Ghoul

Ghouls are a prevalent and hungry type of Undead.

Specifics

Ghouls are individuals who’ve interrupted the circle of life and death, sometimes by eating the dead, coming back from near-death one too many times, or practicing necromancy badly and ending up out of balance, only able to keep going with periods of convalescence, like hibernation, and bursts of life or death voraciousness. Once awake the weakest among them have a three hour window to find food or perish, and then rest for months or years.<ref name=":0">“Ghouls are supposed to be thin,” Rose said.
[...]
“Ghouls are individuals who’ve interrupted the circle of life and death, usually by eating the dead, coming back from near-death one too many times, or practicing necromancy.”

“Black magic?” I asked.

“Yeah. Maybe I should amend that to say ‘practicing necromancy badly‘. Using terms we’re mostly familiar with, they’re individuals who are out of balance. They’re the spinning plates that are only just hanging on, and that means they need a fine touch to keep going. They do that with periods of convalescence, like hibernation, and bursts of… hunger is the wrong word. Life or death voraciousness. Maddened with a need for sustenance. More like a rabid dog than human.”

“So they are basically super-zombies,” Evan said.

I heard Rose sigh.

“Sustenance? Feasting on human flesh,” Maggie added.

“The go-to way, yeah,” Rose replied. “If they have their wits about them, then they can use the necromancy they knew in life, or they just move between areas with an awful lot of death or life energy.”

“But they mostly manage by eating human flesh,” Maggie said. “Right?”

“Essentially. No warning, three hour window to find food or perish, rest for months or years. Depending on where their personal balance is sitting, they eat either corpses or they scarf down bits of still-living victims they’ve found in isolated spots.”
[...]
“They’re dead. They don’t feel the cold, they don’t get tired, the only thing that drives them is a need to gorge themselves with flesh. They aren’t going to move until they have a reason to move.” - Excerpt from Void 7.5</ref> Another conception or metaphor for them doesn't use a cycle but rather a spinner (tops, plates, etc.) where ghouls try to balance at the edge of life and death.<ref name ="tops">Ghouls live on the threshold of life and death, like spinning tops perpetually wobbling, and they keep themselves going by feeding on lives on the brink of death, or the freshly dead, as close to being still warm as they may hope.
[...]
“The closer they get, the more I hang out. Until I’m there whenever nurses and staff aren’t. If they have a place they want to be or a thing they want to do, I sometimes pay a bit of myself to keep… you said we were like spinning tops [...] keep them spinning for the last day or last few hours. One day to sneak out of the hospital, go shopping, go to a movie, or maybe go to the beach. Usually one thing. The last one, I took her back to school, after hours, so she could sit at her desk again. Then they go, I like to listen to music with them at the end. Then I eat, I leave nothing behind unless they ask.” - Excerpt from Gone Ahead 7.5</ref><ref name=":0"/> Of course there many variants who have different presentation of ghoul traits.

Nature

Ghouls are usually thin, resembling addicts or anorexia victims. They have an air of obsession or addiction in their eyes.<ref name=":1">A fat man, with two women and a man in his company, occupying a bus shelter when the buses had stopped traveling their routes days ago. All four wore winter clothes, but they had a demeanor like some of the sketchier homeless I’d run into, once upon a time. Little details that made me think of meth-zombies, cokeheads, or anorexic people. There was a kind of look in their eyes, as far as I could make them out, a dark gleam that had a way of working its way into people’s eyes when one single idea dominated their existence.

Except these things were Others. Their purpose was simple enough.

The fat one carried a dismembered arm, raising it to his mouth periodically to take a bite.

“Ghouls are supposed to be thin,” Rose said.
[...]
The Other stopped in its tracks.

It drew a charm from its pocket. A necklace or macabre rosary, dangling with finger bones.

It pointed at the ghoul lying on the ground, the one I’d cut with June.

The body moved.

Maggie stepped forward, swinging the sword, taking the head of the ghoul before the undead necromancer could do anything with the corpse.

Without waiting, she swung again, the blade biting hard into the pavement, and she took the ghoul’s head.

The braver of the two remaining creatures stared at us. The fat one, still bearing stubble on its face.

“If you attack,” I said, “We take you to pieces. If you run, I’ll come after you and take you to pieces. Can you communicate?”

It nodded.
[...]
It held up two fingers.

“Second choice?” I asked. “Agree never to harm another living soul?”

