Protoflesh
On the Nature of Protoflesh
Protoflesh is technically undead organic matter given the semblance of life in an ancient and long-lost process recently rediscovered by Tenebrae, founding member and Thanatos Domina of the Necromancer’s Guild, via techniques revealed in the infamous Forsaken Book of the Dead combined with certain rare and unusual alchemical processes).
Having undergone this process, protoflesh gains a greater semblance of life than undead matter produced by necromantic means alone. This may extend even to the point of it becoming independent of its creator to some degree. A creature comprised of protoflesh, once animated, can sustain itself indefinitely by ‘refueling’, taking in salts and fluids drained from either living or dead victims. Protoflesh is not a continual drain on the necromancer’s magical reserves and so is most useful, though its benefits must be carefully weighed against the great perils and costs of its creation.
The intelligence of any being made of protoflesh is determined by the amount and quality of brain matter included in its creation process. A whole, fresh brain (preferably that of a vampire, for its physical resilience) allows for various levels of intellect. The most intelligent and independent of protoflesh golems are known as ‘Empusai’, which are wholly sentient beings implanted with a protoflesh symbiote. While the host body is gradually turned to protoflesh, the Empusai retains its original mind – though in time, it usually proves prone to corruption by the baser instincts of its symbiote.
Without a high functioning brain, protoflesh tends to revert to what is basically a self-sustaining, macroscopic amoeba which will grow constantly, feed indiscriminately and can prove quite difficult to control if left to its own devices for long periods of time. Like the simplest forms of life, it can ‘reproduce’ itself from severed parts. It also tends to mimic the things it consumes, so may appear to sprout mouths, teeth, rudimentary limbs and even (on rare occasions) vaguely humanoid features, though without a strong-willed intelligence controlling it these growths at their very best serve only the most rudimentary animal functions.
Given intelligence, a protoflesh golem may enjoy extended periods of independence and even gain total freedom from its creator if its will grows strong enough (much like the more intelligent among the undead population).
Examples of Advanced Sentience Manifest in Protoflesh
Examples of such advanced golems created via this technique include :
- Tenebrae’s infamous gaunt familiar Maladroit
- a scant few individuals among the drider-like golems known as arachnotaurs
Examples of the next echelon on the protoflesh ladder, the Empusai, are Tenebrae herself, and one other whose identity is yet to be revealed.
Creation, Procreation and Availability
No matter how advanced or independent it may be, a creature of protoflesh is not truly alive and cannot procreate beyond the act of shedding parts of itself. Given that these shed parts will not possess or develop complex brains (with the single and very rare exception of the Empusai), these shed (or cut off) parts are doomed to revert to simple, mindless blobs of proto-matter. So it is that even the most intelligent protoflesh beings (which, like the undead, are capable of neural activity approximating humanoid thoughts and even feelings) are wholly incapable of sexual reproduction. They are dead things, despite being a bit more animate than regular undead (and are in this and other ways somewhat more akin to vampires).
The secrets of protoflesh creation are for many reasons kept firmly entrenched in the upper echelons of the Necromancer's Guild. Only those who have worked hard and long at mastering the alchemical arts, as well as the necessary aspects of Necromancy within the Guild, will be entrusted with this knowledge.