Juiblex

Juiblex is a demon lord of oozes and shapeless things, a being that exemplifies the corruptive nature of the Abyss and that is almost glorious in its unrivaled obscenity. Ridiculed by its peers as "Lord of Nothing", the Faceless Lord is, even to them, a demon as revoltingly vile in body as it is inscrutably aberrant in mind.

Description

Juiblex was, in short, disgusting, undoubtedly hideous to demons of all kinds and perhaps the most foul of all demon lords and deities. Its abhorrent aura was as foul as its sickening, shapeless form, a primordial soup of bubbling bile and nauseating fluid bound by a thin epidermis bathed in oil and thick mucus.

The amorphous mass was swirled and striated with a hideous mixture of hues, primarily streaks of black and green combined with bilious browns and yellows as well as translucent grays and ambers. Caustic slime of the same coloration was constantly secreted from the sludge-spewing horror and it was known to weep tears of encrusting black grime from the glaring red eyes that pulsated and shifted across it, peering in all directions.

The Faceless Lord was an appropriate name for the gelatinous monster since it lacked any kind of set form, adopting various sizes and shapes with ease. At rest, it was nothing more than a spread-out volume of reeking filth but at any point it could form a simple blob or gather together into a 18‒20 ft (5.5‒6.1 m) pillar of unsteady ordure before collapsing into a rancid wave and stretching out into a voluminous pool of animated ooze.

Most commonly however, when confronted by others, it gathered itself into a hideous heap, a 9 ft (2.7 m) cone of glistening jelly and shuddering slime. No matter the form, it could manifest dripping, trembling pseudopods in all directions to lash out and hungrily scoop up any creature that caught its attention.

Personality

Juiblex's mind is beyond the comprehension of mortals and alien by the standards of demons; conforming to no standards, it acts with unknowable purpose. Contrary to what one might assume of the Father of Slime based on the mindlessness of his spawn, he is an incredibly knowledgeable being of frighteningly vast intellect that moves with caution and subtlety while manipulating his minions with chess master prowess. The eldritch entity also knows the true names of each obyrith, coupled with an intuitive sense of their goals, and is one of the few beings that understands the true purpose of the Abyss.

Ironically, regarding Juiblex's own goals, he is possibly the easiest of the demon lords to understand purely because his desires are so simple and uncomplicated. Rarely does he need to bother plotting and planning because he is normally content just to continue existing, his only active goal being the corrosion of anything he can reach. The malevolent monstrosity cares little for intrigue and hates practically everything, perhaps enjoying only the act of destruction, and occasionally rumbles with some approximation of amused laughter with his more sadistic moves.

If Juiblex can be said to have a grander, more philosophical mission, then it is his ordinary goal on a greater scale, to dissolve all living things, flooding all of existence in his pestilent putrescence and leaving his shapeless reflections as the only remaining lifeforms. Relatedly, Juiblex is something of a recluse, rarely leaving his lair and reacting with violent anger at any intrusion. The oozes and slimes he surrounds himself with are the only beings that interest him outside of the context of consumption and corruption, and his viscous subjects quiver with something akin to pleasure when their Faceless Lord is near.

Divine Realm

Juiblex's principal realm in the Abyss is its 222nd layer known as Shedaklah, a truly putrid realm of living rot, visible fumes, and bubbling ooze. Upon arrival, visitors are exposed to one of the most sickening swamps in the multiverse, where even those who aren't horribly nauseated struggle to eat or keep down what they have already consumed, and where food and water can quickly putrefy, even in bags or backpacks, and potentially transform into hostile oozes. The vast expanse of caustic, inanimate sludge is broken up by two sluggish branches of the River Styx, as well as the occasional hillock, fungus forest, or foggy moor, but sometimes the marshes of mold and slime (there are no true oceans, only deeper marshlands), rise up at Juiblex's whims. Various areas are deadly stews of slimes, molds, jellies and puddings all feeding off each other and the surrounding matter, meaning that straying from solid ground and making contact with the fetid water could have all manner of unpredictable effects.