“I swear,” it managed. Even from ten feet away in the blistering cold, I could smell the breath. It was the aroma I might expect from a coffin being opened.
[...]
The fourth ghoul turned to go. Maggie stepped forward, swinging the sword with both hands. She took its head.

I met her eyes.

“It was a danger too, and weaker ghouls can’t communicate on that level.”

“What was that thing I just talked to?” I asked.

“Process of elimination says it was a greater ghoul.” - Excerpt from Void 7.5</ref> They have fangs<ref>The skinnier male ghoul grasped in my direction, trying to get a grip on my coat, baring his fangs. I leaned out of the way. He stumbled forward, and I caught his neck with June.

The wound froze as I cut through flesh.
[...]
It drew a charm from its pocket. A necklace or macabre rosary, dangling with finger bones.

It pointed at the ghoul lying on the ground, the one I’d cut with June.

The body moved.

Maggie stepped forward, swinging the sword, taking the head of the ghoul before the undead necromancer could do anything with the corpse. - Excerpt from Void 7.5</ref><ref name=":2">The fat one carried a dismembered arm, raising it to his mouth periodically to take a bite.
[...]
The ghouls noticed us, stirring. The fat one had been gnawing on the arm, and when he turned his attention to us, I saw the gleam of white fangs stained with blood. The bone of the arm had been gnawed, a little more pointed. Maggie wouldn’t necessarily have a problem, but the makeshift knife coupled with his natural reach threatened to let him fight me with more reach.
[...]
“I don’t know if that’s a concern. These guys don’t look maddened with hunger,” I commented.

“The contraction of the city is pushing locals out of their usual haunts,” Rose said. “They’re probably trying to find their way back, maybe grabbing some food to keep nearby while they’re at it.” - Excerpt from Void 7.5</ref> and claws that if they are healthy they can conceal, if not these become larger and ever more dangerous.

Greater Ghouls are comparatively fatter and capable of communicating, with some difficulty, and 'Lesser' Ghouls are thin and can't talk.<ref name=":1"/>

They are essentially dead bodies; they have an immunity to cold, don't need to breathe and have an undeathly stamina.<ref name=":0"/><ref name=":2"/><ref>[Chloe] was fortunate she didn’t get tired anymore, exactly.  Not since becoming a ghoul.  She got numb if she was too repetitive and damaged her body, but she was strong and she was tenacious, and [cleaning] was the right kind of mindless activity that worked for her right now.  If she’d eaten more she’d get bored and if she’d eaten less she’d be too feral.
[...]
She avoided the thoughts of the church in the same way she would avoid a hunter in real life.  She retreated to safe hiding places, moved carefully and with focus, and she retreated to fight, flight, and freeze.  Freeze was first; she made herself stop hissing and growling with every breath, then stopped breathing altogether.
[...]
They were faster, probably faster at a run than he was.  A benefit of being a ghoul, and one she was glad for.  Her clawed toes sank into soil and wood without discrimination, finding grip to propel her forward into her next step.  Rough branches and tree bark scraped at her and her tough skin resisted it.
[...]
They stuck to the darkness in the trees, and she held her breath, drew all Life and energy she could into herself, shutting off some levels of thinking to become a stalking observer.  All of these things flowed out of key points in her, different degrees and types of Life and Self visible and obvious when they came from the peak of the head, throat, heart, gut, or groin, or any of the other spots.  She thought of it as going quiet. - Excerpt from One After Another 10.c</ref> Some have flesh-rotting bites that never heal.<ref>For ghouls that… well, they pretend to be soldiers that die like anyone might, but when you let your guard down and search the body, they bite you and get a hungry kind of death into the wound?”

He raised his hand, showing off the cast.
[...]
The ghoul’s bite had never healed completely. Flesh had necrotized, turning black, and even now, bone was visible in places. He could cut at the rot with a knife, and it would be a red hot agony, or he could let it linger, and he would feel his strength slipping. It didn’t get worse, it didn’t get better, but the dilemma remained. - Excerpt from Histories (Arc 6)</ref> Some Ghouls (possibly limited to Greater Ghouls aka Necrophages) retain the Necromancy they knew in life, which enables them to make use of more abstract ways of feeding, as well as necromantic magic like raising corpses.<ref name=":1"/><ref name=":0"/><ref name=":3" /> They tend to have senses relating to Death and Life sensing their presence through smell or sight,<ref>We took them on because they are fairly effective in a scrap, and they can see Life and smell Death.  Their ability to see Life means they can notice many of those who might try to slip through the perimeter.  The smelling of Death means they may notice the aftermath of any trouble caused by any intruders: bodies/dead residents/dead animals. - Excerpt from [8.a Spoilers] New Other Correspondence #1</ref>. or being able to tell when someone might die soon.

