself to 
  mentor them, and can even serve as a sorcerous patron.
  ATTRIBUTES
  Awareness
  Intelligence
  Personality
  Willpower
  12
  12
  11
  14
  Agility
  Brawn
  Coordination
  8
  7
  8
  FIELDS OF EXPERTISE
  Combat
   —
  Movement
  1
  Fortitude
  1
  Senses
  2
  Knowledge
  4
  Social
  3
  STRESS AND SOAK
  ■
  ■ Stress: Vigor 8, Resolve 15
  ■
  ■ Soak: Armor —, Courage 1
  ATTACKS
  ■
  ■ Hellish Laughter (T): Range C, 5§ mental, Stun
  SPECIAL ABILITIES
  ■
  ■ Information Network: Accustomed to a life 
  spent in secrecy, Hadrathus has spent consider-
  able resources building one of the most remark-
  able network of spies and informants across all 
  Aquilonia. When performing any Society test to 
  learn information that is not publicly known, he 
  receives 1 automatic success as if he had spent a 
  Fortune point, in addition to any other successes.
  ■
  ■ Antiquarian: Hadrathus’ studies have led him 
  to a deep understanding of magic artifacts and 
  their use. He may perform a Challenging (D2) 
  Knowledge test to recall information about 
  item’s storied history and its magical properties. 
  Additionally, he receives an additional point 
  of Momentum whenever using such items, if 
  applicable.
  DOOM SPENDS
  ■
  ■ Sorcerer-Priest: A master of eastern sorcery, 
  Hadrathus is an incredibly powerful sorcerer, able 
  to pit his magic against any mortal or better. Spells 
  he tends to use are Favor of the Gods, Fury of the 
  Elements, and Venom on the Wind, though he 
  knows others. When casting a spell, he may spend 
  Doom equal to the Difficulty of the spell, rather 
  than attempting a skill test.
  ■
  ■ Counter Magic: Especially gifted with the use 
  of counter magic (page 172, Conan corebook), 
  Hadrathus can spend 1 Doom to cast counter 
  magic on any spell he desires.
  ■
  ■ Unseen Legions: When in any Asura cult temple, 
  Hadrathus can spend 3 Doom to summon a 
  Mob of five cultist followers (equivalent to 
  cultists, Conan corebook, page 313). They arrive 
  in the following round, armed with swords 
  (Reach 2, 4§, 1H, Parrying) and clad in black 
  hooded cloaks. He can repeat this Doom spend as 
  often as desired, once per round, and the followers 
  will remain until dismissed.
  Continued from previous page…
  
  65
  MINOR GODS AND CULTS
  THE BLACK GOD
  Some sorcery draws its potency from the Outer Dark, 
  claiming power from beyond the cosmos and seeking, 
  desperately, to control it. But some sorcery comes from 
  elsewhere. It comes from the caress and the attention of 
  spirits and, for some learned in the traditional arts of the 
  the Black Kingdoms, it comes from the orichalka. These 
  are fragments of the dead, souls of ancestors — some seem 
  to have persoanlities, representing some true essence of 
  humanity — but from what whole have these fragments 
  been dislodged? Only those true elders of the many tribes 
  and civilisations which summon the Orichalka to aid them 
  know the answer: the Black God.
  The Black God’s power extends from the centre of the 
  depths of creation itself. The Black God is older even than 
  that most deities and he will outlast them all. The Black 
  God waits, his idols strewn about the world, his followers 
  constantly guessing the whims and wishes of their deity 
  who lurks, unknowable behind everything. But what they 
  do not know is that the Black God does not care what his 
  followers do in his name and in tribute to him. It is not, as 
  some of the sorcerers who draw upon the orichalka for 
  their power have thought, that the Black God is indifferent 
  to human kind. It is that he is indifferent to what human 
  beings do in worship of him: all human suffering, pain, 
  anger, excitement, madness, euphoria, all of this is food 
  to the Black God. He does not care whose blood is spilled 
  so long as blood spills; he does not care whether his most 
  devoted priest drives his followers into a frenzy or whether 
  the priest is murdered in his sleep; all human experience 
  feeds the Black God and his eternal vigilance.
  What the Black God might truly be cannot be divined, 
  indeed whether he truly is anything beyond simply being 
  present cannot be guessed. When those who draw upon 
  the orichalka find themselves, even for a moment, in the 
  presence of the Black God, they are aware of one thing: 
  an absence. It is not, they explain, the absence of death 
  or consciousness or belief or even love. It is the absence 
  of meaning — the ultimate irrationality of life, the futility 
  of all striving and violence — all condensed into a single 
  monstrous form.
  The Black God is that restless heart of darkness which 
  lurks behind humankind’s frantic attempts to divine a 
  purpose for his existence, that lurks of course, at the centre 
  of the place where humanity first emerged, mewling and 
  sweltering in the heart of the illimitable jungle which once 
  covered all the land. The Black God drinks in humanity’s 
  folly, drinks in whatever is offered and will always do so, 
  for the Black God exists because of humankind, as surely 
  as humans exist because of the Black God.
  CROM
  The chief of the Cimmerian pantheon of deities, Crom is 
  the lord of the dead and patron of battle. He and his dark 
  kin of war-gods and worse dwell atop a great mountain 
  in a dreary, desolate realm of ice and eternal fog. He is a 
  harsh and unforgiving deity, well in character with his dour 
  followers, who know little joy but that of the battlefield.
  Crom and the Cimmerian afterlife are also discussed in 
  Conan the Barbarian, pages 66–71.
  THE GREY GOD PASSES
  Crom is unique among gods in that he is barely worshipped 
  — dreaded rather than celebrated. Only the Cimmerians 
  pay him heed, and no Cimmerian prays to him, preferring 
  instead to delay their encounter with their patron deity 
  as long as possible. Unlike the war-gods of Nordheim and 
  elsewhere, Crom’s presence is a bleak one, and he does not 
  invite worship or even sacrifice, though some Cimmerians 
  still offer him small tokens of respect.
  There are no festivals to Crom, no blessings, no temples, 
  fanes, or sacred places. He is nowhere and yet he is every-
  where, present wherever men are slain and battles are fought. 
  
  CHAPTER 5
  66
  There are no artifacts associated with his worship, and the 
  few graven images of the god are dim and indistinct, more 
  figurative than representative. Cimmerians will swear by 
  Crom with epithets such as “Crom”, “Crom’s devils”, “By 
  Crom!”, and “Crom willing”, but other than invoking him 
  in this way, superstitious Cimmerians seek to avoid Crom’s 
  notice, as they would a bear encountered in the woods.
  Unlike southern gods, such as Mitra or Ishtar who are 
  called to in prayer and represented on Earth with rich 
  temples and statuary and a written body of work associ-
  ated with their teachings and divine presence, Crom has 
  no priests, no scripture, and no missionaries who spread 
  his word to nonbelievers. It is a hundred times more likely 
  that a Cimmerian will embrace the worship of a god such 
  as Mitra, Bel, Ishtar, or even Bori than they will pray alle-
  giance to Crom and seek to act in his name. Despite this, 
  he looms large in the hearts of his people, for his stern 
  and savage presence goads them to reckless courage and 
  fearlessness in action.
  A THOUSAND DOOMS
  Cimmerians say that their god Crom does not watch them, 
  caring little for their actions, and claim that they do not 
  wish for his attention. Despite this, they fear that Crom 
  is ever-vigilant, spying for signs of weakness and coward-
  ice, and sending dooms to trouble those he finds lacking. 
  Their god will harry and bedevil them with an arsenal of 
  CROM, DOOM, AND COMPLICATIONS
  Cimmerians take Crom’s grim promise as seriously as 
  they do all other things, and they are all too quick to 
  categorize misfortune as a sign of Crom’s disfavor. In times 
  when a Cimmerian is acting with cowardice, without 
  valor, or even foolishly in battle, the gamemaster may 
  wish to incur the wrath of Crom in the form of a free 
  point of Doom added to the Doom pool whenever the 
  character rolls a Complication. This Doom is to be spent 
  immediately against the Cimmerian as per the rules on 
  page 271 of the CONAN corebook, in addition to the effects 
  of any Complication.
  Multiple Complications rolled will yield multiple 
  points of Doom, all to be used immediately on the same 
  Doom spend.
  Possible uses for this Doom spend are as follows.
  ■
  ■ MISFORTUNE [1 DOOM]: The Cimmerian loses a 
  portion of armor or some other valuable posses-
  sion, is knocked to the ground, or is otherwise 
  distracted, giving a single enemy (or group of 
  enemies) an additional 1d20 on all attacks or 
  actions directed at the Cimmerian.
  ■
  ■ MURRAIN [2 DOOM]: The Cimmerian suffers a 
  longer-term setback, one whose effects are not 
  immediately obvious. This is represented by 2 
  points of “personal Doom” reserved solely for 
  the Cimmerian, to be used at the gamemaster’s 
  discretion as if they were Momentum.
  ■
  ■ CURSE [3+ DOOM]: In the unfortunate instance 
  of a Cimmerian earning three or more Doom from 
  Complications while failing to exhibit sufficient 
  courage, Crom becomes angry at them, his bale-
  ful eye fixed on the character. Effects should be 
  as dramatic as they are severe: an enemy gaining 
  a significant advantage, the Cimmerian break-
  ing a weapon or suffering a dramatic setback, 
  or the triggering of some major environmental 
  effect that causes the Cimmerian considerable 
  hardship. This can be characterized as 3 points 
  of Momentum to be added to actions/attacks 
  directed against the Cimmerian for that round.
  When invoking any of these Doom spends, the gam-
  emaster may attempt to characterize the effect to make 
  it apparent that this is Crom’s disfavor at work, such as 
  the appearance of fog, darkness, an ominous rumbling 
  or cold wind, or even the sudden appearance of gal-
  lows-birds such as ravens, cawing in mockery. It is for 
  the gamemaster to decide whether others, Cimmerians 
  or outsiders, can see these manifestations.
  However, Crom is as capricious as he is spiteful.
  Once per session, should the Cimmerian be acting in 
  accordance with Crom’s grim dictate, the gamemaster 
  may choose to offer a Cimmerian character an additional 
  2 Momentum to a single attack, above the normal max-
  imum of 5d20, at the cost of 3 Doom. This is entirely at 
  Crom’s whim and cannot be called for or asked for by 
  the character. If the character does not use this boon 
  in combat — the greatest of gifts — Crom will likely 
  take umbrage and will bring woe upon the one who 
  ignored him.
  If any Cimmerian has the effrontery to pray to Crom 
  for aid, the gamemaster may increase the Difficulty of 
  all actions the Cimmerian takes for one scene by one 
  step, indicating to the Cimmerian that Crom has been 
  angered by such folly.
  
  67
  MINOR GODS AND CULTS
  misfortunes: ill-luck, maladies, murrains, curses, weakness, 
  poor weather during a battle, or even strengthening and 
  gladdening foes.
  THE BLESSING OF CROM
  The reverse of Crom’s gloomy stewardship is also true: all 
  Cimmerians believe that, upon the birth of a child, their 
  god of ill-fortune and slaughter breathes into newborn 
  Cimmerians the greatest of gifts, the power to slay. He fully 
  expects this birthright to be used, repaid each time steel 
  bites into flesh. This is the greatest power, stronger even 
  than steel: the power to take lives, to send others into the 
  afterworld in one’s stead. The only reward a warrior can 
  hope for, however, is the chance to once again wager life 
  for life, and to conquer, each time giving Crom his due 
  and allowing one more day to walk the Earth, away from 
  his dismal realm.
  THE FACE OF CROM
  Though carvings of Crom are rare and shunned, some still 
  exist, made in times of old when his worship was more 
  active. In times gone by, the Cimmerians made offerings to 
  Crom, attempting to placate him with sacrifices of massive 
  Cimmerian bulls. But the most welcome offering was a pyre 
  of the captured and the dead. Images depict Crom as a great 
  warrior with a thick beard and a stern glare, usually seated, 
  a great sword across the arms of his throne. Some ancient 
  carvings of Crom show him stooped, as if hunched over in 
  spite for the world, and in old tales he is sometimes called 
  the “bloody bent one”.
  THE REALM OF ICE AND FOG
  Cimmerians believe that the afterlife Crom presides over is a 
  place of awful, unending misery, a rocky and desolate realm 
  of ice and fog, where eternity is spent wandering without 
  purpose or companionship, a particularly bleak type of 
  hell. This place, a far more bleak and unforgiving version 
  of Cimmeria itself, has no counterpart in the afterlife, no 
  paradise or heaven, no reward upon death. Presented with 
  such an inevitable fate, the Cimmerian tendency is towards 
  brooding and moodiness, introspection rather than gaiety.
  Within his fastness atop his great mountain in this 
  cheerless realm, Crom holds court, he and others of his dark 
  race watching over the Earth, spying upon Cimmerians for 
  signs of cowardice or weakness. The rest of the Cimmerian 
  pantheon is equally savage, an assemblage of lesser deities, 
  traditionally twelve in number, though legends vary as to 
  the exact count. Chief among these are the battle-maidens 
  of the Morrighu, Badb, Nemain, and Macha. Others in his 
  uncivil court are a host of other horrible beings, an unseelie 
  assembly of night fiends, goblins, dwarfs, and a thousand 
  darksome devils, all served by the ghosts of those lucky 
  enough to be spared the eternity of aimless wandering 
  in the foggy wasteland outside. None of them like Crom 
  overmuch, and some barely acknowledge him as their chief, 
  though all fear him as do the Cimmerian people.
  HANUMAN
  The ape-god, Hanuman the Accursed, has long been for-
  saken by those weak, decadent Hyborian nations who have 
  invested their faith in deities like Mitra or Asura. Even the 
  barbarians of Cimmeria, Vanaheim, and beyond have no 
  love for Hanuman, though their gods are just as cruel and 
  just as savage as the brooding Lord of Apes.
  Hanuman, and those few who have dedicated themselves 
  to him as members of his priesthood, have no false promises 
  to offer those timid pilgrims who furtively enter the scant 
  dozen remaining temples of the ape-god. Hanuman offers 
  neither salvation through love nor salvation through arms. 
  The god and his few still-loyal priests offer only memories 
  as rewards to those who leave their meager offerings before 
  the vast granite ape which lurks at the center of the solemn, 
  looming edifices.
  All who remember to make such offerings, irregular as 
  they may be, come hurrying back out into the daylight. For 
  it is true, no man or woman still in possession of all their 
  faculties will enter the temple of Hanuman the Accursed 
  once the sun has set. No matter how dreadful the rumors 
  of what lurks within the temple limits might be, the truth 
  is perhaps fouler still.
  Within the temples of Hanuman the Accursed lies the 
  true legacy of mankind. The truth of man’s descent and the 
  reality of their condition. In the older places of the world 
  there lurk creatures of uncommon strength and savagery, 
  grey apes whose demonic visages hide more than bestial 
  intelligence and whose clawed hands, imbued with terrible 
  strength though they be, are also swift, clever, and dexterous.
  Nabonidus, the Red Priest, had in his service and bound 
  to him through strange magic, a creature called Thak, whose 
  “There is no hope here or hereafter in the cult of 
  my people,” answered Conan. “In this world men 
  struggle and suffer vainly, finding pleasure only 
  in the bright madness of battle; dying, their souls 
  enter a gray misty realm of clouds and icy winds, 
  to wander cheerlessly throughout eternity.”
  — “Queen of the Black Coast”
  
  CHAPTER 5
  68
  incredible strength and savagery masked a perceptiveness 
  which was disconcertingly human. The great secret can 
  of course be guessed: man is the descendent of the apes, 
  grown upright and thereby believing itself greater than the 
  rest of those creatures who rut and die without language 
  and without thought.
  Priests of Hanuman the Accursed learn this secret in 
  their training and, once they have come to accept it as fact, 
  can progress to deeper levels of initiation. Many fail at this 
  step, unable to accept their ancestry or simply unwilling 
  to. Those who nod in agreement, finding that this lesson 
  accords with some suspicion they have always held within 
  them, can learn the Accursed Truths which, in legend, 
  Hanuman — first and greatest of the apes — taught to 
  his offspring that had learned to think, as a malicious jest.
  The first of these Accursed Truths is that mankind’s 
  existence is a mistake, a fluke, and that human life means 
  nothing. The second Accursed Truth is that man is barely a 
  step from regressing into his primal state, giving in to those 
  baser urges for murder and gluttony and lust. A simple push 
  is all that is needed to make any man or woman embrace 
  the murderous, apish aspects of their nature and become 
  bestial once again.
  This deep, abiding fear leads men and women to leave 
  offerings to the ape-god still, and it is for this reason that 
  the priests of Hanuman order the continued sacrifice of any 
  who pass too close to the temple once the night has fallen. 
  These sacrifices are always performed with bare hands, 
  mimicking the brutal strength of the ape-god and those 
  remnants of his chosen grey apes still roaming the earth.
  These sacrifices are made to honor the memory of man’s 
  true ancestry and to slake the appetites of the followers of 
  Hanuman the Accursed who, in knowing the true purpose-
  lessness of mankind, indulge their whims to the utmost. No 
  debauchery is too much, no sorcery too black, no iniquity 
  too low for those who have seen the true message of the 
  ape-god Hanuman.
  IBIS
  His worship originating in Stygia, Ibis is a god of knowledge 
  and enlightenment, of unearthing truth behind mysteries, 
  and the sharing of new ideas and established wisdom. 
  Stygians once venerated Ibis as the patron of all forms 
  of lore, from mathematics, astronomy, writing, sciences, 
  and religion, to civil issues such as judgment and laws. He 
  divined and laid down the paths by which the stars and 
  the sun and moon would move through the heavens, and 
  in his role as a force of equilibrium, Ibis was the mediator 
  between good and evil.
  In times long ago, temples to Ibis contained libraries 
  and lyceums, academies and forums where intellectual 
  and social issues were discussed openly, ideas explored, 
  theories expounded, and philosophies allowed to bloom 
  and to flower. Aspects of his worship include his role as a 
  judge of the dead, mediator for the souls on their passage 
  into the afterlife, and impartial examiner of the deeds and 
  actions that made up the departed’s life. He is the scribe of 
  the gods, his word vouchsafed as truth, and in times past 
  in Stygia he was a god of judges, invoked during trials and 
  civil matters to ensure honesty in all proceedings.
  Ibis was primary among a pantheon of eight associated 
  deities. Centuries of political change and cultural strife in 
  Stygia have caused the others to be forgotten, their temples 
  defaced and destroyed, their worship set aside. Statues of 
  Ibis, as well as those of his brother — and sister-gods, were 
  demolished, left to be buried beneath the ever-shifting 
  sands, and in Stygia all but the traces of Ibis worship have 
  been stamped out forever.
  In other lands, however, where Ibis’ followers fled… in 
  these foreign places his cult took root.
  Rise of the Old Serpent
  Ibis’ fall from the Stygian pantheon is due to the rise of his 
  long-hated rival, the Old Serpent Set, now the patron and 
  supreme god of Stygia. Once, many gods were worshipped 
  in Stygia, but Set’s ascendancy was as murderous as it was 
  sweeping, with his devoted noble-priests tearing down the 
  statues of other gods, striking their likenesses from walls, 
  burning their holy places, and executing their priests.
  Despite his opposition to Set, Ibis is neither good nor 
  evil, a mediating force rather than a revolutionary one. He 
  is an enemy of Set because Set is an enemy of humankind, 
  an embodiment of that which is secret and occulted. Set’s 
  followers are devoted to hidden knowledge while Ibis’ 
  worship involves the revelation of truth to inspire and 
  to educate. Unbeknownst to most of humankind in the 
  Hyborian Age, Set was the progenitor and patron of the 
  Serpent Folk. This abominable race of humanoid serpents 
  sought to dominate the world secretly, using illusion and 
  The great bronze doors stood wide open as they 
  had stood for centuries. But no worshippers 
  burnt incense within. In the day men and 
  women might come timidly into the shrine 
  and place offerings to the ape-god on the black 
  altar. At night the people shunned the temple of 
  Hanuman as hares shun the lair of the serpent.
  — “The Man-Eaters of Zamboula”
  
  69
  MINOR GODS AND CULTS
  KALANTHES OF HANUMAR, PRIEST OF IBIS
  It is well-known that the priesthood and cult of Set have 
  no greater foe than Kalanthes of Hanumar, a Nemedian 
  priest of Ibis, once worshipped in Stygia and now ousted. 
  Born in the southern reaches of Nemedia, Kalanthes 
  joined the cult of Ibis when he was but a lad, serving 
  as a novice in the cult’s temple in Hanumar. From that 
  humble beginning, he grew in knowledge and devotion 
  to his scholar-god patron of the sciences and civilization, 
  and Kalanthes excelled in all the avenues of faith. In 
  time, he became a priest, and then eventually a leader 
  amongst their ranks; a dynamic and wise shepherd to 
  guide Ibis’ following through the challenges they faced.
  “Ancient gods and queer mummies have come up the 
  caravan roads before, but who loves the priest of Ibis so 
  well in Stygia, where they still worship the arch-demon 
  Set who coils among the tombs in the darkness? The 
  god Ibis has fought Set since the first dawn of the earth, 
  and Kalanthes has fought Set’s priests all his life.”
  — “The God in the Bowl”
  Unlike the other priests of his order, however, 
  Kalanthes was not content to simply praise Ibis and pros-
  elytize to the faithful in Nemedia, so far from the lands 
  where Ibis had once held sway. Kalanthes saw that his god 
  could only be served by direct opposition to the one that 
  had ousted him, his foe Set, the Great Serpent, enemy to 
  all civilized folk throughout the Hyborian Age and in the 
  time immemorial before that. And thus, Kalanthes has 
  fought Set himself in Nemedia and down southward, to 
  Ophir, Koth, across Shem, and into Stygia itself. He has 
  proved a galvanizing force, giving counsel and wisdom 
  to those who have suffered at the hands of Set’s priests, 
  and for this he has earned their undying enmity.
  For decades Kalanthes fought Set, smuggled into 
  Stygia itself to foster revolution among the downtrodden 
  Stygian peasants and slaves, but the serpent priests held 
  their land as tightly as if a constrictor coiled about its 
  prey. He has been at cross-purposes with Set’s greatest 
  advocate, the Stygian sorcerer Thoth-amon, who has 
  long conspired to do away with this rival. Now, in his 
  advanced age, Kalanthes is resigned to battling Set 
  from afar, but the distance has not diminished the ser-
  pent cult’s hatred of him by one iota. From the temple 
  of Ibis in Belverus, Kalanthes still works ceaselessly to 
  rid Stygia and her people of Set’s accursed dominion, a 
  crusade that puts his life in ever-present danger, and yet 
  affords him the opportunity to meet with and aid others 
  who share his contempt.
  ATTRIBUTES
  Awareness
  Intelligence
  Personality
  Willpower
  11
  11
  12
  12
  Agility
  Brawn
  Coordination
  7
  8
  8
  FIELDS OF EXPERTISE
  Combat
  —
  Movement
  1
  Fortitude
  1
  Senses
  2
  Knowledge
  4
  Social
  3
  STRESS AND SOAK
  ■
  ■ Stress: Vigor 9, Resolve 13
  ■
  ■ Soak: Armor —, Courage 2
  ATTACKS
  ■
  ■ Staff (M): Reach 2 or 3, 4§, 2H, Knockdown
  ■
  ■ Distinguished Foe (T): Kalanthes can sway foes 
  with, and demand respect through, force of per-
  sonality and the intensity of his opposition to Set. 
  This ability is otherwise identical to the Sorcerous 
  Might display. Range Close, 4§ mental, Area, 
  Intense.
  SPECIAL ABILITIES
  ■
  ■ Sworn Enmity to Set: Kalanthes has a great many 
  Talents specific to his breadth of experience and 
  his crusade against Set. The combination of these 
  can be summarized so that when acting directly 
  against Set or one of Set’s minions, Kalanthes 
  gains one additional d20 for any skill check and 
  gains 1§ additional Momentum if the roll is suc-
  cessful. He may use this ability once per scene.
  ■
  ■ Opposing the Serpent: Though no sorcerer, 
  Kalanthes can utilize prayer, ritual, and arcane 
  knowledge enabling him to pit his Knowledge 
  Area of Expertise against any sorcery directed at 
  him, as per the rules on counter magic.
  DOOM SPENDS
  ■
  ■ Blessing of Ibis: Once per scene, Kalanthes 
  may spend a single point of Doom as if it were a 
  Fortune point.
  