Despite the horrid conditions, Shedaklah's otherworldly nature isn't always immediately apparent to those of the Material Plane, although eventually the truth becomes evident. For one, the sky holds no celestial bodies, just a permanent overcast of clouds colored a hideous motley of foul green, bruise purple, and mud brown, casting the landscape's unnatural colors in pallid gloom. Torrents are frequent, every few hours or so, as downpours and thunderstorms flood the land with polluted water, yet it is always uncomfortably humid, with an average temperature of 90 ℉ and a thin film of moisture clinging to all the surfaces. If harmed, travelers find one of its rare positive traits; the riotous abundance of life in Shedaklah infuses it with positive energy, quickly undoing ordinary injuries.

It is incredibly difficult to tell areas in Shedaklah apart, but there are some distinctive regions, such as a floating, 30-foot-wide gelatinous orb in its center that serves as a portal to the Swamp of Oblivion. There is also Juiblex's Grasp, a shallow bay of ooze overlaying a hidden mushroom forest where travelers can trip, accidentally fall into a vicious undertow or riptide, and be transported to some unknowable location hundreds of feet away in just a few seconds, possibly to never be seen again.

Many of Shedaklah's denizens are, predictably, demons, vrocks that plague the skies, and hezrous which stalk the bogs, although chasmes and rutterkin are also present and various ooze para-elementals, slaadi, swamp monsters, plant creatures, and fungal entities also lurk within it. Surprisingly, some of the less common monsters in the swamp are actually oozes, a result of Juiblex's archrival, Zuggtmoy.

Slime Pits

To understand Shedaklah, one has to go underneath it and realize it is not just a singular domain but a dual realm, the latter half of which Juiblex rules over. The subterranean network of caves and sinkholes beneath Shedaklah dwarfs any of the Material Plane, supposedly stretching down into the lower layer of the Abyss. Though the entire realm of Shedaklah is often referred to as such, the area that Juiblex calls his own is often referred to specifically as the Slime Pits, a fitting title since oozes of uncountable varieties and numbers all lurk within its depths. Juiblex and his children dissolve several areas to create passages between the chambers, many of which serve as slime breeding grounds.

Many of the creatures are bloated with demonic power and many times larger and fiercer than their ordinary counterparts, and there is perhaps no place where Juiblex's children are greater in number. Though relatively safe on the upper layers, the lesser oozes only being threats when in great quantities, the deeper one delves into the tunnels the more terrifying, cunning, relentless, rare and innumerable they are, until one gets so far that they have to swim through them. The spawning pools in particular are filled with various breeds of horrible oozes i...

Activities

It is rare for Juiblex to actually affect the world outside his Slime Pits in any significant way; he never ventures to the Material Plane, nor wages war against his Abyssal enemies, and his surging presence in the upper realm of Shedaklah is more an act of opportunistic infection than a tactical choice. If he decides to wander, he leaves slime trails that grow into various oozes and he influences the slimes around him, but these are also merely natural, or rather unnatural, processes caused by his presence. Normally, he just stews in his domain, enjoying the presence of his amorphous kin, breeding new oozes and releasing plagues.

That is not to say that Juiblex has no plans or agendas, simply that he is patient and subtle enough that he doesn't achieve them quickly or obviously. Though he wishes to defeat Zuggtmoy, he doesn't feel that conscious effort is needed to do so or that he should feel incited by her taunts. Instead, Juiblex waits, slowly but steadily accumulating more and more power, sometimes taking small steps to further his master plan but never in such a way as to provoke too much attention. He believes that the multiverse is his to claim and he will do so when he decides he is ready.

