One Monster, Five Rooms - Sea Star Temple

 This post is a challenge from Garamondia, and utilises the Monster-making d666 we wrote up together. The challenge was → 1d2 Monsters and 1d4+1 Rooms.

I recommend you give it a shot. 

In the port of Ki-wa, where the river joins with the Sea of Carij, an old god has given an old priest a new blessing. Born from the humours of his brain and of divine word, a Guiding Star has been loosed into his inner-city temple, and now all the dense and raucous streets around have been driven silent. The zilaths of the city demand some travelling hero go in there and destroy it. Capture the flamen alive, too, for we must know which god did this.  Rituals go both ways, and if men must pay obeisance to the gods, the gods must not curse the busy ports of men. 

THE TEMPLE

NORTH and WEST of it are civic insulae, SOUTH of it there is a square full of jacarandas and a wizened olive tree (sacred). EAST there is a canal, though a patch of muddy waste-ground and a 10ft drop keep the canal and temple from meeting productively. The mud is cursed (see Room 3) 

The priest is called Ikua. Flamen Ikua operated the small and currently-unpopular temple of Zancaba, the power of purification, pain, love and boiling water. It’s unclear if Zancaba sent the Guiding Star, or if perhaps her divine rivals, responsible for the dilapidated state of the old temple, did so. Flamen Ikua has 1HD and is dressed in cloth rags. When you arrive at the temple, roll 1d4 to determine where he is (he will never be in the Narthex). Ikua is currently semiconscious (like he’s horribly concussed or unbelievably drunk) and extremely optimistic. He cannot perceive the star and is curious where everyone went. He can probably be healed by a more competent priest than himself. 

0: Narthex

Large arched doorway designed to be used by many people at once. Flanked by serpent statues. Cyan tiled floor, and orange clay walls, lined with pegs. On the pegs, abandoned clothes belonging to worshippers who fled. Searching the clothes turns up 7sp, 1gp and a small iron ball covered in spikes in a purse of its own (decent as a sling bullet, unpleasant to hold, one spike has a hole to pass a cord through).

Dead body tucked calmly into the NORTHWEST corner. The body is that of an old man dressed in the faded black of an artisan. He sits with his hands folded in his lap and his eyes turned into two blackened holes in his head, apparently from his eyes combusting. Nobody has been brave enough to move him. His name was Sethre. If you secure him a proper burial (he has no descendants to do this for him), his spirit will grant you 40XP. 

There’s a door EAST into the Prayer Room (Room 1), and a locked iron gate going NORTH, which leads to a curving stairway down to the Cellar (Room 4). The key to the gate is on a leather loop on Flamen Ikua’s humble cord belt. If you rolled that Ikua is in the Cellar, the gate is opened on arrival and the stairs are accessible. 

1: Prayer Room

Takes up the whole bottom half of the orange clay temple building. 

In the middle of the room, the old stone floor is subtly trenched by the passage of hundreds of feet across centuries - this trench runs WEST to EAST, to the huge curtain of hanging glass beads that leads to the Holy Bath (Room 3). A faint, rhythmic thumping can be felt in the feet, if not heard. 

Against the NORTH wall, a venerable wooden dais with a podium, a dusty scroll rack, a discarded palm-frond hand-fan and a lyre. The podium has a sharp gold spike on it, pointing upwards, worth 5g. It’s held to the wood with an iron nail. There is a secret lever inside the podium that begins or halts the flow of hot water in the Holy Bath (Room 3). 

The scroll-rack contains a number of scrolls detailing local creation myths, civic histories, marriage records from back when the populace came here to get married, and a single magic scroll of Heat Metal, just in case! The magic scroll is cunningly disguised as a boring story about the origin of mint plants. 

Against the SOUTH wall, a row of wooden seats, then an area behind some wooden screens (ebony, worth 25g), in which you will find two sets of boxes. One set of boxes contains ritual implements (fly-whisks, rattles, bone whistles, and other sundries, 10g all told) and the other contains slightly old and past-their-best ritual herbs (ten minutes of searching reveals a dose of sorcerer’s spice, which gives the imbiber a temporary MD). 

