#lanak

Lanak [327 Icons]

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Image © Crash McCreery. Accessed at pinterest here

[Oh, The Village. The last M. Night Shamalyan movie I liked. This makes a double feature with the curucu of “monsters that are just guys in costumes in their source material”. These are actually based on a monster I statted up way back in undergrad. That version was fey. This version is a sakhil, because PFRPG’s obsession with thematic outsiders has extended to “what if there were embodiments of specific fears and phobias?” Which fits perfectly into The Village’s MO.]

Sakhil, Lanak This red-robed humanoid has a mane of quills growing from its neck and shoulders, long curved claws and a face like an emaciated beast.

All sakhils represent the many types of fear that haunt mortal minds, and lanaks represent the fear of punishment, especially earned punishment. Lanaks seek out those that have broken the law or taboo, the more arbitrary and senseless the better, and punish them with terrible wounds and mental trauma. A lanak typically leaves its victims alive, the better to savor their fear and the fear of others who may be tempted to transgress.

Of the sakhils, lanaks are the most likely to be found in the cities of mortals, where they prey on the criminal element and free-thinkers alike. The more isolated or authoritarian the community, the more likely a lanak will call it a home, and particularly repressive societies attract entire cabals of lanaks to reinforce the cruelest of social norms. In especially wicked communities, the leaders may even call a lanak intentionally, deputizing the creature to act as secret police with full sanction of its higher-ups.

In combat, lanaks delight in the terror and disruption of their enemies. Friends turn on each other with lethal violence, people become unhealthily attached to each other, and suicidal violence is attempted when a mortal dares to oppose a lanak’s hunt. Their supernatural knowledge of their favored community’s laws and ethos allows them to treat many of their enemies as favored enemies, even for so small a crime as littering or breaking curfew.

A lanak would stand more than six feet tall if it stood upright, but they typically walk with hunched postures. Different lanaks have faces resembling those of different beasts—bear, wolf and boar-like visages are the most common, but a resemblance to any animal is possible.