Worshippers

Juiblex cared little for followers and mortal cultists, rarely being aware of their existence and neither encouraging nor rewarding them when he did. It was incredibly difficult to find any reason to worship the Father of Slime, and because Juiblex lacked any real use for worshipers, his response besides ignorance could be to give them some form of boon or to simply dissolve them. Humanoid servitors in particular were pointless compared to his easily controlled children, too fearful and independent to effectively command. In Juiblex's alien mind, and in those of some of his cultists, his victory was assured, so there was no reason to take active steps to grow the cult. His presence in Faerun was further diminished by the fact that the god Ghaunadaur had stolen his aspect within Realmspace, with cults acting in the name of the He Who Slithers while in truth worshiping That Which Lurks. Yet despite an absence of good reasons to do so, there were still mortals that chose to worship the Lord of Slime based on their own depraved logic.

The primary reason for the worship of Juiblex was that his few cultists were in some way insane, often dangerously so. Such worshipers were loners, easily regarded as strange or creepy by those around them and often showing some obsession with ooze. The signs could be relatively benign, such as a preoccupation with the capture and study of ooze, or perhaps more obviously disturbing, such as talking to rotting matter or even serial killing. His worst worshipers tried desperately to earn his attention, spreading terror, despair and death in the hopes of appealing to Juiblex. The madness of Juiblex's wretched supplicants was often rooted in desperation born from sickness, physical or otherwise, terrible afflictions that brought their victims such pain that they were willing to turn to the Demon Prince of Ooze. After reaching the heights of depression, the deluded madmen, often humans, turned to the Glistener in the hopes that he could cure them or, failing that, ruin their minds so that the pain would be bearable.

Boons

Sadly for such unfortunates, Juiblex's influence rarely granted anything approximating solace, sometimes driving mortals mad in their dreams with horrible visions. In some way or another, Juiblex's followers were diseased, with the exact nature of the illness ranging from oozing slime, a horrible odor, rotted digits, hideous growths, blisters and pustules ready to pop, or worse. Some were compelled by a sentient pestilence that drove them to horrible acts, while others had acid for blood, or gelatinous bones. At their most horrid, the body parts of these beings could fall off but continue to move; their organs would become malleable and burst without actually killing them. Over time, their entire bodies became more and more oozing until they were nothing more than slimes that could take on humanoid form. Those that fully offered themselves to the Glistener were often reborn, turned into sentient oozes or hybrids as their former bodies and identities were obliterated and all that was left was madness and slime.

Those truly in the thrall of Juiblex were among the most disgusting individuals in existence, sometimes dwelling in sewers or other nauseating locales. The deformed entities had to operate alone normally since only oozes or undead could tolerate their presence. The beings who would dare devote themselves to Juiblex were normally either his clerics, an already rare group since he didn't willfully grant spells and so their divine abilities would rely solely on their reverence, or fighters and barbarians, who benefited the most from his "boons". The exact process for becoming one of Juiblex's devout was somewhat malleable, but generally involved sacrificing a sapient being in acid, either to an ooze or with some present. They also had to possess some level of flexibility before hand, having had some manner of shapechanging experience. The more powerful they became, the grosser and more malleable their features were, as they began leaking a gradually more acidic ooze, summoning oozes and alkiliths, spewing disease and corrosive fluid and eventually leaving behind any discernible anatomy while gaining the ability to polymorph. Other Cultists

The Faceless Lord did have other worshipers besides the deranged, most notably a few of the god-hating aboleths, out of their belief that he maintained the moistness of their skin and environment and thus had to be propitiated, as well as the idea that he would eventually reveal lost arcane secrets to them. Similarly, some demons, particularly hezrou, swore him fealty and retrieved victims for him to feed on. Some were known to seek out the Faceless Lord specifically for the purpose of magically channeling information from him, although it was possible this would get his attention. Though his oozes could be said to show him fealty, their thoughtless pleasure could hardly be classified as worship, and his overreliance on them in comparison to Zuggtmoy's active recruitment and growth of fungi had a tendency to limit his options.

Rarely was anyone who could be considered Juiblex's "cultists", in proximity to others like them, because of their rarity and individualistic nature, although there were some small, secret societies. Followers dwelt underground, taking care of stables of oozes, awaiting and singing the praises of a doomsday when Juiblex would devour all, a fate they would be spared from. Some made use of braziers of green flame and strange incenses in chambers where dark chants were recited, sacrifices made and where the walls were coated in slime, as well as patterns and runes sacred to Juiblex. The greatest of worshipers made permanent portals to the Demiplane of Filth and conducted sacrifices there, and some shrines were also present in Molor.

