The Four Faces of Ishchali
Ishchali has been known by many names, but Caedmon is what he is most widely known for on Hewdamia. His name means many faced, or four face and he is represented by his four different personalities. Most of his past is shrouded in mystery, his many names and faces represent the multi faceted nature of this divine being. Each facet, each face has a different personality and each has its own place and purpose in his plans for the future of Hewdamia, and all those that call him Master.
When the dry bones turn to flesh and eyes of the lost open again, the Harvest shall begin.
This day of Harvest shall reap the souls of the meak
And cast down the righteous from their pompous thrones.
Then the worthy shall inherit the stone and rule for the eternal year.
In strength of might and power shall the rule of the new Era be forged from the flesh and blood of the fallen.
And those that follow the truth shall be raised as gods to unseat the unworthy who rest on high and take what is rightfully there.
And the doors of Aamina-Ala shall spread open for the worthy and the thread of truth and knowledge will be theres for the taking.
Only the true four can lead the way.
He is a caretaker, the God King.
He is a murderer, the Dark Father.
It is an opportunist, the Lost God.
He is an anarchist known as Caedmon.
He is Ishchali, the Four faced God!
All of his names and faces are mixed and intertwined into one singular purpose, one ideal; to bring a new beginning to a new world. Caedmon, or the God King as he is known by the demon kind, leads his children is a strict singular mission of chaotic grandeur that leads to a utopia of enlightenment to his followers.
He is often viewed as the creator of all things as well as the forger of truth and the ages. He is a constructor and a destructor as he both builds and destroys that which he sees. He ushers in a new era onto a new unsuspecting, or unprepared world, and destroys their entire world, creating a new world behind it in its wake. This new world is not the Aamina-Ala that they seek, but it is merely a stepping stone to their safe elevation of heaven.
The demons of the unknown off world follow his preaching to usher in a Hel on a chosen new world. He has a chosen purpose, and that is to lead them, his chosen children, into a new era, a new Aamina-Ala. Loosely translated from a demonic script into safe elevation or safe heaven. He travels from world to world, slowly gathering his followers to create his Demon Gates to open a chaotic suffering on the world. This bloodletting and soul suffering is used as a tool to find the last world, the place of silence and peace, where his children can shake their chaotic shawls of blood and transcend into euphoria. Each new gate that opens brings them closer to this Aamina-Ala.
The God King: Demons view their lord and ruler as the God King, a demon who has surpassed physical form and gone to a level of power and understanding that none other has achieved. This demon god, speaks to their Three and gives them guidance and the knowledge to elevate themselves to this form of power and divine understanding.
Chaos is a tool, a means to an end. By understanding the nature of the tortured soul, one can understand the very foundation of the fabric of the thread of knowledge through the cries of the lost and souls of the conquered. He leads them to new worlds and new conquests. Each conquest another step to their divine power and enlightenment. To become their own God Kings of power, to know and understand the very thread of knowledge at its basic of forms. This is his goal in guiding his demon children. He cares for them, keeps them strong and powerful in their own right, but shows no mercy and favoritism in his preaching. The weak will never understand the thread of knowledge and gain the enlightened state of being which he has achieved. Only the strong evolve.
There are few outside of demon kind who worship the God King, as only a demon could understand his teachings and belief he was once one of their fellow flesh and kin that walked alongside them, only to achieve his elevated state of power through stout conquering.
The Dark Father: As the Gretalia call him, is malicious and clouded. Pleased by the blood of sacrifice and the taste of the red flesh of the soul. He has warped the fragile minds of the already weak willed and banished Derevo-kin. The gretalia flock to his words like a moth to the flame.
The Dark Father feels that in order to gain the understanding of divine knowledge, and therefore ascend to the next level of enlightenment, that one must devour the red soul of the worthy. By doing this, the taker of the red soul, flesh, will be imparted with the knowledge that the sacrificial body had. The more knowledge they take in the closer they will get to divine understanding.
An excerp from a writing of the Dark Father.
