Izzy Marsh @ chiquitafajita_

SMALL TOWN GOTHIC

Demon Compendium
 CONTENTS

First Rank ...................................................................................................... 3

Second Rank................................................................................................. 5
Third Rank .................................................................................................... 7
Fourth Rank.................................................................................................. 9
Fifth Rank.................................................................................................... 11
Sixth Rank ................................................................................................... 12
On Alignment ............................................................................................ 13
The Book of Job ........................................................................................ 14
Author’s Notes .......................................................................................... 15

Demons are numbered 1-6 to easily construct random encounter

tables, with six demons per page. This allows you to roll d66
across Ranks 1-3 and Ranks 2-4. A single player character will
never become even as powerful as a Rank 3 demon.
Ranks 5 and 6 represent much more powerful entities unlikely to
be directly involved in mortal affairs.

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 DEMON COMPENDIUM

Many of the following demons have been created from scratch

or recontextualized from existing myths to emulate the spiritual
world of the American Evangelical Church.
They reflect a grotesque ideology grounded in the social
relations of capitalism, sexism, and racism. Some descriptions
are meant to be silly and entertaining, but others represent
thoroughly disturbing elements of American society.
CONSIDER THIS A CONTENT WARNING, especially regarding
various Evangelical attitudes and paranoia surrounding
sexuality, and their treatment of women and LGBT people.
By creating an original bestiary of demons, the author invites the
reader to abandon the careless demonization of foreign deities,
and to investigate what is already demonized and fantasized
about within the American Evangelical cultural imagination.
What do they fear?

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 First Rank

1 Bishop Fish (L): A small humanoid demon covered in scales,

with a pointy bishop’s hat on top of its head. It is a literal fish out
of water and cannot communicate except in vague gestures.

ayy lmao

2 Brownie (L): A household spirit who performs chores while

their host family sleeps. Her efforts are unnoticed and
unappreciated, but this pleases her.

3 Cait Sith (N): A witch’s spirit in the form of a scruffy black cat.
They often represent omens of death or misfortune, and they are
also known to steal the souls of the recently deceased.

4 Cicada (N): A winged bug with massive eyes who heralds human
suffering with its dizzying song. They are heard in the summer,
when prisoners are forced to work long hours under the sun.

5 Gargoyle (L): A grotesque demon who protects churches from

evil spirits. They have elongated snouts to shoot water from their
mouths, and to redirect rainwater from stone steeples.

6 Homunculus (N): The disembodied soul of a stillborn fetus. It

wanders to and fro the Earth, desiring to slay another fetus and
take its place in the womb.

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1 Imp (C): A little devil more prone to mischief than malice. They
delight in causing trouble, but they have neither the imagination
nor the desire to cause lasting harm.

2 Ooze (C): Sentient sludge with a mouth wide-open to consume

everything in its path. It stalks factories and polluted bodies of
water to seek out victims.

3 Pixie (C): A flamboyant fairy who delights in song and dance.

They are known to draw humans under their spell, charming them
to perform regrettable acts.

4 Selkie (N): A demon who can shapeshift between human and

seal form by shedding and replacing its own pelt. They are said
to be indebted to those who steal their pelt and catch them naked.

5 Shade (N): A ghost who has been trapped on Earth by mediums.

They’ve been unrestful since their displacement from Hades.

6 Tommy Knocker (C): The ghost of a miner trapped under the

Earth. They are known to racketeer miners: either pay tribute or
pay the price of missing tools and collapsing caves.

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 Second Rank

1 Butcher (C): The spirit of a violent surgeon for whom it

pleasured to spill blood. They were known to harvest and sell
organs at exceptionally low prices.

2 Chalkydra (L): A twelve-winged, rainbow-feathered serpent with

an alligator’s face and a lion’s tail and legs. With the phoenixes,
they herald the rising of the sun to the birds of the earth.

3 Chupacabra (C): A bipedal reptilian demon from the Caribbean,

famous for sucking blood from goats and other livestock or pets.
They operate only on instinct to quench their endless thirst.