  CHAPTER 5
  70
  conspiracy: things toward which Ibis is antithetical. Thus, 
  the human worshippers of Set followed suit, and turned on 
  the god and cult that opposed their very nature: Ibis and 
  his worshippers. As Set’s enemy throughout the eons, Ibis 
  was the first among the gods to fall, his worship eliminated 
  almost entirely within Stygia’s borders, now found only in 
  the outskirts or forgotten places.
  As Ibis’ cult is much smaller now, and less powerful, it 
  is much less a thorn in the side of the Set cult than once it 
  was. Mitra, the “new” god of the great civilized kingdoms of 
  Aquilonia, Nemedia, and elsewhere, is also a foe of Set, and it 
  is that god and cult the Set-worshippers are concerned with.
  The Emigrant Cult
  In the time since its ousting in Stygia, Ibis’ cult, led by 
  scholar-priests and philosophers, has spread north to the 
  neighboring kingdoms of Shem and Koth, to Ophir and 
  Argos and to Khauran and Khoraja. Most of all in Zamora, 
  where all gods are worshipped openly, their word is allowed 
  to spread without fear of reprisal. In Nemedia resides the 
  esteemed Kalanthes of Hanumar (see page 69), a well-re-
  garded priest of Ibis, his life dedicated to battling Set and 
  his minions by thought and by deed.
  To the south, Ibis’ cult flourished along the Kushite 
  coastline, extending all the way down to the Zarkheba 
  River, where the river bird that bears his name dwells. He 
  is known by a variety of names there, usually some variant 
  of the name for the bird itself.
  Representations of Ibis
  Though statures of Ibis are few and far between, his likeness 
  remains in hidden shrines within Stygia and elsewhere, 
  along with the spread of his cult. Painted onto faience pottery 
  or on ceramic walls, usually in profile, Ibis is represented 
  as a slender but broad-shouldered, dusky-skinned man. 
  Upon his shoulders is the thin neck and long-billed head 
  of a white ibis, the river bird, a black head-cloth draped 
  across the back of his head and neck. He wears a white 
  kilt bound at the waist with a belt set with precious stones, 
  and he wears jewelry of white gold, pearl, ivory, and lapis 
  lazuli, and about his neck is a gorgerin (or wesekh) collar, 
  also of that brilliant metal and intense blue mineral. In Ibis’ 
  right hand is a long ebony staff with a slight crook at the 
  top, and in his left is held a branched and looped crosier, 
  symbolizing his mastery of lore.
  THAT WHICH IS SACRED
  Animals sacred to Ibis are dogs and baboons, both for their 
  role as creatures of the night, and some aspects of Ibis depict 
  him as a baboon-faced human or even as a noble hound. He 
  is of course a patron of academics, and the stylus and the 
  wax sheet, as well as the papyrus and writing feather, are 
  symbolic items in his worship services. Representations of 
  Ibis are also featured in libraries and archives, as well as 
  troves of knowledge. Whether as a statue set into a small 
  niche over a door, or from a tile upon the wall, Ibis oversees 
  and blesses all places where knowledge might be exchanged, 
  where teaching and learning are fostered and flourish.
  JHEBBAL SAG
  Jhebbal Sag is an ancient god, perhaps one of the oldest. He 
  dates to a time when beasts and men spoke one language 
  and thought of each other as brothers. Jhebbal Sag’s true 
  form is unknown. It is likely that man and beasts each see 
  their own form in him, and it may be that is how he appears 
  to them, adjusting his form to suit his follower. Jhebbal 
  Sag is a god of nature. A nature that is both red in tooth 
  and claw and that has a primal, protean spark of life and 
  intellect. He is from an earlier age when the possibilities 
  of the world were still being formed.
  Jhebbal Sag is remembered by the people and beasts of 
  the wild places, most notably the Pictish Wilderness. He is 
  revered and feared by primitive people still living close to 
  nature. He is the antithesis of civilization, the antithesis 
  of man living as other than a beast. Some of the civilized 
  races have myths that tell of a god or hero that defeated a 
  manifestation of Jhebbal Sag, demonstrating the prowess 
  and dominance of civilization over the wild.
  Not all beasts remember Jhebbal Sag. Those that do 
  are able to speak with the human shaman that reveres the 
  god. Such beasts are open to being influenced and com-
  manded by the shaman. Human and beast call each other 
  kin, because they see little difference between themselves. 
  The beasts that respond to a call from a shaman are only 
  those that remember Jhebbal Sag. They respond to the 
  commands of a shaman, not because they are forced, but 
  because they choose to. Beasts from prior ages that can 
  still be found in the wild places are some of the ones most 
  likely to remember Jhebbal Sag, particularly in the Pictish 
  Wilderness. The shamans of Jhebbal Sag sometimes work 
  with beasts that do not remember him. In such instances, 
  “The mark of Thoth-amon, the Stygian sorcerer, 
  Kalanthes’ deadly foe! He found it in some grisly 
  cavern below the haunted pyramids! The gods of 
  old times did not die, as men died — they fell into 
  long sleeps and their worshippers locked them in 
  sarcophagi so that no alien hand might break their 
  slumbers. Thoth-amon sent death to Kalanthes —”
  — “The God in the Bowl”
  
  71
  MINOR GODS AND CULTS
  NEW SORCERY
  The following spells can be learned by the worshippers 
  of Jhebbal Sag. Each has a requirement of the caster 
  having selected Jhebbal Sag as a Patron.
  Black Death of the Swamplands
  DIFFICULTY: Average (D1) or higher
  DURATION: 3 rounds
  RANGE: Long, affecting all within one selected zone
  COST TO LEARN/CAST: 0 to learn, 1 Resolve to cast
  A shaman calls upon the miasmas of the swamps, draw-
  ing forth a choking mist that causes its victims to cough 
  violently as their lips and tongues turn black. The spell 
  is cast as a struggle between Sorcery and the first tar-
  geted victim’s Resistance. If the shaman succeeds, the 
  victim suffers 3[CD] physical damage plus Stun for each 
  round that they remain in the mist. The mist spreads to 
  envelop the zone, requiring a new Resistance struggle 
  for everyone caught in the mist. If the shaman succeeds, 
  the victim suffers 3§ physical damage plus Stun for each 
  round that they remain in the mist. If a character chokes 
  to death in the mist, the death is so disturbing that all 
  within Long Range who can see the death automatically 
  suffer 2§ mental damage, +1§ per additional victim, 
  up to a maximum of 6§ maximum. Courage Soak will 
  reduce this.
  Curse of the Black Skull
  DIFFICULTY: Daunting (D3)
  COST TO LEARN/CAST: 0 to learn, 2 Resolve and 1 
  Fortune point  to cast
  A shaman sends a forest devil (CONAN corebook, page 
  348) to slay an enemy by painting a skull black, hurling 
  it into the fire on an altar to Jullah, one of Jhebbal Sag’s 
  children, and whispering the name of the victim to the 
  black ghosts that haunt the dark land. The forest devil 
  will go anywhere within the Pictish Wilderness and hunt 
  the victim until one of them is dead.
  Dance of the Changing Serpent
  DIFFICULTY: Average (D1)
  DURATION: 1 scene
  COST TO LEARN/CAST: 0 to learn, 1 Resolve to cast
  A shaman binds a victim to an altar and then calls forth 
  a great serpent using the Commune with the Wild spell 
  (page 175–177, CONAN corebook). As the serpent wraps 
  its coils around the victim, the shaman casts Dance of 
  the Changing Serpent. After the spell is cast, the shaman 
  engages in a struggle matching their Sorcery against the 
  victim’s Discipline. When the shaman has accumulated 
  Momentum more than the victim’s Willpower, the spell 
  is complete, and the souls of the victim and serpent are 
  exchanged so that the serpent is in the man’s body and 
  the victim in the serpent’s.
  The serpent in the human body will attempt to slither 
  along the ground like a serpent. The human in the ser-
  pent’s body may attempt to stand or move their arms 
  as usual only to find that they are in a body without any 
  arms or legs.
  This horrific sight is used by the Pict shaman to both 
  embolden their allies and to drive insane the mortal 
  the spell is cast upon. These shattered souls are then 
  released to their allies, as a sign of the horrors that will 
  befall any who oppose the Picts.
  BLACK DEATH OF THE SWAMPLANDS MOMENTUM SPENDS
  Type
  Momentum Cost
  Effect
  Lingering Miasma
  X
  Add an additional round to the duration of the spell for each 
  Momentum spent.
  Spread of the Shroud
  2X
  Add an additional zone for every 2 Momentum spent.
  Flow Within
  X
  Add the Vicious quality, inflicting X additional damage for each 
  effect rolled.
  
  CHAPTER 5
  72
  the beasts must be handled as any other brutes. Shamans 
  have been known to keep apes chained by the altars of 
  Jhebbal Sag’s son Jullah and to keep ravens caged in the 
  temples of his son Jhil. Jullah, Jhil, and the Brothers of the 
  Night are described in detail on page 73.
  Jhebbal Sag rewards his followers and his children by 
  allowing them to utilize the primal bond between his world 
  and that of humanity. His shamans are noted for their 
  ability to summon and command beasts and call upon the 
  destructive forces of nature.
  THE CULT OF JHEBBAL SAG
  The core beliefs of the followers of Jhebbal Sag are in the 
  power of nature and in the kinship of men and beasts. They 
  see nature as raw and primal where the strongest rule. 
  This is reflected in the reverence for Jhebbal Sag among 
  great predatory beasts such as leopards, panthers, giant 
  serpents, saber-toothed tigers, and the like. The shamans 
  and witch doctors who revere the god use that primal power 
  and kinship with beasts to dominate other men and exact 
  revenge upon their enemies. One of the mysteries known 
  to his priests is the language of beasts, allowing them to 
  speak with beasts that remember Jhebbal Sag.
  The most important and valuable mystery in the cult of 
  Jhebbal Sag is the knowledge of the sign. When marked on 
  a wall, the ground, or some other surface, it can deter a crea-
  ture from pursuing a trail or otherwise passing by the sign.
  The cult worship of Jhebbal Sag is decentralized and 
  largely built around individual shaman and tribal prac-
  tices. The shamans themselves, though, live in a much 
  larger network of men and beasts. A shaman knows all the 
  beasts in their tribal area that remember Jhebbal Sag. The 
  shamans also appear to know each other and, like other 
  apex predators, respect the territory of others. In a region 
  where worship of Jhebbal Sag is prevalent, there may be an 
  elder, more powerful shaman that the other shamans look 
  to for guidance and to resolve disputes, such as the wizard 
  “I saw it carved in the rock of a cave 
  no human had visited for
  a million years,” muttered Conan. “In the uninhabited 
  mountains beyond the Sea of Vilayet, half a world 
  away from this spot. Later I saw a black witch-
  finder of Kush scratch it in the sand of a nameless 
  river. He told me part of its meaning — it’s sacred to 
  Jhebbal Sag and the creatures which worship him.”
  — “Beyond the Black River”
  
  73
  MINOR GODS AND CULTS
  of the Ghost Swamp in the Pictish Wilderness (described 
  in Conan the Scout).
  The greatest concentration of worship of Jhebbal Sag is 
  in the Pictish Wilderness. There, numerous shamans and 
  beasts revere him. There is also rumored to be a sacred grove 
  somewhere deep in the wilds, possibly in the Ghost Swamp. 
  The groves sacred to the god are unspoiled places distin-
  guished by especially ancient trees, with a simple rock altar 
  near their centers. Beasts that remember Jhebbal Sag, and 
  beasts from prior ages, are more likely to be found in these 
  groves and in the surrounding lands. The old god is also 
  revered by witch doctors in Kush, primitive tribes beyond 
  the Black Kingdoms, swamis in the jungles of Vendhya, 
  medicine men in the arboreal forest beyond Hyrkania, and 
  lamas in the lost mountains of Khitai. Others, particularly 
  civilized peoples, see the followers of Jhebbal Sag as brutal, 
  primitive savages.
  The altars to this god are usually simple piles of stone 
  stained black with the blood of sacrifices. These altars can 
  be found in clearings throughout the Pictish Wilderness. 
  Shamans may also erect such altars in the villages where 
  they live. Trees and other spaces around these altars are 
  often decorated with the heads of the victims that have been 
  sacrificed to Jhebbal Sag. Worshippers gather around the 
  altars from time to time to make a sacrifice in support of a 
  raid or to see a shaman enact vengeance against an enemy.
  The primary ritual in the worship of Jhebbal Sag is the 
  blood sacrifice on a stone altar. In some instances, a sacrifi-
  cial victim may be tied to an altar or to a stake while a beast 
  is called forth from the forest to slay the victim through the 
  shaman’s use of Word of Jhebbal Sag (a Momentum spend 
  from the Commune with the Wild spell, Conan corebook, 
  page 176). The shamans of Jhebbal Sag also use a variety 
  of other tricks to assert their power, including the Displays 
  Steely Glare, Sorcerous Might, Dead Man’s Stare, and A Mighty 
  Name (Conan corebook, page 125); a variety of powders and 
  smokes (Conan corebook, page 164); and the Enslave spell 
  (Conan corebook, page 177).
  THE FOUR BROTHERS 
  OF THE NIGHT
  The Four Brothers of the Night are the sons of Jhebbal Sag, 
  dark gods that reside in the long hut beyond the Mountain 
  of the Dead. They are Jhil, the raven god; Jullah, the goril-
  la-god who dwells on the moon; Juok, the leopard god; and 
  Jhekre, who wears many shapes but for one.
  ■
  ■ Jhil is a harbinger of fate, particularly fate in battle. 
  At times, he can spread fear and confusion among 
  soldiers, changing the tide of battle. He is a huge 
  black raven.
  ■
  ■ Jullah sometimes spelled Gullah, is a god of con-
  tradictions. As a gorilla god, he embodies brutal 
  strength, savagery, and frenzy. As a moon god, he 
  represents changes in the natural world, particularly 
  madness. The moon of Jullah seems to be a separate 
  part of the netherworld from the Brothers’ long hut.
  ■
  ■ Juok is a hunter, said to be the wisest and most prag-
  matic of Jhebbal Sag’s children. He disdains the weak 
  and culls herds for the strong to thrive. He is proudest 
  of them all.
  ■
  ■ Jhekre, the least of Jhebbal Sag’s offspring, is also the 
  most capricious. He went to Jhebbal Sag and asked 
  for the form of a raven but was told it belonged to Jhil. 
  When he asked to be shaped as a gorilla, or perhaps 
  a leopard, he was told that his older brothers had 
  claimed those semblances. Unable to decide, he is 
  said to change shape, wearing all animal guises save 
  for the shape of humankind, the worst of the beasts.
  The long hut of the Brothers is a place for dark celebra-
  tions and rites, a place where the four Brothers sit in judg-
  ment, and a place where shamans visit via spirit journeys 
  to learn secret mysteries. The loon is their messenger and 
  is held to be a sacred beast to them and all the worshippers 
  of Jhebbal Sag. Shamans use the call of the loon to signal to 
  other brothers of Jhebbal Sag or as part of their sorceries, 
  such as when drawing someone out of a camp or home. 
  More than one person has been known to stop what they 
  were doing to follow the call of a loon into the forest where 
  they meet their death.
  These gods are revered by many of the same tribes and 
  shamans that worship Jhebbal Sag, and are also worshipped 
  separately. Jhil is favored by Ghanatas and by the inhabi-
  tants of Tombalku. Jullah is worshipped by the people of 
  Kush, and also held as sacred by the Picts, who chain apes 
  to altars in his name. The people of the savannahs and 
  eastern jungles worship (and fear) Juok, but none worship 
  Jhekre for it is ill-luck to say his name aloud. Those who 
  know of him make signs against his notice.
  “Once all living things worshipped him. 
  That was long ago, when beasts and men 
  spoke one language. Men have forgotten 
  him; even the beasts forget. Only a few 
  remember. The men who remember Jhebbal 
  Sag and the beasts who remember are 
  brothers and speak the same tongue.”
  — “Beyond the Black River”
  
  CHAPTER 5
  74
  CHILD OF JHIL  
  (TOUGHENED, HORROR)
  Nightmarish hybrids of bat, ape, and bird, the Children of 
  Jhil are the god’s messengers and furies, ancient harpies 
  from the primordial otherworld in which dwell the Four 
  Brothers of the Night. Lean, sinuous bodies covered 
  with a mix of short dark fur and black leathery skin, 
  the Children of Jhil hunt in small packs of at least three, 
  never more than a dozen, and their cackling screeches 
  are terrible enough to make even the most stalwart 
  warrior blanch and shrink from the sky. Rarely, Jhil has 
  sent all the Children at once, blotting out the moon and 
  stars with their great wings.
  These are not the only servants of the Four Brothers to 
  visit the mortal world but are the most common. Despite 
  this, the Children of Jhil are never encountered in this 
  world unless summoned or sent.
  ATTRIBUTES
  Awareness
  Intelligence
  Personality
  Willpower
  9
  6
  7
  8
  Agility
  Brawn
  Coordination
  10
  12
  10
  FIELDS OF EXPERTISE
  Combat
  2
  Movement
  4
  Fortitude
  2
  Senses
  3
  Knowledge
  —
  Social
  —
  STRESS AND SOAK
  ■
  ■ Stress: Vigor 12, Resolve 8
  ■
  ■ Soak: Armor 1 (Leathery Skin and Fur), Courage 2
  ATTACKS
  ■
  ■ Sharp Beak (M): Reach 1, 5§, 1H, Piercing 2
  ■
  ■ Tearing Claws (M): Reach 2, X§, 2H, Grappling, 
  Vicious 1
  ■
  ■ Diabolical Cackle (T): Range C, 2§ mental, Area
  SPECIAL ABILITIES
  ■
  ■ Familiar 1
  ■
  ■ Fear 1
  ■
  ■ Feed Upon Fear
  ■
  ■ Flight
  ■
  ■ Keen Sense (Sight)
  ■
  ■ Rain of Blood: This Display (see above) may be 
  performed as a Free Action after a target has been 
  Torn Apart (see below), showering their allies 
  in Close Range with the victim’s blood, organs, 
  and parts of their sundered corpse. This Display 
  causes 5§ mental damage, with the Area, and 
  Stun Qualities.
  ■
  ■ Drag into the Sky: The Children of Jhil work 
  together to pull a foe into the air and apart. When 
  a character has been successfully Grappled, they 
  can attempt a Struggle pitting their Movement 
  against the victim’s Athletics or Acrobatics, Other 
  Children in close range can forgo their actions to 
  add an additional d20 per Child. If the target is 
  successful, they remain on the ground. Success for 
  the Children of Jhil means that they have pulled 
  the target aloft and may spend Doom to make 
  a Tear Apart special attack (see below). While 
  performing this Standard Action they will defend 
  using the captured character as a shield. If the 
  Children successfully avoid an attack, their living 
  shield will suffer 3§ damage with any Qualities 
  that the attacking character’s weapon possesses.
  DOOM SPENDS
  ■
  ■ Tear Apart: When two or more Children of 
  Jhil are holding a character aloft and spend 2 
  Doom, the held character must make an imme-
  diate Resistance vs Movement Struggle. Each 
  Momentum gained by the Child deals 1 Wound to 
  the target, representing the damage caused this 
  savage force applied to their body. If the attack 
  kills the target, they may attempt the Rain of Blood 
  (see above). This spend can be attempted every 
  round a character is aloft (see Drag into the Sky, 
  above).
  ■
  ■ Grandchild of Jhebbal Sag: As grandchildren of 
  Jhebbal Sag, a Child of Jhil will never be attacked 
  by any natural animal. They may track any desired 
  target with a Senses test at one lower step of 
  Difficulty. Furthermore, as Horrors, the Children 
  of Jhil may be summoned by particularly daring 
  sorcerers.
  “But a bat has flown over the Mountain of the Dead 
  and drawn your image in blood on the white tiger’s hide 
  that hangs before the long hut where sleep the Four 
  Brothers of the Night. The great serpents coil about 
  their feet and the stars burn like fire flies in their hair.”
  — “Beyond the Black River”
  
  75
  MINOR GODS AND CULTS
  NAKURA, THE 
  GREAT SKULL
  Nakura… the great skull which rears above its followers, 
  bared bone glinting in torch light, teeth eternally smiling 
  at the depredations of those who worship it. How has this 
  skull, this single totem, survived through millennia? How 
  can anyone say — save that the man whose brain once inhab-
  ited the ivory dome was reputed to be one of the mightiest 
  and most dangerous sorcerers of any age of the Earth. The 
  sorcerer was an Atlantean, the high priest of a sinister cult 
  which turned away from the dualistic faith of those who 
  inhabited the lost continent at the time and who saw the 
  universe as a pair of competing forces — life and death.
  Instead, these apostates, led by Nakura when his skull 
  still formed part of a body, became fascinated solely with 
  the overwhelming power of death. What drove Nakura 
  into this poisonous obsession is impossible to tell: was 
  he stricken with a wasting disease which had begun to 
  mummify him alive? Had so many of his followers been 
  swallowed by war and famine and the bloody sacrifices of 
  other Gods that his mind snapped? There are no answers, 
  save what can be inferred from those stories which have 
  survived cataclysm, fire and slaughter.
  Nakura was the high-priest and wizard of those people 
  who lived on Atlantis and named themselves, the Negari. 
  When Nakura abandoned the pursuit of life and dedicated 
  himself to exploring the ineluctable power of death, the 
  Negari followed him unquestioningly, ready to follow the 
  master whose wisdom had secured them power and prestige. 
  Even the strange, arcane ceremonies which Nakura insisted 
  his people follow caused no perturbation in those who 
  trusted in the wise and learned Nakura. From then on, at 
  every Moon of Skulls, the Negari would sacrifice the young 
  and beautiful of the neighboring cities and townsteads 
  to the hungry dark jaws of death. All of this was done at 
  Nakura’s command and according to his instructions and 
  the sorcerer reveled in the power which these sacrifices gave 
  him. Until, quite unexpectedly, he died. All the power and 
  might he could summon was useless in the face of that he 
  had devoted his faith to and Death took him as readily as 
  it took those Nakura had himself offered to the darkness.
  But what Nakura left behind was more than simply 
  mortal remains. The Negari plucked Nakura’s skull from the 
  grave where they interred his remains and began to dedicate 
  their worship to it, venerating it as the incarnation of Death 
  itself. Where once Nakura had been the high priest of Death, 
  now Nakura became Death’s representative. Whatever 
  power Nakura had possessed in life had seeped into his 
  bones, for the Skull would glow and pulsate with energy as 
  the sacrificial rites were conducted. On occasion, Nakura 
  would speak to those assembled to worship but this had 
  always been a trick of his priests — but the deadly, seductive 
  force of the skull, and the yawning darkness which invests 
  the skull has never dissipated and has been transferred, in 
  some sense, to many different men and women in the long 
  ages since the demise of Atlantis.
  In the Hyborian Age, Nakura’s followers are few and 
  isolated, concealed within the dense jungles of the South 
  and where they conduct strange experiments with deadly 
  poisons. These poisons are distilled from roots and berries 
  long since forgotten by those civilized races whose cities 
  have sprouted in place of the once great towers of Valusia. 
  With the wit and skill of alchemists, Nakura’s remaining 
  cult creates poison which kills, paralyses and eliminates 
  enemies, but they also create poisons which do far more 
  interesting things: they make a man forget the joy of life 
  and battle, women and song, shriveling his soul with dark 
  thoughts and darker appetites. Nakura, lord of Death, will 
  survive all the ages of the world, the grinning skull an 
  eternal symbol of death’s dominion.
  YAJUR
  The Black One, the Ten Arms of Death, She of the Seven 
  Tongues… Yajur acquires names like a corpse acquires flies. 
  Indeed, Yajur is Devi of the Dead, among other things. Her 
  cults are found throughout the East, but open worship is 
  most common in Kosala and Ghanara.
  A dark god, Yajur dances on the corpses of the dead, 
  including her lover — who some say is Asura — whom 
  she killed after mating. For this reason, she is sometimes 
  associated with the black widow and the spider god of 
  Yezud, though she is neither of these things.
  Ghanaran texts going back seven centuries bear what 
  appears to be eyewitness accounts of Yajur’s intervention 
  on the battlefield, sometimes for one side, other times for 
  another. Her priests and faithful ritually sacrifice their 
  victims to her, but never by drawing blood. In Kosala, great 
  priests called Stranglers wring the life from victims with 
  bare hands. In Ghanara, they wrap silken cords around 
  their necks or use poison. The body itself is then burned, 
  for every drop of blood must go to Yajur alone. Should an 
  assassin of Yajur spill a victim’s blood, some sects demand 
  they replace the sacrifice. These zealots go willing to Yajur’s 
  many-armed embrace.
  As a female deity, Yajur bestows her power upon mortal 
  women. In Ghanara, a matriarchy formed under the intoxi-
  cating red eyes of the Black One — the largest matriarchy in 
  the known world. There are few men, despite their positions 
  of power, who would openly invoke Yajur’s wrath. Better to 
  err on the side of caution than find oneself visited in the 
  night by one of Yajur’s Stranglers.
  