In the SOUTHWEST corner, a ladder ascends 30ft up the wall. Any strong pull would rip the bronze rings holding the ladder free of the wall, causing it perhaps to fall into the room. Climbing the ladder goes to the Rafters (Room 2) 

2: Rafters 

The upper part of the building consists of a slightly ramshackle room above the rafters. The floor is made up of boards laid over the rafters, and diffidently nailed down. Any strenuous activity by anyone that weighs anything has a 2-in-6 chance of snapping or dislodging a board and throwing you 30ft down onto granite. 

The NORTHWEST corner is the Flamen’s sleeping quarters - a feather mattress and patterned blanket of decent quality, along with a brass spitting jug and a few copies of the scripture of rival temples (know thy enemy! Or, well, know what thy enemy is doing to beat your arse). There are a few amateurish charcoal drawings stacked under a brick by Flamen Ikua’s bed.

The EAST side of the room is a storage area for the temple - the assigned ration of candles, grain, spare sandals, salt, sealing wax, honey, wine, &c. (Ki-wa is a particularly involved palace economy). 

3: Holy Bath

Largest part of the building - roof is a wooden lattice overlaid with palm branches to form a shaded chamber. The atmosphere here is humid, and steam hangs in the air thick enough to reduce visibility significantly. The walls are covered in a blue-and-white mosaic, depicting scenes of frolic and history. The only exits aside from the door from the Prayer Room are climbing the water-slick walls, or going SOUTH to the drainage trench. 

On the EAST wall, there stands a shrine to Zancaba - a huge brass statue of a masked woman carrying a large brass jug and a lash. She is decorated with paltry offerings of flower garlands, soapstone statuettes of recently-distant spouses, and hanging iron spheres covered in spikes. The spiked spheres (once blessed by one of her Flamens), serve as a holy symbol of Zancaba, allowing a priest to turn ritually polluted people, birds and faithless spouses. 

The centre of the chamber is dominated by a deep, cylindrical indent, lined with brass. Hot, steaming water (painful to the touch) pours from the huge jug carried by the statue of Zancaba, as if by magic (it is not, see Cellar), filling the massive bath. Bathing here purges ritual pollution, curses and gives another save against ongoing works of sorcery. It also deals 1d6 boiling damage to you. Failing to observe the right ritual has a 2-in-6 chance of angering Zancaba, a powerful demon goddess. In Ki-wa, only Flamen Ikua knows the proper ritual (they’re extensive and change with the moon phase). 

At the SOUTH side, a sluice gate connects to a deep stone trench that runs SOUTH out of a small brass grating decorated like a demon’s toothy mouth. This connects to a little ditch outside that dumps outflow from the bath into the muddy patch above the canal. The mud out there is full of so much built up profanity that standing in it for more than a few moments is liable to curse you. Ikua should have dealt with this, but failed to, due to being one old man with no extra funds. 

4: Cellar

Dark, extremely humid, smells of smoke, with a thin layer of (normal) mud on the floor, and black tiles on the walls. The ceiling is covered in a thick layer of soot.  

The EAST side of the room contains an elderly mechanism of bronze and wood, which draws water from the canal, passes it through a huge steaming kettle-like boiler, then draws it further up when commanded to by the secret lever, in order to fill the bath. The boiler is heated by a magic coal, head-sized and permanently burning. It’s a treasure anyone would pay 100g for, but it’s heavy, obvious, on fire, and temple property. 

White tiles on the SOUTH wall depict the scene of Zancaba’s entry into the world, breaking free of the Earth-mother’s eye as a single scalding tear of rage. 

THE MONSTER

The Guiding Star is usually perched on Flamen Ikua’s head, body flat against the small circular hole in his forehead which it was born from. 

Guiding Star

9HD (45HP), AC12 (Special), Morale 13 (Divine Certainty) 

A huge, fibrous brittlestar with five radially symmetrical limbs, filamentous and internally luminous. It’s hot like a lightbulb and dripping wet. 

No. Appearing: 1 (2d6 in prophet’s graveyards) 

Movement: Slow levitating flight assisted by grasping limbs. 

Senses: Detect Divine Influence, Detect Good and Evil‚ Detect Greed, Excellent Smell & Taste - Deaf and Blind. 

Morality: Mission from a higher being (incomprehensible to people, usually, but in this case the star seems aggressively territorial of the temple). 

Intelligence: Excellent architect and mathematician, supremely intelligent, cannot effectively communicate with humans, grasps no mortal language. 

Attacks: 3x Grasp and 1x Beam, or 2x Beam, or 1x Grasp and 1x Enlighten. 