4 Ghoul (C): A demon who inhabits graveyards to consume rotten

human flesh. They are gluttonous and know nothing of inhibition,
and they enjoy terrorizing the living with their antics.

5 Gorgon (N): A melancholic demon spawned from a violated

woman. She is blessed to petrify those who look longingly into
her eyes, to protect herself from harm.

6 Hangman (L): A spirit of a human falsely accused, executed, and

dishonorably buried. They desire retribution for their death, and
they curse the descendants of those responsible.

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1 Incubus (L): A vengeful spirit who punishes young women for
lust by impregnating them in their sleep. They are shapeshifters,
able to fulfill any fantasy.

2 Jack O’Lantern (N): The spirit of a drunkard who gambled

against Death, inadvertently preventing himself from entering
Heaven and Hades. He wanders the Earth with a gourd lantern.

3 Llorona (L): A mother’s ghost who drowned her children born

out of wedlock to please a suitor. Ashamed, she drowned herself.
Now she abducts living children to replace her own.

4 Nephil (C): The giant offspring of demons and humans. They

are known as the pagan heroes of old and were once worshipped
as living gods, taking anything they pleased from their subjects.

5 Siren (N): A femme fatale thought to tempt men into making

poor decisions to deceive their loved ones and embrace pleasure.
However, they are spawned by the very act itself.

6 Zombie (N): The visage of a pauper’s corpse reanimated and

cursed to live forever to work for a necromantic slaver. They fear
that they will never rest.

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 Third Rank

1 Angel (L): A dutiful messenger who corresponds between

Heaven and humanity. They see themselves above mortal matters
and take pride in their mission. They can perform small miracles.

2 Auto-Icon (C): The dusty visage of a mummified philosopher,

who in life was obsessed with destroying the very pillars of our
society. They are an iconoclast, and they despise God.

3 Baron Bones (N): A (psycho)pompous spirit with the appearance

of a well-dressed skeleton, who scams terminally ill patients by
selling them forgiveness for their sins.

4 Bigfoot (N): A cryptid supposed by some “scientists” to be the

missing link between humans and apes. Bigfeet don’t know where
they come from either, but they would like to know.

5 Drude (L): A demon who visits humans in their sleep to awaken

them with nightmares. These frightful dreams actually serve to
prolong fantasy, preventing humans from realizing their guilt.

6 Father Christmas (L): A spirit of one of the Magi who visited the
Christ after His birth. He is a true Christmas warrior, and he also
prepares the Earth for Winter by opening Heaven’s snow gates.

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1 Lamassu (L): A guardian demon with a human’s head, bull’s
body, and bird’s wings. They work in pairs to protect their zone
and they are very difficult to persuade.

2 Leeds Devil (C): A wyvern with a horse’s head and a forked tail.
They spawn from infants abandoned and cursed by destitute
families to become devils.

3 Lilu (C): A daughter of Lilith, the headstrong first wife of Adam.

She is known to haunt men in the night, tempting and taunting
them to make her come.

4 Minotaur (C): A monstrous demon with the head of a bull and

the body of a human. They are born from the dreams of jealous
men, usually trapped in their psychic labyrinths.

5 Sphinx (N): A territorial demon with a human’s head, lion’s

body, and falcon’s wings. She is extremely wise and inquisitive
and will ask riddles to gauge an intruder’s worthiness.

6 Vampire (N): An undead demon who subsists on human blood.

Newly awakened vampires will often appear malnourished and
pale, while active vampires are bloated from drinking blood.

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 Fourth Rank

1 Archangel (L): A superior officer of Angelic messengers who

protects their subordinates from being captured by malicious
demons, Principalities, or other entities.

2 Bull of Heaven (N): When a golden calf matures, they ascend to

the Heavens and join the Cherubim in the stars. They are often
enlisted by Principalities as brute force troops.

3 Cacodemon (C): A powerful demon, born from the wounds of

the Leviathan like a maggot from a corpse. When fully developed,
they cast off their cocoons to spread Chaos across the Earth.

4 Cherub (L): A four-winged angel of lightning who carries the

Merkabah of God with the Ophanim. They have the likeness of a
human, with the faces of a human, an eagle, an ox, and a lion.