Hunger

Ghouls can cycle between months- or years-long periods of convalescence (although they will still snack on humans if they encounter them) and brief bursts of mad, rabid hunger that must be sated or they will perish.<ref name=":0"/> Depending on where their personal balance is sitting, they eat either corpses or they scarf down bits of still-living victims they’ve found in isolated spots.<ref name=":2"/>

Most ghouls will have a hunting cycle of some sort, variants can change this pattern of course. If a ghoul is healthy enough they can be active at all times.

Weaknesses

They can be staved off temporarily by reintroducing them to the cycle of life, using menstrual fluids, using plants connected with life and death like Holly, or funeral rites, done over the prone body or at a distance if you have the ghoul's name.<ref>“Conventional wisdom is that you stave them off by reintroducing them to the cycle of life.”

“Meaning?” I asked.

“The go-to answer is menstrual fluids,” Rose said. “Drawn on their forehead, fed to them, ‘poison’ a weapon with it.
[...]
“Some plants are tied to the cycle of death and rebirth. Holly.”

“We used holly against the Hyena,” Evan said. “See? I know stuff. You can tell me stuff. No need to leave me out because I’m a kid.”

“No holly near here, as far as I can tell,” I said. “Not sure how that would work, either.”

“Funereal icons,” Rose said. I heard her turning a page. “Either done over the ghoul’s prone body or you can do it from a distance if you have the full name of the ghoul. Not going to work. Don’t have any of that.” - Excerpt from Void 7.5</ref> Eggs may or may not be unpleasant to them.<ref>“Ugh,” Evan said, then before I could reprimand him, he said, “What about eggs?”

“What?” I asked.

“When my mom told me about that stuff, I remember not getting it, and she said something about it being like chickens laying eggs. It confused me more.”
[...]
whipped an egg at the first one to step outside of the bus shelter. I missed, hitting the edge of the glass enclosure.

The ghoul stopped in its tracks, and the one behind it collided with it.

It was hard to say whether it had worked.

Maggie landed a dead-on hit.

It seemed to startle them more than anything. Part of it might have been our relative lack of fear.
[...]
Maggie egged the thing, holding three eggs in one hand and whipping them at him one after the other.

“It’s not really working,” I said.

“I think it’s working a little,” Maggie told me. She flashed a grin, not taking her eyes off the Other. “He doesn’t like it.”
[...]
“The eggs totally worked, didn’t they?” Evan asked.

I wasn’t so sure they had, but it was hard to say. Maybe the other stuff worked because it was human, and the ghouls were closer to humans than not. Were eggs too far removed?

“Maybe,” I said. - Excerpt from Void 7.5</ref> Beheading them or cutting their throat also does the trick.<ref name=":1"/> Ways to deal with ghouls aren't necessarily well known.<ref>“We should do something about that one first.”

The eater.

“What do you want to do? Kill it?”

“You can’t kill something dead.”

“Then birth it or…?”

“I have no idea how you’d do that.”

“Yeah,” Verona said. “Bind it?” - Excerpt from Back Away 5.2</ref>

Their individual strength is largely dependent on their diet, its stability and regularity. They will have to have some place to sleep unless they don't have a hunting cycle or don't exist while they're hunting.<ref name=cg/>