  CHAPTER 5
  76
  Yajur’s temples are found within cities as well as in ruins 
  crawling with age and vines. Some say she was first a god 
  of life, but after the Cataclysm became a god of death. For 
  others, she is merely the god of change.
  YMIR
  The northern lands are a mystery to many of those who 
  inhabit the Hyborian Age and a terror to those who live 
  close enough to the borders to fear the raids which come 
  from Asgard and Vanaheim. Vast tracts of open tundra lie 
  beneath a sky from which snow falls with the same regu-
  larity as a warrior swings his sword. Across these untamed, 
  endless snow dunes stalks Ymir, the great frost-giant, the 
  god of the ice and of the snow itself. And, like the ice of 
  which he is god, and from which some claim he was born, 
  Ymir seeks to make those who would follow him hard and 
  cold and steely.
  Those who have wandered in the trackless wastes of 
  the north have heard stories of the frost-giant’s daughters 
  — beautiful, elfin women who lead men from their camps 
  and from their companions, luring them into the wilderness 
  where Ymir’s other children, lesser frost-giants, can feast 
  upon their warm, bloody hearts.
  It is said that Ymir’s sons and daughters are those 
  unfortunates who have become lost and met the god 
  himself. Confronted by their insignificance in the face 
  of the wilderness in which they are immured and the 
  unknowable potency of the frost-giant, their minds are 
  blasted apart and Ymir puts them back together in his 
  image — cruelly indifferent to those men and women 
  whom they encounter and consumed only by their hunger, 
  their need for something to fill the vast emptiness of which 
  they have become part.
  
  77
  MINOR GODS AND CULTS
  Yet, as alien as it may seem to his nature, Ymir has some 
  affection for these twisted and ruined things he has made 
  from the husks of men and the remains of women. On 
  occasion, he has saved them from the cold iron of those 
  mighty enough to kill them, whisking them away in a blaze 
  of white fire and stark lightning. He has also let his favorites 
  be butchered and then pursued the slayers, hounding them 
  through the wilderness, his beard of ice shaking with the 
  love of the hunt and the lust for sacrifice. More than perhaps 
  any other being acclaimed as a god by the peoples of the 
  Hyborian Age, Ymir’s motives are un-guessable.
  Though many worship him, they do so through battle 
  and drinking. They do not congregate at shrines and offer 
  prayers to him. He is a god of a wolfish age, who cares noth-
  ing for incense and reverence. Ymir has no priests and does 
  not seek to find any. Those who inhabit the lands through 
  which he roams offer sacrifice to him in the form of still-
  bloody human hearts sizzling on a wooden sled, left at the 
  edge of the village. Sometimes, this sign of deference is not 
  enough, and many are the villages which have been found 
  by travelers ripped apart, the people slaughtered, and only 
  the sign of footprints disappearing into the wilderness to 
  indicate what has happened there.
  As unsettling and beautiful as the landscape of which he 
  is both ruler and manifestation, Ymir is a changer of shapes 
  and forms. Sometimes he is a part of the whirling winds 
  bearing the snow before it, sometimes the howling wolf, 
  and sometimes the vast, ice-blue figure of a giant striding 
  naked and terrible through the snow, hands clawed with 
  frost and the terrible, keening sound of the wind emerging 
  from between snow-covered lips. Sometimes, he waits 
  beneath the mountains, gnawing at the roots of the earth, 
  his hunger insatiable, his gaze sweeping out over the tundra 
  which is his realm.
  Ymir and the gods of the north are also discussed in 
  Conan the Barbarian, pages 72–75.
  
  T
  here is more than one form of belief in the Hyborian 
  Age. While, in most cases, the god to whom a cult 
  might be said to belong is more widely known than 
  its followers, this is not always so. Sometimes, as with the 
  cannibals of Zamboula, the god to whom the strange and 
  bloody rites are dedicated is forgotten, effaced in memory 
  by the vividness of the rites themselves. In other cases, 
  such as those cults whose gods have been shown to be 
  imposters, or else have seemed to vanish, the persistence 
  of the cult is as interesting a phenomenon as its theology 
  or organization. Many such peculiar remnants still exist 
  in the cities, jungles, and temples of the Thurian continent.
  Many more have yet to be found.
  THE CULT OF 
  ALKMEENON
  Who can know how many men and women have inhabited 
  the earth? How many nations have risen and been destroyed? 
  How many cultures have reached impossible heights of 
  artistry and are now no more than the clay with which 
  another nation’s greatest temples and palaces are built? One 
  such is the ancient kingdom of Keshan, a strange civiliza-
  tion which built its greatest city, the palace of Alkmeenon, 
  within a concealed valley, accessible only via the sheerest 
  and most dangerous of cliffs, or through a series of secret 
  tunnels which only those immersed in the secrets of the 
  strange cult which has sprung up around the place can 
  know. For around the great palace of Alkmeenon, strange 
  and sinister tales are told, and a cult, filled with the purpose 
  of their god, has continued to visit the city, lurking nearby 
  and waiting for the voice of their deity’s oracle to explain 
  to them their duties.
  The gods which the cult gathers to worship are not 
  named, nor are they ever to be depicted or otherwise referred 
  to in any term more precise than “the gods” or “the High 
  Ones” or “the Old Ones”. Those who choose to draw such 
  connections between strange religious orders of one kind 
  or another maintain that these mysterious gods must be 
  those unknowable, impossible entities called, The Great Old 
  Ones, but there is little to connect the former inhabitants 
  of Alkmeenon with the men and women who commit such 
  dread blasphemies in the name of those monstrous things 
  waiting in the Outer Dark.
  What is known of the cult is the power of its oracle, the 
  Princess Yelaya. Although it is said that all the princess’ 
  prophecies were, in truth, the mutterings of the long-lived 
  Pelishtim, Bit-Yakin. He found a means, preserved by some 
  power, inviolate and pure on a stone tablet within the depths 
  of the palace, to hide himself and his strange, inhuman 
  REGIONAL CULTS
  CHAPTER 6
  They passed through the torn hangings and entered the room, 
  which was rather more dimly lighted than the corridor. Doors 
  on each side gave into other chambers, and the walls were lined 
  with fantastic images, gods of strange lands and far peoples.
  — “The God in the Bowl”
  
  79
  REGIONAL CULTS
  followers from the world he had grown to loathe in the 
  remnants of Alkmeenon culture, and the strange cult which 
  grew around the form of the princess.
  Bit-Yakin, a man of peculiar genius, chose to remove 
  himself from the world and, upon making his way to the 
  forsaken city of Alkmeenon, discovered the strange cult 
  which gathered there to praise the long dead Princess 
  Yelaya who, though centuries dead, still exerted a strange 
  hold over the nearby populace. It was to placate the princess 
  that priests of the old gods would make their way to the 
  palace of Alkmeenon, to leave offerings of food, gold, and 
  incense that the Princess Yelaya might continue her rest.
  Bit-Yakin entered the temple of Alkmeenon to explore the 
  strange, abandoned palace and, finding the dead princess, 
  set himself up as an oracle, dispensing wisdom and orders 
  to those who visited the sepulcher of Yelaya. Secreting 
  himself in a hollow in the rock, Bit-Yakin would issue his 
  pronouncements and watch as the priests hurried to follow 
  his instructions, eager to placate the gods and ensure Yelaya’s 
  endless sleep would not be interrupted.
  Issuing strange orders in a resonant voice, Bit-Yakin 
  was able to ensure that he remained both undisturbed 
  in his retreat and did not have to venture far to find any 
  items or objects he needed for whatever peculiar purposes 
  he might have. Bit-Yakin used the offerings of food which 
  the priests brought for Yelaya to feed himself and left his 
  savage, inhuman followers to find their own food from 
  different, less salubrious sources.
  Where Bit-Yakin acquired these strange travelling 
  companions, shapeless creatures of enormous strength 
  and unquenchable savagery, no one can tell. Just as some 
  scholars opine that the “Old Ones” or “High Ones” which 
  Yelaya’s priests serve are synonymous with the “Great Old 
  The dread of mortality has made men and 
  women believe in many things to insulate 
  themselves from the darkness and chew upon 
  their misery. How many years did I spend, in 
  the blessed arms of Ignorance, before the truth 
  consumed my mind and the fictions of the 
  Gospels became that which I read and laughed 
  at, until tears of blood stained my cheeks. My 
  comfort was that other men had followed 
  falser Gods than I, in all ages of the earth…
  — Unaussprechlichen Kulten,  
  Friedrich von Junzt
  
  CHAPTER 6
  80
  Ones”, so have some, hearing the strange tales of brutal 
  monsters, imagined them to be the odious Shoggoth crea-
  tures of legend. Some have claimed they may in fact be even 
  more sinister creatures — the mi-go or another hideous 
  form of life alien to the Hyborian Age and, perhaps, to the 
  planet itself. Whatever the true nature of these creatures’ 
  heritage, when at last Bit-Yakin died of extreme antiquity, 
  they mummified his remains with the care and attention 
  paid only to those worthy of the greatest veneration.
  However, the next time the priests came to consult 
  the oracle they met only with the unconscious bestiality 
  of Bit-Yakin’s creatures, now without any master to keep 
  them docile. So, despite the absence of an oracle, the priests 
  of Yelaya maintained their watch, governed by a series of 
  charismatic high priests, devoted to their fallen princess 
  and the gods she served and later joined. Gorulga, the 
  only one of these high priests whose name is recorded in 
  “The Nemedian Chronicles”, continues the tradition of his 
  forebears; complete obedience to the whims of his deities 
  and to their oracles, to the point of death and beyond.
  THE SECRETS OF ALKMEENON
  The Cult of Alkmeenon is quite willing to share its exis-
  tence with the outside world. After all, they possess a real, 
  live oracle. An oracle which, silent as it may have been 
  for some time, still speaks to those who will dare the long, 
  dangerous journey to the temple and the perilous steps 
  through the dark labyrinth of the Alkmeenon palace to the 
  ritual chambers, where the priests lead the cult’s catechism. 
  The only aspect of the cult’s belief which is kept secret and 
  hidden is the importance, and if possible the existence of, 
  the Teeth of Gwalhur. These enormous, beautiful gems 
  have drawn thieves to the city of Alkmeenon for centuries 
  and always the cult has sought to protect them, though 
  whether this is because the Teeth have some vital ritual 
  role to play in the arcane rituals which the cult perpetrates, 
  or instead are simply relics which have become holy due 
  to their extreme age, it is somewhat difficult to ascertain. 
  None in the cult know.
  Unlike many cults, that of Alkmeenon actively encour-
  ages new adherents to join due to the simple fact that pre-
  cious few men or women live in the proximity of Alkmeenon. 
  Too many stories of the hideous deaths that await those 
  who trespass upon the palace have reached nearby villages 
  and the ears of traveling merchants. Too many people shun 
  the paths which might lead them close to the lands that 
  once composed Keshan. Those who do approach the area 
  and do so peacefully, without any apparent designs on the 
  Teeth of Gwalhur, are likely to be treated hospitably and 
  importuned to join the ranks of the cult with the promise 
  that the oracle’s words will alter the course of their life, 
  once they have heard them.
  Alkmeenon and the Teeth of Gwalhur are described in 
  Ancient Ruins & Cursed Cities.
  The Inner Mysteries
  The cult’s secrets and mysteries are, in many senses, secrets 
  even to itself. No member of the cult knows, for instance, 
  that their oracle was a Pelishtim called Bit-Yakin. Or that 
  Bit-Yakin worshipped the god Pteor, converting part of 
  the temple of Alkmeenon into a private shrine to his dark 
  Pelishtim deity.
  While members of the cult have encountered the obscene 
  brass idol which Bit-Yakin installed in the palace, none of 
  them could say how it had got there or what, in truth, it 
  meant, for the vast majority of the cult’s membership have 
  never travelled beyond the limits of their small enclaves. 
  Even the identity of Yelaya has been lost — that she was 
  a princess and was thought a goddess even in her own 
  lifetime is all the knowledge that remains. Stories have 
  accreted around her — that she was the bride of Set himself 
  but spurned the cruel serpent god to protect the people of 
  Keshan from his rapacious intent.
  Others claim she was a great warrior princess, who led 
  the people of Keshan in a bloody crusade against the world, 
  inspired by the voices of her gods until, at last betrayed 
  by her own generals, she was slain and consigned to an 
  undeath in which her body remained behind as her soul 
  entered the afterlife.
  None of these tales have the ring of truth to them; they 
  contain echoes of other myths and legendry, folktales, and 
  the boastings of drunks. The cult of Alkmeenon exists only 
  in the words of the oracle and in one other thing — the 
  ritual of Gwalhur which all adherents of the cult carry out 
  with teeth-gnashing fervor.
  Centers of Influence
  The cult has one place in which it maintains a following 
  and wields any sort of power. In the palace of Alkmeenon 
  and the surrounding wilderness, the cult rules unopposed. 
  Not that anyone wants to oppose them for, beyond the 
  rumors of the Teeth of Gwalhur, what would tempt even 
  the boldest adventurers to this desolate spot? There 
  are no cities filled with wealthy merchants or men and 
  women of easy availability. There are barely even villages 
  any longer.
  
  81
  REGIONAL CULTS
  Instead, there are rumors of brutal slaughter and a 
  strange, insular cult that worships a dead princess and a 
  series of gods without names. There is an oracle who makes 
  peculiar demands on behalf of the princess and her gods 
  and offers nothing in return. It is not an attractive prop-
  osition. A few of the bravest and most reckless treasure 
  hunters still make their way to the palace, but the few that 
  return intact and still breathing claim that the jewels that 
  lured so many to the forgotten kingdom of Keshan have 
  been lost or else consigned to some recess of the palace so 
  inaccessible as to render them gone to mortal man. Still 
  the legend is enough to elicit the attention of all who seek 
  wealth throughout the lands of Kush, Shem, Zamboula, 
  and beyond. And the cult still waits, faithfully repeating 
  the rites and incantations it has always done, waiting for 
  the voice of their oracle to return.
  Temple
  The entire, vast span of the palace of Alkmeenon is the 
  sacred temple of the cult. It is a huge sprawling space 
  containing dozens of rooms which the cult believes to be 
  invested with the holy presence of the gods. Where the 
  footfalls of the Princess Yelaya have invested the stones 
  themselves with the perfume of divinity. The octagonal 
  throne room where the nameless kings of Alkmeenon once 
  held court, the seat of their office — the vast golden chair 
  carved with exquisite skill and craftsmanship — and the 
  stairs which lead up to it, are studded with lapis lazuli and 
  other precious stones. There is the sepulcher of Yelaya, which 
  is also the chamber of the oracle — a cold, forbidding stone 
  room in which the corpse of the goddess remains, clothed 
  in silks and waiting for the offerings that her followers 
  make with such unfailing regularity.
  The cult also maintains that the fast-flowing river which 
  courses beneath the palace is in fact a sacred symbol of 
  the old gods and that, should it ever stop flowing, both the 
  palace and the cult will finally be claimed by the fingers 
  of history. The cult deposits its dead into the river, giving 
  their physical forms to the water in the hope that it may 
  further fortify the gods, and Yelaya, against the possibility 
  of destruction. Of course, it is these corpses — those of 
  the cult and of other nearby dwellings using the river for 
  similar purposes — that feed the dreadful appetites of 
  Bit-Yakin’s hideous servants. The temple of Alkmeenon is 
  an ecosystem, sustained by the cult which gathers there, 
  somehow surviving through even the most bloody and 
  brutal of events.
  Rites and Rituals
  There are several rituals that the cult performs. The first of 
  these is the delivery of food and goods to the oracle chamber 
  to solicit the prophecies of Yelaya. This involves the careful 
  entrance of the high priest into the presence of the princess 
  and watchful obeisance as he waits for the utterances of 
  the oracle. On the rarest of occasions, the cult gathers in 
  one of the large halls that are found throughout the palace 
  and begins a series of strange and ominous chants, while 
  drums beat with hypnotic regularity and fires burn, and 
  the thunder of the river beneath with the fervid moans of 
  the worshippers becomes a roar.
  Of course, the presence of those deadly malformed 
  creatures that served Bit-Yakin makes these rituals short 
  and bloody affairs, and yet the cult conducts them still. 
  Their faith is stronger than death, though not stronger 
  than the grotesquely muscled arms of Bit-Yakin’s servants.
  While Derketa is a death goddess, it is as a goddess of 
  fertility that most outsiders know her. The scandalous orgies 
  of the Luxor temple are open to all, as priests peddle the 
  virtues of the young to gain influence with the powerful. 
  These lavish parties are spectacles of unrivalled licentious-
  ness. Lesser occasions must be paid for by those seeking 
  Derketa’s blessing. Important festivals at the end of the 
  harvest, or the funeral of a significant royal, can continue 
  for days as it is only with the death of a celebrant that the 
  orgies must cease. Usually, the death is with a ritual suicide 
  as one of the acolytes chooses to join Derketa in protecting 
  the community, but occasionally Derketa chooses one of 
  the celebrants to join her side.
  The frequency with which the chosen are from rival royal 
  lines is too great to be mere chance, and rumors abound 
  saying that the chosen are not mere victims of pleasure. 
  Still, with the deaths provoking another festival, such 
  thoughts are quickly done away with. To avoid the orgies 
  is to provide your rivals with opportunities to conspire and 
  gather unchallenged, while you appear irreligious and weak.
  WITCH-GHOST FAMILIARS
  Whether it’s possible for a sorcerer to turn their own 
  dead child into a familiar is for individual gamemasters 
  to decide. Generally, ghosts such as this have Attributes 
  of 7 and no Fields of Expertise. Their sole ability is to 
  aid in the casting of magic. When acting as a familiar, a 
  witch-ghost can add 1d20 to Sorcery tests but will seldom 
  do so unless a part of their body is held under ransom. If 
  the body part is ever lost to a sorcerer, the witch-ghost 
  will haunt their murderer and increase the Difficulty of 
  all Sorcery tests by one step.
  Generally speaking, a sorcerer debased enough to 
  kill one child will kill several and have a host of such 
  assistants. However, regardless of number, witch-ghost 
  familiars only ever provide a maximum of +2d20 to 
  Sorcery tests, up to the normal maximum.
  
  CHAPTER 6
  82
  GODLINGS
  Not all entities that walk the mortal world were born upon 
  it. The godling is an infant god left behind in a summoning 
  circle during the summoning of a great Horror, a by-product 
  of some greater conjuration or even an unintended result, 
  frequently ignored. It may appear before the desired entity, 
  along with it, immediately after, or even eons later.
  While constrained by the circle, it is generally sustained, 
  though may be bored, hostile, or even feral, depending 
  upon its nature. Most appear within the summoning circle 
  — which is why they are frequently made of chalk and 
  destroyed once used, while at other times a godling may 
  appear outside it, even a great distance away. If constrained, 
  it may attempt to bargain to the best of its ability to be freed, 
  offering anything within its power, or lying brazenly about 
  its capabilities to deliver said favors.
  Other than its arrival being linked to that of the Horror, 
  the godling may or may not have anything to do with the 
  entity summoned, other than seizing the opportunity to slip 
  from whatever other space it inhabited once the barriers 
  between worlds was weakened.
  SEMBLANCE
  The Godling Appearance table (next page) serves to create 
  quick descriptions of these creatures. Roll a d20 for each 
  entry or pick a specific result, combining them as desired 
  or ignoring any entries that do not make sense.
  GODLING (TOUGHENED 
  OR NEMESIS, HORROR)
  A godling is more of a long-term nuisance than a villain to 
  be immediately overcome. Each godling’s appearance is a 
  random accumulation of images taken from the dreams of 
  humankind, and merged with no understanding of biology, 
  gravity, or purpose. They tend to hang in the air even when 
  possessed of functioning limbs, alternatively flailing and 
  shrieking until their whims are satisfied
  ATTRIBUTES
  Awareness
  Intelligence
  Personality
  Willpower
  10
  4
  5
  10
  Agility
  Brawn
  Coordination
  5
  5
  5
  FIELDS OF EXPERTISE
  Combat
  —
  Movement
  —
  Fortitude
  —
  Senses
  2
  Knowledge
  —
  Social
  —
  STRESS AND SOAK
  ■
  ■ Stress: Vigor 5, Resolve 10
  ■
  ■ Soak: Armor 4 (Horror), Courage 4 (Horror)
  ATTACKS
  ■
  ■ Transdimensional Bite (M): Reach 1, 3§, 
  Piercing 5
  ■
  ■ Flailing and Shrieking (T): Range C, 4§ mental, 
  Area, Knockdown
  SPECIAL ABILITIES
  ■
  ■ Familiar
  ■
  ■ Fast Recovery (Vigor and Resolve) 2
  ■
  ■ Fear 2
  ■
  ■ Feed Upon Fear
  ■
  ■ Flight
  ■
  ■ Unliving
  ■
  ■ Worship Me! The godling is an infant god and 
  desires worship. At any point, a sorcerer can 
  worship the godling who will in return act as a 
  familiar for the sorcerer. The godling grows bold 
  over time, and while it might initially provide 
  this service for an occasional offering, every time 
  complications are rolled when casting a spell that 
  the godling aids, the price increases. The first 
  complication increases the price to an offering a 
  day. Every complication after these increases the 
  price by 1 offering until the price reaches a total 
  of 5 offerings. If the sorcerer is foolish enough to 
  pay this price, the godling will transform into a 
  larger and more horrible adult form. Witnessing 
  this transformation causes a Dire (D4) Discipline 
  test, with failure causing 6§ mental damage. 
  Once the godling matures, it becomes capable of 
  functioning as a patron and is more-than-willing 
  to assist its worshipers in bargaining their souls 
  away, or it may simply decide to eat anyone within 
  reach. The adult form of the godling can be any 
  horror that the gamemaster desires, including 
  forms that resemble humankind.
  DOOM SPENDS
  ■
  ■ Flail: The creature can spend 2 Doom to target 
  all characters within Reach with its Flailing and 
  Shrieking attack. If Doom is spent in this way, the 
  attack temporarily loses the Area Quality.
  ■
  ■ Leech: While the godling can draw sustenance 
  from the latent magical energy in an area without 
  drawing suspicion, it occasionally enters a feeding 
  frenzy. When in a feeding frenzy, the godling 
  spends 1 Doom to increase the Difficulty of any 
  spell casting within the zone by two steps.
  