“And Lo! The flesh turns to ash and is food for the Dark Father and the fires that rise up are his drink to quench his thirst. The taste of virgins shall be his entrée and his appetite is lustful for the sanguine of men and shall outlast even the Souless of the childgod Sethalis.
The Burning Door shall open and a new world shall be ushered into the lands of the unfaithful and it shall be shaped into the Dark Fathers image and all not worthy of his gaze shall crumble to nothing. Those who follow his words and walk his path shall rise above the ash and feast on the wicked to become like gods themselves.
The coming of the Dark Father will be heralded when the twin brothers collide and the overseer of the world can no longer see. The door shall open and the Dark Father shall walk through and the world shall know pain and rebirth.”
The Dark Father is worshiped in many ways, often times he is worshiped by cults who do not pay attention to his teachings and simply follow his tidings as a rule of all that is to come. Others follow his teachings to enact his word on the unworthy, ushering those who are worthy that much closer into the time of the Burning Door. These religious cults often are guilds for assassins or highly educated sacrificial cults, or cults of death.
The Lost God: More of an ideal, he or she, is common among the races of the worlds that are fresh and new to the touching grasp of Caedmon and his other personalities. Little is actually known about the Lost God and her motives. Most worlds have a rumor, a myth, or a secret cult that worships a lost or dead god. This is where he or she steps in. When a new world is found and the gates are beginning to be built, the lost god begins working its way into the realm of reality and stepping in to fill the void of these lost and dead gods.
Whether or not a real lost god or dead god existed on a new world doesn’t matter as long as the belief is there. It gives the followers a new hope and a new belief to tell others. Only those who were skeptical before are now followers as the proof of the RETURN is real. The Lost God brings hope and truth where there was none before. Out of all of the facets of Ishchali, this one is the most obscure and chaotic. One instance he may be malevolent, the next instance she may be compassionate. Always an opportunist that takes every chance to gather followers and believers to the cause of the enlightenment of the children of the God King.
Many groups and cults follow the Lost God. It is usually the first god most of the misguided flock to. Once they begin to get an understanding they usually do one fo two things. Continue to follow the Lost God and gain more followers, or search for the truth of ages and find one of the other facets of the truth. Often times jumping from religion to religion learning everything they can about the many faces of their true and hidden god, Ishchali. Those of a multi study of the four faces tend to be very fanatical and very powerful.
Caedmon: He has a dark way of looking at the universe. The first chance Caedmon gets when traveling to a new world is to teach them about war. He is instrumental in teaching them the ways of battle and killing early on, much to the displeasure of the other Gods. With the idea of war in the blood mortals, they begin waging war on each other for pleasure and power, never being done before. When the mortals began war, he just sits back and watched in mute pleasure.
He is malicious and cruel. He tries to supplant most other gods when he arrives to a new world. His goal is to create as much chaos and mayhem as he can to pull the sight of the other gods away from the followers of each of the other facets of his personality as the Demon gates are built to usher in the horde of demons sweeping through their quest to find Aamina-Ala.
Caedmon is not commonly worshiped on Hewdamia as he was supposedly lost or killed during the War of Ascension eons ago. He is often worshiped as a god of war or suffering no matter where he travels. Even on Hewdamia, he is seen as a god of warriors and soldiers, mostly those of ill desires and morals, but a singular god of war is a common focus of the unlearned worship.
EDIT This is an un-finished result of a compilation of tie ins with a bunch of other submissions. More submissions will be linked and tied to this as they are finished. This one is done more as a singular submission, but has aspects that answer questions from others which have been linked for better understanding the indepth look at Hewdamian Demons.
Article Codex
Items • Armor • Cursed
Those who wear this item are usually laughed at and scorned for its appearance at first. It looks odd adorning the head of any warrior as it always seems a little too small and its thin strap that secures it in place seems far to fragile and loose to keep it in place when worn in a melee. However, when the wake of its powers catches up to those who scorn, their attitudes and lives change abruptly. The knowledge about this helm is vague but throughout history, events of a chaotic nature seem to follow in the path of this item, sowing the seeds of disorder and discord. However it is when all four of these set items are found and placed together, does true havoc reign.
