Monthly archives: October 2022

Life is a secret to be cut open and understood

I will find this being and make it teach me all it has learned. So many deaths can’t just go to waste without a single human profiting from it—anonymous note on an edition of “Monsters and Their Kynde” containing lore on the vivomancers.

The Alpaca

Darkness falls, the stars go out, and the faint moonlight disappears leaving the investigators in complete darkness. A wave of blackness seeps towards them like a deadly fog. Mesmerising shapes that swirl inside it reflect the nightmares of those that stare into it as it forms tendrils and tentacles that writhe around one another

A Daredevil of Carcosa 

Fee Fi Fo Fin#0812 and magnificentophat#2199 

“It was standing on the bed, it cocked its head at us like a german shepherd. Hellmann was crawling towards us, it must have stabbed him at least six times.” 

“Then what?” 

“Then – I don’t fuckin’ know – it just throw that cloth over itself and it was gone. It just wasn’t there. I don’t (unintelligible)” 

“Okay. So it’s still out there somewhere.”

– After-action report gathered by Agent Wynch 

“They are small, gray or brown, and look velvety soft. Cute, really. Except for those tusks. Those actually look like they could do some damage. Then, when the little bastards start swarming, all thoughts of cuteness vanish right quick. Wish I didn’t take that path through the forest. Didn’t even notice the little holes in the hillside where I decided to take a break, until they started streaming out. I woke up not long after that.”

-from the dream journal of Charles Curry 

Newborn Servants of Bokrug

“Well-equipped,  I started out on a spring morning (near the end of April 1929) and after a short climb I reached the top of the Tempelmauer. After a short rest between the cliffs I started to look for the entrance to the cave. Suddenly I saw a snake-like animal sprawled on the damp rotting foliage that covered the ground. Its skin was almost white, not covered with scales but smooth. Its head was flat and two very short feet on the fore-part of the body were visible. It did not move but kept staring at me with its remarkably large eyes. I know every one of our animals at first glance and knew that I faced the one that is unknown to science, the tatzelwurm….[the] tatzelwurm did not have large claws but short and atrophied-looking feet….Most probably the tatzelwurm is a rare variety of salamander living in moist caves and coming only rarely to the light of day.” – unnamed Austrian schoolmaster, quoted in On The Track of Unknown Animals, Bernard Heuvelmans (1955)

Used, Broken, But Unending.

“Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor how justified, is not a crime” – Ernest Hemingway, 1946

Po…Po…Po Po Po…Po…Po…Po Po…

Alternative names: The Eight-Foot-Tall Lady 

Hachishakusama is a spirit that abducts children on the edge of puberty. She takes the form of an unnaturally tall and lithe woman. A long white dress clings to her body. A matching wide-brimmed sun hat casts a shadow over her beautiful yet cold face. A haunting, deeply masculine voice chanting “Po” always accompanies her. She haunts the liminal spaces between civilization and wilderness such as farms, country homes, and suburbs. She has even been encountered at parks in dense urban areas. 

She first makes her presence known to a child she intends to steal while the child is alone outside. After initial contact she withdraws, making no attempt to harm the child. This begins a campaign of terror that lasts 1D20 days. Over the course of days, Hachishakusama will appear to the child at random moments, a hungry, sinister expression on her face. Most often she will appear at a distance, though only for a moment, vanishing in a blink. In some reported cases, she will stare at a child through a window at night. She makes gestures to the child, beckoning them to come to her. Hachisakusama is also capable of mimicking the voices of adults the child trusts, though the “Po” runs under her words. 

 He was so damn insistent I almost did it just out of frustration, to get him to shut up. I didn’t know why it had to be done in some dank, musty old cellar, though I do now. He said the location and the work of the alchemist, some ancestor of his, had to be kept secret. Clearly he was correct.

Defiler of the Forsaken

For a scavenger, Patience is the key to the Pantry.

-Delia Owens