The Reaper, The Foe of All Good, Hater of Life, Bringer of Darkness, King of All Gloom, Reaper of Flesh
Greater Deity
Symbol: Skull and scythe
Home Plane: Carceri
Alignment: Neutral Evil
Portfolio: Death, darkness, murder, underworld
Worshippers: Necromancers, assassins, rogues, murderers
Cleric Alignments: LE, NE, CE
Domains: Death, Evil, Pestilence, Trickery
Favoured Weapon: “Lifecutter” (Scythe)
Relics: Censer of the last breath, tabard of the disembodied
The deity of death, Nerull (nare-ull), is widely known and widely feared. His gaunt form resembles a mummified, nearly skeletal corpse with rusty red skin, thick blackish-green hair, a cowled cloak of rusty black, and eyes, teeth and nails like poisonous verdigris. His black staff, Lifecutter, forms a scythe-like blade of red force that slays anyone it touches.
Nerull is the patron of those who seek the greatest evil for their own enjoyment or gain.
All are equal in Nerull’s cold realm. Every living thing is an affront to the Reaper, and every death brings a dark spark of joy to his long-dead heart. Those that pray to Nerull to appease him only attract his attention and their own doom. Those that kill in his name shall be rewarded (or so Nerull promises).
Clerics of Nerull are secretive and solitary, since few sane people tolerate their presence. Except in the most evil lands, Nerull has no organized churches. With no overall hierarchy, individual churches work against each other at times. Still, the Reaper is feared across the lands. His clerics wear rust-red garb when not in disguise. Nerull’s clerics commit murders as offerings to their deity. If their actions are discovered, they move on to new hunting grounds. Some take up the wandering life and put on innocent faces as they move from town to town, murdering a few people and then moving on.
Temples to Nerull are always hidden, even in lands where the Reaper is honoured. They usually are located underground, often as parts of catacomb complexes. Most temples are stocked with undead creatures and others that spread or celebrate death, such as hags, fiends and vargouilles.
Some are obsessed with death, even as children, and those are potential recruits to the clergy of Nerull. All must survive the final initiation rite: being buried alive.
Nerull’s followers desecrate ancient tombs looking for lost lore, establish cults to provide willing food for vampires, and raise undead armies to terrify the world of the living.
Much of Nerull’s liturgy is spoken in the past tense, even if it hasn’t happened yet. For example, a cleric of Nerull might pray, “You granted me ultimate dominion over the dead…”.
Nerull’s temples are generally secret places hidden underground and crawling with undead. For unscrupulous adventurers who can stomach Nerull’s hatred of the living, they’re good places for “no questions asked” raise dead spells.
Nerull finds little worth celebrating, other than death. The number of different funeral rites Nerull has, depending on who died and how, is staggering.
Nerull uses a nightwalker as his herald on the Material Plane. Allies are shadow mastiffs, average salamanders and cauchemar nightmares.
Source: Deities and Demigods (Page 84), Complete Divine (Page 116)