Lifeforms • Third Kingdom • Any
From the depths of the void the masses crash through the Gates of Forlorn and wreak havok on the world of men. The flood is an unending tide of chaos and destruction that is everlasting. Their thirst for blood is surpassed only by the rising of the son, on it stands eternal. On the comming of the Flood, the children of the lost god will reign supreme on a charred world where the people are enslaved, and the rulers are Demonblood.
- Excerpt from the tome of Caedmon.
Systems • Combat/ Warfare • Defining
The six demonic legions are extremely structured compared to their seemingly chaotic nature. While to the outside, those looking in to the hate and rage filled beast of nightmares all that is seen is a lust for blood and death and suffering. While that is true to some degree it is all for a purpose and all for a reason.
This is a detail of the structure of the demonic military ranks and their leaders.
Organizations • Criminal/Espionage • Country/ State
Death is an art form. Where can a single act that is repeated by every single life at least once in their lifetime and have multiple emotions involved in each one. I relate this in a similar manner as a dramatic play. You look into the audience at the height of the emotional act and you see ranges of emotion from everyone. I experience this every time I watch the eyes of a guasto widen and become cold to look at. You should witness this yourself, to understand your own immortality and how to overcome it. Look into the mirror as your life trickles away and the truth will be revealed.
- Janus Sanguine High Priest of the Jongleurs Sanguine
Locations • Ruins • Any
The Demon gates are all hidden from prying eyes, either under mountains or lost within their vast chasms. In fortresses hidden by magic, or guarded by the unknowing. A single key, if found, will open only a specific gate. However, directions to the gates location are inscribed on each key in a demonic script. Only those loyal to Caedmon, or can understand the ancient written language of the Demon’s are able to read it.
The gates are massive stone doorways standing roughly thirty feet in height and twenty feet wide and made of black granite or onyx, with scenes of a demonic horde flooding through the gate as a wave through a cistern. Horrific images of murder and unspeakable acts toward the mortal races also adorn the doors.
Items • Jewelry • Magical
‘I told Sir Ursus not to take the amulet, to leave it be in it's resting place. But he would not listen. We now trek to his place of hiding to remove the amulet and return it, and to destroy that which Ursus has become. '
- Arch-Danath Maccalas of the Dark Step Tribe
Organizations • Religious • World Wide
The priest's ability of prayer as well as their divine spells comes not from themselves, but from their Deity. Because of this, very few abilities are personal to the priest as all others who have chosen this path or had it chosen for them. Even so, while most of their prayers and divine spells will be the same, there will be a few differences or a few different abilities depending on the deity that the priest worships. This is the codex of the religious followers of Hewdamia.
Lifeforms • Intelligent Species • Forest/ Jungle
As we viewed the island from afar, I knew we would be forced to land there. Our hull was breached and we are taking on water rapidly. My hope of us making the island is grim, but I keep a face up for the crew. The rumors every sailor has heard of this dreadful place makes even the stoutest sailer make water. We shall see.
-Captain Edver Brakuars, Second to Last Journal Entry.
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? Responses (11)
When I can vote on this codex, it will be a 5/5
You haven't voted... yes a shamless bump.
WOW, this is really good. If I steal, errr, borrow it for use later will you be displeased?
Use whatever you wish for your games. If you want it for other purposes, send me a PM.
This Magnum Opus is an easy 5 for me as well!
The quality of your subs have increased noticably Mourngrymn! This is very good though I trace components back to an old post of CaptainPenguin's.
For this I award thee the crescent birthmark!
Thanks AG. Although I am at a loss to the sub your referring to pf CP's. I'll check up on that.
To be honest, I have no clue anymore either. Steven Erikson's seven gods do come to mind, but I use him as inspiration all the time.
Bloody awesome sub!
A multi-faceted god for demons, a likeable idea and good presentation. Good work.
