What are the Bleak Ones?

criswolf09

Hello guys, I have a lore question for you, as the tittle of the thread says, I'd like to know who or what are the Bleak Ones. According the NPC Baelrath the Blasphemer, he says that they are evil entities from the Qliphotic Realm that offered power to the Lemurians in exchange for servitude. But then I remembered that Shadow Destroyer, as well other factions like DEMON want to free the Kings of Edom. Are the Bleak Ones related to the Kings in some way?

criswolf09

Thanks Gradii, I appreciate the clarification. I thought Shadow Destroyer was working for the Kings of Edom, not other Qliphotic entities.

eiledon

From Atlantean Age

The “underworld gods” of the Lemurians are the Rastrinfahr, or “Bleak Ones” — the original
gods of the Lemurians, who gave them life and souls. Under the rule of Faltrah Lem, who discovered ignaetium, the Lemurians turned their backs on the Bleak Ones in favor of their new gods, whom Faltrah Lem had actually created whole-cloth and who don’t really exist. (Which is why Lemurian priests lack the sort of powers Atlantean priests possess.) The Bleak Ones take the Lemurians’ bodies and souls when they die, and no Lemurian likes to even think about what might happen then.


There is a reference to more indepth detail on Lemurian Religion in Hidden Lands.

bulgarex

The classifications of these godlike Qliphothic entities gets a little muddy -- deliberately so, to guess from some remarks in published sources.

The original mention of the Rastrinfhar, or Bleak Ones, in the Lemurian section of Hidden Lands, makes no mention of a Qliphothic origin for them. But Cryptic so defined them for Champions Online. A couple of CO lore entries, reproduced here and here, name two of the Bleak Ones as Esleggua and Orogtha, the names of two Kings of Edom from the book Arcane Adversaries.

The Kings of Edom are godlike beings from the Qliphoth who rampaged across the Multiverse until a coalition of other great powers imprisoned them, before life appeared on Earth. It's not known how many Kings of Edom there are; the Kings which the leader of DEMON was attempting to bind, as described in the PnP book DEMON: Servants Of Darkness, and the Demonflame adventure in CO, are explicitly not the same Kings as named in Arcane Adversaries.

As mentioned in Book Of The Destroyer and Champions Villains Vol. 1, the "Presences Beyond" which Shadow Destroyer serves are the same beings who empowered Sharna-Gorak the Destroyer, who brought about the end of the Atlantean Age and reshaping of the world. The Elder Worm -- the Slug and his people -- were originally said to worship the Kings of Edom, but Champions Beyond redefined their gods as being other entities, although also Qliphothic.

Steve Long, former line developer for Hero Games (PnP Champions publishers) has written that any or all of the above beings might be related to each other, and in some cases might even be the same entities. Or they might not. Creatures from the Qliphoth are so alien to our universe that it's hard to define them that clearly. (In other words, an individual Game Master can draw any connections he likes for his game.)