It hurt the eyes just to look at the being. The air around it shimmered, like pavement on a hot summer day. There was no radiation, the scientists in charge assured us. The effect was due to thex being’s strange composition, they said. It was just a guess, though. They’d never been able to get a tissue sample. The colossal creature seemed to be made entirely of bone or something like it. Whatever it was, it’d proved too hard for the government’s tools to even chip. Immense chains binding it gave the illusion of security. No doubt if it awoke it would easily shrug them away. Even as it slept, it felt as though the being was reaching inside of our minds, weighing our sins, judging our worthiness.
Alternative names: Angels, Cleansers of the Earth, Fires of the Elder Gods.
The Xaazenak were created by the Elder Gods to cleanse entire worlds of the corruption wrought by the Great Old Ones. They are living weapons of mass destruction, scorching all life from a world lest any influence of the old ones remain. The Necronomicon states that at least four exist on Earth. Their very descent upon the planet created cataclysms that ended several advanced human civilizations in prehistory. A fifth died as it descended. Evidence of its fall is misinterpreted by researchers as the Younger Dryas Impact, a suspected meteorite strike that triggered abrupt climate change and the extinction of several species.
As they fell upon the Earth, something compelled the Xaazenak to slumber. No source has provided a clear explanation as to what. Theories range from the influence of the Old Ones being too great, to some sort of binding curse, to the Xaazenak waiting until corruption reaches some arbitrary critical mass. Regardless of the reason, we are fortunate they have never fully awoken. If they were to do so, all life on Earth would come to a tortured, fiery end.
A Xaazenak currently slumbers in the Middle East near Baghdad, another near the Plateau of Leng in southern China, and yet another under an artificial mountain in Antarctica. A fourth is bound in the American Southwest. This was discovered by the US military sometime in the late 1940s. Believing it to be some sort of extraterrestrial life, a military base was constructed over the entity dedicated to studying and eventually communicating with it. It briefly woke in the 1980s. President Reagan was brought in to meet the being. The revelations that the being uttered to the president left him in a weeping depression for a week.
Xaazenak, retribution of the Elder Gods.
| char. | roll | average |
| STR | 3D6 x 50 | 525 |
| CON | 3D6 x 50 | 525 |
| SIZ | 4D6 x 50 | 700 |
| DEX | 3D6 x 5 | 50 |
| INT | (3D6+6) x 5 | 80 |
| POW | (6D6+6) x 5 | 130 |
Average Hit Points: 120
Average Damage Bonus: +13D6
Average Build: 14
Average Magic Points: 10
Move: 6
ATTACKS
Attacks per round: 2 (stomping or claws) or 1 (black flames)
Black Flames: a jet of ebony fire erupts from the Xaazenak’s winged hands, reaching up to a mile from it. Anything caught in the flame is immediately destroyed. A person in the path of the flames may make an Extreme Luck roll to avoid being killed.
| FightingBlack FlameDodge | 60% (30/13), damage 13D6 + damage bonus N/A, target instantly destroyed. N/A |
Armor: None but due to a Xaazenak’s unnatural composition, mundane weapons and attacks only do minimum damage. Half of its hit points are restored each round. Though the beings are not invincible, only humanity’s most destructive weapons are powerful enough to kill one.
Spells: Each vestal knows at least 2D10 spells, as Keeper sees fit.
Sanity Loss: 1D10/3D10 to see a Xaazenak.
Bruce is a sociology student and co-host of The Crypt Keepers podcast
