Episode Notes:
Title: Qlippoth - The Faithful
Thumbnail: Qlippoth Lords Collage
Introduction
James: Anemone
Freeman: One in a Billion
Qlippoth Lords
Rarely worshipped by non-Qlippoth, the best known is the Polymorph Plague, Yamasoth
· Others include Chavazvug the Crawling Inferno, Isph-Aun-Vuln the Feaster Within, and Thuskchoon the Everglutton.
Chavazvug, the Crawling Inferno (1)
Realm: A deep Rift cavern filled with boiling lakes of bile and seepage.
Description: A mound of digestive organs that drools fire held up by 5 long, thin legs with dripping entrails dangling and twitching from its mass.
· His entire body steams with heat that can set a creature on fire at a touch.
Lore: His hatred for demons is particularly strong, and he can regenerate his body after being killed, within one of his boiling lakes.
· He regularly goes on suicidal assaults on Demonkind, killing as many as possible and regenerating for the next one.
· His hatred for demons distracts him almost completely from mortals and their worship.
· Those who do worship him are usually solitary pyromaniacs who consider spontaneous combustion the ultimate fate. :’D
Bonus – Obedience (1e):
Gholz, the Untitled
Long dead, mostly forgotten.
Was once associated with unlawful intrusions and magical lures.
Appearance is forgotten and can only be inferred by its victims.
· …no description of victims given on the wiki, buuuuutt…
Spoilers for Return of the Runelords, Book 2, It Came from Hollow Mountain
An area the PCs are meant o venture into contains a large pool of water. The walls contain mosaics of aquatic vistas, and a platform contains a statue of a hunched over, twisted creature with a tentacle-infest mouth.
I won’t say anymore than it’s technically a creature in mid-transformation, the stone/statue nature it is unconnected to Gholz, and we dooooo have a picture!
Statue of Gholz (2)
Isph-Aun-Vuln, the Feaster Within (3)
Realm: N/A, The Outer Rifts
Description: Human-sized maw of an anemone surrounded by roiling tendrils.
· She is wholly incorporeal, made up of nothing but vapour adorned with incandescent fragments of her victims’ souls.
Lore: Easily one of the most powerful Qlippoth (2nd most in fact), she actively works toward the goal of removing all Sin through tactics like subtle possession and mental control.
· She very much enjoys possessing the right people to lead an entire nation to ruin.
· She is worshiped on hundreds of planets, with most of the cultists unware of who they truly worship.
· Usually the cult leaders are charismatic, but brainwashed and lobotomized by Isph-Aun-Vuln herself.
· Sacrifices are common in these cults, usually by magically launching someone from the top of a mountain to fall to their death.
Bonus – Obedience (1e):
Oaur-Ooung, the Blistering Womb (4)
Realm: An impossibly deep and immense, completely toxic Abyssal Ocean.
· She has no lair, but endless floats producing endless Qlippoth. Many of which either drown or are eaten by her. Many of course also escape.
Description: A gigantic, pale, poisonous fungoid creature. She swells with blisters, fungoid eyes and gasping throats, is about 120 long, but with tendrils that can stretch like a jellyfish for miles.
Lore: Cultists that worship this Qlippoth Lord eagerly wish to become infected by Qlippoth and live on.
· They do not care that they will lose their memories and lives in the process.
· They often reject their own racial identities and modify their bodies. Many sacrifices are subjected to fleshwarping in a bid to “evolve the faithful” and “consume their enemies”.
· In regards to Cyth-V’sug, it was Oaur-Ooung who first learned of the her childs changes and threatened to destroy them.
· Some say that she is now growing something new and unprecedented in her blistering womb.
Bonus – Obedience (1e):
Shiggarreb, the Marauding Maw Bonus Image (5)
Realm: N/A, The Outer Rifts
Description: Resembles a bloated drider with multiple arms, a chitin-plated body and split deformed face.
Lore: She serves as a messenger of sorts for the other Qlippoth Lords.
· She also often leads invasions both in the Outer Rifts and the planets within Universe.
· The ground she walks is influenced by her connection to the Outer Rifts and becomes twisted and warped.
· In Deep Tolguth, a massive cavern region of Orv (the deepest of the three layers of the Darklands), under its central ziggurat, Xulgath (troglodytes) thoughtmaws (members of the species who did not lose their intelligence after the fall of the great Xulgath empire) are known to worship Shiggarreb.
· She bestows ‘forbidden magic’ upon them, and they believe the false sun within Deep Tolguth will one day become a portal to her realm.
Bonus – Obedience (1e):
Thuskchoon, Everglutton(6)
Realm: A vast tunnel network that connects to most of the Outer Rifts (but he rarely spends time here)
Description: A 40-ft. long Slug with clattering limbs and mouths
Lore: He is nearly mindless, and spends most of his time feeding on anything he can find in the deepest reaches of the Rifts.
· He will occasionally wander into portals or connections to other planes. And eventually finds himself banished from these places (probably through a very concerted effort of the locals).
· When he digests his prey he also consumes parts of their thoughts, gaining quick but vast insights as a result.
· Worshipers accept the mindlessness of the Thuskchoon, and expect little from him.
· Instead they seek the powerful secrets he sometimes accidentally reveals in the wake of his destruction.