  83
  REGIONAL CULTS
  HOUSEHOLD GODS
  While more powerful gods are known by name and possess 
  thousands of eager followers, superstition and a desire to 
  have a personal spiritual protector leads the multitudes to 
  venerate personal family gods. Whether palace or hovel, 
  most homes have a shrine dedicated to the spirit of a pro-
  digious ancestor, forgotten god, or spirit that has looked 
  over them for generations. These many unnamed and 
  often unknown gods are generalized as household gods 
  even though they may hold sway for their followers over 
  domains much wider.
  Few pay this much notice. Pantheism is commonly 
  accepted in most nations and even those under the sway of 
  the most hostile of regimes are usually allowed to worship 
  peacefully out of public eyes. Worship of these gods is 
  usually informal, but in larger, richer households can rival 
  that of Mitra in pomp and ceremony. While most idols are 
  carved wood painted in lustrous colors, the great houses 
  lay cloths of gold across statues carved from ornate stone.
  Still, even when mighty beasts and outrageous sums 
  are sacrificed to them, it is rare that these gods make their 
  attentions known to their mortal kin. On rare occasion, they 
  might send an oracular dream or offer dire warning about 
  the hidden enemies of their protected few. One can only 
  hope that one’s family god might receive the household’s 
  prayers, dine heartily upon them, and offer protection from 
  ever-approaching night. Perhaps the household’s waking 
  is proof the god has been steadfast once again.
  But what receives worship may not be the god it seems. 
  When the dream-world of Andarra is in ascendancy and 
  words carry deeper than can be perceived, many of the 
  more vicious, lesser, other gods dine well on the sacrifice 
  and draw near that they might receive greater sustenance. 
  It is no great matter in these times of celestial turmoil for 
  these creatures to take up residency within the idols of 
  their prey. In fact, it is a trifle for such a creature to establish 
  dominion over a multitude of idols using each to snare 
  more sacrifices for its unending hunger.
  Some scholars warn of the danger of a school of such 
  gods taking up residence. Others say that we confuse the 
  jaws of a single larger mouth chewing on its food with two 
  creatures clashing in opposition. What is certain is that if 
  the town or village is lucky, the gods will destroy each other 
  before they can cause any great nuisance. Should the gods 
  fall to stalemate then they raise up their armies to provide 
  sacrifices enough that they might triumph. In such times, 
  neighbor turns on neighbor, blood spills in the night and 
  dreams are haunted with visions of madness.
  These wars might last days or even years as these para-
  sitic gods feast upon any stray prayer within reach. It ends 
  only when one of them is devoured, and the ascendant god 
  enters a horrible feeding frenzy turning its devotees on 
  each other and feasting on the sacrifice.
  What eldritch monstrosities might hide in angelic 
  shape? What soulless predator stares through the 
  soft marble eyes of Juno and listens with Jupiter’s 
  ear? We should be careful that we direct our prayers 
  well, lest demons grant them with mocking laughter.
  — Unaussprechlichen Kulten, 
  Friedrich von Junzt
  GODLING APPEARANCE
  Roll
  Body
  Limbs
  Skin
  1-2
  Spiderlike
  Unipod, like a slug
  Black warty skin
  3-4
  Homunculus
  Loping biped
  Rich Green with Red tipped scales
  5-6
  Bloated rough and hairy
  Long stilted legs
  Covered in soft brown fur
  7-8
  Crustacean, like shell
  Hooved limbs
  Dripping egg like slime
  9-10
  Bristling with spikes  
  like a thorny devil.
  Legs of a bird such as a Rooster
  Transparent with luminescent 
  organs
  11-12
  Ferret like
  Tentacles with suckers
  Invisible
  13-14
  Insect like
  Tentacles with Hooked tips
  Ever shifting colors and rippling 
  textures
  15-16
  Bat like with wings
  Fins like a shark
  Thick and leathery
  17-18
  Reptilian, like a gecko
  Tendrils like a jellyfish
  Feathered
  19-20
  Roll twice, merge the results. The 
  creature manifests as a strange 
  conjoined twin of the two types
  Roll twice as multiple sets of 
  limbs jut out at peculiar angles
  Roll twice and merge descriptions 
  as you see fit.
  
  CHAPTER 6
  84
  But this madness does not always go unnoticed. Those 
  with a sorcerer’s understanding of the gods can recognize 
  when the household gods have been supplanted. Indeed, 
  sorcerers have a different name for such creatures. They 
  call these beings household gods, or sometimes, gods 
  of blood. When the gods are recognized, prayed to, and 
  given tribute, they can be tamed as much as any other 
  scavenger might be tamed. The household idols are cast 
  aside and new monuments are erected. These monuments 
  are marked with each fresh kill made in the name of ven-
  geance. Trophies are added to the idol and effigies of the 
  slain burnt before it.
  But only slaughter can appease these gods after long. 
  They need to feel the hatred that drives men to kill. Unless 
  war or feud provides bodies for the pile, they soon become 
  restless again. Even the most debauched of ceremonies will 
  bore such a creature. It needs the jealous rage of revenge to 
  be truly satisfied. War is an addiction it gleefully indulges, 
  and if it must divide its flock to service this addiction, so be it.
  It is not hard to convince the passionate to become 
  vicious in their passion. The gods can easily incite violence 
  amongst their cult members. They might start by convincing 
  the cult to turn on the sorcerer that helped to tame it and 
  force division between the families that are united in its 
  worship. They might start with convincing the sorcerer to 
  seek vengeance on a public official or lord with a mind to 
  start a civil war.
  HOUSEHOLD GOD (NEMESIS)
  Whatever their scheme, these gods are more direct than 
  intelligent. They are ill-suited to plotting and they seldom 
  have complex plans. They are impatient, and slaughter is 
  all that matters. Only when innocents are killed, and the 
  hatred becomes real, will the god return to its sloth. With 
  the newfound bounty of savage repercussion drenching its 
  followers in sweet righteous carnage, the god can satisfy 
  its urges. Urges it will cater to until nothing lives, and the 
  god discards our world like we might leave an apple core 
  to slowly rot.
  ATTRIBUTES
  Awareness
  Intelligence
  Personality
  Willpower
  8 (1)
  6
  10
  10 (1)
  Agility
  Brawn
  Coordination
  8
  8
  8
  FIELDS OF EXPERTISE
  Combat
  —
  Movement
  1
  Fortitude
  —
  Senses
  2
  Knowledge
  3
  Social
  —
  STRESS AND SOAK
  ■
  ■ Stress: Vigor 8, Resolve 11
  ■
  ■ Soak: Armor 4 (Incorporeal), Courage 4 (Horror)
  ATTACKS
  ■
  ■ Visions of Death (T): Range C, 5§ mental, Area
  SPECIAL ABILITIES
  ■
  ■ Feed on Mayhem: Anyone killed within sight of 
  the household god causes it to heal all Vigor and 
  Resolve instantly. If the household god has full 
  Stress, it heals 1 Trauma instead.
  ■
  ■ Incorporeal 4
  ■
  ■ Insane Devotees: A household god routinely 
  drives people to madness in its worship. The 
  household god provides all its followers +1d20 to 
  any tests involving violence to a human.
  ■
  ■ Masters of Sacrifice: A household god can store 
  any Momentum gained from a sacrifice within 
  sight as Doom.
  ■
  ■ Monstrous Awareness 1
  ■
  ■ Monstrous Willpower 1
  ■
  ■ Night Vision
  ■
  ■ Possess Idol: A household god can possess any 
  idol that has been subject to legitimate worship 
  within the last year, so long as no other force 
  maintains habitation or control of the idol. The 
  range for any ability it can use is determined from 
  any idol the household controls.
  ■
  ■ Telepathy
  ■
  ■ Warring Pair: Household gods may manifest in 
  pairs. These pairs, while aggressive against each 
  other, often perceive outside threats as something 
  to face communally. Any time a paired household 
  god comes under direct attack, it can take two 
  Standard Actions.
  DOOM SPENDS
  ■
  ■ Sorcery: A household god can cast any spell with-
  out a test by paying 2 Doom for every success or 
  point of Momentum needed.
  ■
  ■ Feud: Household god are masters at stirring up 
  unrest. Should a household god become aware of 
  two or more factions vying for the same goal, they 
  can spend 3 Doom to make any argument become 
  sour. If the arguing sides have had a trauma 
  inflicted by Visions of Death, the argument will 
  immediately become violent.
  
  85
  REGIONAL CULTS
  THE IVORY  
  WOMAN OF PUNT
  The people of Punt are survivors, a fact evident in all aspects 
  of their lives. They take great pride in their strength, and 
  any Puntish storyteller will proudly repeat their histo-
  ries: how the Ivory Woman led them to their settlements, 
  how the Ivory Woman pulled the starlight down to make 
  strengthening war paint for the people, and how the Ivory 
  Woman showed them how to find the sparkling gold hidden 
  within her chosen rivers.
  Punt’s community holds tightly to its histories as lessons 
  and guidance for each new day. While the thatched roofs 
  and even the huts themselves are kept carefully, the more 
  one looks, the more it is apparent that new structures are 
  built over the old. Communal fires are carefully kept in the 
  same public squares as their forefathers kept them. Once 
  the Ivory Woman told them to stand firm and never give up 
  their homes, they never did. Now, travelers and strangers 
  will find roads worn and filthy, a striking contrast with 
  well-maintained homes.
  The people of Punt are some of the most tightly-knit 
  in the world. While men and women do marry and form 
  intimate family units, there is always a larger sense of 
  community and belonging; when food is gathered, there 
  is always enough to share. When children are born, they 
  are children of the entire town, and are blessed and made 
  welcome by the Ivory Woman.
  The Ivory Woman has had many names over the cen-
  turies, from Netjera, Ati, to the current and most preva-
  lent, Ayesha.
  Ayesha, the Ivory Woman, claims a central temple as 
  her sanctuary, and it is held as the keystone of Puntish 
  community. Generations upon generations ago, in the 
  darkest times of the Puntish people, at the very brink of 
  disaster, it was the Ivory Woman who appeared, bathed 
  in light, a shining warrior naked save for her carved mask 
  and her golden warpaint. Then, she was known as Netjera, 
  the First Goddess. She taught the people to defend them-
  selves against their enemies. Since then, they have done 
  everything she has commanded, and their people remain 
  strong and unconquerable. One would be hard-pressed to 
  find a Puntish tribesman, woman, or child who would not 
  drop everything to defend that temple, should the Ivory 
  Woman ever be endangered.
  The Ivory Woman usually remains within her sanctuary, 
  only predictably emerging to walk among the people with 
  the dawning of a new season. These days are marked with 
  celebration — not only for the beginning of the new season, 
  but for the blessings the Ivory Woman will bestow. All 
  newborn children are brought before the goddess, where 
  she bestows a communal blessing on all, solidifying each 
  babe’s place as a welcome part of Puntish community.
  It is rare, but during the celebrations, a babe may be 
  chosen by the goddess to learn from her, either as a disciple 
  of her faith, or as a warrior meant to protect the people. 
  The babe is taken by the Ivory Woman and her dedicated 
  priests, to the cheers and delight of the people. The baby’s 
  parents are suddenly held in the highest esteem, and the 
  people are happy, for they will have another generation of 
  spiritual leaders and powerful heroes, taught by the hand 
  of the goddess herself.
  The Ivory Woman does not fear her people — some 
  would insist that she fears nothing — but all the same, 
  she prefers the sanctuary of her dedicated temple. For a 
  hundred hundred years, she has remained, always youth-
  ful, never changing. Outsiders and those who would wish 
  to break the spirit of the people of Punt sling accusations 
  and rumors. Some insist she is but an opportunistic pirate, 
  hiding behind war paint and masks until her features change 
  and her skin starts to sag, at which time the old “goddess” 
  disguises herself as just another priest. Others insist that 
  something far worse is happening: that the Ivory Woman 
  is feasting on the souls of her disciples. How else could 
  she remain alive so long? Perhaps she insists her people 
  commend the bodies of the dead to the river is to help her 
  hide her own victims. For was her own temple not built 
  directly over a part of it?
  The truth may never be known, for it is said that within 
  the gold-flecked walls of her temples, behind the green 
  fire-stones that light the way, only those of a true faith 
  may safely walk.
  THE PALE GODDESS
  For all that Keshan claimed to have Punt as an ancient 
  and hereditary enemy, very little was spoken of the people. 
  Both Keshan and Punt were warlike, and yet Punt, for all its 
  vagaries, maintained a very real and threatening dominance. 
  Border skirmishes were constant and the dark-skinned 
  warriors of Punt terrifying in their ferocity, driven to 
  conquer and destroy their enemies, all at the command of 
  — and with the promise of favor from — their Ivory Woman.
  — “Lectures in Hyborian Religion and Ecology”, 
  Prof. John Kirowan (PhD, FRS, FRAI, FRGS)
  
  CHAPTER 6
  86
  THE JUNGLE CULTS 
  OF KHITAI
  The beauty of Khitai is ancient, centuries upon centuries 
  of histories, tradition, and carefully-maintained structure. 
  Any western visitor to Khitai will find a difficult challenge, 
  as most non-Khitan visitors are viewed with disdain or 
  outright disgust. The insular people consider their foreign 
  neighbors to be lower than the lowest beggar; for even the 
  beggar knows his place within Khitan society and will not 
  dare to upset the ancestral structure of the land.
  The farther one travels from the simple, aesthetically 
  beautiful centers of civilization, the more one starts to see 
  the jungles and wild forests of bamboo that are the subject 
  of many a rumor. Even the harshest of the lands of Khitai 
  have a striking and dangerous beauty to them, well deserving 
  of the poems and artistic calligraphy handed down from 
  god-emperors and exalted historians.
  The jungles are dangerous. Even the oldest of warriors 
  will tell his grandsons to pray to their ancestors before 
  stepping foot within the shadowy maw. Each soul that 
  wanders in without returning is said to remain trapped there 
  to forever hunger for the soul of the next hapless victim. 
  No wonder, then, that the very rare and deeply poisonous 
  black lotus and gray lotus are only to be found within. It is 
  said that they grow the strongest in the places where the 
  greatest number of lives were lost. Truly, amazing things 
  may be discovered within the swamps and jungles of Khitai, 
  if one is brave enough to risk never returning.
  It is little wonder that the only souls strong enough 
  to remain alive must pay homage to secret and starving 
  gods. It has been speculated — usually by those who are 
  strangely never seen again — that the lack of knowledge 
  of what transpires in the jungle’s depths is a tremendous 
  weakness of the Khitan empire. Certainly, if those wilds 
  could be tamed, it might be a tremendous advantage should 
  invaders ever test Khitai’s borders. Unfortunately, that has 
  proved unlikely throughout the centuries, as the mysteries 
  and dangers of the wilds prove equally fatal to outsider 
  and Khitan alike.
  THE HIDDEN TEMPLES
  It is known that there are temples hidden throughout the 
  jungles and swamps, some fallen and little more than ruins, 
  others still standing tall, ancient and intimidating. The few 
  “Here my journey ended, but from learned wazams 
  in souks that smelled of oranges and incense, I 
  learned of the distant east, of fabled Khitai. There, 
  purple-towered Paikang — abode of sorcerers — 
  rose from jungles of tangled bamboo. An ancient, 
  yellow-skinned race dwelled among the ruins of 
  temples, where elephant-headed gods are revered.”
  — Astraeus of Nemedia
  THE SCROLLS OF KAI’ZHANG
  While it is true the people of civilized Khitai do not know 
  or understand what secrets lie within the jungle, there 
  are records to be found, should one have the correct 
  contacts, lineage, status, and ability to barter. Those few 
  who have escaped from the jungles and their strange 
  inhabitants eventually, inevitably speak, whether in 
  cautionary tales or in weeping gibberish, and those words 
  are caught up and any official record kept behind very 
  closed, very guarded doors.
  Perhaps the most complete collection of these records 
  was in possession of Third Lotus Kai’zhang, great-great-
  great-great grandson to the Scribe of Heaven, whose 
  ultimate honor was to record each thought of the God-
  Emperor, the Magnificent Son of Ten Thousand Years, and 
  see to it those golden-scribed scrolls were set to safety. 
  Each need, each piece of information desired and found, 
  was set upon the scrolls.
  Third Lotus Kai’zhang, however, saw fit to dishonor 
  his ancestors and his position. Greed overtook him — or 
  madness, some would argue — and the man, driven by 
  some strange need, scribed those scrolls pertinent to 
  the jungle’s secrets onto his body with needle and ink 
  before setting fire to the scrolls and fleeing.
  While some of those scrolls were able to be saved, 
  Third Lotus Kai’zhang’s actions damned him. To say his 
  name in civilized company is to blaspheme and will result 
  in instant arrest — or instant beheading, depending on 
  one’s surroundings. Third Lotus Kai’zhang is hated, an 
  enemy of every true Khitan citizen. His name and the name 
  of his family is forever stricken from all histories of the 
  land, and it is the duty of any true citizen to kill the man 
  upon sight. Undisputable proof of the traitor’s death, or 
  delivery to the god-emperor, will certainly be rewarded.
  If one can find Third Lotus Kai’zhang, doubtless one 
  will have a treasure trove of information on the jungles, 
  their traps, their people, their dangers, and their beauties. 
  Until then, only whispers and broken information remain, 
  pieced together from those that survived.
  
  87
  REGIONAL CULTS
  reports that can be found suggest that these temples are 
  so different in appearance and structure that they simply 
  cannot be dedicated to only one people or religion.
  Some report hearing low, sonorous bells singing in the 
  distance, only to find nothing when followed. Others swear 
  that as they pass certain points within the bamboo-lined 
  dirt paths, chimes tinkle at the edge of hearing, only to 
  never be heard again.
  Rumors abound of frightening shapes at the corners 
  of one’s eyes; here, a gray ape slipping out of sight, there 
  a horrible, dancing vine whispering faint words and 
  unholy promises. Yet elsewhere, tiny people, too small 
  to be proper humans, laugh and sing and slip out of sight, 
  but not before letting your eyes linger on their fearsome, 
  grinning masks.
  Names are called, with little more than speculation 
  as to their meanings and intricacies. Nüba, the lady of 
  living drought. Yun, the black skull, whose priests jeal-
  ously guard the secrets of the black lotus. Yag the Last, 
  the Elephant Lord who brought life to a select few. Many 
  more names may pass the lips of travelers, and yet for all 
  that is known about them, they may as well be the names 
  of passing strangers.
  Reports of potential enemies are few and far between, 
  made all the more unreliable from how tangled any tales 
  are. One report mentions a handful of dark-skinned natives, 
  naked but for the bones that they pierce through their 
  bodies. Travelers are greeted with spears and knives, and 
  more bones are added to the collection. Another report 
  speaks of a powerful, nomadic tribe that gains strength 
  through the consumption of their enemies and with 
  this added strength they call down the might of their 
  unholy gods.
  And what of the ruins to be found within the jungles and 
  swamps? Stories are not much improved. One tale speaks of 
  a temple, completely ruined and little more than rubble, but 
  still gleaming red with newly-shed blood. But who or what 
  bled there? And more important, who or what caused it?
  Another hidden temple was reported to be completely 
  overgrown with plants, save for one strange path through 
  the building that had withered and blackened. What hap-
  pened to that path? Why were whispers heard only when 
  touching the plants, but never upon the walk itself? Was 
  the dead growth a corruption, or was it overgrown life? Yet 
  another temple was reported to echo with song, and yet 
  no life resounded within. Were spirits singing? Thieves? 
  Something else?
  The only way to seemingly make sense of these names, 
  locations, and dangers would be to explore, or to try to find 
  Third Lotus Kai’zhang. But who would dare be so foolish as 
  to risk the hatred of a nation just for answers? What brave 
  and daring adventurer would dare to set foot within the 
  haunted jungles of Khitai?
  KHOSATRAL KHEL
  “The Nemedian Chronicles” hold the first agreed-upon 
  account of Khosatral Khel on an isle in the Vilayet Sea. Yet 
  conflicting texts, which many scholars dismiss as mythology, 
  speak of Khosatral long before his appearance on the Isle of 
  Xapur. Old zuagirs, travelers, and beggars trade stories for 
  thin coins and relate the legends which precede Khosatral 
  Khel’s presumable final resting place.
  Khel’s appearance on Earth stretched long back to the 
  pre-Cataclysmic Thurian Age. He came unto the world 
  from the Abyss, that great void called the Outer Dark from 
  whence spring dreams and madness. Perhaps some sorcerer 
  of old Valusia summoned him, or a member of those called 
  the serpent-men. His arrival is unknown, but surviving 
  records, if they are to be believed, indicate he either came 
  willingly or broke the spells which bound him forthwith.
  Khosatral Khel was free in the world, at least in part. It 
  soon became apparent to the demon that this world, and 
  that native land unto which he was born, were incompat-
  ible. To stay, he must of necessity assume an aspect like 
  that of these menfolk which walked the land. Flesh was 
  too weak to hold his malevolence and his alien nature. A 
  hard, pure, elemental material was necessary. After some 
  experimentation, Khel found himself able to fashion a 
  body made of iron.
  Yet it was beyond Khel’s ability to turn iron into flesh. He 
  remained a body of metal, a living element which sought to 
  take on the world, for thus are the ambitions of creatures 
  of that scale. He marshaled forces and strode forth upon 
  the Thurian Age as conqueror.
  His would be a tempestuous reign that did not last long.
  Sometime or another, Khel was defeated by nothing 
  more than a man who made a clever pact with other demons 
  who knew Khel and sought vengeance on him for some 
  slight. They gave this man the ability to bind Khel as well 
  as power beyond the scope of most human minds. The 
  sorcerer’s name is lost in the chaos of the Cataclysm, but 
  his work lived beyond his preternaturally long life. Khel was 
  “Listen, now, for these things are all forgotten 
  by men. I shall tell you the whole of it, for I am 
  old beyond reckoning and walked the earth in 
  the days of the warlord Khosatral Khel. A coin, 
  perhaps a jack of wine, then we’ll talk.”
  — Anonymous wanderer, as recorded 
  in conversation by Astreas
  
  CHAPTER 6
  88
  imprisoned, split from his iron body, and trapped beneath 
  a great seal. Nothing would ever release him save for the 
  will of gods greater than Khel himself.
  There, Khel waited, for a demon does not sleep and the 
  centuries crept on like torture. There were no gods to help 
  him; the great lords of the Outer Dark would not heed his 
  pleas. Perhaps they did not even hear them.
  Yet the demon found salvation in the end of the world 
  of men. The Cataclysm broke the world, shattered Valusia 
  and Commoria, sunk Atlantis and Lemuria. As it cracked 
  the great rock of the Earth, it also broke the seal. When the 
  rumbling ended, and the world was as quiet as a field after 
  battle, Khel was again free.
  KHOSATRAL KHEL AFTER 
  THE CATACLYSM
  In the wreckage the upheaval left, man was thrust back into 
  savagery. Indeed, much of what crawled from the wreckage 
  devolved into that which modern men would not call human. 
  Khel had the world much to himself for some while. The 
  survivors remaining, however, sparked interest in him. He 
  could not rule in the void, but he could again be king on 
  this miserable world. Khel would take what he could get.
  He gathered followers and became preoccupied with 
  finding the nature of the spell that bound him and those 
  fellow demons that sold him to the sorcerer. He traveled 
  the world and, in time, came upon some of the people of 
  Bori. These barbarians were strong, willful, and exactly the 
  sort of force by which Khel could carve empires. He turned 
  some of the early Bori into a fighting force, helping them 
  pull down ancient Acheron. It is said Khel, for his part, had 
  once been among the fell creatures who taught Acheronian 
  sorcerers magic. Perhaps he had a falling out with them as 
  well. Perhaps history is merely full of irony.
  Whatever his motive, Khel’s legend states that he forged 
  one of the first Hyborian kingdoms with his barbarous 
  followers. He gave them civilization, and they gave him 
  worship. A kingdom was not enough for Khel, and he 
  turned his eye all the way to the inland sea created by the 
  Cataclysm. His men marched, but the rest of the Borians 
  and the descendants of races from Mu and Lemuria rallied 
  against him. Even Khel’s mighty necromantic powers failed. 
  He and some few remaining followers were driven from 
  the known world.
  In time, they settled in what fragmentary texts seem 
  to indicate was an abandoned Kosalan city. There his fol-
  lowers grew old and died. No magic Khel yet knew could 
  keep them alive. He needed followers whose flesh did not 
  wither. People of iron, or at least people whose flesh might 
  be remade. Traveling to places man knew not about, he 
  collected the necessary powers and took them to a small isle 
  in the Vilayet Sea. There, a people called the Dagon became 
  his new project. He would forge them into a civilization of 
  immortals, resurrect them as necessary, and take them back 
  into the world of the Bori and make them pay.
  Once again, man intervened in Khel’s schemes and his 
  people were slain, his island kingdom left to ruin, and all 
  because of a knife — one no doubt forged by man with the 
  help of one of his enemies.
  So, history leaves Khel, supine under a great dome among 
  a ruined city with that same dagger across his chest trap-
  ping him as surely as the seal once did. Those scholars who 
  believe this tale hope history does not repeat. They hope 
  Khel remains asleep. Yet, in his long wanderings, Khel left 
  many believers behind, and they all wish to see their god 
  of iron brought forth once more into the world.
  THE CULTS OF 
  KHOSATRAL KHEL
  Like a travelling, libidinous father leaving behind progeny 
  wherever he roams, Khel left believers in his wake. Cults 
  that worship him exist still, practicing the dark rituals he 
  taught them, or at least degraded variations of those magics.
  In the lands of the people once called the Bori, many 
  such cults are found. They rarely operate in the open, for 
  the greater host of the Bori turned against Khel. These 
  people consider themselves a separate race, imbued with 
  the blood of their god. That Khel had no blood is not some-
  thing the fervent consider. His cults are therefore, in theory, 
  all blood relatives.
  FROM THE NOTES OF JOHN KIROWAN
  Late at night. Same day. I awoke from a dream I can 
  scarcely now recall. Figures around me, indistinct, large 
  eyes and thin limbs. Too many eyes. Something left over 
  in my subconscious from my research no doubt. What I do 
  remember from the dream is the image of a dagger. I saw 
  it, secretly, some years ago. It was shown to me by one of 
  Carter’s men, after his death. The man claimed it was made 
  from a meteorite. Immediately, upon waking, I recalled a 
  fragment of “The Nemedian Chronicles” which describes a 
  similar dagger, also carved from a meteorite, which was used 
  to trap a demon. Did Tut’s dagger have the same function? 
  Or, even more compelling, was the dagger found in his tomb 
  the same one from the Hyborian Age?
  If I could inspect it, have it analyzed… I might have 
  physical evidence of that era… something other than that 
  damnable ring.
  
