Deep Horror

Death against Death

The old ramshackle hamlet laid barren as the man clad in an ink black coat wandered among the soul-robbed dead. Cane in one hand and Death’s grimoire in his other, as his boots trudged through a mess of muck and rot. Coal dark eyes from the pupil to what should have been the whites betrayed a crevice of terror within the wrinkles of his cheeks.
A spike of pain shot through his mind, as he saw a writhing mass gaze back with an eyeless face through the veil of sanity.
“The Reaper take and ward my soul.” His voice quivered underneath a chill so cursed a child of Death itself for the first time in their limbo came to know the cold as ought more than a warm embrace.
The writhing mass of flesh and tentacles now had him in its sights. An alien maw dripped floating orbs of oil from an endless abyss, as the Blackblood raised his cane and spoke the forlorn words in the raven's ancient tongue. With trembling feet, he took a step ahead while weeping dark blood from his eyes. Tearing the rapier from its cane scabbard as dark fires burned from gore red sigils in the metal. “Accursed spawn of madness. The b-bells, they toll for the return of stolen souls.”

Anatomy

Consisting of a mass of regenerative flesh woven into tentacles and tendrils, the Deep Horror has no bones or organs in its body and consists of tainted blood and a mass of muscle around an oil-like liquid which can only be described as a physical residue of void.
This void in its maw serves as its one single organ and is effectively a portal between a so-called soulvat and other Deep Horrors that belong to the same corrupted pool.
These creatures and the soulvat together form a larger entity as a vicious amalgamation of fused together abyss corrupt souls that serve as an engine for the horrors.

Behaviour

Deep Horrors are known to be more carefully used entities of the Glôh'krakh forces. Most often found haunting old battlefields, graveyards or hamlets that are poorly protected. Alternatively at the back within the army of an invasion.
While they try not to engage in direct combat with anything considered a potent threat, these monstrosities are far from weak and can easily decimate unprepared hunters and even military squadrons.
Primarily, they serve as soul harvesters. Devouring the souls of the recently deceased which transport through the viscous ink and into the soulvat.

Weakness

While Deep Horrors are not to take lightly, one can kill a whole host of them through destroying the soulvat itself. This causes the corrupt liquid within to break apart from each other and scorch the filth away.

Image generated with Midjourney

Writing by Tonarus