Let all who look upon them despair. For they are like unto perfection. For they are not of this world but of all worlds. Not of this life but of all lives. Their sight is without limit and through the Eight Eyes of the Magi the truth of all things is bared through the Touch of Chaos.
This blackened tome has a clasp of polished bone. Its pages are those of a spellbook which has been annotated to become a book of lore detailing the strange abominations that revealed the contorted rites of chaos magic which it describes.
“Know ye then the Nineteen Names of Their Power, chief among which is the word shaadom.”
The shaadom are consummate chaos mages. Their knowledge of both the crafts of spellsong and the weavings of chaos are reputedly without peer, and they can wed these paradoxical bodies of knowledge – the rigorous precision of spellcasting; the anarchic, spasming liberties of chaos – into a more perfect whole.
THE CREATION OF THE SHAADOM
“In the Book of the Akop Kings it was written that the shaadom were instruments of their own creation. So, too, reads the Prophecy of Ubala Dal: That the last of their race shall forever forge the first of their kind. They are the circle without end; sundered from this world at both beginning and end and neither. Unto themselves they have perfect knowledge, for of their knowledge they are unto.”
A hulking creature, a shaadom has two muscular arms that end in three-fingered hands. Its head is arachnoid with six eyes and a large, mandibled mouth. Its long torso ends in a squirming mass of short, wide tentacles rather than legs.
Shaadom are said to float just above the ground, “for their very being is repugnant unto this earth” or possibly “because they do not deign to touch a world imperfect”.
THE EYES OF THE SHAADOM
The eyes of a shaadom are said to be possessed of a “vision beyond vision”. Even in death, some of their supreme potency remains: When bound in a circlet of woven taurum and mithril, they can be fashioned into a crown which gifts the wearer with the “shaadom’s eye”.
Shaadom’s Eye: The circlet functions as a crystal ball of true seeing. The shaadom’s eye requires a Wisdom save (DC 21) to resist the scrying effect. In addition, there is a 10% chance each time the shaadom’s eye is used (and once per day that it is worn) that the wearer must make a Wisdom save (DC 21) or be afflicted as per a nightmare spell.
THE WEAVE OF CHAOS
“Through the arts of shaadom, the nature of the world is divided from itself and into an interstice of terror is driven the wedge of chaos.”
The shaadom’s greatest art is chaos-weaving. They able to transform the spells they cast even in the act of casting, infusing them with great chaotic energies. Mortal sorcerors attempting to pursue such arts find the results unpredictable and dangerous; but somehow the shaadom manage to create incantations which draw only strength from their anarchy: Their unpredictable nature only makes them more difficult to resist; their effects more terrible in their afflictions.
THE ANARCHY OF THE SELF
“Unto themselves they are a law. Unto themselves are they beholden. Unto themselves are they masters. Unto themselves are they tyrants.”
It is said that among the Chaos Lords, the shaadom represent individuality taken to the ultimate extreme of selfishness and obsession. They hate even each other as rivals and enemies – locking themselves into aeon-long machinations wrapped around their “twisted spires of silver-grey”. Fueled by hate, jealousy, lust, and greed – all centered around the acquisition of power – the shaadom are most often found on their own, individual quests, willing to bend all that they encounter to whatever suits their immediate needs and desires.
SPELLBOOKS OF THE SHAADOM
All of the spells described here have been woven with chaos using the arts of the shaadom. These versions of the spells are more difficult to dispel (disadvantage on the dispel check). In addition, there is always a 10% chance that the target of these spells will automatically fail their saving throw regardless of what their saving throw roll is.
However, there is a price: The chaos weaving of the spells touches upon the “web of the Demon Princes” itself. The process draws taint into the world, afflicting the caster as if they were using a tainted item each time a shaadom spell is prepared or cast.
- blessing of mutation**
- chaositech enslavement**
- chaositech enslavement, greater**
- confusion
- contagion
- darkness
- detect chaositech*
- detect evil and good
- detect mutation**
- dispel magic
- fear
- identify device*
- lightning bolt
- magic circle
- power word kill
- power word stun
- teleport
* This spell can be found in the Ptolus sourcebook.
** These spells can be in the Chaositech sourcebook.
