Hex Crawl 23 #20: A Cult and a Maze

Lord of All Fevers and Plague!
Blessed Black Wings!  Scourge of Lamashtu!

Hail Pazuzu!

 

Three hexes north of Alakran.

Eastward from the Scarp juts a jagged badland in hues of russet and rose. The convoluted paths through its formations and cliffs are a maze, entered through a gulch to the north, having two southerly exits and many dead ends. 

Apart from the maze, in a human-made underground complex facing south and dug into the most southerly cliff of the badlands, is a cult of the demon Pazuzu led by Kokumo, a former priest of Mitra. Kokumo, after seeing Dulsharna overrun by the forces of Tiamat and Apep, has lost faith in the holy and believes that only through other demons can demons and Chaos powers be cast out of Dulsharna.

To this end he pursues a scheme to free and (with a spell tablet he possesses) bind to his service the demon whom he knows to dwell in the damnation tomb of Narshish (hex #2). He has taken under his vulture wing a boy, Gimu, who ran away from Alakran because his parents hated his mental disability and beat him cruelly. Raghru's pack found him and realized that this might be the young adolescent Kokumo had advertised interest in. You may fear for Gimu's ultimate fate but in truth Kokumo is not all evil, and will try to get him placed in better conditions after Gimu helps with the door which can only open on his thirteenth birthday, coming soon.

Kokumo is a heavy-set, dark-skinned man whose family is originally of far western Muqqura. His locust-helmed habit is of woven straw. He wields a magic weapon, the Fury Whip, which lashes out with gouts of fire. He feeds his cult by calling down rains of carrion in the name of Pazuzu. They number:

12 robed and locust-masked human cultists

1 human and 1 gnoll junior warlock (level 2)

9 gnoll warriors, male and female, with pole weapons and white-feathered arrows for their longbows

Kokumo has a twin brother, Thulsa, who is not at all ambivalent about Chaos, and leads the underground cult of the Chaos serpent Apep under the rule of Tiamat worship in the capital Dulshamar to the east.

The cult treasury is worth some 3000 gp in mixed coins, and they also have a number of useful potions and incendiary concoctions stored in wax-sealed human skulls. 

Campaign lore:

Pazuzu, He Whom Demons Fear, Prince of the Powers of the Air.

Four-winged, with a bestially ugly face and a serpent-headed phallus, this entity is nonetheless seen as the demon closest to human interests. Midwives and traditional healers at times call upon him to protect from disease, stillbirth, and other demons. Pazuzu commands scavenger beasts such as vultures, hyenas, and jackals, as well as flying insects. His other epithets include Lord of all Fevers and Plague, Gnawer of Carrion and Grain, Black Wings, and the Mocking One. Midday heat creates the mirages that are the mark of Pazuzu's power.