| There is a shop in the Lady's Ward called the Golden Ziggurat. It holds little resemblance to its namesake, being a blocky mausoleum of a building with red marble columns supporting its front. Behind the counter is a man named Lianzer, an arrogant, prying, unpleasant merchant who seems to speak in double-meanings and ghastly implications. He is not well-known to the average Cager, and those who live nearby shun his establishment becaues of his dark reputation. Lianzer will sell any item that a patron requests, and in fact seems to take perverse delight in particularly abhorrent wares. It's perhaps best left unknown what sort of depraved necessity would drive a person to consort with such a tradesman, but that's not the half of it.Lianzer is, in fact, far more than what he seems. Far more devious, far more powerful, and far more sinister. His true identity is that of a glabrezu tanar'ri named Maegoshel. As any greybeard knows, glabrezu exist to corrupt mortals into wickedness through the allure of magic, wealth, and power. Maegoshel has spent decades (if not longer) integrating himself into the Cage under a false identity. He uses his store as a front to his grander schemes of claiming mortals' souls. When a buyer seems particularly desperate or succeptible, Maegoshel draws him deeper in, offering grander and grander prizes in return for more and more despicable acts of cruelty and evil. Of course, Maegoshel doesn't take very exacting measures to completely obscure his true self. He likes for his customers to feel uncomfortable around him. It gives him cruel pleasure to watch lesser beings squirm and besides, it helps to separate those passingly curious from those truly willing to abandon their morals.About two years ago, Maegoshel was revealed as a glabrezu by a handful of planewalkers and had to close shop after most of his customers became peery of his motives. He opened the Golden Ziggurat a short while later and in a new location under the new guise of Lianzer. Chant goes, the band of adventurers that unveiled his operation met a sticky end when their tout turned stag and left them to die in the wastes of Limbo. Nobody knows whether the whole affair was orchestrated by the irate tanar'ri, but only a complete Clueless would believe he had no part in the revenge. The glabrezu is patient, though, and sees each new disguise he must adopt as merely a new phase in his designs. He simply changed his name and moved his shop. His only real motivation seems to be to collect the souls of desperate sods willing to enter a pact with him.Though Maegoshel does not share the secret, the back door of the Golden Ziggurat is actually a portal to the gate-town Bedlam. The key from the Sigil side is a live rat, cranium or otherwise, and from the Bedlam side the key is three rusted nails. |
| Maegoshel |
| (planar / male glabrezu / advanced to 15 hit dice / chaotic evil) |
| Male glabrezu advanced to 15 hit dice: CR 14; hugeT outsider (chaotic, extraplanar, evil, tanar'ri); HD 15d8+150; hp 219; Init +0; Spd 40 ft. ft; AC 27 (–2 size, +19 natural) touch 8, flat-footed 27; Base Atk +15/+33; Grp Pincers +23 melee (2d8+10); Atk 2 pincers +23 melee (2d8+10) and 2 claws +21 melee (1d6+5) and bite +21 melee (1d8+5); SA Improved grab, spell-like abilities, summon tanar'ri, damage reduction 10/good, darkvision 60 ft., immunity to electricity and poison, resistance to acid 10, cold 10, and fire 10, spell resistance 21, telepathy 100 ft., true seeing; AL CE; SV Fort +19, Ref +9, Will +12; Str 31, Dex 10, Con 31, Int 16, Wis 16, Cha 20. |
| Skills and Feats: Bluff +25, Concentration +25, Diplomacy +15, Disguise +18 (+20 acting), Forgery +9, Intimidate +25, Knowledge (arcana) +18, Knowledge (the planes) +20, Listen +26, Move Silently +18, Search +18, Sense Motive +21, Spellcraft +18, Spot +26, Survival +3 (+5 following tracks); Cleave, Deceitful, Great Cleave, Multiattack, Persuasive, Power Attack. Speaks: Abyssal, Planar Trade, Celestial, Draconic. |
| Special Abilities: Maegoshel's natural weapons, as well as any weapons he wields, are treated as chaotic- and evil-aligned for the purposes of overcoming damage reduction.Typically, once Maegoshel has identified a likely victim, he makes efforts to provide whatever the customer wants at ever-escalating costs. For payment, he may ask for murder, arson, theft, betrayal, desecration, or anything else he can devise. He enjoys creativity with his prices. In the end, Maegoshel offers use of his wish ability, sometimes after he has revealed his fiendish nature. In such instances, he finds great joy in his "clients'" disgust as they understand exactly what they are doing, yet agree to the deal anyway.Improved grab: To use this ability, Maegoshel must hit a Medium or smaller opponent with a pincer attack. He can then attempt to start a grapple as a free action without provoking an attack of opportunity.Spell-like abilities:At will--chaos hammer (DC 19), confusion (DC 19), dispel magic, mirror image, reverse gravity (DC 22), greater teleport (self plus 50 pounds of objects only), unholy blight (DC 19); 1/day--power word stun. Caster level 