5 Chimera (C): A fire-breathing abominable lion with a snake for

a tail and a goat’s head sticking out from its behind. It only desires
to destroy and consume.

6 Derrake (N): A black serpent who penetrates the earth with its
tail to pump natural gas from underneath the ground. This
enables the Derrake to shoot fire from its nostrils.

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1 Fury (N): A demon sworn to take vengeance upon whoever
shall break an oath. They especially punish murderers and
malicious hosts, carrying brass whips to beat them with.

2 Hellhound (C): A massive multi-headed dog with a snake for a

tail and with piercing eyes all over its body. It was thought to
protect Hades from unwelcome visitors, but it can be easily
persuaded.

3 Ophan (L): An angel composed of two interlocking wheels with

spokes, all covered in eyes. There are four Ophanim underneath
God’s Merkabah, representing God’s omnipresence.

4 Power (L): A cosmic soldier, waging war against the stars on

God’s behalf. They apprehend demons who disobey God’s Word,
and they deliver them to Gehenna.

5 Serpopard (N): A very long-necked big cat, who likes to entangle

their necks with other serpopards to make agreements between
principalities. They can also bite from a mile away.

6 Watcher (C): An angel who abandoned God in the earliest days.

They came down to earth to teach humans forbidden wisdom and
to fornicate with them. Their descendants are the Nephilim.

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 Fifth Rank

1 Behemoth (C): A Behemoth is like a blood clot where a Leviathan

was slain. It is a hardy remnant of where Chaos was cut across by
the Name of the Father, or a Symptom of the Law.

2 Leviathan (C): The spawn of cosmic Chaos. In the beginning,

one Leviathan was slaughtered for each boundary laid across the
universe: Dark and Light, Water and Land, Man and Woman.

3 Maveth (N): An angel named Death, this demon is worshipped

all over the world. God would threaten to turn the kingdom of
Judah over to Death when they disobeyed His Word.

4 Principality (N): The guardian spirit of a group of people. There

exists a Principality between any number of people given a Name,
but these great Principalities protect nations and kingdoms.

5 Seraph (L): A six-winged creature covered in eyes. They may

have the appearance of a lion, an ox, a human, or an eagle. They
directly attend to the demands of God.

6 Wormwood (L): A massive, herbaceous angel with the power to

turn water bitter, so that any living thing inside becomes dead.
Tiny Wormwoods have been known to treat malaria and parasites.

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 Sixth Rank

Demons of the Sixth Rank are powerful individuals. The party will
never encounter them out of the blue, or even if they try.

Merkabah (L): The throne-chariot of God composed of Ophanim,

Cherubim, and Seraphim. Only prophets have beheld the throne,
descending from the infinite expanse of Heaven down to Earth.

Metatron (L): The Angel of YHVH, God’s Word, the Heavenly

Adam. The Metatron is the Phallus of the Godhead which
infinitely penetrates the cosmos. The Metatron is identified with
God insofar as God identifies with Metatron.

Satan (C): A satan is an adversary. The Satan was the greatest

prosecutor of Heaven, challenging believers to determine their
true hearts. Satan now believes that life is cruel, and that the
universe and its inhabitants should return to undivided unity with
God. Satan is really a Neutral being, but it aligns itself with Chaos.

Therion (C): The great scarlet Beast who ascends from the Sea,
with forty-five heads and fifty horns. A woman dressed in red,
white, and blue sits on top of the Beast: “ROME THE GREAT, THE
MOTHER OF HARLOTS, AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.”
She is drunk with blood.

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 On Alignment

God is said to have created the world by drawing lines between

Dark and Light, Sky and Earth, Eater and Land, Night and Day,
Animals and Humans, and Man and Woman. The Law is the Name
of the Father who partitions the world and guarantees meaning.

Chaos exists in the indeterminate space of undifferentiation.

Chaos resists the Name of the Father, and thereby resists
meaning. The world cannot live up to its identity under the Law.
The world experiences an excess because of the Father’s decree,
and it cannot be reconciled with itself.