· They will also often seek our strange drugs in search visions and answers to unasked questions.
· (Fuckin’ hippies.)
Bonus – Obedience (1e):
Yamasoth, the Polymorphy Plague (7)
Realm: The Kingdom of New Flesh, Sekatar-Sektaris
· Sekatar-Sektaris is located at the center of Yhidothrus’ Spiral Path.
· It is partly ruled by Yamasoth, alongside thirteen powerful warring Demons.
· The Kingdom of New Flesh is Yamasoth’s portion, where he is allowed autonomy to view and research his experiments.
· It is home to hundreds of thousands of Yamasoth’s test subjects, all taken from countless planets and fleshwarped beyond recognition, even to themselves (all memories and identity are gone).
Desription: Yamasoth is said to be like a large octopus or squid with too many tentacles and eyes.
· His large mouth contains another single eye that remains unless in a confrontation. With a simple gaze of this eye he can transform a victim in monstrous forms.
· Thought to be more than just a Qlippoth, but also a “Nascent Demon Lord”.
· Demon Lords are described as unique versions of their own kind of demon.
· All demons start as Larvae from sinful souls, once they grow into a demon they become something that can seek out power and reputation, evolving over time into greater and more powerful demons. Demon Lords are the most powerful, successful and unique of these.
· This would put Yamasoth in a rather unique position between the Qlippoth and Demons. Still a Qlippoth, still not quite a Demon Lord.
o In fact…one of the four Horsemen of the Apocalypse saw the larvae that were created by sin (formed during the formation of the current reality, with the other planes coming into creation, along with Pharasma’s Boneyard, the material Universe, the Cycle of Souls, etc.), were doing nothing more pointlessly gnawing at the Outer Rifts.
o So they, through a series of experiments, fed a larvae to one of the oldest Qlippoth (presumed to be Yamasoth), and produced the first Demon.
o But the transformation replicated itself with the other Larvae of Sin that existed.
o This experiment is considered to be one of the greatest “Sins to ever be committed”.
· In fact the idea and claim of being a Demon Lord angers Yamasoth greatly.
· He hates deities of all kinds (though grudgingly respects some, such as Lamashtu for her monstrous creations and the fact that she is the strongest Demon Lord (apparently).
· He specifically despises Haagenti, the demon lord of Alchemy and Change.
o Both claim to be the inventor of fleshwarping, and accuse the other of being a fraud.
o Haagenti’s followers are usually concentrated in the Darklands (such as the Drow), while Yamasoth’s are on the surface of Golarion.
· Yamasoth once occupied the realm of Gongorina, in the deepest parts of Sekamina (the middle realm of the Darklands), directly below the Varisian Gulf.
o In this place he experimented on drow, xulgath and countless surface creatures.
o And the tunnels of Gongorina ran from the ancient Thassilon city of Xin-Bakrakhan all the way to Sekatar-Sektaris.
· Yamasoth was at one point specifically allied with the Alaznist, the final Runelord of Wrath.
o Alaznist apprenticed under her own father, and when she surpassed him she sought out Yamasoth. Her father warned against it, but she sacrificed him along with the rest of her family to Yamasoth for the greed of more arcane power.
o Yamasoth gave her the knowledge of Fleshwarping (and she created reefclawd and sinspawn.
o (I couldn’t quite find it, but perhaps this was the beginning of the renowned Thassilonian Fleshwarping practices.)
o She provided test subjects for Yamasoth, and he in return he provided creations for her armies.
o It is thought that without Earthfall, Yamasoth would have launched an massive invasion on Golarion.
Bonus – Obedience (1e):
Hermetic Qabalah
Hermeticism
· Philosophical and religious belief structure
· Combines elements of Greek god Hermes and Egyptian god Thoth
· Alchemy, astrology, theurgy (divine magics) [practical side of theurgy = thaumaturgy]
· Structured around henosis – self-perfection
· Qlippoth became mystical worlds, or entities and merged with ideas from demonology
Mathers
· The Kabbalah Unveiled is a partial translation of Kabbala denudate (1684) by Chrisna Knorr von Rosenroth
· Intended to produce a Latin translation of the Zohar
· Suggest that Adam = Jesus
· 3 highest sefirot represent the trinity
· 3 highest qlippoth represent the powers before Satan (not sure what this means)
· The other 7 correspond to a layer of hell
Crowley
· Aleister Crowley – occultist, magician, poet, philosopher, mountaineer, novelist, etc
· Most famous for
· 3 evil forms before Samael are: Qemetial, Belial, Othiel
· The other “Orders of Qliphoth” are akin to the seriphot tree of life known as the Tree of Death
Grant
· Kenneth Grant was the founder of Typhonian Order
· Extensive teachings on Qlippoth & Tree of life
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· Qlippoth represent the negative counterparts to sefirot
· Grant put an emphasis on understand these darker aspects for a more complete spiritual perspective
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· Advocated for balance, believing engaging with Qlippothic energies can lead to spiritual growth
· Most often aligned with sexual magic, tantric practices
· Suggested that HP Lovecraft’s Yog-Sothoth could be Qlippoth inspired (an amalgom of glowing spheres & all knowing deity & deity of the Yuggoth)