Variants

• Standard Ghoul, Ghoul Scion, Branch Ghoul, Family Ghoul, possibly Lesser Ghoul<ref>Faith. Became a ghoul after getting infected by another ghoul. The Death that runs through them can leech into a person who doesn’t have enough Life (because hurt, because other reasons).
  [...]
  Sometimes called the standard ghoul, the ghoul scion, the branch ghoul or the family ghoul. Pyramid scheme type power: it flows uphill, you get anchored more if you create more ghouls. At the bottom/if you’re new then existence is hard. As you get higher you get the really strong/dangerous necrophage types. I think they should be called ghoulfathers. No really obvious strengths/weaknesses except the ghoul scion is even better than regular ghouls at making more scions and gets stronger by doing it - Excerpt from New Other Correspondence #1</ref> - the most well known type of ghoul with the communicable condition.
  • Necrophages, Ghoulfathers, possibly Greater Ghouls - ghouls that are incredibly strong and have access to Practitioner knowledge.
• Brine Ghoul - an aquatic variant,<ref name=":4">Terrence Hegh is not an anecdote drawn from ancient times, but a relatively modern example of the unconventional relationship. Awakened, Terrence was forbidden from taking a familiar without family approval. Driven by a fascination with the sea, in part due to his belief that he could reunite with a drowned lover if he could find her body, Terrence met and forged a deal with a Selkie, Graeme. [...] Terrence was ultimately interrupted by the Selkie in the midst of the ritual to revive his partner. Death energies carried him to the edge of death, where he was left suspended, turned into a brine ghoul. The Selkie, too tired to withstand the onslaught of the loose energies, was slain. Before he could come to his senses, Terrence devoured the waterlogged corpse of both Selkie and lover, sealing his fate as a lonely undead creature. - excerpt from Famulus, quoted in Bonus Material: Famulus Text</ref> presumably having resistance to salt and water.
• Couch Ghoul - those who have stopped living as the natural light of their lives as been eclipsed by the artificial light of some screen, they can scrape by soley on this light with no need to sleep as a typical ghoul does.<ref name=cg>Nibble spent too long on the cusp of barely surviving while sitting in front of a flickering screen. Life gave up on him & Death was not alerted to claim him. Legal authorities eventually wrote him off as dead. The power shut off and when the screens went black he lost his last light and connection to the outside world. Was thrust into Undeath. This is fairly standard for couch ghouls with only some minor differences in context & circumstance.
  [...]
  Nibble as a couch ghoul leans more heavily into light/dark dynamic than some other ghoul types. [...] Unlike other ghouls he doesn’t sleep like the dead outside of the hunt phase and is thus easier to contact. Good for us!
  
  Nibble Gets low level of sustenance from games/TV/artificial light. Like plants & sun. - Excerpt from New Other Correspondence #1</ref> Aren't as tied to Death as a typical ghoul is, as a result they're vulnerable to ghosts and similar death based Others.<ref name=Ech><nowiki>[Nibble] had gotten walloped by a ghost.
  [...]
  Ghouls were creatures of Death, and many ghosts were as well. There were symbiotic relationships in some ghoul clusters with the ghosts of their areas. Being around a ghoul could sustain an ghost well past its usual expiration, and the ghosts could themselves deter innocents from the ghoul’s hunting ground.
  
  Nibble wasn’t so great at that part of things. Chloe had a better sense of the things, and felt more comfortable around them. As last night’s issue with the ghost tearing into him had proven. - Excerpt from One After Another 10.c</ref>
• Dreck Ghoul<ref name=":3" /> - dreck can mean trash which may mean it is some form of Peddler ghoul or similar.
• Eater of Unborn - as the name suggests, does something unspecified and grisly to pregnant women. Unlike most ghouls, tied to both birth and death energy. <ref name=":5">His face emerged from the darkness. It was an old man’s face, but it looked like someone had taken the old and baked it in a bit too much. Like those little details that made an old person look old, wrinkles aside, had multiplied. Too many liver spots, too many broken veins. Too many old scars, too much yellowing of the teeth, which were a bit too long as he fixed his eyes on her and smiled rictus-wide.
  [...]
  “A variant on a ghoul,” Matthew said, behind her. “Eater of Unborn. He causes women who were pregnant to… have you taken health class?”
  [...]
  “The details don’t need to be dwelt on. Ghouls can range from weaker than a kitten to impossibly strong, depending on how well they eat. Most tie themselves to death alone. He ties himself to birth and death both.” - Excerpt from Back Away 5.2</ref>
• Ghul obitus - more spirit then visceral and able to spend time in potentia without wasting energy or leaving itself open for attack.<ref>“A digression: those of you who have attended lectures on the habits of Others may recall that we can have Others who only exist in the context of their nature. The ghul obitus is more ephemeral than many other types of ghoul, fleeting and vague, with a wide hunting ground and prerequisite for hunting that increase in scope as it gains power. It simply does not truly exist in a real, physical capacity when it’s not active, with no hiding place and no bed, grave, or hovel it rests in where it may be hunted. It is potential energy, an apple held in the air, waiting to be dropped, at which point it will take action for a short span of time, often days, before it makes its impact. [...] The ghul obitus holds off on existing, hibernating until someone passes through its sphere of influence. This particular ghul obitus looks for young people who are slowly and inevitably dying and sufficiently detached from everything else. It could be considered a vulture, circling. Some unnerve or terrify the victim in their last moments. Others simply watch, a recurring figure that eases the dying into the realization of what’s coming as they realize nobody else can see this dark figure.” - Excerpt from Gone Ahead 7.5</ref><ref>

We don't know but we can work it out [what makes a Ghul Obitus].