  89
  REGIONAL CULTS
  While they do not actually possess demon blood, it is 
  not entirely unlikely that they are related. Khel often took 
  followers with him, and surely those Bori tribes, and even 
  kings, were left behind him as he went. This is what his 
  cultists believe. Their version of secret history is this: the 
  lineage of Hyborian kings is not divine but demonic. Khel’s 
  followers are the true heirs to the Thurian continent, and 
  the great rulers of the world will one day be reminded of 
  this. In the meanwhile, Khel’s followers wait.
  They have stories passed down through the centuries. 
  Some are like broken pieces of a frieze, mere parts of the 
  whole. Others might possess the great truth of Khel’s arrival 
  on Earth and his true history, if it can be called true at all. In 
  cities from Corinthia to Zamora, Turan to Khemi, they plot 
  and wait, gaining influence, practicing necromancy, and 
  searching for their lost master. If they ever find him, they 
  believe Khel would marshal men against men again and, 
  this time once and finally, conquer the whole of the world.
  OLLAM-ONGA
  In the deserts of Tombalku is an ancient and seemingly 
  timeless city named Gazal, wrought of green jade, now 
  partially in ruins. Desert caravans steer wide of Gazal, and 
  few dare enter its crumbling walls. The people therein live 
  a curious existence, cut off from and ignorant of the rest of 
  the world. To the folk of Gazal, the world is as it was 800 
  years ago. They originally came from Koth, and brought 
  with them the worship of Mitra, but have long since aban-
  doned that faith.
  One building, however, in the southeast corner of the city, 
  is intact. Amidst broken buildings and crumbling avenues 
  still stands a red, spired cylindrical tower, and none of the 
  folk of Gazal will even so much as look upon it, avoiding all 
  mention of it and its terrible inhabitant. For in that tower 
  dwells a god in human form, a pallid and giant humanoid 
  thing called Ollam-onga. It preys upon the people of Gazal, 
  devouring them slowly, and they are seemingly unable to 
  do anything against the god, caught in a ceaseless lassitude 
  in which they spend centuries as they were mere years.
  The witchmen of Kush know of an incantation that 
  binds the being in human form, but none dare use the 
  incantation for to do so would tempt the wrath of the god, 
  and even a god caught in mortal form is still a potent and 
  deadly foe. It is said, too, that the fall of a god will be avenged 
  by seven black riders on the desert sands, and none care 
  to learn the truth.
  THUGRA KHOTAN 
  AND THE 
  ZUGITE CULT
  What is death to a god? An insignificance. What is death 
  to a man? A terror and a senseless fear which can never 
  be truly appeased. Why should this be so? Why should 
  it be that man suffers and ages and dwindles, while gods 
  remain ever vital, their power undiminished even as the 
  number of their worshippers may wax and wane? For as 
  long as man has known and recognized the inevitability 
  of death, there have been those who sought to cheat it, to 
  avoid it, or to eliminate it entirely. For as long as death has 
  rendered the ambitions of the powerful a hollow mockery, 
  there have been those who have sought to escape its grip. 
  The greatest of these men and women who have sought to 
  make themselves immune to the condition of their species 
  was, and is, Thugra Khotan.
  Some 3,000 years before the Hyborian kingdoms cast 
  the shadow of their civilization across the Earth, Thugra 
  Khotan ruled a great city, where he acted as the high-priest 
  of Set, and of the king of Kuthchemes. It is forgotten by 
  many that Thugra Khotan served Set, the Old Serpent, 
  faithfully for many years, until his own obsessions dis-
  placed the service of his god and set him on the darkest 
  paths through sorcery and slaughter towards some vision 
  of immortality. From his vast palace in the forgotten land 
  of Kuthchemes, Thugra Khotan dispatched his priests and 
  servants to loot the libraries of the wise and to thieve from 
  the greatest apothecaries.
  Endlessly, Thugra Khotan sought to find a means to 
  defeat death. Men, women, and children were slaughtered 
  for their blood and the gilded walls of the sorcerer’s great 
  ivory dome rang with the screams of the dying. Even as the 
  Even those forgotten epochs harboured men 
  like myself. Men who would pursue the true 
  nature of things — beyond the posturing of the 
  church and the blandishments of love — into 
  whatever darkness awaited them. I have heard 
  tell of one such man, a man in whose image I 
  imagine myself. Possessed of great power and 
  greater knowledge. Of greatness itself. Thugra 
  Khotan who, with all I learn of him, I cherish 
  and fear as I do all dark phantoms of the past…
  — Unaussprechlichen Kulten,  
  Friedrich von Junzt
  
  CHAPTER 6
  90
  northern barbarians swept across the borders of his nation, 
  slaughtering the terrified populace of Kuthchemes and 
  beyond with as much conviction and skill as their sinister 
  master had shown, though on a much greater scale, Thugra 
  Khotan continued his devotion to his dark studies.
  By the time the hordes of slavering barbarians had 
  hacked their way to his bastion, Thugra Khotan no longer 
  cared. He had created the elixir which would prevent his 
  death and sustain him over thousands of years, in the very 
  image of life. Even as the northerners surrounded the ivory 
  dome of Kuthchemes and began the bloody massacre of 
  his priests, Thugra Khotan invoked the darkest of magics 
  to seal the door to his citadel and drank the elixir which 
  decades of research, ritual, and the blackest of pacts had 
  enabled him to create. Preserved then, perhaps forever, 
  Thugra Khotan became a myth, a memory, a ghost story 
  whispered between hunters after secret lore and those who 
  lust after the riches of a lost age.
  Even in the age in which he was merely called Thugra 
  Khotan, he was worshipped. Many of those whose heads he 
  separated from their shoulders with an ancient stone knife 
  believed that the man killing them was a god incarnated 
  in a weak human shell. The powers which Thugra Khotan 
  possessed were formidable. Able to project himself into 
  the dreams of men and women or to summon the shades 
  of the dead to serve him, they enabled him to secure the 
  devotion of thousands of the common folk who tended the 
  earth under his dominion. Feast days were held in his honor 
  and many of the poor sent their children to the ivory dome, 
  marked with the red stroke across the cheek which denoted 
  they were destined for Thugra Khotan’s altar.
  Thugra Khotan eventually awoke, three thousand years 
  after his slumber began and, even then, in a new world in 
  which new nations had risen and already been consigned 
  to history, his potency remained as did his determination 
  to subjugate those less powerful than him. Which was, of 
  course, everyone. Styling himself as Natohk the Veiled One, 
  he again rebuilt his kingdom only to be thwarted, in ironic 
  circuity, by barbarian cunning and savagery.
  And yet it matters not, not truly, for Thugra Khotan’s 
  legend will never die. His ivory dome, alight with gold 
  and jewels, stands uncorrupted and perfect amidst the 
  crumbling city of Kuthchemes even now; the great throne 
  of Thugra Khotan may be unoccupied but it will not be so 
  forever. The Zugites who worship the sorcerer have always 
  prophesied his return.
  In one story whispered among his followers, the potion 
  that Thugra Khotan created is able to knit flesh back together 
  over centuries, reviving necrotized tissue and finally, finally, 
  forcing the crimson lifeblood through veins clogged with 
  the dust of millennia. In another tale, the coins stamped 
  with Thugra Khotan’s visage are not simply the currency of 
  a forgotten epoch and a vanished nation — instead, these 
  coins each contain a fraction of Thugra Khotan’s spirit and, 
  if enough of them are gathered together, then the veil of 
  death can finally be shredded and he will emerge, ready 
  to lead his people into a new and splendid age, where all 
  men and women who have sought to restore their god to 
  life will be rewarded with immortality themselves. And 
  the Earth will be brought once again beneath the sway of 
  Thugra Khotan, dread lord of Kuthchemes.
  THE ZUGITE CULT
  To the world, the Zugite cult dedicated to the worship of 
  Thugra Khotan does not exist. How could it? There are few 
  enough who live near to where Kuthchemes once stood 
  and where the ivory dome can still be seen by those who 
  are willing to search hard enough, and who have heard of 
  Thugra Khotan, let alone who believe him a god.
  Who now recalls the tales of the sorcerer who sought to 
  defy death, or who allowed the country he had conquered 
  to fall beneath the scything blades of barbarians? Perhaps 
  a historian of the ancient world will know the tales, if not 
  the names attached to them, and perhaps those who seek 
  after the loot left behind by fallen kingdoms may recognize 
  the name and the coins, with that strange gaunt profile 
  stamped on them, but there is precious little else to reveal 
  the existence of a band of ruthless devotees dedicated to 
  Thugra Khotan’s return.
  The Inner Mysteries
  To those scant few, degraded and debauched as they assur-
  edly are, who still revere Thugra Khotan’s name, the cult 
  is more than life itself. Its message is handed down from 
  initiate to initiate. Each recipient of the true nature of 
  Thugra Khotan is selected by a fellow member of the cult 
  and inducted by that member.
  The tenets of the cult are that each member must be 
  prepared to sacrifice anything to ensure Thugra Khotan’s 
  return from the dead. That no torture, bribe, or other induce-
  ment will lead to a confession that the cult in fact exists, 
  and that the ivory dome is to be protected and its location 
  kept a secret by whatever means are necessary.
  The cult also produces coins, in imitation of those true 
  coins which bear the features of Thugra Khotan and can 
  still be found by those who care to look through the ruined 
  streets of Kuthchemes. The cultists manufacture these 
  coins as an offering to their dead lord, to Thugra Khotan, 
  hoping he will accept them into the kingdom of death he 
  has built for himself, where they will wait until the thin 
  line which separates the netherworld from the living is 
  irreparably pierced. The true coins, the coins minted in 
  the long-forgotten age of Kuthchemes’ predominance, are 
  hoarded together in the hope that they hold some essence of 
  Thugra Khotan himself and, when assembled, may provide 
  
  91
  REGIONAL CULTS
  a link with their god that might allow them to bring him 
  back, resplendent and vengeful.
  Centers of Influence
  The Zugite cult is small and constantly on the verge of 
  dying out. It is an obnoxious cyst, clinging to life in a few 
  places — largely in Stygia where the cultists must carefully 
  conceal their true loyalties or risk bringing down the ven-
  geance of the priests of Set upon themselves. While the 
  dangers of Stygia are evident, the greater danger lies the 
  ruins of Kuthchemes.
  It is also rife with the unsatisfied and the apostate, with 
  those who have been disgraced by the priesthood or else 
  victimized by those who follow Set, doggedly, in all things. 
  There are many in Stygia who would offer their prayers and 
  their dedication to a god other than the Father of Serpents, 
  and the worship of Thugra Khotan offers this opportunity.
  The lure of immortality is enough to draw many in to 
  the cult’s vicinity. They have many tales, spread between 
  members, which claim that Thugra Khotan moves still in 
  the world — that the mysterious assassination of a member 
  of the Vendhyan royal family is the work of the sorcer-
  er-king, perhaps, or that he has appeared in the dreams of 
  one of the cult’s most elderly members and promised that 
  resurrection will be hers, not long after her death, as shall 
  be revenge on those who cost her teeth and her beauty as 
  a young mercenary.
  The Zugite cult of Thugra Khotan is filled with the delu-
  sional and the psychotic. Its members are often homeless 
  and see, in their degradation, the fault of some power 
  determined to crush them. In Thugra Khotan, in the myths 
  of his war with death, the cultists see themselves and more 
  than themselves. They see the hope of their eventual victory. 
  While there are hundreds of thousands of such people 
  throughout the kingdoms of the earth, the Zugite cult does 
  not expand often into other nations. There are pockets of 
  devotees in countries and cities surrounding Stygia, but 
  these worshippers tend to be willing to worship any god 
  that seems to offer revenge. The dedication of the Zugites 
  in Stygia is unusual and perhaps has something to do with 
  their relative proximity to the ivory dome of Thugra Khotan 
  and to the wealth of marked coins which are produced 
  there; the coinage of Kuthchemes produced beneath the 
  nose of the Great Serpent’s servants.
  Temples
  There is only one site sacred to those who have chosen 
  Thugra Khotan as their deity: the ivory dome that lies in 
  the heart of the ruined city of Kuthchemes. It is here that 
  their god ruled over his kingdom, here that he conducted 
  his dark researches into conquering death, and here that he 
  carried out his final ritual, through which he deceived death.
  Thugra Khotan slept through such cataclysms, uncon-
  scious and insensate, his mighty conjurations protecting 
  that ivory dome as the elixir he produced saved his physical 
  form. The ivory dome is a place of pilgrimage to those pitiful 
  few who still believe in the powers of the priest-king. None 
  would dare profane the sacred edifice with their hands or 
  their feet, and so none have ever entered to see, within 
  those mighty doors, the beauty of gemstone and filigree 
  which adorns every surface.
  Instead, the cultists gather outside the ivory dome and 
  attempt unusual and useless rituals. Most of these are purely 
  the invention of the cultists themselves — assembled from 
  vaguely understood pieces of esoteric lore, half-remembered 
  prayers, and chants and invocations offered to other gods, 
  but here they are repurposed in the hope that whatever 
  magic might be contained in the words and actions can 
  summon Thugra Khotan.
  The gatherings often include the assembling of vast 
  stores of coins, both those made by the cultists and those 
  which came from Kuthchemes itself, in the days of its glory. 
  Of course, Thugra Khotan does not return to life in front of 
  his followers, no matter how many coins they gather, but 
  this has not stopped them yet.
  Rites and Rituals
  The rites and rituals of the cult of Thugra Khotan are strange 
  amalgams of magical and holy workings carried out by the 
  devotees of other faiths. Although they hold no true power 
  themselves, the zealotry and conviction with which Thugra 
  Khotan’s followers perform them can sometimes result in 
  unusual effects. The gamemaster may choose to manifest 
  these with unique Doom spends, as desired.
  THE ZAMBOULA 
  CANNIBAL CULT
  Zamboula, that great desert city, relies upon its system 
  of slavery for existence. For this reason, and perhaps this 
  reason alone, it has become synonymous with the cannibal 
  cult which stalks its streets by night, preying on the lost, 
  the drunk, or the homeless. It is not, however, the only 
  nation where this noxious practice exists, though it is 
  only in Zamboula where such depravities appear to occur 
  quite openly. It is only in Zamboula where it is considered 
  as a cult populated by black men and women exclusively. 
  For, in every other place where the Cult of Yog exists and 
  thrives, there are no distinctions between those who savor 
  the flesh of man as the sweetest of delicacies. Far from it. 
  In truth, the Yoggites have only a single condition for entry 
  into their ranks: that the initiate must be a slave.
  
  CHAPTER 6
  92
  THE OUTER VEIL
  The Yoggites are secretive everywhere they exist, save for in 
  Zamboula where circumstances have made them reckless. 
  In every other nation of the earth, the cult exists only as 
  a rumor, an explanation for the strange remains found 
  washed up along river shores or dredged from the bottom 
  of wells. Only slaves may join the secret cells and, even 
  amongst slaves, the reality of the cult is rarely discussed. 
  Some slaves can toil for years alongside one another, never 
  realizing that they are both members of different cells, for 
  secrecy is everything. In Hyrkania, for instance, the scantest 
  of evidence of the cult’s practices could lead to instant death. 
  The practice of other religious rituals being discovered in 
  Stygia could result in something far worse.
  THE INNER MYSTERIES
  How the cult began, which slaves were its first members or 
  where they came from, is impossible to know — the cult 
  of Yog maintains no history, even orally — and so all that 
  is passed on is a series of beliefs, from the leader of the 
  cult to each initiate. Once these scant facts are imparted, 
  they are not mentioned again. As the cult is only for slaves, 
  should a member manage to secure his freedom through 
  some means, they can no longer belong to the Yoggites.
  The eating of flesh is sacred for slaves as it is the only 
  pleasure they might know which their masters will not 
  and will never be able to take from those they have made 
  their property. Despite this, the cult is pragmatic. It does 
  not believe in the overthrow of slavery or in bloody revo-
  lution; it has endured too long to believe in such things. 
  Instead, it simply persists, performing its bloody rites over 
  and over again, establishing itself even more firmly within 
  the hearts of each and every nation where men and women 
  toil under the whip.
  THE STRUCTURE OF THE CULT
  The cult of Yog is broken into individual cells, usually num-
  bering no more than twelve and typically fewer. Again, no 
  such discretion is required in Zamboula where the cult is 
  an open secret, free to rampage as it chooses. A cell has a 
  nominal leader who arranges meetings and who, alone, 
  is aware of any other cells which might be operating in 
  the same city or area. This ensures that, should one slave 
  
  93
  REGIONAL CULTS
  or cell be caught, the entire network of the cult won’t be 
  revealed and destroyed.
  It also helps to prevent any unfortunate questions being 
  asked by local watchmen or militia, noticing too many 
  travelers and wandering merchants disappearing at once. 
  The wider structure of the cult is something of a mystery.
  Among the older members of the cult on whom the 
  consumption of human flesh has begun to wreak a strange 
  effect, it is rumored that a tall, black stranger with a lordly 
  bearing is the true leader of the cult and that, at certain 
  times, he has eaten flesh with his slaves and blessed them, 
  exhorting them to continue their feasting.
  CENTERS OF INFLUENCE
  While Zamboula is the cult’s most noted manifestation, 
  there are few cities in the world that do not have slaves 
  working in noble houses or tending to the needs of the 
  wealthy. And where there are slaves, the Cult of Yog can be 
  found by those who know how to look. While extremely 
  prevalent in the south of the continent, where slavery is 
  as common as sand, the cult is still active in the Hyborian 
  kingdoms and certain whispers indicate that it may have 
  adherents in the barbarian regions of the North. Slavery 
  is a common industry after all, and who notices a missing 
  merchant anyway?
  Temples
  The cult of Yog, naturally, maintains no formal temples or 
  churches — to do so would be doubly impossible. Firstly, 
  as all its members are slaves, and unable to own property. 
  Secondly, to do so would be to acknowledge the existence 
  of the cult to the world. However, the bloody rituals which 
  the cult participates in are held in places which have the 
  same symbolic significance, no matter where in the world 
  this might be.
  Each cannibalistic feast takes place at night, typically in 
  coincidence with a full moon, and at a crossroads. What the 
  importance of the crossroads might be has never been fully 
  explained, save for vague murmurings that this “pleases 
  the Black Man” for whom the crossroads is a sacred place 
  through which he can travel, seemingly at will.
  During the feasts, in which cooked and raw human 
  flesh is devoured with unseemly relish by cult members, 
  uncanny things can begin to manifest themselves at the 
  edge of firelight: ravening, hound-like maws snap fero-
  ciously into existence and vanish again; vague, monstrous 
  forms are glimpsed in silhouette before revealing faces of 
  pulped, bloody flesh. Even when these rites are conducted at 
  junctions within major cities, some instinct or supernatural 
  force ensures that they are rarely interrupted. And those 
  who do stumble across the feast simply become another 
  course on the blood-smeared menu.
  “At the edge of the desert, beyond the houses, there is 
  a clump of palm trees, and within that grove there is a 
  pit. And within that pit have been found human bones, 
  charred and blackened. Not once, but many times!”
  — “The Man-Eaters of Zamboula”
  RITES AND RITUALS
  Although the rites of the cult of Yog are bloody, frightful 
  spectacles of degenerate appetites, they seem to have 
  little effect upon those who perform them. The con-
  sumption of flesh bestows no magical gifts upon those 
  who do the consuming, nor does it invest them with the 
  memories of those whom they have eaten or the strength 
  and courage of a dozen men. Its effects are subtle and 
  insidious. The gamemaster may have an encountered 
  Yoggite possess one of the following two abilities at 
  the cost of 2 Doom.
  SPECIAL ABILITIES
  ■
  ■ Touch of the Weird: A cultist of Yog who has 
  taken part in at least one ritual is immune to Fear 
  or any other psychological effects associated 
  with encounters with magic or creatures from the 
  Outer Dark. If a spell is cast on a Yoggite which 
  causes Fear among other effects, the cultist suf-
  fers the other effects as normal but is not afflicted 
  by any mental attacks.
  ■
  ■ Magical Resistance: A member who has taken 
  part in at least one ritual has +1§ Courage Soak 
  for any magical attacks or weapons used against 
  them.
  