Relationships

Juiblex's greatest strength was perhaps how easily he could be dismissed, both by scholars and his peers. He was shunned by most of demonkind, regarded with hateful ridicule and callous contempt mixed with genuine fear of the gelatinous abomination's greatest desire. Few demons wished to deal with the disgusting monster and on his part, Juiblex couldn't care less for the schemes of other demons, almost never making alliances except in the direst situations and consuming all envoys that intruded on his home. Though he claimed the title of "master of all slime and ooze", there was a fair chance that no one ever challenged him for that epithet. Juiblex's lands were similarly undesirable; though some demon lords could crush him individually, invading his nauseating kingdom would not be worth the effort, for though he was a lord, his domain was something no one would ever want.

It would be incorrect to view Juiblex's position as pitiable however, as in truth, the current situation was exactly as Juiblex desired. Despite being hated by almost everyone in the Abyss, the loathing he received was the disrespectful disdain held for a menace, with most viewing him as a useless hazard that was only a threat to those foolish enough to stand in his sight. With fear came hesitation, with scorn came ignorance, and with disgust came avoidance. Juiblex desired to be hidden and overlooked because his rivals' indifference towards him meant that he could act without fear of reprisal, his unwanted status effectively granting him impunity in demonic politics.

Juiblex's most immediate and obvious opposition was Zuggtmoy, although even then both acted more as mutual nuisances to each other. Though Zuggtmoy often spat vile insults and foul curses at the Faceless Lord, he was either unaware of her remarks or too indifferent to respond, knowing that she and everyone else would eventually be under his control. He didn't exactly protest her presence either, since Zuggtmoy's rule over Shedaklah's surface hid his own kingdom and created an extra obstacle for anyone who might care to claim it, protecting it from other demon lords. Zuggtmoy herself could barely be bothered to try and deal with the tenacious demon lord, either fearing him or being too apathetic to his presence to resolve the issue. Nonetheless, both actively hated each other, the Faceless Lord being known to take an active role in sabotaging her plans at times and the Queen of Fungi sometimes concocting plots to permanently destroy him.

Despite his antisocial behavior and being repulsive in every meaning of the word, there were some entities that could be tentatively categorized as Juiblex's "allies". The demon lord Turaglas viewed him as the being with which he shared the most common ground, but even then he planned to devour him in the end. His most powerful potential ally and an entity he shared a common goal with, the common goal being mass destruction and a world drowned in slime, was the Devourer in the Depths, Zargon. Possibly the former king of Hell, who oversaw a kingdom of rampant slime and terror, or perhaps a demon prince exiled from the Abyss, Zargon was one of the few beings Juiblex would go out of his way to work with. There was also the ooze archomental Bwimb II, who recognized her own position as the weakest of the archomentals and had come to some manner of understanding with Juiblex in her search for allies, the exact relationship between the two as unknown as it was likely unpleasant.

Servants

Rarely did Juiblex recruit demons to serve him, instead relying on his ooze servitors to do his bidding. Practically none of these beings were sapient enough to make an actual choice to serve him, but sometimes the Faceless Lord fused demons that his oozes had trapped or consumed to create intelligent demonic oozes. Still, only one of these entities was intelligent enough that it willingly served Juiblex, that being the black pudding known as Darkness Given Hunger.

Said by demonologists to had once been an unfortunate demon that lost its way in the Slime Pits and met the unholy attention of Juiblex, the demonic half of Darkness Given Hunger was that of a hezrou. The hezrou was forced to possess a black budding before Juiblex cast an imprison possessor spell to make the transformation permanent, and over the centuries the mind and body of the hezrou dissolved into the pudding until they became truly one, a creature of malevolent cunning more horrible than the sum of its parts. Darkness Given Hunger was the largest of all black puddings, a result of its insatiable appetite, and the most powerful and favored of Juiblex's servants. The abomination helped his master patrol the Slime Pits while looking for food, occasionally venturing to the surface or the Material Plane while chasing something particularly delicious.

