The 'missing' Aswadim

[Demigod Beast]

From one of the scenarios in Ascension, backgrounds and descriptions are given for the Aswadim. However, certain Spheres are not represented, due to the Unnamed considering them 'base' and 'vulgar'.

Well, that's no fun! What would Aswadim of Forces, Life and Matter be like?

[Muad'Dib]

The Liar of Ashes, the Aswad of Forces

Of those that had encountered her and lived, all note that the Liar of Ashes denies anyone the dubious honor of gazing upon her. She is cloaked in shadow devouring darkness and emanates coldness so venomously icy that the pain caused by it is both searingly hot to the point of black madness, and pleasantly numbing to all senses, like the grace of oblivion should be. Once a glorious sun-worshiper who protected her people for over a millennium, she was shown the folly of trusting the ideal of light and warmth when a mere week of constant pale night was enough to strip this whole ancient civilization of not only their material stability, but also their supposedly vaunted culture and values. At the end of the period, the darkness receded. Despite their newfound savagery, people prayed for deliverance and started rebuilding – starting with the material, political and military foundations.

Perhaps if given a decade or more the people would have gone back to their golden age. But already during some forgotten point of the pale week, the woman who would become the Liar of Ashes traveled to a nameless Qlippoth of endless ice and frost. While every of her fellow Aswadim later denied involvement in the tragedy of her people, all agree that the Liar's visit to that Qlippoth was not merely her journey. She was perhaps drawn there, perhaps invited, by something or someone, else than they.
She found guilty pleasure pursuing the elegance of maddened gravity, suffocating luminescence, and creeping azure flames. When she returned to Earth at the end of the week of darkness, she reduced her civilization of origin to echoing whispers that spoke of the false promises a home's hearth gives, and the tormented assurance that is found when the cold claims one's body and the soul is free to reflect on how very fleeting the comforts of the light are.

The Liar of Ashes was given the demesne of former Russia, centered around the Ural Mountains. During the coming of Hell on Earth, she first brought still winter over the land, and later trapped the power of the nation's nuclear arsenal under the surface of frozen lakes; where the force, heat and radiation of the blasts are all made equal by the rate they are transformed into a coldness whose color returns sight to the blind and robs men and women of their voices.

Her Pillars would be Truth of the Void | Truth of the Silence | Truth of the Cold | Truth of the Ash
I have no idea what each Pillar would do; though I guess that the Truth of the Cold would be able to mimic Elsa from Frozen :-).


The Aswad of Life could be focused on vampirism, predation and changes of consciousness (as the body changes), in addition to the idea of cancerous life that Nephandi are associated with so far. The Pillars I envision to be Satiation, Strife, Hunger, Cruelty. Also, this Aswad should also be (or at least have been) a woman, in order to bring the ratio of women-men among the Aswadim to a nice 4-5.

The Aswad of Matter I imagine to be a Technepandus / Technomagician. So his effects would be works of alchemy, contraptions, undertakings, weapons and machines etc. Might have been the guy who developed siege warfare throughout the millennia.

Also, check out my write-up of the Foundation and Pillars for the Harlot Empress.

However, certain Spheres are not represented, due to the Unnamed considering them 'base' and 'vulgar'.

'Base' and 'fleeting', it is. Be careful when quoting Al-Aswad :-P. (Though maybe it was a group decision?)

[Demigod Beast]

For my own two cents:

The Hellfurnace: Aswad of Matter
He has ceased all motion long ago, trapped by his own hand into a technomagical prison/armor designed by the best soulforgers the Labyrinth has to offer. He does not move, he does not speak, he does not command: instead, he burns.

Inside his self-inflicted prison, the Hellfurnace's flesh and bones are no more; instead, a larval star is being kindled, the remnants of his corpse under so much pressure as to ignite nuclear fission. One day, he will finish gestating this unholy 'child' and it will burn through the cradle of its armor and explode into being. He and his star will be the same, then, and gravitic lashes will rend all they touch.

[Muad'Dib]

I just recently came to the idea that the technomagkical Aswad of Matter would be called The Judge of Aspirations, and his (or hers) Pillars would be: Toil, Invasion, Ambition, Destruction. I dunno about the Foundation for those Pillars.

[Muad'Dib]

An update about The Liar of Ashes, the Aswad of Forces. Her Foundation would be: A Void Is Never Necesirely Of Meaning Devoid.