  N
  o foe is more reviled than the cultist — and no 
  one is more fun to fight. What more dangerous 
  foe can a player character hope to meet than the 
  devotee of some dark and deadly god? What more grisly 
  fate awaits them, should they fail, than the granite altar 
  and the obsidian knife? Summon a cultist of the Hyborian 
  epoch in the mind’s eye. What does one see? Chances are 
  there are hooded robes, sinister tattoos, odd symbols etched 
  into walls; all the mysterious trappings and tropes which 
  make a cult such an evocative and entertaining opponent 
  for a band of player characters.
  And then, of course, there are the gods the cult wor-
  ships. This nexus of deranged worshippers, and the dread 
  object of that worship, is an ever-blooming tree to which 
  the gamemaster can always return, knowing there will be 
  something compellingly nasty to pick from its branches. 
  However, cultists don’t have to be evil. The cult of Asura, 
  for example, is remarkable for its faith, kindness, and 
  compassion, as well as its loyalty to the throne of Aquilonia. 
  Even when oppressed by the priests of Mitra, the cultists 
  of Asura remain steadfastly decent.
  If the player characters find themselves confronted by 
  the threats of the Thurian continent, they might find allies 
  in the local temple. Or they might find themselves tied 
  to altars while sorcerer-priests brandish obsidian knives 
  overhead, chanting as the darkness churns above them.
  GOALS OF THE CULTS
  The cults of the Hyborian world are, typically, populated by 
  the desperate and the mad. That is not to say that only the 
  desperate and the mad believe in the gods they worship; that 
  is certainly not the case. This is also not true of the priests 
  who intone the holy names of their chosen deities and keep 
  the fires of the temple lit — some of these priests may be 
  less than salubrious individuals, and others of the priestly 
  caste may be so dangerous and twisted and powerful as to 
  be a nearly gods themselves — but there are many who 
  are dedicated to their faith and to the duties it betokens.
  This chapter concerns itself with those cults and religious 
  orders whose worship involves blood and madness and 
  slaughter. While that sometimes concerns the major gods 
  of the Hyborian Age, such as Set and his devious priesthood, 
  these are, most often, the furtive, unseen men and women 
  who devote themselves to the darkest and strangest beings 
  which men deem gods.
  Each cult is unique, and each god may have one or more 
  cults dedicated to them. Whether this is the furtive, ruthless 
  cult of Cthulhu — its undying masters hidden in Khitai and 
  waiting for the moment the stars come right — or it is the cult 
  of Bel — each member committed to theft and duplicity — 
  these cults are inimical to any who would seek to impede them.
  THE CALL OF THE CULTIST
  CHAPTER 7
  “Conan, do you fear the gods?”
  “I would not tread on their shadow,” answered the 
  barbarian conservatively. “Some gods are strong to 
  harm, others, to aid; at least so say their priests.”
  — “Queen of the Black Coast”
  
  95
  THE CALL OF THE CULTIST
  Even those cults which may be described as “benevolent” 
  have an edge of danger to them. Members are willing to 
  choose death by the most sadistic methods to worship their 
  god. While they may prove to be valuable allies while goals 
  align, the same may not prove true in the very near future. 
  After all, while fighting alongside a cult, a player character 
  might be struck by the gold icon on the peculiar altar and, 
  a few weeks later, decide to claim it for their own. Cults 
  should always have an aura of menace and unpredictabil-
  ity to them, even if they are fighting alongside the player 
  characters. The gamemaster should frequently drop hints 
  of unusual practices and unsettling beliefs which only 
  expedience prevents from being revealed.
  THE GREAT REWARDS
  While the broadest goals of each cult may be said to be 
  similar — the worship of their chosen god(s) and the perpet-
  uation of the cult — the ways in which these goals manifest 
  themselves are wildly divergent. Where one cult might 
  glory in debauchery, the slaking of lust and the acquisition 
  of sacrificial victims for the bloody altars, another might 
  praise their chosen lord through extreme asceticism, the 
  refusal of food and water, and the mortification of the flesh. 
  These practices, however peculiar they may seem, should 
  always have some intended outcome. Cults in the Hyborian 
  age might well be composed of madmen, but they shouldn’t 
  be composed of idiots. Certainly not if they hope to provide 
  some opposition to the player characters.
  The practices of a cult are inextricably tied up in the 
  rites and rituals which make it what it is. Within that cult’s 
  worldview, all these beliefs make perfect sense and are as 
  appropriate as they are necessary. Cults are more frightening 
  when they are coherent; when, no matter how horrific the 
  rituals the cult engages in, the cult members retain some 
  rationality and their plan makes sense within their moral 
  perspective. Which is a convoluted way of saying: if the cult 
  is trying to destroy the world, the gamemaster should give 
  them an internally consistent reason to do so.
  The cult of Cthulhu, for example, is dedicated to the 
  transformative destruction of the Earth and the onset of 
  a cataclysm worse than the one which sank Atlantis and 
  obliterated Valusia. For them, this is a logical thing, as it 
  will hasten the coming of the Great Old Ones and a new 
  age of worship and freedom. Waking Great Cthulhu is 
  clearly something only the mad would do, but for one who 
  worships a tentacled alien god sunken beneath the waves 
  in a city whose architecture is enough to drive one mad, 
  this is a desirable outcome.
  ARE THE GODS REAL?
  The gods in the world of CONAN are ambiguous things. 
  One may argue that Mitra exists — his dream-sending and 
  phoenix blessing saves Conan’s life in “The Phoenix on 
  the Sword” and Mitra openly intervenes to assist Princess 
  Yasmela in “Black Colossus”, but other such intervention 
  is nowhere to be seen. For this reason, many of the gods 
  in this book do not have definite rules attached to them, 
  or rewards associated with praying to them. After all, 
  the gods do not rely upon their human worshippers for 
  power or for their existence. They either are, or they are 
  not. Mankind’s belief makes little difference; certainly, 
  as Yasmela finds out, Mitra’s help is not contingent on 
  the consistency of their obeisance to him. The Khorajans 
  have been praying to Ishtar for years, having abandoned 
  Mitra for the goddess, only to return when aid is needed.
  This disinterest in mortals echoes that of the entities of 
  the Cthulhu Mythos. Howard and Lovecraft were friends 
  and their ideas influenced each other — and this is cer-
  tainly the case here, with both Howard’s and Lovecraft’s 
  higher powers being mysterious, with motives which are 
  not just difficult to guess but virtually impossible for a 
  human mind to parse. The gamemaster can use this in 
  CONAN games and make sure that, while a cult may be 
  pursuing one goal, the being they make their god might 
  well have something different in mind.
  This can go further; the gamemaster should not be 
  afraid to have a god simply not exist. Perhaps, as is the 
  case in “The Servants of Bit-Yakin”, the god which the cult 
  bows before is a devious fiction, devised by a charlatan 
  with a sense for the theatrical. Or, instead, perhaps the 
  cult believes the god it worships to be false — a con-
  venient figment to hide their plans for extorting other 
  followers and robbing from other temples in the name 
  of the “true god” — only for the convenient figment to 
  prove to be less of a figment than is convenient.
  The gods in this book are presented to be versatile and 
  to be used as desired. They are as real as the gamemaster 
  allows. No more and no less.
  “I have known many gods. He who denies them is as blind 
  as he who trusts them too deeply. I seek not beyond death.”
  …
  “But the gods are real,” she said, pursuing 
  her own line of thought.
  — “Queen of the Black Coast”
  
  CHAPTER 7
  96
  This can open interesting avenues of play. After all, if 
  the player characters are thieves or survive long enough to 
  become kings, their experience of cults is unlikely to be the 
  same as those rough and ready adventurers who explore 
  the wilderness of the far north or the steaming jungles of 
  the south. The cults that occupy the more stable, civilized 
  territories are very different and less likely to be engaged 
  in regular orgies of bloody sacrifice — unless, of course, 
  one lives in Stygia.
  The cult of Mitra clearly has a darker, inquisitorial side. 
  In Conan’s time, the cult of Asura has been suppressed and 
  hunted by Mitra’s servants for generations. Fortunately, 
  the Asuran cult is smart enough to remain hidden and 
  endure, but how many other cults have been destroyed by 
  the formidable orthodoxy of the Mitran cult, their beliefs, 
  attitudes, and idiosyncrasies erased entirely? Perhaps the 
  player characters are helped by members of one such cult, 
  given food and lodging and medical assistance after an 
  escapade which went badly wrong. When torch-bearing 
  Mitra fanatics begin pounding at the doors of the refuge, 
  smashing the idols which adorn the small shrine outside, 
  what will the player characters do?
  Alternatively, it may be that the cult the player charac-
  ters stumble upon during an exploration of the fringes of 
  a major city is engaged in something devious — and the 
  only recourse is to turn to the dour priests of Mitra for their 
  help in combatting the strange and sinister machinations 
  which threaten to consume the city.
  The sheer variety and range of cults that can be distrib-
  uted through the continent is a great boon to the game-
  master. Player characters should not be allowed to get 
  complacent, certain that one cult will always act the same 
  as the last, or even that one branch of a cult will behave 
  the same as another. Variety will keep them guessing and 
  on edge, with a cult’s true aims never fully revealed and its 
  loyalties ever on the point of shifting.
  WHAT A CULT 
  LOOKS LIKE
  Cults are all different and all unique but devising a unique 
  cult every time the player characters stumble into a pecu-
  liar chapel or an obscene rite may prove difficult for even 
  the most creative gamemaster. This book provides many 
  high-level features of each cult, but doesn’t provide all the 
  answers, such as who the high priest of a certain temple is, 
  which temples are in which cities, or how many followers 
  of a god can assemble on short notice, armed and ready 
  to die for their faith. The following sections provide a few 
  ideas which can be applied to almost any cult, to give it 
  more character and detail.
  DEGREES OF INITIATION
  Cults are, almost always, hierarchies. This is inevitable — as 
  a simple rule of human behavior is to organize by status, 
  power and influence. Therefore, if more than one person 
  is dedicated to the worship of a god, someone will need 
  to be in charge. But, as a means of maintaining security 
  and ensuring that the cult can survive attacks — from 
  without and potentially within — many cults have levels 
  
  97
  THE CALL OF THE CULTIST
  of membership. New members usually start as novices, of 
  one kind or another, and then ascend through the ranks, 
  gaining prestige and learning new aspects of the cult’s 
  belief structure as they go.
  This also ensures that people remain with the cult — 
  most members want to advance and discover the next 
  level of the god’s mysteries, or perhaps they simply want 
  to enjoy the advantages a cult offers, whether sex, drugs, 
  or salvation. The Cult Hierarchy table provides some idea 
  of the level of knowledge, sophistication, and resilience 
  that each potential layer of the cult will have. It also 
  describes an easy structure for adventures — let the 
  player characters kill their way to the top — but it also 
  ensures that finding who is at the top may require just a 
  little more thought.
  Note that the terms initiate, adept, and Master are also 
  used in The Book of Skelos to describe members of a sor-
  cerous cabal. This is to emphasize their similarity, as most 
  cabals are essentially cults whose primary purpose is the 
  pursuit of one branch or aspect of sorcery instead of a god, 
  or sometimes alongside that god. If desired, the gamemaster 
  can use the rules for sorcerous cabals to represent a cult, 
  as there are more similarities than differences between 
  these organizations.
  INSIDE A CULT
  Most cults in the Hyborian Age are similar in their struc-
  ture, despite the wide range of gods they represent. This 
  section presents a description of the structure of an 
  average cult, from the outermost and most peripheral 
  of followers to the cult’s leader.
  ■
  ■ LAY MEMBER: This is the most superficial layer 
  of membership within a cult, and perhaps its 
  most numerous. A lay member believes in the 
  god and worships them regularly and may donate 
  or tithe some portion of their income. However, 
  a lay member is not entrusted with duties in 
  the temple or cult and is not expected to do 
  any more than attend public worship services 
  when possible.
  ■
  ■ INITIATE: An initiate is one who has been wel-
  comed into the cult’s organizational structure, 
  whether as a servant of the cult directly or as a 
  priest-in-training. They have responsibilities to 
  the cult and to their home temple and must obey 
  the instructions of their superiors within the 
  cult. Initiates are expected to attend all public 
  and private worship ceremonies; devote some of 
  their time to studying the cult’s history, dogma, 
  and its most superficial mysteries; and defend 
  the temple to the best of their abilities. Initiates 
  may live within the temple’s premises, if possible.
  ■
  ■ PRIEST: The priests are appointed with special 
  rights and privileges within the cult and are 
  expected to live in devoted prayer and service 
  to the god. They perform worship services and 
  almost always live within their temple. A cult’s 
  priesthood inevitably has ranks, with junior 
  priests expected to assist senior priests with ritu-
  als and ceremonies. They are initiated into some, 
  but not all, of the mysteries of that cult, and are 
  expected to die in service to their god, whether 
  of old age or through more violent circumstances.
  ■
  ■ MISSIONARY: A special type of priest, the mis-
  sionary is expected to travel outside their home-
  land and expand the cult’s influence in the world, 
  converting those of other cults to their own. This 
  can be handled through demonstration of the 
  superiority of the cult’s theology and temporal 
  power, through some enactment of the god’s 
  virtues, or by defeating a people, throwing down 
  their gods and forcing them to swear allegiance 
  to their conqueror’s god.
  ■
  ■ HIGH PRIEST: Generally, this is the senior-most 
  priest. Sometimes the high priest officiates at 
  worship services, and at other times they only do 
  so for religious holidays or special occasions. A 
  temple has a single high priest in residence, and 
  a grand priest or arch priest for those religions 
  whose membership span multiple cities or even 
  kingdoms. The high priest may or may not be 
  blessed with the god’s attention, but their will 
  is considered equivalent to that of the god, and 
  they speak for their patron deity. They are inevi-
  tably acquainted with all the god’s mysteries.
  Rare is it that any worshipper of a god has any super-
  natural power above and beyond any sorcerous gifts they 
  may have learned on their own, but depending on the 
  nature of the cult, some high-ranking priests within a 
  cult are practicing sorcerers. If the cult has any religious 
  artifacts or items significant to the god, these are stored 
  within the cult’s main temple, and can be accessed gen-
  erally only by the high priest or senior priests.
  
  CHAPTER 7
  98
  CULT HIERARCHY
  Rank Titles
  Effect
  Neophyte, 
  Initiate, 
  Novice
  What They Know: The lowest level of initiation chiefly focuses on promises of greater knowledge 
  to be gained later, and on the correct way to worship the god in question. In the worship of Ishtar, 
  this stage focuses on purification rituals. In the worship of Set, this involves tending to the ser-
  pents of the temple and the preparation of both those bound for sacrifice and the weapons to be 
  used for the gory task. The basic truths of the cult’s occult secrets will have been revealed and the 
  initiation process will have taken place, binding the initiate to the cult.
  As Opponents: Initiates will usually be Minions, though potentially accompanied by a person of 
  a higher rank, either as a teacher, or because of the task they are involved in — certain rites and 
  rituals require the oversight of a cult member of greater learning. Initiates will attack with great 
  fervor, thinking of this as an opportunity to prove their loyalty to the order; however, their faith is 
  not as strong as they might think. If the player characters manage to kill enough of them, they may 
  well break and run.
  Adept, 
  Brother or Sister, 
  Fellow, 
  Bonded, 
  Learned
  What They Know: The true heart of any cult, these are the novices who have succeeded in their 
  initiation and been elevated to full membership. Their knowledge of the cult and its ways, its 
  plans and its long-term aims are much more thorough. Or at least, so the adept will believe. They 
  perform the tasks set for them by the upper echelons of the cult: they kill the cult’s enemies; they 
  procure the gold and treasure necessary to keep the cult solvent; and they recruit new members, 
  either through existing relationships (with family members for example) or through proselytiza-
  tion of varying degrees of subtlety.
  As Opponents: Those who form this level of the cult are perhaps best described as fanatics. While 
  a few have the ambition and intellect to ascend higher and become even more closely involved 
  with the cult’s leadership and organisation, this is rare. For the most part, the adepts are loyal, 
  obedient believers. What they have learned and been shown has ensured their faith and their 
  commitment. In combat, adepts will be a mixture of Minions and Toughened opponents. They will 
  never break and run; they are too loyal to the cult and more than prepared to die for it.
  Priestess, 
  Teacher, Sage, 
  Magus or Mage, 
  Enlightened
  What They Know: A cult needs people to act as intermediaries between those who occupy the 
  positions of real power and those whose station is to obey the orders handed down by those at the 
  top. These are its priests. They are the most trusted advisors of those who run the cult, they are the 
  disseminators of the word of the god or gods the cult worships. They train the adepts in the true and 
  occulted knowledge which the cult believes in, schooling them in the correct conduct for the rituals 
  which must be performed. The maintenance of knowledge, of orthodoxy, and of obeisance to it is 
  integral to preserving the cult’s identity. After all, if the adepts aren’t sure who they are worshipping 
  and why, they are likely to become confused and even be seduced away by another cult.
  As Opponents: Priests are always Toughened foes, or may even on occasion be Nemeses, though 
  this should only be true for the largest and most dangerous of cults. Most priests who become 
  this dangerous are either quickly elevated to some sort of leadership role, or else take one for 
  themselves. It is likely that any priests the player characters come to blows with will either have 
  a bodyguard of adepts with them or be able to summon one. Unlike adepts, priests may seek to 
  escape. Their message is too important to be lost in a meaningless fight with disbelievers and 
  heretics such as the player characters.
  
  99
  THE CALL OF THE CULTIST
  CULT HIERARCHY (CONTD .)
  Rank Titles
  Effect
  High Priest 
  or Priestess, 
  Master, Leader, 
  Sorcerer-king or 
  -queen, Priest-
  king or -queen, 
  Chosen, Elect, 
  Emissary, Envoy
  What They Know: These are the ones for whom the priests drop to their knees and rest their 
  foreheads on the floor. These are the few whose intelligence, ruthlessness, and devotion (or at 
  least, apparent devotion) is enough to draw dozens, scores, even hundreds to their side and inspire 
  them with the fervour of belief. Or, at least, a similar lust for power, gold, and the delusion that 
  sufficient belief in one god or another might just deliver these things — if enough throats are 
  cut and enough people are corralled into joining their crusade. The high priests of the cult are 
  the inheritors of their god’s wisdom, the ones who hear the voice and etch the tablets of stone, 
  the ones whose dreams are touched by the tendrils of a divine power, whose powers seem to be 
  supernatural. They are dangerous, deadly, and have an entire cult dedicated to their whim as if 
  they themselves were a god.
  As Opponents: Such figures should always be placed in the Nemesis category — they are the ones 
  around whom the cult revolves and their power, within its structures, is absolute. There may, in 
  certain circumstances, be more than one high priest in a cult. Some cults such as those spread 
  throughout the continent, like Mitra’s or Hanuman’s, will have several high priests. But, in the 
  smaller and most loathsome of such organizations, there is one who hears the words of the god 
  and interprets them. They are, except at specific times when they commune with their god for 
  example, surrounded by a bodyguard of adepts and by advisors in the form of priests. They are 
  devious and will always attempt to escape, content to sacrifice all their followers if necessary. But 
  they are also the key to bringing the cult crashing down.
  FALSE GODS
  As discussed in Are the Gods Real? (page 95), those who 
  are wise — the gamemaster should be counted among 
  them — must contend with the very real possibility that 
  there are no gods at all in the Hyborian Age — whether 
  neutral, benevolent, or malign, and that any evidence of 
  their existence is either the fakery of priests, perceptions 
  being colored by belief in the divine, ghosts or other 
  beings of a supernatural bent, or simply the presence 
  of demons or devils of the Outer Dark, who are unfor-
  tunately all-too-real.
  “Mitra has spoken,” replied the princess. “It 
  might have been the voice of the god, or a 
  trick of a priest. No matter. I will go!”
  — “Black Colossus”
  This can be a difficult context to grapple within the 
  context of a CONAN campaign, but nonetheless Conan 
  manages to see multiple evidences of such fakery and 
  yet continues to believe in the gods and accept their 
  existence, though he owes no allegiance to any and read-
  ily takes their names in vain. He encounters first-hand 
  the supposed daughter of a god in the frozen north, yet 
  none (but one) believes him. In Alkmeenon he discovers 
  that the oracle goddess is in fact voiced by concealed 
  priests, and he is quick to realize that he might replicate 
  the same scheme with another ivory-limbed goddess 
  in a nearby kingdom. Yet in his own bedchamber as 
  king he visits a priest of Mitra in dreams, who leaves 
  an indelible phoenix symbol upon his sword, which has 
  undeniable potency.
  It is recommended that, like Conan, the gamemas-
  ter keep the matter unresolved. Just as Conan claims 
  that he would not walk on their shadows, an approach 
  might be for the gamemaster to provide ample evidence 
  of fakery — such as ventriloquism, mummery, presti-
  digitation, sleights of hand, or other ruses to lull the 
  faithful — when player characters look closely, and yet 
  occasionally counter these with an act or event that 
  cannot be easily explained away, such as any of those 
  experienced by Conan and mentioned above.
  This way, the gamemaster has the leeway to address 
  the issue with as much surety as desired, revealing the 
  truth behind the façade, and perhaps even a greater 
  truth behind the apparent one…
  
  CHAPTER 7
  100
  THE NATURE OF BELIEF
  The original Conan stories feature cults whose raison d’etre is a 
  lie, a fabrication. Sometimes, as in “The Servants of Bit-Yakin”, 
  this construct is simply to ensure that a hermit can continue 
  to live alone. While this is amusing, and can offer an inter-
  esting twist, it should, perhaps, be the exception rather than 
  the rule. These are adventures in which player characters are 
  going to be confronted by the horrors of the Outermost Dark, 
  nightmare creatures bleeding from a realm of pure chaos. 
  Setting the player characters up to deal with something of 
  this magnitude, only to end up amid an eccentric’s ploy to 
  isolate himself from the outside world, may pall quickly.
  However, this should call for an examination about how 
  belief works in a cult. The rank-and-file members — initiates 
  and adepts — are likely to be true believers in almost all 
  circumstances. This is as much for narrative convenience 
  as anything else. Having to establish what percentage of 
  a dangerous cult’s membership are really invested in what 
  they are doing and how many have been forced into the 
  cult’s employ is unlikely to remain interesting for long. 
  That’s not to say there isn’t some mileage in this idea — 
  with a cult preying on a small town for new recruits and 
  the player characters having to rescue as many as they 
  can — but again, having to interrogate every cult member 
  about their allegiances is not especially interesting in play.
  The high priest of the cult and, to a lesser extent, those 
  teachers who act as their advisors are a different matter. If the 
  gamemaster decides that a cult the player characters come 
  across is a sham, it is best to make the leader of the cult the only 
  one in on the deception. The gamemaster can include advisors 
  who are also aware of the deception, but the fewer the better.
  It is a good exercise to ask questions such as: why has 
  the cult proved successful and how has it continued to 
  grow? What is it, in the belief patterns of the cult, that 
  makes people susceptible to it? The cult of Alkmeenon is 
  an accretion of rituals which have built up over years of 
  worship. Or will its attraction be in the immediacy of its 
  promises, such as the threat of a looming apocalypse, with 
  the cult the only way to guarantee eternal life?
  However the gamemaster assembles a cult — whether 
  the god they worship is real, whether the leader of the cult 
  is a true believer or a licentious charlatan — they should 
  consider why the belief in this cult is attractive. Would the 
  cult of Mitra be the dominant religious order in Aquilonia 
  and beyond, if the god had not performed miracles to help 
  his believers? Would the cult of Cthulhu maintain its hidden 
  legions if its devotees could not visit primordial forests 
  and commune with black-winged devils who fly up from a 
  cavern beneath the earth? Belief is the thing that coheres a 
  cult and, in the main, it must be genuine belief for the cult 
  to work — either as a threat to the player characters or as 
  an aspect of the world which they might want to explore.
  THE PROBLEM OF FAITH
  In the very first Conan story, “The Phoenix on the Sword”, 
  Mitra’s intervention saves Conan from the depredations 
  of conspiracy, of which Set’s servant Thoth-amon is a 
  part. This aid comes in the form of a dream in which 
  Conan is visited by Epemitreus, a long-dead priest of 
  Mitra. Epemitreus inscribes a phoenix emblem on his 
  blade, which appears on his sword in the real world. 
  Thoth-amon’s own sorcerous power stems from a ring, 
  steeped in the serpentine power of Set. A relationship 
  with a god brings sorcerous might (and its antithesis) to 
  those who seek it. So why shouldn’t player characters 
  seek out this kind of power?
  If player characters want to draw on the power of the 
  gods, they should have to pay for it. However, the way 
  they are going to have to pay for it may not be worth what 
  they get in return. This book is filled with details of gods 
  and their associated cults — some of these gods come 
  with rules related to their worship, and how player char-
  acters might seek their blessing. Many, however, do not.
  Joining the cult of Azathoth and signing one’s name 
  in the Black Book of Nyarlathotep isn’t what a CONAN 
  player character is typically expected to do, and generally 
  falls outside the scope of any but the most diabolical 
  of adventures. Sword-and-sorcery characters aren’t 
  always heroic in nature, but when confronted by a cult 
  whose chief aim is to destroy the world, they know which 
  side they’re coming down on. The rules in the CONAN 
  corebook describe the requirements for a mortal or 
  barely-mortal patron, and those of an actual deity should 
  be that much more demanding, more onerous, and more 
  dominant over the player character, should they choose 
  to seek power along these avenues. The player characters 
  may also see the cost of these Faustian bargains in the 
  setting: gaining sorcerous powers from a god might seem 
  like a good idea, but at the end of the allotted term the 
  price will come due, with interest.
  This is also a great way of destroying a cult — should 
  the cult’s leader have failed to defeat the player char-
  acters, that leader may marshal their resources and call 
  upon the god directly, only to have the god, demon-prince, 
  or Great Old One decide not to aid them, but instead to 
  call in their debt. A frenzy of annihilation as a temple 
  collapses, its acolytes maddened and despairing in the 
  wake of their high priest’s demise — an apparent judg-
  ment on their cult — is a spectacular ending for any 
  CONAN adventure.
  