• Grasp - 1d6+3 piercing damage from limb-bristles, reduced to 0 by any armour more persuasive than padded cloth. Hit targets are grappled and lifted off the ground by the deceptive strength of the star. Subsequent Grasps on the same target hit AC10 until they’re freed of all grappling limbs. 

• Beam - Projected from the centre of the Star, feels like stargazing, does 3d6 damage to exposed skin and 1d6 damage to anything else. 

• Enlighten - A target hit by 3 or more Grasps is dragged face-to-face with the centre of the Star. If they fail a save, they either submit to the will of the Star and become its servant, or roll on the Revelations Table. 

Blinding Light - Looking at the Guiding Star without being chosen by at least one god to do so burns out your eyes (no save) - usually nonfatally. If you are chosen by some kind of a god, the Star will relay to you instructions, directions, and a powerful blessing. 

Glowing Weakpoint - Attacks aimed at the dead middle of the Guiding Star only need to hit AC5, and deal triple damage. (however, there comes the question of figuring out where the middle is with your eyes shut.)

The Guiding Star is a sort of beholder-type monster, and can be employed in place of such, I suppose. 

I used the Monster Table that Garamondia and I put together to make the Star, ending up with:

FORM: STARFISH

DANGER: BLINDNESS 

MIEN: LIGHT-BRINGER

HABITAT: HUMAN BRAIN

DRIVE: HOLY MISSION

WEAKNESS: WEAK POINT

I'LL HAVE YOU DIE FOR THIS (Assassins of Penny Dreadfuls)

 

Alamut stood here, once.

The word Assassin, in variant forms, had already passed into European usage as a term for a hired professional murderer in this general sense. The Italian chronicler Giovanni Villani, who died in 1348, tells how the lord of Lucca sent 'his assassins' (i suoi assassini) to Pisa to kill a troublesome enemy there. Even earlier, Dante, in a passing reference in the 19th canto of the Inferno, completed in 1320, speaks of 'the treacherous assassin' (lo perfido assassin); his fourteenth-century commentator Francesco da Buti, explaining a term which for some readers at the time may still have been strange and obscure, remarks: 'Assassino è colui che uccide altrui per danari' (An assassin is one who kills others for money).

You are not a loser who kills people for money. 

You (and other correctly-minded killers of various sorts) are aware of those freaks and their black pocketbooks that hand out random murders for paltry rewards. You, and all other correctly-minded killers of various sorts, despise them.

The Asasiyun (Those Faithful to the Foundation of the Faith) 

A Nizari Ismaili order founded in 1090 by a man named Hassan Al-Sabah. The order was something akin to a state, scattered across around 200 self-sufficient castles, many captured covertly, across Fatimid and Seljuk territory. The most famous was Alamut - officially, the Kursi Ad-Daylam, a castle of knowledge, learning, and paradisiacal gardens. It was all destroyed when the Mongols came, and scattered the order to the four winds. There is a very small chapter in London - not the only “assassins” in London, but certainly the only Asasiyun. 

The sub-sect who perform the killings are the fida’i, “those who sacrifice themselves”. For them, the use of the word “assassin” in its current meaning is a very dreadful insult. 

Based In: Have tiny sects in nearly every major city between London and Dhaka. 

Symbols: Dagger embedded in the ground, black eagle, blooming flower. 

Membership: Nizari Ismaili men. 

Secret Magic: Entry into locked places through means unknown. 

Wants: The restoration of the Asasiyun to glory and the recapture of their castles in the Levant and Iran. 

By: Try and guess. 

And Also: Most members of the Asasiyun were just fairly ordinary people living under the Order’s protection, the same way most Templars were proto-bankers. 

The Assassins (The Brothers of St. Judas Sicarius)

An extremely radical sect of Catholic Christianity, who have as a patron saint a very, very contentious interpretation of Judas Iscariot. Taking as their warning the great sinner who is chewed this very moment in the teeth of Satan (so says Dante), and taking as their example the ancient sicarii, they kill the enemies of the faith as an act of penitence, expecting this shall condemn them to Hell. 

For them, the word “assassin” is a term of penitence and disgrace, like a noöspheric hair shirt. 

Based In: North Italy, Switzerland,  Austria, the Balkans, with small chapels in Porto, New York and London. 

Symbols: Hands stained red with blood, a sica, thirty pieces of silver. 

Membership: Penitent Christians who consider themselves already damned. 

