Wednesday 5 February 2020

281 - Hollow Earther

Unnatural Entity: Hollow Earther

The Invisible Clergy don't always get them all when the universe resets, that's where Neverwhen People and Hollow Earthers come from. Unlike Neverwhen People, Hollow Earthers know exactly what they're doing. They're old hands at surviving the apocalypse even as the new worlds become stranger and less hospitable. Holdouts who have learned to sequester themselves beyond the Clergy's reach that make the basis of myth: kobolds and gnomes, the strange, stubborn precursors to humanity that live beneath the surface of the Earth.

They no longer have physical form, instead persisting as underground psychic entities in a world where the air and the gravity and the number of subatomic particles are poison to their odd bodies. If you know where to look and have the right sensitivity they're eager to talk, caverns with high concentrations of silicates are generally a good place to start.

They're curious. Hollow Earthers want to see the world, they need you to do it and are eager to share their secrets. It's nothing like demonic possession, they just ride around in your head like a passenger looking over your shoulder. A strong aversion to direct sunlight complicates the arrangement but having a creature with a natural affinity for rituals attached to you is sometimes worth dressing like a vampire braving high noon. Not only are they dab hands at seeing the cracks in the universe but once per week someone playing host to a Hollow Earther gets a 1 significant charge discount on casting a ritual of their choosing. For some this is the only way they can try the big stuff.


The cost of this power is severe. The longer a Hollow Earther is attached to someone the more intertwined they become. The aversion to sunlight becomes a shared condition, skin blistering and cracking under UV rays. Extra toes and digits sprout along with coarse, wiry hair as limbs and faces become short and gnarled. In wearing us they press us into their shapes. Removing one is a matter of exorcism, they won't let go willingly. It's not cheap or easy and it won't restore your appearance or let you develop a tan again. The alternative is to retreat back beneath the Earth, shedding material form and becoming as they are, waiting out the next incarnation of the universe in crystalline lifeboats.

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