  D
  espite the teeming number of cults that have risen 
  and fallen before and during the Hyborian Age, 
  true magic in the form of sacred relics and their 
  ilk are few and far between. Overwhelmingly, such items 
  are, though sacred, are valued solely for their religious 
  connotation and their significance within the cult, rather 
  than having any divine provenance or supposed magical 
  properties. Of these few items that are indeed claimed to 
  be imbued some sort of supernatural power granted by 
  the god directly or through contact with the god, most 
  have no true enchantments bound into them, and their 
  magical properties are empty claims. However, there are 
  some few items, scattered across the Hyborian continent 
  and the lands beyond, whether lost, hoarded, or securely 
  watched, that indeed have exhibited uncanny abilities and 
  the touch of the divine.
  This chapter presents a myriad of such items, with sug-
  gested properties and the legends that surround them. 
  They are not to be used lightly, and the gamemaster is 
  advised to be less-than-generous when introducing them 
  into campaigns. Player characters may spend their entire 
  adventuring careers coming within sight of only a few of 
  such items, or none at all, and acquisition of one of these 
  relics may become the focus of an entire adventure or 
  campaign entire.
  It is recommended that placement of these valuable 
  relics be done with careful deliberation rather than being 
  determined randomly. When a relic’s properties and origin 
  is known, it is inevitably well-guarded, whether within walls 
  of stone and behind doors of metal or cleverly concealed 
  within a temple where the faithful may easily access it.
  Finally, the association of a relic with a god does not 
  mean that it must inevitably be found in a locale relating 
  to that god: many temples have within their vaults items 
  of value from other cults, sorcerers covet such artifacts 
  seeking to divine their mysteries, and a royal treasury 
  may contain one of these items, whether its true nature 
  is known or concealed. Some of these items, however, are 
  simply lost and may be found anywhere where humans 
  dwell or have gone: amidst the ruins of a sunken ship in 
  a now-dried stretch of river; littering the ground amidst a 
  foliage-infested ruin, cast aside by an uninterested forager; 
  or concealed beneath the floorboards of a dismal tavern in 
  the Maul, tucked there by a thief eluding pursuit.
  Some of these items, however, are entirely mortal in 
  nature, however, but are manufactured almost exclusively 
  by priests and adherents to a particular god, so closely inter-
  twined are the practices of sorcery, alchemy, and worship. 
  They might be used to bolster a priest’s repertoire of occult 
  capabilities, or exist as zealously-guarded secrets of a cult’s 
  scholars and mystics.
  SACRED RELICS
  CHAPTER 8
  Here and there too, stood figures of curious gods — images 
  carved of stone or rare wood, or cast of bronze, iron or silver 
  — dimly reflected in the gleaming black mahogany floor. 
   — “The God in the Bowl”
  
  CHAPTER 8
  102
  At the end of each item’s description are Reputed 
  Qualities which it may possess — the gamemaster should 
  decide whether these claims are true, or mere hyperbole. 
  At the gamemaster’s discretion, these relics can be incorpo-
  rated into a hoard or given Qualities from those provided 
  in Ancient Ruins & Cursed Cities.
  No Gold values are provided for these relics, as the 
  material worth of each is highly subjective: an item might 
  be turned away by the most indiscriminate of pawnbrokers 
  and yet be simultaneously worth a caravan-full of gold and 
  jewels in ransom to the cult it is sacred to.
  THE APE-GOD’S SCEPTER
  Fashioned out of the jawbone of one of the great herd-oxen 
  such as are found in the Black Kingdoms, this savage weapon 
  is said to be the war-scepted of Jhullah, the yellowed bone of 
  its narrow handle wrapped in well-worn and stained leather 
  from which depend braided and beaded cords and bright-
  yet-tattered feathers. Still set with teeth, the wide curve of 
  the jaw has been sharpened into a spike-like protrusion, 
  resembling a brutal pick or axe, and more-than-suitable for 
  such use. Over half a yard in length, this primitive weapon 
  was passed from warchief to warchief among the Bamulas 
  for centuries, until being lost in battle, and generations 
  have passed with it unrecovered.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: This grisly looking relic is 
  equivalent to a hatchet in combat but allows its 
  wielder a special Display, Jullah’s Might (T): Range 
  C, 4§ mental damage (plus the wielder’s mental 
  attack bonus), Intense. Against natural animals, the 
  sceptre provides an additional +1d20 for this Display, 
  up to the normal maximum, and has the Stun, 
  Area Qualities.
  BEL’S SLIPPERS
  Said to have been worn by the god himself, these slippers 
  are common in appearance: seeming to be little more than 
  a pair of well-worn low slippers of dark, well-oiled shagreen 
  leather. Thieves claim that the wearer may move in utter-
  most silence and leave no tracks, but they have been long 
  lost; appropriately stolen from the vaults of the temple to 
  Bel in Shumir, where they were said to be kept.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: The wearer gains an automatic 
  success on any Stealth test as if a Fortune point was 
  spent (thus, two automatic successes if the wearer’s 
  Stealth Focus is 1+), and any tracking attempts made 
  against someone wearing the slipper are increased by 
  two steps of Difficulty.
  THE BONE RATTLE 
  OF JHEBBAL SAG
  This grisly relic consists of a short wooden handle wrapped 
  in leather that appears to be tanned human skin connected 
  to several rings of yellowed bone, bound to the handle by 
  human hair and decorated with bright feathers. Barely 
  longer than a human forearm, the rattle is deeply stained 
  with blood and smells musty and has an unpleasant sensa-
  tion when held. It is rumored to be held by a Pict shaman 
  deep in the Pictish Wilderness, though a Bossonian trader 
  claims that he had it from a frontier soldier and sold it to 
  the owner of a treasure-house in Numalia. A Complication 
  causes creature to attack the spell’s caster, and each new 
  Complication brings a new creature with the same purpose.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: This hideous charm allows any 
  sorcerer to make a separate Minor Action to shake the 
  rattle and invoke its maker while attempting magic 
  related to Jhebbal Sag — such as Commune with the Wild, 
  Form of a Beast, or Summon a Horror. Once used, the 
  sorcerer may re-roll any d20s that fail to yield a success, 
  but the results of the second roll are final. 
  THE CIRCLET OF ASHTORETH
  A crown wrought of polished gold, featuring a motif of bull 
  horns surmounting a silver crescent moon at its center, 
  the Circlet of Ashtoreth was said to have decorated a great 
  statue of the goddess in her high temple in Eruk, in Shem. 
  As such, it is too large for any human to wear, nearly twice 
  the size of a full-grown man or woman.
  Unbeknownst to the lay members of the temple, the 
  true circlet was stolen decades ago, and a replica quickly 
  fashioned to take its place. The whereabouts of Ashtoreth’s 
  true crown is unknown. Her priests fear it was either melted 
  and refashioned into something more portable, or simply 
  hacked into fragments and traded piecemeal.
  There remains the slim hope that it is intact somewhere in 
  the world, perhaps stored as a treasure in some neighboring 
  kingdom’s treasury, where it might be bargained for once 
  found. To this end, priestess of Ashtoreth are always alert 
  to rumors of anything resembling the Circlet, and may even 
  sponsor thieves to scout for it in the vaults of the mighty.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: The lay members of the temple 
  claimed that any able to lay hands upon it would be 
  blessed in the matter of fertility: bestowing fecundity 
  when barren; twins or even triplets rather than a sole 
  child; and a healthy offspring when they might other-
  wise be born sickly or weak. The gamemaster should 
  determine these effects if desired, as they fall outside 
  game-specific mechanics.
  
  103
  SACRED RELICS
  THE DANCE OF DERKETA
  No physical artifact, the Dance of Derketa is a ritual dance 
  said to have been performed by the goddess herself, suppos-
  edly taught to the Amazons of the lands south of the Black 
  Kingdoms in times agone, but maintained by a secretive 
  sect within her cult. This dance, rumors claim, can inspire 
  the most stalwart of souls to debauchery, the most placid to 
  an inferno of rage, and the most tepid into rabid believers. 
  The Stygians boast that their initiates of Derketo (for they 
  know here by this name) know this dance as a rote part 
  of their training, but the movements they teach are but a 
  shallow mimicry of the goddess’ true expression. It is said 
  that any ecstatic dancing performed by the priestesses and 
  worshippers of Derketa or any other such deity are echoes 
  of her dance, bereft of its magical potency.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: The Dance of Derketa, when 
  performed by one instructed in its use, requires five 
  continual rounds of uninterrupted dance, a series of 
  Standard Actions in which no Minor Actions, Free 
  Actions, or Reactions may be attempted. Each round 
  requires a Challenging (D2) Athletics test, and all 
  Momentum generated by these attempts are gathered 
  into a separate pool which may be used only by the 
  dancer. The Momentum remains for the duration of 
  the scene and may be used for any Display, Personality-
  based skill test, or in an appropriate Sorcery test when 
  casting a spell. The gamemaster is the final arbiter over 
  how the Momentum may be spent, however.
  THE DUST OF VATHELOS
  A fine, golden substance known to only the most brilliant 
  of alchemists, the properties of the dust are quite wondrous 
  to behold. Any unnatural creature or being drawn into this 
  world from another realm, is wracked with agony when 
  afflicted by the dust. Even the greatest and most powerful 
  of such entities is left writhing in pain and anguish at its 
  touch. Its name is taken from the ancient and blind sorcerer, 
  Vathelos, said used the dust himself to drive back the crea-
  tures he had summoned from beyond these mortal realms 
  when his business with them was completed.
  Few know the methods by which the Dust of Vathelos is 
  prepared. It is said that the Dust must be gathered by tear-
  ing a whole in time and space itself and waiting, until the 
  universe attempts to mend its fraying edges. The substance 
  which reconnects this skein can be collected, and once 
  refined becomes the Dust itself. This material, a physical 
  emanation of the process in which the world itself re-as-
  serts its naturalness, is anathema to anything which would 
  disrupt that reality, causing severe distress to all denizens 
  of the outer places.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: The Dust of Vathelos is created 
  with a Daunting (D3) alternative effect of the spell 
  Summon a Horror. A successful test will create one 
  handful of powder with an intensity of 4. Up to 2 
  Momentum can be spent to increase this intensity by 
  +1 per Momentum spent. If successfully thrown at a 
  Horror — even as an alchemical attack — this powder 
  will do Intense physical damage in § per point of 
  intensity. The powder is ignores any Soak other than 
  that caused by solid cover or heavy weather, as the 
  dust is ineffective if it cannot land squarely on its 
  intended target. Creating the Dust of Vathelos requires 
  1 sorcerous Offering, which is converted into the Dust.
  THE ELDER SIGN
  Not so much a relic as a sigil often carved onto stones or 
  amulets, the Elder Sign resembles a rune-like twig or branch, 
  almost crude in fashion compared to other mystic sigils or 
  glyphs. Despite this simplicity, the symbol has immense 
  occult power, or so those who use it claim. Their stories 
  vary, however, and some claim that the branch is an earlier 
  version whose true form is that of a star. Rumors amidst 
  sorcerers claim that this sign protects one against the man-
  ifestations of the Outer Dark, while others say it has limited 
  use for that, but excels when used in wards and bindings.
  A tale told out of the uttermost north — far beyond even 
  Nordheim — claims that a hoard of small soapstone tokens 
  inscribed with a variant of this sigil were found scattered 
  in great number upon the floor of a sprawling, ice-bound 
  cavern deep beneath the earth’s surface. The flat, coin-like 
  stones were strewn in great number amidst a plethora of 
  bones from various animals, all curiously mutilated. Seeing 
  no real value to the stones, those primitive hunters took 
  only a few and left the rest.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: With a successful Challenging 
  (D2) Sorcery test as a Standard Action, the user may 
  use any Momentum gained from the test as an imme-
  diate use of counter magic (Conan corebook, page 
  172) against a magical effect. Some legends, however, 
  speak of these as being of utility when conjuring up 
  creatures from the Outer Dark. If these mad tales can 
  be believed, the Elder Sign, when used in conjunc-
  tion with the Summon a Horror spell, grants 1 bonus 
  Momentum and increases the duration of a summon-
  ing by one scene.
  
  CHAPTER 8
  104
  LOOTING THE TEMPLE
  As temples and cults usually have a regular stream of 
  income from donations and offerings from worshippers, 
  and often have stored within their premises items of 
  mundane and practical value, ritual and holy accoutre-
  ments that may be worth something to the right buyer, 
  and sacred artifacts of considerable worth. The greatest 
  treasures, though, can be those relics related to the 
  god (and often named for the god), such as the Teeth of 
  Gwahlur. An entire adventure or even a short campaign 
  may be crafted around acquiring such a treasure, and the 
  gamemaster is encouraged to create the item specifically 
  for the exploit in mind.
  However, a temple is rarely as simple as a single vault 
  built around a single item, and the gamemaster will 
  inevitably need to know what opportunistic player char-
  acters discover when opening a cabinet, chest, or entering 
  a room other than a treasure store-room. For such cases, 
  the gamemaster is encouraged to utilize the Temple Loot 
  table, rolling 2d20 or picking an appropriate result.
  Other more specialized or unique items can be selected 
  from those described in The Book of Skelos or Ancient 
  Ruins & Cursed Cities, if desired. Values are approximate 
  and may vary based on the buyer, the location, and the 
  circumstances. Even those who trade in illicit goods 
  may pass when word is on the street that the Temple of 
  Set is seeking the thieves who stole their sacred relics. 
  A “—” for value merely means that the value cannot be 
  assessed easily, not that it is worthless.
  TEMPLE LOOT
  Roll
  Item
  Value
  2
  Wooden boxes for offerings, still full of copper, silver, and even a few gold coins. Roll 10§ to 
  determine how much Gold is present, total.
  10§
  3
  A relic treasured by the cult, whether having material value or being otherwise worthless. This 
  could be anything from something owned by the god in a mortal incarnation, evidence of a 
  miracle, an artifact owned by the first high priest of the cult, or something supposedly not from 
  this world.
  —
  4
  A suspicious amount of jewelry and personal ornaments, ranging from rings, necklaces, ear-
  rings, hair pins, armlets, bracelets, ankle — and wristlets, cloak pins, belt buckles, etc.
  15§
  5
  A piece of a fine stone or metal statue — head or hand, most likely — depicting the god in some 
  form. This may be set with gems or inscribed with hand-written glyphs. It feels strangely warm 
  (or cool), despite the ambient temperature.
  20
  6
  An ancient stone tablet or marker, denoting the ownership of the temple and its grounds, and 
  listing the names of the high priest and architect of the cult.
  —
  7
  A ring of keys, likely misplaced, able to lock or unlock any of the doors or locked containers 
  within the temple.
  —
  8
  Alchemical powders and liquids for producing smoke, bright flashes of light, or making an item 
  appear to glow.
  6
  9
  A ceremonial dagger (not useful for fighting) and a large burnished brass bowl.
  4
  10
  Bundles of dried aromatic herbs, for burning during ceremonies.
  1
  11
  Healing supplies, including a ligation kit and 5§ refills.
  10
  12
  A map showing all of the holy sites and temples of the cult, including those that are publicly 
  known and some that are not.
  —
  13
  Dried food (meat and fruit), several jugs of wine, and a few jars of stronger liquor.
  2
  14
  A large cloth bag stuffed with clothing of all sorts, sizes, and made for either gender, from high 
  society court garments to lowly beggar’s rags.
  10
  15
  A board-game of some sort with curious pieces made of scented wood.
  4
  16
  Props and costumes for enacting the god’s great deeds or activities — these range from fake 
  weapons and armor, makeup for appearing divine, to set and background pieces.
  —
  17
  A carven image of the god in stone, ceramic, wood, or metal, as appropriate.
  6
  
  105
  SACRED RELICS
  TEMPLE LOOT (CONTD .)
  Roll
  Item
  Value
  18
  Stacks of dishes, serving platters, cups, utensils, for cult meals.
  4
  19
  Phials and jars of sacred oils and unguents to anoint the faithful.
  2
  20
  Folded robes, sandals, and other ceremonial vestments. Roll 1d20 for how many, and 1§. On 
  a roll of 1 or 2, one of the robes belongs to a high priest or priestess and is worth 12 Gold. An 
  effect is the same, but robes also can be used as sorcerous garb (page 141–142, Conan corebook).
  2§ 
  each
  21
  Sheets of well-worn papyrus, animal-hide, or paper containing lyrics to ceremonial verses.
  —
  22
  Jars of oil for braziers and lamps.
  1
  23
  Coin-like tokens of metal or wood depicting the god’s likeness, representing some value to be 
  redeemed within the temple or by other worshippers.
  —
  24
  Candles. Many, many candles.
  1
  25
  Music instruments such as drums, horns, cymbals, gongs, flutes, and the like.
  10
  26
  A stack of comfortable silken cushions for the wealthier patrons of the cult to sit upon during 
  ceremonies and rituals.
  2
  27
  A small box of dried yellow lotus pollen (page 166, Conan corebook).
  5
  28
  Decorative items such as candle holders, ornaments, metal lamps, etc.
  6
  29
  The exquisitely stuffed carcass of a type sacred to the cult or god.
  3–8
  30
  A set of clothing specifically crafted to fit the giant statue of the god in the main temple, as if in 
  readiness for the god’s arrival. It has never been worn. Or has it?
  —
  31
  A thick volume and many sheets of paper containing detailed financial records of the temple, 
  including offerings, and a complete list of lay members, initiates, and others of higher ranks.
  —
  32
  A rough leather bag containing implements of torture: thumbscrews, hooks, gouges, files, 
  rasps, scalpels, pokers, brands, and other items whose purpose is to cause misery.
  4
  33
  Chains and manacles, and a set of keys to go with them.
  1
  34
  Evidence of some sort (a covered mosaic or ornamental wall) depicting another god, revealing 
  that this temple site was once sacred to an older — and perhaps more terrible — deity.
  —
  35
  Metal urns containing ashes and bone chips, with the names of ancient and venerable holy 
  people etched upon them.
  —
  36
  Skulls and bones, enamelled and covered in semi-precious minerals, with strange markings 
  upon them.
  12
  37
  Mummified or skeletal remains of some saint or former holy person venerated within the cult.
  —
  38
  The corpse of the high priest/priestess, stripped of their robe, stuffed rudely into a side closet, 
  the marks of a stealthy and violent death upon them. You may not be the only ones robbing the 
  place…
  —
  39
  A narrow, concealed compartment containing a bound and gagged man or woman, dangling 
  from a chain hanging from the ceiling. Their eyes fix upon you imploringly. Who is this, and 
  what are they worth?
  —
  40
  A hidden compartment springs open and from it emerges a temple guardian of a type appro-
  priate to the god (gamemaster’s choice). Eerily silent, it moves to strike the player character 
  unlucky enough to have found it!
  —
  The gamemaster may also refer to the chapters of Ancient Ruins & Cursed Cities dealing with treasure hoards and 
  magic artifacts for additional guidance.
  
