Undead

Overview

Oblivion

All undead creatures are animated by a cosmic force known as oblivion. This demiurge attempts to erode what already exists, particularly things already succumbing to the late stages of entropy.

Hollowing

When a living creature becomes undead, the power of oblivion fills its mind. Strong-willed creatures can resist this impulse for a time, but it inevitably causes madness and a desire to either go on a rampage or withdraw from the world and enter torpor. This is how living minds reconcile oblivion's cosmic imperative to return reality to a state of primordialism: they confuse the flow of entropy with a need to cause death. In mystic subcultures, this effect is known as the Hollowing.

Phylacteries

Powerful undead creatures can protect their souls from the hollowing by placing them in an enchanted reliquary. This protects the soul from oblivion's touch and allows the creature to retain its intellect for centuries. If an undead creature with a phylactery is destroyed, it possesses a new corpse within 1 kilometer of its phylactery 1d10 days later.

Nightsong

Undead creatures that operate together in large numbers become connected by a gestalt hivemind known as the nightsong. Telepathic creatures can sense large numbers of undead by the eerie siren call they give off. Powerful undead with the ability to command lesser creatures do so by "singing," and necromancers learn to wrangle undead by broadcasting their artificial version of the nightsong. When thousands of undead gather together, their evil psychic whalesong can be heard for miles by telepathically sensitive creatures.