Mask of Hayama

A carved wooden African mask with four hideous faces perched atop a thick, corded neck with a basket-like reed, feather, and fabric collar that hides the wearer’s face. No straps, ties, or handles hold this unsightly mask to the face.

Mechanics & Inner Workings

Azathoth

Contact with Azathoth should be nothing short of a horrific, near soul-annihilating experience, which can be modulated on the result of the associated SAN loss. Descriptions can center on Azathoth’s dark existence in the roiling frozen void deep in space. The PC’s vision may begin with the sensation of being in a dark room, but then realizing they can draw no breath and soundly hear the insane monotonous piping emerging from nowhere and everywhere. They may realize that the darkness surrounding is not the absence of light, but an all-encompassing void, swirling in chaos, devouring the constellations that spin rapidly around it. The Investigator may feel themselves being ripped apart with their mind, body, and memory disintegrating in Azathoth’s all-encompassing maw. A return from the vision will be an equally traumatic experience as they realize the complete futility of everything and struggle to process the overwhelming, vivid stimuli of an intact reality. Alternatively, the experience of Azathoth can merely serve to fully inform the wearer of their completely insignificant existence relative to the vastness of space.

Nodens

Lucky investigators will experience a relatively benign encounter with Nodens, who serves as the Mythos foil to Nyarlathotep. You may consider portraying him as some version of the patriarchal figure in the vein of Odin and Zeus with a formidable, yet aged exterior featuring flowing, long white beard, and hair. You may consider placing him in a remote location, perhaps on a mountain top or cliff face, evoking Olympus or more specifically, the seaside scene in Thor: Ragnarok. Given his mastery over these Mythos creatures, consider populating the background with distantly visible, swooping night-gaunts. The encounter with Nodens may be interactive and accompanied with clues, particularly related to Nitocris or an offer to assist them in disrupting one of Nyarlathotep’s schemes. He may allude to his pleasure in hunting the servants of the Crawling Chaos. As mentioned above, you may want to consider Nodens imbuing your Investigator with his Contact spell. If the PC fails to demonstrate appropriate deference or respect, Nodens may terminate the vision abruptly, possibly accompanied by a physical consequence as a parting gift.

Shub-Niggurath

This vision should rely heavily on a disturbing visual depiction of this Outer-Goddess, The Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young. Consider placing the mask’s wearer on the edge of a putrid, bubbling cesspool, at the center of an oppressive wood wrapped in a toxic miasma. Veterans of the Great War may find themselves in a bubbling mud pit from the killing fields of Passchendaele. The edge of the pool will be teeming with the writhing spawn of Shub-Niggurath, which may resemble the Kharisiri larva to the terrified Investigator. The pool may swell and expand as a giant beast arises from its center. The vile offspring will burrow in their exposed skin as the PC struggles to stay afloat in the rising muck. Slowly, a giant beast with a thousand eyes and innumerable writhing stunted legs along its underbelly will emerge and vomit even more of its wriggling children into the pool as it gazes balefully at the drowning Investigator. The Investigator may emerge from the vision choking and coughing attempt to rip their clothes and imagined parasites off of them.

Yog-Sothoth

You may present this Outer God in the form of a mass of glowing orbs, which float outside a massive arcane gate, which sits in the center of the wearer’s vision surrounded by strange light of infinite constellations and stellar bodies. The light of the orbs pulsates while shifting colors and hues before the Investigator. You may allow the PC to glimpse images of their companions, adversaries, or unspeakable horrors, including mythos creatures or terrible violence. These visions can be used to foreshadow future events or encounters. Captivated by the visions, the PC will not notice a dim, unlit globe approaching them from behind. Once the globe makes contact, the player will see flashes of their life from birth to their horrifying death appear before them in mere instants before suddenly realizing that they are within the globe, which now glows with a disturbingly faint light. The wearer can awaken pulling the mask off their head and leaping to their feet in an attempt to escape the entrapping orb. They may continue to be haunted by recurrent visions of their death in dreams or episodes of insanity.

History

Investigators may make an Anthropology roll or rely on an expert (or “local authority” Mordecai Lemming) to learn the following info. The stylistic features and construction of the mask resemble those worn during the Yoruba Gelede spectacle or Egungun, though the faces on the unusual wooden topper do not resemble any of the known Yoruba deities worshipped in western Africa. A successful Hard Biology/Botany or Natural World roll can identify the remarkable lightweight and resilient wood as similar to the rare specimen described in observations from an ill-fated expedition to a Central African rainforest by now deceased, adventuring botanist, Charles Angley. Depending on the expected level of player interest, consider referring to Donald Wandrei’s “The Tree Men of M'bwa” for further details.* A consulting botanist, anthropologist, or another expert will be interested in a detailed study of the mask. Should your players be trusting, feel free to allow awful consequences to ensue from a variety of angles as the experts experiment with the mask. Consider tempting reticent Investigators with promises of guaranteed safe-keeping. A successful Cthulhu Mythos roll may allow the PCs to correctly identify the faces on the mask, or you may simply provide a description reflective of each deity (see below).

Significance

A carved wooden African mask with four hideous faces perched atop a thick, corded neck with a basket-like reed, feather, and fabric collar that hides the wearer’s face. No straps, ties, or handles hold this unsightly mask to the face. As soon as the mask is placed on the head, the collar constricts around the face, holding it tightly in position, its agonized grimace clear to all onlookers. The wearer cannot remove the mask, and neither can anyone else pull it free.
As the mask stays on, the wearer ceases to struggle. After 15 seconds, the wearer’s pupils expand to fll their eye sockets, unseen by those watching. At that point, and for the following 30 seconds, the wearer has an all-too-clear vision of one of four gods, chosen at random by rolling 1D4 and consulting Table: Mask of Hayama Visions, unless a specific Call or Contact spell is used at the same time (see following the wearer must make a Sanity roll to determine their fate. The mask then releases its grip on the wearer’s face and can be removed. If used in conjunction with a Call or Contact spell for one of these gods, as described below, the mask also releases itself when the spell concludes.

There are benefits to wearing the mask, if the wearer survives with their Sanity intact. The first time each god is viewed through the mask, increase the wearer’s Cthulhu Mythos by 1D10 points, in addition to any Cthulhu Mythos gain due to insanity. Secondly, donning the mask while casting any of the spells Contact Nodens, Call Azathoth, Call Shub-Niggurath, or Call Yog-Sothoth effectively opens a more direct line to that god. In game terms, this adds a bonus die to the roll for the spell being cast for the first time. The Mask of Hayama is a prized Mythos artifact and cultists will kill for it.

Item type

Unique Artifact