Ghouls are formed when someone is brought perilously close to the threshold of life and death, and doesn't come all the way back. We know they're more ephemeral (immaterial), and we know they tend to orbit around targets who they stalk.

I'd say you could get one from something like someone who loses a loved one and can't let it go, to the point they get dragged toward Death themselves, or even not losing a person, but spending so much time around someone that's dying or on the threshold themselves that you yourself can't have a life and are a shadow of your former self. That kernel of desire to escape, to have rich experiences, that hunger for the visceral? Becomes the hunger for flesh. - Wildbow on Discord</ref>

• Near Death Experience (NDE) Ghoul<ref>Second possibility is she is a NDE ghoul or Near Death Experience ghoul. Same story but without the curse. If she nearly died or came to the razor’s edge of Death’s embrace (by being hurt enough or a metaphorical hair’s breadth from hanging/being shot/other execution) and stayed there long enough that could push her to become a ghoul. This state/Otherhood may have allowed her to fight her way free and deal with her captors. I can’t remember the specifics about NDE ghouls. Resilience?
  [...]
  Texts at school says NDE ghouls can get stronger as you push them to the brink of Death. Or they may not be more resillient at all, they don’t get as weak as we do when they get more hurt so they keep going right up until they fall over and die for real. They get best sustenance from the recently dead ‘specially if they were scared when they die.
  
  Best sustenance isn’t “more” sustenance. Is what pushes her closest to balance between Life/Death. - Excerpt from New Other Correspondence #1</ref> - caught the attention of Death after narrowly escaping its clutches.
• Profane Ghoul<ref>We don’t know the specifics of her becoming a ghoul but from what I remember two possibilities stand out. The first is that she is a profane ghoul. Nibble’s rendition of her story is that the friends were tied up and made to decide who was most responsible for the offense and they named Chloe thinking she would die. They were released and started on their way home and then Chloe was released & caught up. She later attacked and devoured them. If she is a profane ghoul then she was cursed between the time they were released and the time she was and this pushed her into that knife’s edge state between Life and Death. Curse-oriented origin would mean she is more focused on right/wrong & law/justice & maliciousness.
  [...]
  Can’t find the same kinds of details on profane ghouls. They’re a footnote in this book. They seem to be rare. - Excerpt from New Other Correspondence #1</ref> - comparatively rare form released as part of some sort of vengeance for transgression against the divine.
• Rime Ghoul - arctic variant<ref>Wildbow on Discord</ref>

Known Ghouls

• Toronto ghouls led by a Greater Ghoul
• WWI ghouls, one of which bit Aimon Behaim
• Terrence Hegh, Brine Ghoul<ref name=":4" />
• Dreck Ghoul (possibly) who messed with Clem's life<ref name=":3">Summer 2010 – Clem discovers a crow pecking at something glinting, and discovers it to be a gold tooth. The tooth belonged to an Other (thought to be a Dreck Ghoul) that sought to be whole again. Thought by Clem to be a homeless man, it harassed her and tried to arrange deals, threaten, and use practice to obtain its tooth, upending trash cans and turning the refuse into sendings that could enter the house. Due to the Other’s communication issues and Clem running in fear from most encounters with it, or else being too scared to look away, she never seemed to discover it was the tooth it wanted. Due to residual taint in the tooth, her body slowly became more like that of the Other, with patches of her flesh undergoing various changes, including suppurating, drying out, tearing, scarring, and staining with ambient pollutants. She lost a tooth, several fingernails, and the vision in one eye, which she would never fully regain. Believing the Other had done it, she lashed out, attacking it, and drove it off, though it would continue to watch from a distance. In the winter of 2010, in the throes of the tooth, she picked up a dead and rotting bird from the playground and stuffed it into her mouth, chewing and swallowing much of it before faculty were able to stop her, all in view of her classmates. Distraught and confused, she ended up throwing everything she owned onto the lawn of the backyard, and called out to the ghoul to take anything and everything it wanted. It did just that, taking everything from toy, mother’s keepsake, and clothing in three trips, along with the ‘black gold tooth’. - 4.8 Bonus Material: Dossiers</ref>
• Eater of Unborn near Kennet
• Musette
• Kennet resident ghouls
  • Nibble, Couch Ghoul
  • Chloe, unknown ghoul type, possibly NDE or Profane Ghoul
  • Faith, Standard Ghoul (destroyed before the others arrived in Kennet)

References

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