Embrys the Anomaly

The wretched being named by ‘his’ master as Embrys, or ‘the Anomaly’ by others, was never supposed to exist. He was neither conceived, carried, nor born. ‘Accident’ is the best explanation Grand Arcanist Kelezar, a Knight Revenant of the Cult of K’Leth, can give. He calls himself Embrys’ ‘master’, but he and everyone around him knows that to be self-flattering at best. It all began with the quest of some Knights Revenant to find a cure for the dread illness known as Stormwind rot, an agonizing wasting disease which originates in the Stormwind Wastes, where the Cultists of K’Leth operate in large numbers. The illness is so potent it infects the soul, following infected Knights Revenant from body to body, even damaging the soul gems they depend on to preserve their spirits in Teleria. Many Knights established underground arcane laboratories in the Stormwind Wastes to find a solution, using relics, dark magic, slaves, and animals in countless depraved experiments, racing to be the first. Nothing worked. But there were results that defied explanation. Test subjects went catatonic or bloodily exploded before a spell was cast or they were exposed to an artifact. Books of dark magic refused to be opened. Animals physically merged into horrific constructs without warning. Relics known to have deadly potency fell inert or suddenly turned on their owners in murderous rampages. There was a power here beyond the combined knowledge of the best Knights Revenant arcano-scholars and esoteri-mages. Kelezar hypothesized it was connected with the Stormwind rot, and desired to study and weaponize it. He believed mastering this force could grant him far more power than just being able to cure Stormwind rot, and dared dream he could do both. In the face of opposition from his colleagues Kelezar turned on them all, killing or driving them away before seizing their sites, acolytes, and resources. The Grand Arcanist had his followers dig tunnels between as many of the laboratories as possible and increased the number and complexity of experiments. Given the perplexing nature of this force they had discovered, most tests were little more than observations of whatever happened to the subjects. As often as not, cultists setting up the experiments were engulfed in them as well, mutated, rendered hysterically happy, ripping each other limb from limb, or becoming inert. Many terrible beasts were formed, the largest of which Kelezar called the Chimera, a monstrous hybrid of slave Skinwalkers, lions, rams, and venomous snakes, which possessed terrifying intelligence. Kelezar had no idea the power was Uncreation itself, brought there when the Demon Lord tore into Teleria through the Brimstone Gate centuries after the Sin of Dragons. It could not be controlled. It behaved, not according to any will, but because it just behaved. One of its manifestations was the spontaneous growth of hundreds of amniotic sacs, some the size of a hen’s egg, others titanic. Each carried a creature which clawed and cut its way into the world. Some died quickly, dissolving to fleshy paste once exposed to the air, or eaten by another beast. Hundreds survived, to Kelezar’s delight. The first of these was Embrys. ‘He’ is also the most physically and magically stable. He is a musclebound, towering brute with pallid, lilac skin, blood red eyes, and pulsating crimson veins. Thick, fleshy, protruding spikes and writhing tentacles burst from his back and along one arm. Over his head – or perhaps it is his head – lies a hood of the same royal purple, vein-threaded substance. For some time Kelezar and his acolytes observed Embrys. The being crafted himself armor and took an enormous, heavy-bladed ax from the detritus that lay within the warren of tunnels. Kelezar marveled as he killed cultists hunting other creatures born from the region’s bizarre magic, or interlopers who had found their way inside. He possessed remarkable affection for the Chimera, their bond to this day inexplicable. Kelezar’s ego could not have been more stoked when, of its own volition and without explanation, Embrys came to him, offering his weapon, from then on becoming the Grand Arcanist’s chief, silent enforcer. In Kelezar’s council meetings, Embrys stands at his right shoulder, tentacles wriggling, eyes glaring, veins throbbing. To be merely in his presence – except for Kelezar, for reasons unknown to all – is deeply disturbing, in a different way each time. Sickness, existential angst, migraines, and a deep sense of foreboding are common. Further unease is inspired by Embrys’ physical form. His tentacles move according to their own whims, sometimes caressing their host or fighting with each other, or drifting in the air like seaweed in an ocean current. The final component of Embrys’ intimidating quality is his ax. Were the enormous weapon in his gigantic fists not enough, the blade itself sports a growth of tentacles, with slime-drenched bulbous growths embedded within them. These are sentient and ever-hungry, given names and doted on by Embrys like a besotted father. He feeds them gibbets of meat whenever he pleases, but sometimes this is insufficient and they screech in ravenousness. In these hungry moments they eagerly lash out to tear into the necks of passers-by. Embrys does not realize that at times it is they who control him, not the other way around. On occasion, Embrys takes a different form, one of a mortal man in the garb of a K’Lethi Cultist, bedecked in symbols of death, though some of his veins still paint red rivulets across his skin. It was years before Kelezar knew he could do this, and the Grand Arcanist and his council wonder how often he transformed before they noticed. What might he have seen or heard, wandering about the laboratories in disguise? Is this, or his monstrous form, his true form? Might the impossible power of the Wastes allow him to present as he wishes, in front of anyone, or even appear differently to each individual in a group to better have the impact he wishes to have? Such is the mystery of Uncreation made manifest.