Secret Magic: To turn a dagger red and blazing, even able to harm demons and angels, like the sword of Shamsiel.  

Wants: To pave the way for goodness on the earth by undertaking evil acts, so that the innocent do not have to.  

By: Try and guess. 

And Also: A few of their members have snuck into the Swiss Guard at the Vatican. 

 

The Assassins (The Last Defenders of Antioch)

Last remnants (so they say) of the Crusader States, especially the Principality of Antioch, around whose founder, Bohemond of Taranto, they have formed a sort of bizarre and extremely specific cult of personality. They wish to destroy the current rulers of the Holy Land (so, the Ottoman Empire), and reinstate the rule of Christendom there. They go about this with all the care and precision of an opiate-dosed bull with flaming branches tied to its horns. The Knights Templar hate the absolute shit out of them. 

For them, the word “assassin” is a self-applied moniker, based on the famous actions of the Asasiyun during the time of the Principality of Antioch.

Based In: Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, the Balearics, Ceuta and Gibraltar (and through Gibraltar, now, London). 

Symbols: Hauteville coat-of-arms, Jerusalem cross in sky blue, cruciform sword set with a piece of lapis lazuli. 

Membership: Italian and Spanish Catholics. 

Secret Magic: Rituals to summon and invoke Sahaquiel, an angel, in multifarious ways. 

Wants: The restoration of the Principality of Antioch (this was a more reasonable and achievable goal a few hundred years ago). 

By: Try and guess. 

And Also: They have a secret magical castle that floats on a cloud, currently moored above the Atlantic Ocean, very far from land. They nicked it from a Kurdish wizard in 1301. 

The Assassins (The Brethren of Baal-berith) 

A mid-society cult to the veiled devil Baal-berith, a fettering prince of Hell who blasphemously claims to be the grandfather of God and the ruler of the primordial waters. They kill for Baal-berith, or to fulfil their goals to place themselves in positions of kingship -  or sometimes just kill for fun. Their membership is extremely eclectic, extremely awful and extremely internally competitive. 

For them, the word “assassin” is a pejorative label received from other demonic cults operating in western Europe, which they have taken to with great enthusiasm. 

Based In: London, Paris, Nice, Copenhagen, Bremen, and surroundings. 

Symbols: Flies, Goetic Sigil of Baal-berith, blue-black Circle (representing primordial water). 

Membership: Anyone willing to sell their soul to Baal-berith. 

Secret Magic: Supernaturally binding contracts, and opening of gateways into the tehom. 

Wants: Political power on the Earth, (and, secretly, to get one over on Baal-berith). 

By: Try and guess. 

And Also: Many of the Brethren are seeking out paths to eternal life (but not in concert with each other - their temperament ultimately disallows cooperation in this matter). 

The Assassins (of Execution Dock) 

An entirely irreligious (except in a nervous sense at Christmas, Hallowmas and Candlemass) group of thugs operating in the East End, working for the various organised crime clans of east London. An allowed insanity, these half-esoteric half-exoteric maniacs (drunk, high, or just plain crazy) are allowed to gather in a building near the remains of Execution Dock in Wapping, a reservoir of sudden and fearless violence to be tapped for the general community good. Beginning as nothing more than stupid murderers, some dreadful change is taking hold, and they are sliding unstoppably into the arcane world - appearing in hidden places and interrupting occulted meetings when they, surely, could not have. 

For them, the word “assassin” is a term of glory - as much glory as one can achieve when one is face down in a puddle of spilled rum in Wapping, anyway. 

Based In: Wapping (in London) 

Symbols: Butcher’s knife, noose, gibbet. 

Membership: Convicts and career criminals 

Secret Magic: Not that they know it, but their utter fearlessness has attracted the gory eyes of a genuine valkyrie, who watches over them. 

Wants: Money, power, fame, attractive evening company, and so on. 

By: Try and guess, if you think you fucking can. 

And Also: They keep having screaming nightmares about swans, gilded skulls and fairy smiths. 

The Assassins (Iga-ryū)

The Iga School is one of the main traditions of the shinobi - ninjas, we all know what ninjas are. The Iga School were gathered in Edo to guard the castle gates - history records a fading of ninja skills around this time, but it’s more like the bakumatsu is driving them to ever deeper secrecies. There’s not a huge amount of them in London, naturally (in fact, there is precisely one), due to the distance from here to Tokyo. However, due to the ongoing turmoil in Japan, the Iga-ryū are both busy at home and looking for new opportunities elsewhere. 