History

Juiblex's true origin was unknown, although there were many theories about where the Indescribable Darkness originally came from. At earliest, he was one of the original tanar'ri, somewhere around the age of Demogorgon, but many posited that he was far older than that. The obyrith lords Dagon and Pazuzu suspected that Juiblex was himself an obyrith lord who was mostly destroyed by Tharzidun, gradually declining in importance until eventually becoming an ancient relic of the past. Some cited the presence of certain obyriths on Juiblex's plane as a sign that he came before the tanar'ri, although this wasn't concrete evidence.

According to the research of some, Juiblex was originally just part of the Elemental Chaos, part of its raw essence until the appearance of Tharzidun. When Tharzidun first planted the seed of evil, it wounded the Elemental Chaos, and at the direct site of the wound was the first mass of infection, a black, bilious collection of fluids and solids awakened to wicked self-awareness. Dark knowledge rushed into his newly formed mind as he welled up, but after the obyriths began to emerge from the Abyss, he fled deeper inside to escape the conflict, coming to grips with his new existence, reflecting upon his home and contemplating his purpose while creating new oozes wherever he went. Still, some theories suggested that he could be even older than that, that he was a being from beyond any of the planes that found its way into the Abyss and settled there.

Regardless of what was true, for as long as Juiblex had existed, he had stayed out of the conflicts by the rest of demonkind, presuming of course that he was present. He was said to have witnessed the Abyss' beginning, the emergence of obyriths, and the final battle between them and Tharzidun, but he avoided the long conflict the entire time, secluding himself in Shedaklah shortly after the war ended to drink from the Abyss and bloat himself with its power and knowledge. He did not defend his home against the gods during the Dawn War or when Asmodeus supposedly fell and took a sliver of its original shard, nor did he fight for it alongside the Queen of Chaos during the Age of Ages or involve himself in the more recent Blood War against the devils. While others throughout the history of the Abyss and those surrounding it rose and fell, the Faceless Lord always remained in the background, preparing to consume all reality, knowing the true nature of the Abyss and fully intent on fulfilling his discovered purpose.

Juiblex's only consistent opposition against this goal was Zuggtmoy, who, for her faults, had ways of keeping Juiblex in check. Once, centuries ago, the Queen of Decay used a series of potent divinations to determine Juiblex's exact location, erected a series of adamantine plinths throughout Shedaklah, and then triggered a ritual to banish Juiblex somewhere else in the multiverse. Fortunately for Juiblex, this plan only partially worked, but fortunately for everyone else, the partial success was enough to separate a portion of him from his whole, the unnecessary expenditure of power being something he tried to avoid. Part of his polluted essence was sent to the Elemental Plane of Water but was too toxic to be permanently stored there, so its inhabitants banished it once more to its own demiplane. That demiplane would become known as the Demiplane of Filth and a shard of his essence would become the Hermit. Despite the many failings of the project, it demonstrated Juiblex's seemingly inevitable descent was not as predestined as he would want.

Juiblex

Demon Lord

Basic Information

Titles

The Faceless Lord
The Slime Lord
Father of Slime
Patron of Pestilence
The Fetid Prince
Indescribable Darkness
He Who Slithers
Glistener
The Unspeakable
The Unnameable One
The Formless One
The Oozing Hunger
Slick of Foulest Humors
Demon Lord of Ooze
Lord of Nothing (derogatory)

Pantheons

Archfiend

Attributes

Alignment

Chaotic Evil

Symbol

A pseudopod dripping slime

Realm

Infinite Layers of the Abyss/222nd Layer/The Slime Pits

Portfolio

-

Following

Worshippers

Aboleths
Demented individuals
Hezrous
Oozes

Domains

Destruction (Hatred)
Evil (Demon)