Bel Aloth

Strangely enough, one of the sobriquets associated with Bel Aloth is ‘the Serene One.’ This ultroloth has not once – at least, not any time in recent history or recalled memory – displayed any sign of strong anger, fear, hatred, or any other powerful emotion. Everything, to Bel Aloth, is a tool to be used, a situation to be manipulated, or an obstacle to be overcome.

Similarly, she is not known for strong likes or dislikes, being virtually impervious to whims. The ultroloth is, however, notorious for smiting mortals who attempt to directly invoke or contact her. Said mortals seem to always end up dead in horrible ways – sudden suicides, deaths of unknown causes, death by sudden infection with a rare and horrible disease, and so on. Such a death never occurs immediately after an attempted summoning, but only after a certain length of time (a day to several weeks).

Her True Name appears to be totally unknown, though incorrect names that purport to be her True Name show up occasionally. (She has disposed of a few enemies who believed they knew her True Name, then only discovered too late that the ‘true name’ was no such thing.)

In general, Bel Aloth is not keen on mortals even knowing of her existence, and has been known to take steps to prevent such knowledge from being too commonplace. While in this case she usually stops short of widespread slaughter, written works that mention her may be suppressed or mysteriously disappear, or loud-mouthed rumormongers may have bad things happen to them. Among very ‘in the know’ types on the Lower Planes (such as Blood War mercenaries and those mortals who have become bound to fiends in one way or another), referring to Bel Aloth is generally regarded as bad luck.

The few references to her that exist place her as the head of research for the Wasting Tower, perhaps even for the race as a whole. This has been true through the reign not only of Mydianchlarus, but also Anthraxus before him. (It is entirely possible that she couldn’t care less who sits on the Siege Malicious, as long as yugoloth research continues to proceed smoothly.) Exactly how she dealt with the transition of power, or whether she favors either ‘loth over the other, is unknown.

She is believed to be among the oldest of the ultroloths, going back either to the time the race was originally created or shortly afterward. She has some form of access even to the General of Gehenna, though the nature of this access is unknown. It is known that she is no stranger to either the summit of the Wasting Tower or to the Crawling City. Throughout all of her long existence, she has never once made a move for the Siege Malicious herself, though she always seems to end up in a position of power and influence.

Most of her day-to-day existence seems to be taken up dictating how the Wasting Tower’s resources will be spent in the course of the never-ending experiments held in that place. Bel Aloth does not know everything that transpires within Khin-Oin, but where its experimental efforts are concerned, she is extremely likely to know of it.

Those "resources," of course, include a large number of the more research-focused and brilliant of the arcanaloth caste. Within the yugoloth race, there exist a wide variety of philosophical differences of opinion (mainly concerning the proper methodology and focus of Evil) that may not matter very much to mortals, but do seem to matter very much to them. Bel Aloth has a reputation for being more "tolerant" than some, and has both conservatives and firebrands working for her.

Once in a while an arcanaloth has challenged her position, which invariably results in the arcanaloth’s head and hands being nailed to a wall in full view of his former colleagues – minus his ears. Popular rumor among them holds that Bel Aloth keeps an entire drawer (or an urn or other object, depending on the rumor) full of preserved arcanaloth ears somewhere as trophies, and may open this object and rifle through it absently if she is particularly displeased with an arcanaloth she’s speaking with.

Despite the ears, her usual way of doing things does not have very much of the ‘schoolyard bully’ to it. She does not make enemies without careful forethought. She does not bluster, rarely threatens – and when she does threaten, Bel Aloth is always prepared to back it up. She is unusual in that she does not even seem to particularly gloat over the suffering of others. Her question in such matters would be: ‘Is this being’s suffering useful to me, or is it useless?’ She will torture for information or in the course of an experiment, but not simply for pleasure.

The ‘Serene One’ is notorious for never forgetting anyone who crosses her. Years or (in the case of immortal beings) centuries may pass, but once she deems it practical to do so, Bel Aloth will exact revenge on whoever thwarted her – almost always by some indirect means. This does not mean that she does not tolerate disagreement or simple annoyance, but those who actively act against her tend to suffer for it.

Her appearance is not much different from that of other ultroloths – the best way to distinguish individual ultroloths, generally, is by the weapons they carry. Bel Aloth wields a large two-handed sword that is usually a lifeless grey in color, but has been known to change to a black color or to different shades of grey, seemingly without any pattern. When exposed to blood, bile, spinal fluid, or any other bodily fluid, it will always drink them, up to a seemingly limitless quantity. (Bel Aloth has used the sword occasionally to drain standing pools or large spills, which are not all that uncommon in Khin-Oin.) If the ultroloth kills someone with the weapon and leaves the sword in the body for a time, the corpse will become dessicated as it is drained of fluids.

Wounds inflicted by the sword appear to be impossible to heal. Additionally, if the injured being is not immune to disease, any wounds will always become infected, which seems to invariably result in death.

She is always seen in grey or white-grey robes, inscribed in a few places with runes. Bel Aloth also wears a pair of amulets, each having a seemingly simple geometric shape. It is probably safe to assume that these are magical, but their exact properties are unknown.