14th. The save DCs are Charisma-based.Once per month, Maegoshel can produce a wish for a mortal humanoid. He typically saves this for his selected targets and draws them in until they give in to their basest desires, at which point he grants a wish in return for tremendous suffering, pain, or sacrifice inflicted.Summon tanar'ri (Sp): Once per day, Maegoshel can attempt to summon 4d10 dretches or 1d2 vrocks with a 50% chance of success, another glabrezu with a 20% chance of success, or Terouwel Malicequeen the night hag with an 80% chance of success. The reasons for the unusual ability to call upon this particular hag are unknown, but he may be beholden to her in some way. Maegoshel rarely summons her (both because he resides in Sigil and because he loathes to go to her for help).True seeing (Su): Glabrezu continuously use true seeing as the spell (caster level 14th).Skills: Glabrezu have a +8 racial bonus on Listen and Spot checks. |
| Possessions: When disguised as Lianzer, Maegoshel typically goes unarmed. Most assume that this is merely because he is a spellslinger, but in fact the fiend knows that most patrons with whom he deals cannot hope to threaten him and that, if truly pressed to defend himself, his true form renders such crude weaponry useless.In his shop, Maegoshel carries a tremendous assortment of magical oddities. In addition to a small selection of standard magical equipment, the Golden Ziggaurat stocks a wide variety of spells, arcane components, and eldritch curiosities, most of a sinister origin. Maegoshel gladly sells items from the Book of Vile Darkness and evil or vile spells. He knows that these are most likely to cause suffering to others, and revels in the thought that he could provide so much harm to the multiverse. He also recognizes that customers who are interested in such products are the best victims to target for his corruptive schemes, which he considers an art form.It is unknown what exactly Maegoshel uses to create his seemingly permanent illusion as the fell merchant Lianzer, but the effect appears to be equivalent to a polymorph spell. Most likely, he uses a magic ring to create this guise. This raises the question, though, of what other forms he might have taken in other situations and the roles he has already played in the Cage. |
| Companions: Maegoshel employs two minions to run puppet shops. Elui (NE male aasimar rogue 1/wizard 3) manages The Scarab's Trove in the Lady's Ward, while the proprietor of The Curious Collection in the Guildhall Ward is a man named Kilian Verwick (CE male human adept 5). Elui, a pale--nearly albino--planetouched, sells high-end items and is prone to cursing liberally. Kilian is a sharp-featured man of about fifty who deals more prominently in consumable magic items and some uniquely enchanted weaponry. Both of these shady cutters report to Maegoshel regarding any customers who seem particularly desperate or unusually interested in dark merchandise. They do not suspect their master's fiendish identity, but do understand that he has connections to the nearby Temple of the Abyss, which they assume simply means that he buys magic devices from the clergy there and passes it along to them. Maegoshel reveals little to the two about his own dealings, and simply supplies them with rare and evil wares to pawn off in return for information which he uses to locate his next targets. Truth be told, they would probably be little fazed to discover that their enigmatic supplier and benefactor is a glabrezu out to consume desperate mortals foolish enough to trade with him. Each knows of the other's shop, but believes that his own is the more valued relationship with Maegoshel who, for his own part, holds disdain for the two petty villains who remain foolishly content to be pawns in his schemes.Additionally, a quasit named Imnezh ("Skullbiter") can often be seen in the Golden Ziggurat. Some have asked to buy him, and Lianzer usually lets the little demon's own cursing speak for itself. Imnezh is usually assumed to be Lianzer's familiar, and is too lazy to object to his part in the masquerade, for which he cares little. He sometimes runs errands for the more powerful fiend. |
| Allies: When Maegoshel has trouble with evasive customers who don't pay up, he might call on the services of a night hag by the name of Terouwel Malicequeen on Oinos (NE female night hag, diviner 9) to plague the offender's dreams until he is driven into insanity. He is hesitant to request help from her, though. It seems that she helped him in the past with some tremendous desire and has held him in debt to her ever since, simply adding each call for aid to the fiend's obligation. Possibly, Terouwel helped a Maegoshel to attain his current station when he was a much lesser fiend, and he now corrupts mortals for the hag's benefit to pay her off. Further requests for her help, then, simply add to his sentence.All in all, though, Maegoshel has no allies to speak of. He hates all creatures but himself and any cooperation on his part is either part of his mortal ruse or a very temporary truce for as long as it is convenient. |