  CHAPTER 8
  106
  ESSENTIAL SALTS
  Blood and bone and brain: over millennia, the sword has 
  proven all people to be constituted from these three things. 
  This rough human clay is composed of many substances 
  other than these, however, and to those who understand how 
  the blackest of sorceries works, the human form can also be 
  constituted from much, much less. Through necromancy, 
  the body and soul of a person can be broken down into its 
  very tiniest and most basic form… known as essential salts. 
  Everything that person is, was, or might have become, is 
  contained in the particles of impossibly fine dust. Each 
  of these scintillas is a particle of life, a persona atomized. 
  And all of it can be restored to full, irresistible life with the 
  merest flourish of a hand and the utterance of a few words.
  It is said that a skilled sorcerer can possess a small 
  army of creatures and loyal servitors, capable of stored in 
  common glass bottles. The applications of such sorcery are 
  terrifying in their scope — a palace coup can be staged by 
  a single, hunched old woman entering via the kitchens. A 
  dynasty can be butchered by someone masquerading as 
  a minstrel. No power, of course, is without its drawbacks, 
  and the slightest error with the reconstitution of a person 
  from essential salts is enough to leave them a ravening, 
  brainless monster; as liable to turn on their master as on 
  their master’s intended foe. Nevertheless, the power to 
  create and reduce life to the finest, most frictionless dust 
  and resurrect it with the utterance of a few syllables is one 
  not to be taken lightly.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: This is a rare alternative effect 
  for both the Raise the Dead and Dismember spells. A 
  sorcerer learning both these spells can learn how 
  to craft essential salts when purchasing the talent 
  Bargain the Soul. The process is an extended and 
  horrifying affair wherein a living being is reduced to 
  a state beyond mummification and stored in jars that 
  not even air can pierce. When the jar is broken, the 
  sorcerer must make a Daunting (D3) Sorcery test. If 
  more than one jar is broken at once the test increases 
  in Difficulty by one step per additional jar. If the test 
  is successful, the creature is returned to life and will 
  act as if no feat of magic had occurred. If the test fails, 
  the resulting creature’s sanity is blasted, with mortals 
  becoming degenerates and beasts becoming savage 
  and untamable.
  THE FIRE-JEWEL OF HELL
  Long have human sorcerers craved power and wealth, and 
  in this incredible gem are the epitomes of both ideals. Said 
  to have been wrought in the underworld of the very frozen 
  flames of Hell itself, it possesses powers and properties 
  beyond any item within this world, save perhaps for the 
  fabled Heart of Ahriman. This great gem has made its way 
  to Earth more than once, as foolish sorcerers seek to claim 
  it from its maker and warden, a primeval demonic entity 
  inhabiting a vast cavern in the darkest underworld. Potent 
  must be the spells to quell this great fiend, and thus rare 
  are the sorcerers capable of venturing to the cavern, much 
  less ensorcel its keeper.
  Despite the intensity of desire for the fire-jewel of Hell 
  (it has no other name), this bauble has brought nothing 
  but tragedy and misery to those who have possessed it. 
  For when it has surfaced on in the mortal world, it is often 
  followed by its maker, a great demon that spawns from a 
  black cloud, and sets its baleful might on those who stand 
  between it and its prize. When the foolish speak of the 
  hell-jewel, the wise should make a sign sacred to whatever 
  god they worship and silence such prattle and pray that it 
  remains in Hell where it belongs.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: The fire-jewel of Hell counts as a 
  sorcerous offering that never depletes, adding +1d20 
  to any Sorcery test, up to the maximum allowed, but 
  any Complication rolled automatically becomes a 
  Consequence. The nature of this Consequence is the 
  near-immediate summoning the arch-fiend who 
  made the fire-jewel, and at the gamemaster’s discre-
  tion, it will quickly manifest in the form of a spinning 
  black cloud from which emerges an unspeakable 
  abomination (Conan corebook, page 345), a devil of 
  the Outer Dark (Conan, page 347), or worse.
  To gain honor and power for himself, he dared 
  the horrors of a nameless vast cavern in a dark, 
  untraveled land, and from those fiendhaunted depths 
  he brought that blazing gem, which is carved of the 
  frozen flames of Hell! By reason of his fearful power 
  in black magic, he put a spell on the demon which 
  guarded the ancient gem, and so stole away the stone. 
  And the demon slept in the cavern unknowing.
  — “The Fire of Asshuribanipal”
  
  107
  SACRED RELICS
  JADE HOUND AMULET
  A small amulet carved of jade representing a sphinx-like 
  hound, complete with an inscription in an ancient and 
  indecipherable tongue, this relic is in the possession of the 
  royal family of Stygia and is one of a handful of sacred items 
  passed posthumously from king to king, laid upon the breast 
  of a departed king in their tomb. There it remains until the 
  current king dies, and then it is removed and placed into 
  the newly-interred monarch. The amulet is ancient beyond 
  the Cataclysm, rumored to have been wrought in Lemuria 
  and brought out of the east by the earliest proto-Stygians.
  The most esteemed and trusted of the Stygian king’s 
  household know that the reason that the amulet is passed 
  from regal corpse to corpse is to prevent baleful calamity 
  and curses to befall upon the deceased, maintaining the 
  integrity of the body and soul until such a time as it may pass 
  into the afterlife and its ultimate destination without harm.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: The jade hound amulet is a 
  potent magical talisman attuned to a powerful 
  hound-like demonic entity capable of moving 
  through the planes. While the amulet is in the wear-
  er’s possession for several years, they are safe from its 
  notice, but when the amulet is disturbed, it attracts 
  the creature’s awareness and it will begin baying, a 
  call that can be heard only by the one in possession 
  of the amulet. The creature is a deamoniac hound, 
  described in Horrors of the Hyborian Age, but the 
  gamemaster can substitute a devil of the Outer Dark 
  (Conan corebook, page 347) if desired.
  THE KEY OF THE TOAD
  It looks something like a ruby, sometimes part of an amulet 
  and suspended on a thin leather cord or a delicate golden 
  chain. Sometimes it is merely clutched in the hands of those 
  who would lay claim to it. Its appearance, however, does not 
  matter. What matters is what the Key can be used to open. 
  The Temple of the Toad has existed through the ages of 
  the earth, constant and eternal. Some locate it in the Black 
  Kingdoms of the extreme south. Others claim it lurks in 
  Kush, or in the verdant jungles of Vendyha. Rumors of a vast 
  treasure contained within the temple have been traded by 
  brigands and explorers, scholars and thieves — none have 
  been proven true. Other, darker tales also circulate: each 
  speaking of a bloody and lethal vengeance exacted upon 
  any who profane the temple. These tales, at least, have 
  proven far more authentic than those promising vast wealth.
  Some claim that, within the perimeter of the Temple of 
  the Toad, if one can discern it, lies the means to manipulate 
  time. But that it is not possible to emerge from the Temple, 
  once one has learned this secret. Others claim that what 
  lies within the Temple is a creature of vast and implausible 
  power; a living god, and that the Key is the means to wake 
  this entity, to wake and to parley with it. Perhaps even to 
  control it. But the god is jealous of its power, of its sleep, 
  of its knowledge. And any who breach its dreaming will 
  be forced to offer their life in penance. Who knows what 
  is true and what is mere myth in such cases? All that is 
  certain is that men and women have spilled blood for the 
  chance to enter the Temple of the Toad, and the only means 
  by which they might do so is the strange, ruby-like gem 
  which is the key to doing so.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: The Key of the Toad adds 3 
  Momentum when casting the spell Summon a Horror 
  when conjuring and controlling the specific demon 
  entity within the Temple of the Toad. The gamemas-
  ter should determine the exact nature of the toad-like 
  being within, if desired.
  MOONSTONE POWDER 
  OF ROTATH
  The pre-Cataclysmic kingdom of Lemuria saw the rise and 
  fall of a wizard known as Rotath of the Moonstone and 
  Asphodel, and though most of his great sorcerous works 
  and discoveries were swept away by the treacherous Earth, 
  some few scraps of lore remain. Though it is unknown if 
  he, in fact, was its creator, he is credited with the formula 
  for an alchemical dust called Moonstone Powder. Over the 
  long centuries since the oceans drank Lemuria, the Powder 
  has been known by many names, its formula inscribed in 
  ancient and hideous texts whose names are blasphemous 
  to utter. Despite this, the secrets of the Moonstone Powder 
  of Rotath have withstood the ravages of time, and are as 
  effective and potent as ever they were.
  Those few alchemists who will speak of its properties 
  claim that the Powder makes visible that which cannot 
  be seen. Whether the creature is from a realm beyond or 
  between ours, or even from this material world and somehow 
  cloaked from sight… it does not matter. The Powder will 
  adhere to its outline, sticking to the contours and shape 
  of the thing which has been hidden, revealing it to the 
  world. No detail, no strangeness, no impossibility is not 
  picked out by the Powder and made observable. Eventually, 
  when Xapur fell and the alchemists were slaughtered, the 
  production of the Powder ceased but it can still be found 
  and there are always things, creatures, waiting behind the 
  veil of the world to be revealed. What happens once they 
  have been revealed, however, is a different matter.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: Moonstone Powder is created 
  with a Daunting (D3) alternative effect of the spell 
  Astral Wanderings. A successful test will create one 
  
  CHAPTER 8
  108
  handful of powder. When tossed into the air the 
  powder will momentarily reveal the cracks in the 
  world, allowing the character to act as if they were 
  within a magical circle for their next action. In 
  addition to this, any invisible or otherwise magically 
  concealed creature is rendered visible. Revealing 
  such creatures is a startling affair and any character 
  possessing a Sorcery Expertise of 2 or less treats the 
  revealed creature as if it had a Fear ability 1 higher 
  than normal. Creating Moonstone Powder requires 
  the use of one sorcerous Offering, which is converted 
  into the Powder.
  THE SILVER KEY
  Any who have ventured into the world of the strange, expe-
  rienced the strange phenomena which linger on the periph-
  eries of sense and perception, peered into strange books 
  and scrolls which clutter the shelves of the wise, knows 
  that there are worlds beyond our own. Though human-
  kind may never be fully conscious of them, or apprehend 
  them directly, they exist, separated from this world by a 
  veil which, however thin it may sometimes seem, requires 
  incredible expenditures of energy and magic to pierce, 
  even if but a little. But there are other ways, other means 
  of slipping the constraints of this world and venturing 
  somewhere else. Some such items were manufactured in 
  the impossibly ancient past, which provide the owner a 
  means of simply bypassing this reality, of slipping from 
  one world into another.
  The Silver Key is one such item. There are those who 
  claim that it is so named because it offers a means by which 
  the mysteries of the universe might be unlocked. It is also 
  called that because it is a key made from that metal, although 
  not solely silver. The key does not open a door, precisely, but 
  rather it must be used to create the door through which the 
  user passes. It must be bathed in the light of either the sun 
  or moon, or of a close passing star. The right sequence of 
  movements must be performed, and the right words uttered. 
  Some claim that these words are secret, fixed codes which 
  must be learned through extensive study; others say that 
  the words can be chosen by the bearer of the key, so long as 
  they are uttered in the right tone and with the right force 
  of will. From there, the universe opens before the bearer 
  and all of reality is available to them though the penalties 
  for those unprepared for what lies beyond this reality can 
  be extremely severe.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: Any player character in posses-
  sion of the Silver Key automatically generates 2 points 
  of Momentum when using either the Atavistic Voyage 
  or Astral Wanderings spells, and for 1 Fortune point 
  my use the Silver Key to physically transport another 
  player character to the location in space and time 
  identified by the spell. Additionally, the Key reduces 
  by one step the effectiveness all Fear-based Qualities 
  or special abilities used against its bearer, so, for 
  example, Fear 2 would become Fear 1.
  STONE SKULLS
  Curiously fashioned with astonishing attention to detail, 
  these strange artifacts are human skulls, each fashioned 
  from a single piece of precious or semi-precious minerals 
  — crystal, obsidian, turquoise, jade, lapis lazuli, and even 
  porphyry — utterly lifelike but for the material of their 
  making. They are heavy, and unlike normal human skulls, 
  are quite solid, with the jaw affixed and immobile. Stone 
  skulls have emerged in many places across the continent, but 
  their origin remains unknown, the degree of craftsmanship 
  often far outstripping that of the cultures they are claimed 
  by. They figure into rituals and are even worshipped by 
  primitive tribes, and some are prized by sorcerers for their 
  reputed magical properties.
  A Numalian antiques dealer claims to have seen one of 
  these skulls made of the same material as the mysterious 
  glowing fire-stones found in some of the ancient green stone 
  cities of the south, though his report may be apocryphal.
  ■
  ■ Reputed Qualities: The stone skulls contain an 
  incredible secret, in that each is a connection to a 
  powerful entity from another plane of existence, 
  and the skull itself is a means by which they might 
  be reached. First, the sorcerer must be aware of this 
  fact, which requires a successful Daunting (D3) Lore 
  test. If unsuccessful, the sorcerer can continue to 
  research the skull’s origin and nature. During another 
  downtime between adventures, the sorcerer may 
  attempt another test. Alternately, the “That Which 
  Lies Within” alternative effect of the Summon a Horror 
  spell will reveal the skull’s linked entity. Once the 
  identity of the being connected to the skull has been 
  ascertained, the sorcerer must cast Summon a Horror 
  successfully and use the Grave Counsel Momentum 
  Spend to speak with the skull’s linked entity. At this 
  point, the entity connected to the skull can serve as 
  a Patron for future spell learning, with the nature 
  of the entity and its needs to be determined by the 
  gamemaster. Once the Patron relationship has been 
  established, the entity will communicate with the 
  sorcerer as it sees fit, with no roll required.
  
  109
  SACRED RELICS
  UNSPEAKABLE TOMES
  Not every magical relic is a weapon, tool, or element 
  of ornamentation. Many priceless relics have no meta-
  physical or supernatural properties attached to them 
  and are merely held sacred for the knowledge they store 
  and can impart. The following are all such items: scrolls, 
  books, tablets, or other means of storing lore that may 
  be studied by the priests or others to divine secrets of 
  the gods and the grand and secret universe beyond this 
  mortal realm.
  The Aklo Tablets
  Said to be written in the language of the long-extinct 
  serpent-folk of Valusia, who perished at the hands of 
  King Kull millennia before the Cataclysm, the Aklo Tablets 
  are a series of thin sheets of marble of irregular shapes, 
  inscribed with careful lines written in the characters of 
  the language of the serpent-folk. These tablets describe 
  the history and origins of the serpent-folk and their con-
  nection to the Old Serpent, Set, and outline their rituals 
  and worship practice of that terrible deity.
  ■
  ■ REPUTED QUALITIES: Anyone able to deci-
  pher the Aklo tongue — requiring a successful 
  Dire (D4) Linguistics test — will be able to read 
  the Tablets and discern a means by which the 
  Summon a Horror spell may be used to contact 
  the serpent-folk (as a 1-point Momentum spend), 
  even though the serpent-folk are not classified 
  as Horrors. The Tablets do not confer the spell 
  to the sorcerer if the sorcerer does not already 
  possess it: they merely allow the spell to contact 
  the serpent-folk. The information contained in 
  the Tablets can also be used to summon a child of 
  Set (CONAN corebook, page 334).
  The Elder Jars
  These strange ceramic urns stand at almost two-thirds 
  the height of a human being and are five-sided, vaguely 
  ridged, and are made of a surprisingly durable form of 
  clay, though the jars are marked with cracks and seem 
  likely that they will eventually come apart.
  Deciphering them is a Dire (D4) Linguistics test and 
  success reveals that they depict the origin and history of a 
  mysterious, race of body-switching aliens and their early 
  encounters with a plant-like species of scientist-aliens, 
  equally enigmatic. It describes a prehistory of the Earth 
  itself, with the rise and fall and wars of several dominant 
  species of creatures long vanished from history, with 
  few-to-no traces of their mere existence. The overall 
  impression upon reading the inscriptions on the jars is 
  that the authors were the plant-like scientists. The jars 
  themselves were separated, and now no one knows how 
  many there were and what story, if any, they tell when 
  read together.
  A Turanian trader claims to have once stumbled across 
  one of the green stone cities that dot the land to the 
  south of the Vilayet Sea and found a trove of metal plates 
  covered with alien glyphs. One of these he brought with 
  him to Sukhmet, where it was copied and distributed 
  northwards, until coming to the attention of Astreas of 
  Nemedia. That notable scholar identified the copy of the 
  plate as identical to the jars, one of which is displayed
  ■
  ■ REPUTED QUALITIES: None.
  The Inscriptions of the Dwellers
  No book or scroll, this is a series of seven conical stones, 
  each inscribed from top to bottom with parallel lines from 
  which strange, flowing glyphs depend. The language is 
  native to the dwellers of the deep (page 336, CONAN 
  corebook), but a successful Dire (D4) Linguistics test can 
  decipher it. It describes the cult of the dwellers, their 
  litanies and their prophecies, mostly focusing around 
  their gods Dagon, Hydra, and Great Cthulhu. Reading 
  this work causes the user to suffer one point of Despair 
  and 5§ mental damage. Courage Soak will apply against 
  the damage to Resolve and/or Trauma, but the Despair 
  cannot be avoided.
  ■
  ■ REPUTED QUALITIES: A sorcerer master this 
  resource by deciphering it may refer to it while 
  casting the Summon a Horror spell when attempt-
  ing to contact dwellers of the deep or other 
  aligned creatures and receives 2 additional 
  Momentum for such a summoning.
  Continued on next page…
  
  CHAPTER 8
  110
  The Tablets of Destiny
  The tales surrounding these three mythical stone tablets 
  are so grandiose and preposterous that they scarce bear 
  repeating in as reputable a source as this volume. They 
  date to some sort of cosmogenic age in which a few 
  unnamed ur-gods both created the tablets and used 
  that inscribed magic to further shape and guide the 
  creation and design of the universe and all worlds within 
  it. Shemitish scholar-priests claim that these tablets 
  are central to their ancient and obscure proto-mythical 
  cycles, and that one of the Tablets contains the methods 
  by which our Earth was expelled from the plane of the 
  gods and set into this mortal universe. However, few of 
  these esteemed scholars truly believe that the Tablets 
  — sometimes called the Elder Keys — are actual. Instead, 
  it is the accepted dogma that they are merely mythic 
  creations, the likes of which the world could not contain.
  ■
  ■ REPUTED QUALITIES: The purported powers 
  of these Tablets are such that they might offer 
  incredible control over any spell that affects the 
  material world, controls or affects living beings 
  or supernatural entities, or provides knowledge 
  that is concealed. Possession of but one of these 
  tablets — two are said to be lost or hidden on 
  the Earth — could form the basis of an entire 
  campaign, with the player characters attempting 
  to stop a power-mad sorcerer (or legion thereof) 
  from attempting to find them and re-scribe the 
  world to some new design. The potential powers, 
  as described by legends, are beyond the capabil-
  ities of these rules and should be determined by 
  the gamemaster, but at their weakest, posses-
  sion of such a Tablet might provide an additional 
  5 Momentum to the spells Enslave, Fury of the 
  Elements, and Venom on the Wind.
  The Yithian Fragments
  These fragments of parchment are purported to be 
  copies of original documents dictated by a long-dead 
  Acheronian sorcerer who claimed to have journeyed 
  through time and space, coming to inhabit the body of 
  a strange conical being betopped with manipulating 
  tentacles and sensory organs. While in this remarkable 
  form — which the sorcerer intuited to be manufactured 
  — the sorcerer explored a curious city made by these 
  creatures and was allowed access to their great archive, 
  learning their strange language quickly. Blessed with 
  an excellent memory, the sorcerer sought to memorize 
  as much as possible, and upon a return to his body the 
  sorcerer transcribed what had been seen and read. He 
  later identified the creatures as being from Yith but was 
  uncertain if Yith was the place he visited or was a former 
  home of the creatures, perhaps in other manufactured 
  or original bodies.
  The manuscript created passed through many hands, 
  including a curator who sought to destroy it but failed. 
  The current state of the fragments is a case made of a 
  silvery metal and containing several dozen torn fragments 
  of papyrus, each covered entirely with a set of writing 
  resembling cuneiform interspersed with a series of glyphs 
  made up of dots. Attempts at reassembly have demon-
  strated that much of the original manuscript is missing.
  ■
  ■ REPUTED QUALITIES: A translator be able to 
  successfully decipher the fragments — requiring 
  an Epic (D5) Linguist test — will be rewarded 
  with an extraordinary and scarcely-believable 
  history of this “Great Race” of Yith, their interac-
  tions with various godlike entities superficially 
  resembling Hyborian Age deities, and the appar-
  ent locations of various places that might not be 
  located upon Earth, such as the Plateau of Leng 
  and the Lake of Hali. So outlandish are these 
  revelations that reading them incurs no mental 
  hardship of any sort.
  …continued from previous page.
  
  DA WEI LIN
  The product of an unlikely pairing of a Cimmerian hillman 
  and a Khitan scholar in the dense forests of Shau Lun in 
  the remote northlands of Khitai, Da Wei Lin inherited his 
  father’s wanderlust and the occult knowledge of his mother’s 
  ancestry. Brought up in the temple and trained as a scholar, 
  he quickly grew bored with this limited existence, and the 
  clear stamp of his “western” bloodline marked him too 
  much the outsider. He left the monastery and his studies 
  at an early age, seeking wisdom in the forbidden temples 
  found in the Mountains of the Night.
  Seeking scraps of legend concerning one of these tem-
  ples — whose secrets included the Five-Fold Path of Life 
  Everlasting — Wei Lin devoted all his energies to finding 
  the place. After years of searching, he discovered the place, 
  called the Temple of Seven Tears, hidden high upon a near-
  ly-inaccessible mountain peak wreathed in fog and ice. In 
  this, his Cimmerian heritage served him well, and he was 
  able to scale the incredible heights to the site of the temple. 
  Bypassing traps, mazes, as well as mortal and immortal 
  guardians, Wei Lin overcame all and gained access to the 
  temple and its secrets.
  Finding the place long-deserted, he quickly found the 
  subject of his pursuit, but the cryptic scrolls were inde-
  cipherable, and he spent many years in devoted, careful 
  study, attempting to prize the sacred knowledge from the 
  ancient scrolls. As he translated and deciphered the secrets 
  contained in the scrolls, his sanity was sorely wounded by 
  the awful, terrible secrets that burned into his soul as he 
  came to comprehend them. Despite this, when he realized 
  the truth of the Five-Fold Path, he became uncertain he 
  had the strength of will, and the depravity of spirit, to go 
  through with the ritual and attain true immortality.
  A CULTIST OF THE AGE
  CHAPTER 9
  “The mysteries of the shadows are beyond our grasp. Symbols are but 
  the external signs of hidden powers. We only see the outward evidences; 
  we do not see the eternal play of the forces which lie behind…”
  — “The Phoenix on the Sword” (original draft)
  BACKER CHARACTER
  Presented on the following page is a character created 
  by a backer for the Robert E. Howard’s Conan: Adventures 
  in an Age Undreamed Of Kickstarter campaign, provided 
  here for use by the gamemaster or as a player character.
  
  CHAPTER 9
  112
  ATTRIBUTES
  Awareness
  Intelligence
  Personality
  Willpower
  10
  11
  10
  12
  Agility
  Brawn
  Coordination
  6
  7
  8
  FIELDS OF EXPERTISE
  Combat
  —
  Movement
  1
  Fortitude
  1
  Senses
  2
  Knowledge
  3
  Social
  1
  STRESS AND SOAK
  ■
  ■ Stress: Vigor 8, Resolve 13
  ■
  ■ Soak: Armor —, Courage 1
  ATTACKS
  ■
  ■ Staff (M): Reach 2 or 3, 4§, 2H, Knockdown
  ■
  ■ Implacable Calm (T): Range C, 6§ mental, Area, 
  Non-lethal
  SPECIAL ABILITIES
  ■
  ■ Patron: Wei Lun has devoted himself to the secret 
  studies of the Temple of Seven Tears and treats it 
  as a living patron.
  ■
  ■ Sheltered Upbringing: Wei Lin is relatively 
  inexperienced when it comes to dealing with 
  others, as his upbringing was entirely spent in 
  a remote temple and was self-secluded in a 
  nigh-unto-inaccessible mountain temple for many 
  of this adult years. When dealing with others 
  outside his background, the Difficulty of any social 
  interactions is increase by one step.
  DOOM SPENDS
  ■
  ■ Ancient Bloodline (Lemurian): When Wei Lin 
  fails a Personality-based test, the gamemas-
  ter must spend 1 Doom in return for an addi-
  tional 1d20 to be added to the roll. Those who 
  behold him will sense the alien, ancient and cruel 
  culture Wei Lin is descended from, and may be 
  galvanized to action.
  ■
  ■ Khitan Sorcery: Wei Lin has studied within a 
  Khitan temple and is adept at several spells, 
  particularly Atavistic Voyage, Favor of the Gods, 
  and Raise Up the Dead. He spends Doom for these 
  spells in place of Momentum.
  THE FIVE-FOLD PATH OF 
  LIFE EVERLASTING
  DIFFICULTY: Dire (D4)
  DURATION: Ten years (see description)
  COST TO LEARN/CAST: 1 Resolve to learn, 3 Resolve 
  to cast on top of any other spell costs
  Many are the paths to true immortality, and this for-
  bidden ritual is among the more despicable of those 
  yet devised by jealous mortals, seeking to walk upon 
  the golden trail to eternity. This particular technique 
  requires five assistants, each of whom must sacrifice 1 
  Wound in the ritual and be anointed with 5 Gold worth 
  of sacred oils, gold dust, ink made from powdered gems, 
  and ceremonial garments. The ritual takes five hours to 
  cast and must be cast upon the womb of a virgin female.
  If cast successfully, the virgin becomes host to a child, 
  bearing an infant to full term in one months’ time, a 
  painful and traumatic experience. The birth is frequently 
  fatal to the mother. After the child is born, it takes on 
  the semblance of the subject of the ritual — usually the 
  caster — and this child grows rapidly, attaining full 
  adult size and cognizance within one week’s 
  time. During this time, the child eats 
  ravenously, while the subject of the 
  spell drastically becomes enfeebled, 
  withering and dying when the child 
  has reached their fullness of growth 
  and has all the subject’s attributes, 
  skills, and talents.
  This ritual must be enacted 
  once every ten years, as the 
  new body quickly desta-
  bilizes and begins to age 
  rapidly. However, it can be 
  repeated endlessly, the 
  only restrictions the burden 
  upon the soul and the cost 
  in human life.
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Conan RPGs/Conan (2d20)/Conan 2d20 - Nameless Cults {MUH050390}.pdf