Beloved of the gods (Class: Heretic)
So goes Lugal’s first and greatest command: Those who place any other above God must be destroyed. There are none greater than Lugal, for I am God of Life, named Waterbearer.
Your every breath is an assertion of autonomy. Cardinal sin is a sweet, sweet thing.
The Heretic1
+1 MD and +1 language per template
A: Literacy, Acolyte, Evocation
B: Insight, Famed Ability
C: Favored Servant, Servant Favored
D: Metamorphosis
A: Literacy
The first step to heresy. You can read the heretical Urukite script in addition to speaking it normally, but have simultaneously lost the ability to recite the hymns and histories of the world without consulting written references.
A: Acolyte
You are an initiate of a heretical cult known and feared by common Urukites, whose secrets you learn and whose tenets you must follow. You can both read and write the secret language of the cult of which you are an acolyte.
Only the most famous servant called into service by each cult—daimons known and feared by common Urukites—are listed below. There are many and more evil spirits out in the world.
Astrologers
Spirits: Stars
Language: Empyrean
Symbols: owls, glass prisms
Ritual item: pitted iron orb
Seers that look to the cosmos above and read FATE in the stars. But in these days only one FATE can be read, for the moon hangs low in the sky, unmoving, and the stars only move as the Queen of Heaven bids them.
The most famous servant of the Queen of Heaven is Ninna-Saan, a steward of the Queen’s palace, who appears as an imperious, bird-like man made of smoky glass and crowned with a halo of starlight. His feet sharpen to needle-points, as do the tips of his fingers; the sound of wind chimes accompanies every delicate movement. Ninna-Saan's purpose is temporal orderliness. He can be directed to suspend the auspices of time governing [dice] processes: objects freeze in midair, scrolls refuse to burn, wounds stop bleeding out. He will abide by your instructions for only [sum] minutes before disappearing to right some other household wrong.Midwives
Spirits: Gallus
Language: Chthonic
Symbols: bats, petroleum handprints
Ritual item: cypress staff
Demon-binders, curse-wielders, and life-bringers instructed in their arts by the seven witch-queens of the Underworld, the once-mortal servants of the Queen of Hell. All mortuary cultists are women.2
The most famous servant of the Queen of Hell is Namtar, who appears as a shapeless figure cloaked in tattered black silks from which countless, ink-stained hands emerge; he is crowned with a halo of interlocked skeletal arms. His voice is nasal and rapid-fire, and his first question upon meeting someone living is to demand their association with the Doorkeeper and his servants—he has a terrible grudge against all of them for their lack of proper passport systems. His purpose is cataloguing the dead. Namtar knows where every shade is in the Underworld—or, if he can’t find them personally, he can find someone who can. Each time Namtar is evoked he will relay [dice + highest] questions to a single shade currently in Hell. Roll one fewer MD for Namtar to compel truth from the shade or for him to mimic the emotion of the shade’s voice in his retelling. This process takes between a minute and a season, depending on the shade’s obscurity and current location in the Underworld.Deep-Seekers
Spirits: Lampads
Language: Chthonic
Symbols: spiders, tamarisk bundles
Ritual item: bronze torch
Navigators of those deep places near the threshold of the Underworld, whose initiation is a season spent alone in the darkness beneath the earth. Those few that return do so guided by the torchlight of the servants of the Doorkeeper of Hell, he who is sometimes mistaken as its king.
The most famous servant of the Doorkeeper is Kukku, who appears as a hunchbacked woman mummified with age, crowned with a halo of interlocked skeletal arms. Her eyes are empty sockets sewn shut, but nonetheless Kukku’s head follows your every movement—others will swear that, no, she was following them. She does not speak; her mouth, too, is stitched shut. Her purpose is disorienting darkness: Kukku wields a black flame that sheds it as a torch does light. Under the auspices of Kukku’s black torch, the senses are dulled and the mind wanders—apparitions appear at the edge of the gaze, the paranoia of seasons spent in isolation in the great caverns below the earth. Kukku can be evoked for only [sum] hours before she departs once more.Children of the Sea
Spirits: Tempests
Language: Abyssal
Symbols: leviathans, pearls
Ritual item: braided rope torc
We are all the children of the Mother of Monsters, say the sea-children. Only they truly understand the monstrosity lurking in the hearts of men. All sea-children are weird.
The most famous servant of the Monster Mother is Umummu, who appears as a bloated, translucent jellyfish with shark-toothed eels for tentacles and crowned with a halo of schooling spirit-fish. Its purpose is mutation. Direct its interest toward a creature nearby: its venomous bites inflict [dice] mutations unless they successfully roll fortitude.3
The servants of the Enemy, those living plagues crowned with horns, have no associated cult.
A: Evocation
You know the secret names of the servants of heretical gods, and the words to call them to heel. The god you court and the daimons you command depends on the cult into which you are inducted.
You can expend MD (which work as they normally do) to evoke a particular daimon: either to converse with them or to command them to fulfill their divine purpose, the reason for their very creation.
You begin by knowing the secret names of two daimons: the most famous servant of your chosen god and one other servant of theirs, determined at random. There are many more in the world to befriend or master.
B: Insight
Daimons cannot hide from you, the way they can normal men.
Meet someone’s eyes to learn how many MD they possess and the daimons over whom they hold sway. (This does not grant you the knowledge of those daimons’ secret names—you must treat with them yourself for that.)
C: Favored Servant
You are inducted into the innermost circle of your cult, and the god to whom you have sacrificed your very life finally begins to take personal notice. The form this takes is unique to each of the gods, and their gifts for loyal vassals are many and varied. At the very least, you know you are promised the right of passage in their sacred domain.
C: Servant Favored
Choose a daimon whom you have evoked many times; they have grown used to your beckoning voice, and you may now evoke them to speak with them at any time, no MD required.
When you evoke them to fulfill their purpose, you do so with +1 MD.
D: Metamorphosis
The truth of your allegiance can no longer be hidden. You undergo a strange and numinous transformation, the specifics of which are hidden even to you.
In the vein of deus ex parabola’s masked clerics and Loch’s magos.↩
See the river kingdom sex and gender post, coming soon.↩
Umummu is inspired by Sylvanas’s magos order, the Proteoi.↩