For them, the word “assassin” is a curious word of foreign origin which, for convenience, is used as a term of art.  

Based In: Edo (it’s still called this, until 1868, upon which it will become Tokyo). 

Symbols: Dark blue cloth - beyond that, no other definite symbols. Why be identifiable? 

Membership: Members of the Iga-ryu families settled in Edo. 

Secret Magic: Walking on water and the summoning of giant animals (the hand-seals are for meditation purposes). 

Wants: The survival of the bakufu (a failing hope), and their own survival into the coming era (a near-certainty). 

By: Espionage and sabotage for hire (They only kill when absolutely necessary.)

And Also: They are intensely studying the occult underworld of Europe - knowing is easily two thirds of the battle. 

Mnemonic Apocrypha (Noncanonical Daemons for the Psychopaladin)

 

The Psychopaladin’s Daemons have been knocking around in my brain (appropriately) since the post was posted. Here are some knockoff versions from the rotten depths of my psyche. 

You can’t use this post without reading the original over on Spiceomancy, so go do that. Danke. 

A reminder from the original post: Daemons start with 2HD, are ostensibly friendly, and whisper lots of (mostly bad) advice in your ear. They inform your personality, or are informed by it: philosophers are still debating this point. Other Psychopaladins can see and hear them, as well as certain sensitive types.

If you're on good terms with a daemon, it will let you cast it like a spell. If you do, roll their HD instead of MD.

There’s definitely an underlying theme to the naming and colouring of these things. In the spirit of early psychology, I decided to guess instead of asking.

1. Armaros - Tangled ball of snakes nailed together by their tails. Argues with itself constantly, theorises wildly, spews endless ideas. If it arrives at a conclusion successfully, it’s horrified, forgets it quickly, and returns to the safety of inchoate wondering. When cast, describe something you would like to have happen, and gain information on [sum] randomly ordered steps towards achieving that.

2. Corus - A fragment of stained-glass window, depicting a knight riding something unclear. Hates the wealthy, hates anyone who succeeds at anything, in fact. This hatred is primarily envy, and if you are given the chance to take something from someone, or assume some part of their life, Corus will scream until you do it. When cast, duplicates an object [sum] times - each duplicate lasts until it is tested in any way (ex. A sword is swung, a key is used on a lock), upon which it functions once, then crumbles into chalk dust.

3. Frederica - A great crested helm of war, with a gorget and an aventail. Proud, haughty, isolationist, well-spoken. Judges your friends harshly, but forgives and smoothes over all of your flaws. Would love nothing more than to stand atop a mountain and look down upon the whole world. When cast, for [sum] hours, the poor, meek and downtrodden automatically fear you.

4. Masseter - Fat dead rat with a big human mouth on the stomach. The mouth is talkative and hungry, a gourmand. Rambles incoherently about the wonders of flavour. Will not be happy unless you regularly eat unusual delicacies. When cast, induces an obsessive craving for something of your choice in [sum] visible creatures.

5. Issachar - An owl with its eyes gouged out. Endlessly curious, and expects you to share in that, even to the point of bodily harm. She expects you to test if that spinning sawblade does in fact cut things, using your fingers, if we’ve got nothing else to feed into it. When cast, gain [sum] rounds of precognition - act out the next [sum] rounds of gameplay - if it’s to your liking, you can declare it to be how things went, and if it isn’t, you can rewind to the point of casting.

6. Forneus - Hideous thing like a deep-sea creature with a glowing mouth and big wet eyes. Declares things to be “hot” or “ugly” in the tone of a priest dividing virtue and sin. Interacting too much with ugly things makes him cry for hours. When cast, makes an object either disgusting and terrifying to onlookers, or wondrous and desirable to onlookers, for [sum] hours.

7. Despite - A pair of clanking spurs shaped like strangling hands. Demands respect and (literal) elevation. Orders you to intimidate people whenever you can. Has a perverse sense of honour, and will get extremely salty if you act against it. When cast, she carries you [sum] feet in any direction quicker than a blink (though she can’t make you intangible). Casting Despite can be done at any time, even on other people’s turns.