Fantasy mediates between Law and Chaos. Between their

representation and their actual being, the subject imagines self-
cohesion to repress their castration like pausing a movie to avoid
the ending. It pains the subject to acquire what they desire and to
realize they are still incomplete. Verily, verily: they never really
desired the damn thing to begin with.

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 The Book of Job

God sits on His Throne. The Adversary sits in His court and
challenges the Heavenly Father. “Does your humble servant Job
fear you for nothing? You have blessed his household and
protected his family from all harm. If You took everything away
from him, he would curse You to Your Face.”

So God allowed the Adversary to bring Job’s life to ruin. His house
was burnt to rubble, and his family was murdered by bandits.

Three ministers approach Job, who now laments his own birth.
One tells him that he would not have been punished if he were
innocent. Another says that he would only have to apologize
before God for his fortune to return. The third says that he should
not presume that his life is blameless only because he was not
punished until then.

Job is steadfast and demands that God answers for His injustice.
God appears in the whirlwind and poses different questions.
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the world? How
could I be held responsible for all the terrible things in the world
when so much is outside of my own control? Can you drink of the
cup that I drink?”

Job was satisfied with this answer. God rebukes the ministers, and
He agrees to restore Job’s fortune and family as a mere pittance.
Then there was evening, and there was morning.

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 Author’s Notes

I want to credit my partner with the idea of writing original

demons (and reinterpreting old ones) to lean into the American
setting. My original intent was always to enable stories that shift
the perspective on Evangelical religion, but I was originally going
to pull from the traditional “pool” of demons. These are usually
foreign deities who have been stripped of their power and
demonized, which is an awful trope.

Yet, many of the demons I wrote are downright grotesque too.

Sure, plenty of them are silly and others are faithful renditions of
Abrahamic beings. But certain ones are shocking and scary, at
least to me. I wanted to write about my decisions to justify them.

When researching demons, I discovered that many, many demons

embody women as seen by the male gaze—especially women who
tempt men into committing sins. This is an extremely gross
religious fantasy that I wanted to confront, and it ties directly into
the Evangelical treatment of women.

The Succubus and the Incubus have incredible name recognition

as demons who sleep with humans. Although this could certainly
represent terror for men and women, usually these demons are
conceived through a male lens. The Succubus is sexy and
tantalizing, while the Incubus usually conforms to masculine
fantasy or is just plain ugly.

My solution was not to make Succubi and Incubi equally sexy.

Instead, I wanted to use the myth of the sex demon to shed light
on how women are demonized through the Evangelical religion.
There is no Succubus in Small Town Gothic. There is an Incubus
who punishes women for lust by impregnating them in their
sleep. This represents how women are punished for having sex
and ruining the “goods” while men tend to get off scot free.

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Pregnancy as a woman’s punishment for sex also relates to how
Evangelicals often conceive of abortion as women running away
from the consequences of sex. Note that my version of the
Incubus is aligned with Law, whereas the Succubus is often
interpreted as a Chaotic entity—no doubt because it plays into
the trope of the temptress.

My rendition of the Siren might appear similar to the usual

conception of the Succubus. This is due in part to the two myths
sharing the premise of a female demon who tempts men into
accepting their own destruction. I specifically chose to exclude
the Succubus to draw attention to the Incubus by the former’s
absence. Yet I included the Siren to draw attention to how women
are blamed for men’s weakness.

The Gorgon is another female monster, and I do not stray that far
from the original myth. According to Ovid, Medusa was raped by
Poseidon in Athena’s temple, and the wise Virgin decided to
punish Medusa for Poseidon’s crime. I wanted to focus on the
Gorgon as a symbol for female victims of sexual assault who are
nevertheless demonized because they are no longer chaste. I even
chose not to mention the usual snakes-for-hair!

The Homunculus and the Minotaur also play on Evangelical

anxieties about abortion and sex, but they are not as potentially
triggering as the others I have mentioned. The Selkie and La
Llorona are also based on bad cultural depictions of women, but
I hoped to bring attention specifically to their myths’ treatment
of women. I recontextualized the Pixie based on the idea of the
“pixie” as a common demonization of LGBT people.

I hope that this bestiary is interesting and useful for you!

Sincerely,

Izzy Marsh

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