Bestiary: Abominations
Abominations, also the abomina, are beings which have been corrupted, usually by powerful outerplanar sources of evil. They have been twisted beyond typical Taluman natural characteristics, and often inhabit places inhospitable to others. Though some could be qualified as monstrosities, they are so much further corrupted in anatomy or temperament that they are something altogether different.
There are two types of abominations: monstrous (bestial) types are called aberrations while humanoid ones are called deviants.
Aberrations include: aboleth, chuul, cloaker, flumph, gibbering mouther, grell, otyugh, piercer, roper, xorn.
Deviant include ghouls & ghasts, who according to the Baest Notera are not undead.
Abominations of Taluma
Most abominations in Taluma were created by the of Sezsezkya. Under Sezsezkya’s influence, Gwyven herself mutated from monstrosity to perhaps the original abomination.
Deviant Humanoids
Ghouls are humanoid beings, in fact once humans, that have been infested with an abominable parasite from an eldritch lich*. After being infested, they can only be sustained by human flesh. Ghouls are not affected by spoiled flesh, and they search for sources of recently deceased such as hanging out in cemeteries and crypts or going to the frontlines of wars. Of course they could kill humans and then feed on them, but they usually are not strong enough and their fear of daylight hinders them as well.
When a ghoul is killed, the larva(e) will leave it and seek a new host or hosts. Anyone that has been struck by a ghoul’s claws has a residue in the wound that attracts the larvae to enter it. The host has to be alive though, and it is difficult for ghouls to refrain from killing a victim to be able to eat them. It is the larva that is fed by the human corpses, and it is thought that for each corpse consumed it is able to spawn another larva.
Though they are mostly mindless, a rare few retain or gain some cunning to lead other ghouls. They are called ghasts. Ghasts, and allies they might make, will hatch devious plans to force humans to kill each other or people or monstrosities to attack humans. They are warmongers and plot wars as well as ways for deadly diseases to spread among communities.
* Eldritch liches are created by a ‘gift’ from Sezsezkya, an abominable parasite. The parasitic tentacle attack of the eldritch lich infects anyone hit. If they fail the first two saves but make the final one, they remain human-like and are themselves infested, turning into a ghoul or ghast.