8. Dogsbody - Looks like a dead fucking dog, which is something very few people like. Appropriately, very few people like Dogsbody. Denigrates everything. Wants you to eat rotten meat and to make a mess in public places. When cast, [sum] slots of objects are affected heavily by entropy, rendering them useless - wooden things rot and bloom fungi, iron things rust and stone things weather and split, sprouting roots.  

9. Sepharvaim - Resembles a city’s gate in miniature, crowned with little towers topped with eyes. Sneering old money attitude, unironic monarchist. Xenophobic to the point of insanity. When cast, seals the next [sum] doorways or windows you touch - nobody you consider an enemy, consciously or otherwise, can open them until you sleep.

10. Raphael - A glowing trumpet which hovers, ready to be blown. Purist, musical, with a burning voice that stings the ears. Screams so, so loud if you misbehave. Has curious and antiquated standards for misbehaviour. When cast, produces a cacophonous cone-shaped blast of hot air and fire in a cardinal direction of your choice (bring a compass), dealing [sum] damage and igniting all flammables.

11. Berlichingen - An silvered gauntlet with spiked knuckles which replaces your non-dominant hand. Stiff, uncooperative, laconic. Likes to pick things up, does not like to let them go. Occasionally engages in an elderly ramble about old friends like tetanus or caltrops. When cast, suspends an object he is touching in time and space for [sum] hours.

12. Katharsis - A copper krater with a pained looking face on the outside. Is distinctly aware of the contents of all human beings, horrified by this, and intent on spreading the word. She is disgusted by all animals, especially people, who have the temerity to speak. When cast, purges poisons, acids and dangerous liquids from [sum] visible targets. Used on people, this causes painful vomiting.

13. Esther - A figure suggested by veils and silken drapes. Shy and yet megalomaniacal. Believes in a secret cabal of people out to get you (not her, though). Likes to vaguely imply extremely consequential secrets, then never follow up on them. When cast, you become invisible in dim or dark light, and horrifying in bright light, for [sum] hours.

14. Varney - A hovering fanged head with leprous skin and empty eye-sockets. Proud of his fine black hair. Gives not a whiff of shit about the world or rules, and will call you slurs if you’re not on board with his worldview. Will shriek at you to speed up if you’re taking things too slowly. When cast, always go first in initiative for the next [sum] hours, and get a +[sum] bonus to the damage of surprise attacks.

15. Allocer - A lion’s head with half a man’s face. The mane forms a sort of aureole around the sneer, and has something of a luminescence. Utterly immoral, loves cloudwatching, alternates rapidly between dreamy and psychotic. When cast, produces a broad cone of pale white light from the middle of your forehead, for [sum] minutes. It doesn’t blind you, but certainly blinds others.

16. Zebulun - Rotund, mole-like creature with a metal sphere for a head. Blinkered, trusting, believes literally anything you tell him. Possesses Edenic innocence, hasn’t yet heard of evil, and will probably forget tomorrow if you tell him. When cast, for the next [sum] hours, everyone you meet immediately forms a positive, trusting impression of you.

17. Syndesis - A knot tied from ropes that trail in from the corner of your vision. Tense, unimaginably so, but could you just pull that rope? Imagine the release? Gets a little weird about it. Has strongly held opinions about how and when society will collapse, and whose fault it will be. When cast, triggers up to [sum] visible mechanisms, weapons, traps, &c.

18. Tamerlane - A jagged, hooved shadow, with the glinting suggestion of eyes. Nonspecifically foreign, causes distress and panic in nearby xenophobes even if they can’t perceive him. Has extreme political ambitions - you must be king of the world, or nothing at all. When cast, [sum] animals attack an indicated target until they or the target are dead.

19. Natura - A soft-faced cat with no forelegs, bright eyes that gleam in the dark, and a docked tail. Gently patronising, well-read. Makes references, and expects that you will get them. If you ask them questions, they softly shut you up and keep talking. When cast, reveals [sum] facts about visible plants and animals (and, keep it hush hush - daemons, too).

20. Teres Major - A bulky, muscular torso, arms and neck ending in ragged smoky stumps at the atlas and the elbows, smoking entrails hanging low. Heavily tattooed. Has no idea what the fuck is going on, but bets you could lift that box over there above your head. Hype-guy, hypes you up to do clearly impossible things, always egging you on. When cast, take [sum] turns immediately, then save vs. death - if you fail, your spinal column explodes.

And, in the style of the “tag yourself” at the end of the other Psychopaladin post: