Kolyarut

I don't often indulge myself in the use of outsiders in my games, but there is a certain appeal to the Kolyarut. The first time I read the bestiary through, this brooding inevitable stood out in both theme and mechanics—not to mention the art!

Now the kolyarut's stats are pretty standard for something with martial capabilities at level 12, but it also comes with some powerful options for both roleplay and mystery. This Inevitable can find things, command them easily, and disguise itself all the while. With truespeech, the kolyarut is rife with potential roleplay options.

When considering the use of the kolyarut, assuming your players are not perpetual bargain breakers, a kolyarut on some other unknowable mission could be an interesting ally of convenience or source of information. Reframing the lore for yourself, the kolyarut of your own setting could be a harbinger of some greater tragedy or a kind of corrupted angel with a singular purpose.

What is considered a bargain worth punishing is ultimately up to you, and that can make for some interesting encounters (and plots!) in your game.

-Reece

Hook 1 (Max) - I Am The Law

A deal is sacred, even more so in the town of King's Crossing, as it lies in a place where several prominent mercantile routes meet. At the crossing, countless transactions are made daily; it is no surprise, then, that it needs someone to make sure they are upheld.

That is where The Judge comes in. Whenever a disagreement arises, he steps in to adjudicate and smites those who have tried to wrong their associates. He cannot be bribed and so far has proven to be incredibly hard to kill. Hence, at least for now, it appears he shall keep his vigil over the King's Crossing, as he has done for the last two centuries of its existence.

Hook 2 (TJ) - The Bondkeeper

Copriticani youth are taught with utmost gravity about the purpose of deals and promises. At the Copriticani coming-of-age ceremonies, those that would transition to adulthood swear by a "social bargain." This bargain-contract is made with the community at large and concerns their purpose within society, as well as their general commitment to uphold their word. The ceremony always takes place under the watchful eye of the Bondkeeper.

Should anyone break the social bargain they created, rest assured, the Bondkeeper will find out and exact retribution, regardless of how legitimate the transgression or how misguided the social bargain at its inception.

Hook 3 (Nemanja) - The Family You Choose

A group of investigators are on a deep-undercover mission to bring down the biggest mafia boss in all of Braha city. While they've seen some horrible things in their pursuit of the top dog, their hands have remained relatively clean, despite earning Carmine Hawkone's trust.

When Carmine invites them to a formal bonding dinner to accept them into the inner circle, things appear to be moving away from the bleakness of their situation. That was the case, at least until he asks them to make an oath to be forever faithful to The Family, just as a Kolyarut comes into the room...

Arbiter

So, uh. Just wanted to point out that this is our tenth post and it appears that it will be on schedule. So, I'm taking this thing seriously. Yay me. Anyway, enough  of my sentimentality and on to the arbiter.

A lowly wizard who is also a known gambler, cheat and all-round scumbag, has recently made a series of great investments and amassed a fortune. The fact that he pulled it off by imprisoning an arbiter and torturing it into revealing bits of the cosmic plan is revealed in quite an unsubtle way, though - a minor army of arbiters are now threatening to erase the city from existence. Even if the city's protectors somehow manage to merely murder their way out of the situation, the Sages warn them that such a course of action is inevitable (pun fucking intended) to bring forth more powerful Aeons.

In the Blessed World Bandallallayah, chaos was entirely exterminated. Three milliseconds after that, all of the world's arbiters went haywire. Apparently, self-preservation is located deep within their machine code. Realizing the truth of the fact that once chaos was exterminated, they no longer had a reason to exist, they correctly deduced that it meant they would need to be destroyed. However, as they are technically still acting according to their (and the universe's) coding, the higher-order aeons cant directly deal with them. Strangers from far flung corners of the multiverse are now summoned forth to deal with this predicament.

The shimmering oracle is an arbiter that takes the ideas of duality too seriously even for an aeon. It has come into possession of an artifact that literally erases it from existence for a while. After it has been "existent" for a while, it will phase into nothingness for a while. Though those who have spoken to it claim it has some sort of internal logic deciding when and where it will disappear or reappear, it seems random from an outsider's perspective.
If one does manage to find it, it is more than willing to share cryptic tidbits of the cosmic plan, but it has been know to disappear mid-sentence on several occasions.
Of course, while its oracular prowess is highly sought out, there are also those who are willing to pay a kings ransom for the procurement of the artifact it is using, with no questions asked.