Ingu'lumin

Ingu'lumin, a primordial disembodied thinker, was created in the Creation War (1486 DE - 8777 DE) by the Nine-Tongued Worm. Like other disembodied thinkers, he was made to help manage the vast numbers of troops under his master and to coordinate their activities in a conflict spanning systems.

Ingu'lumin brain was composed of thousands of brains merged together in some hideous dark experiment. These brains were supposedly the top minds of those that fell defending Sphere 380.

Typically, one brain showed dominance over the others, slowly consuming the others, and adding their brain power to its own. The disembodied thinker was then exposed to some force, perhaps psionic, which lobotomized the brain to a point where it was subservient to a primordial master.

- Ptah, excerpt from a Scroll of Dawn - "Primordial Psionic Surgery"

Ingu'lumin was not of much use to the Nine-Tongued Worm and even suspected of being a spy of the one who made him.

The Nine-Tongued Worm was too inclined to brute force attacks and not into creating elaborate and winning strategies. If he had taken my guidance, we would have beaten Bal-Kriav and driven the Nawirrûs Covenant from Sphere 411.

- Ingu'lumin, from Hirstyr Signir - "Mind Over Brawn"

When the Nine-Tongued Worm was defeated at the Battle of Šadullu (1501 DE), Ingu'lumin fled to Nemexus. In one of his labs he used some primordial ichor or elixir to turn his body into water and then a vapor whereupon it drifted up into Nemexus's swirling cloud of debris. The gods and the angels could never find him, wrongly assuming he fled back to Chaos with his master.

In the Demon Spawn War (8972 GE - 9493 GE), whatever substance he used to turn himself to vapor, wore off. After he was reconstituted, a revived Ingu'lumin turned to rekindling the primordial invasion of the Mortal Systems. He opened one rift to Chaos which brought a volcano into the bowels of Unaraggumak and up to the surface of what was then called Maziggandîm. After the first rift was sealed by weave spiders, Ingu'lumin tried to open another rift in the volcano that had just left a sea of entropy and entered the world Bal-Kriav. This second rift proved unstable, soon collapsed and sucking most of the unnatural volcano back into Chaos. In its wake was left the sinkhole Zurukthûr and a fragment of the volcano Gunul-Birum. After these episodes, the angels came looking for Ingu'lumin. The traps and guardians of Nemexus were such that they lost many trying to enter the place and when they did get enough prisoners they learned that their master had soon left after the failure of his second rift.

Ingu'lumin's stubborn determination to open a rift to Chaos did not end at Zurukthûr. Ten years later, he was contacted by his master, the Nine-Tongued Worm, ordering him to help out the demon lord Yeenoghu.

My old adversaries are wearing me down me. I'm being slowed with each poisonous arrow and thrust. Nawenglorûs's poison is befouling my blood , slowing me down. When I go, I will sacrifice my gut rift to a spell which will cause it to open somewhere in Zyrath. This will be of such entropic power that even the weave spiders will never be able to close it. You will aid the demon lord Yeenoghu through the rift and help him bring destruction to our Covenant foes.

- Nine-Tongued Worm, telepathic link to Ingu'lumin - "Last Order"

In 9111 GE, Yeenoghu invaded Bal-Kriav by coming through the Primordial Storm. His closet advisor was Ingu'lumin and unlike his previous master, Yeenoghu let him be the brains while he was the brawn for a demon offensive that led to the capture and control of all of what is today called the Northern Hordelands.

Ingu'lumin was of such intellect that he would make the combined brain power of the Court of One Hundred Eyes seem infantile. His genius led to the finding of a Spark of Creation which allowed his master Yeenoghu to create a race of humanoids similar to him - the gnolls. While Yeenoghu and Ingu'lumin were together they were never routed, which is not to say they weren't driven from a battlefield. When the other demon lords began to fall to the Quara'tun Covenant, Ingu'lumin advised his master that it was time to retreat back to the Abyss. At this advise, Yeenoghu flew into a rage and nearly killed Ingu'lumin before his gnoll generals could stop him. After he came to his senses, Yeenoghu agreed with his now crippled adviser and left for the Abyss, taking a fully intact and battle-hardened army of demons and gnolls with him. He left a thousand gnolls on Bal-Kriav, to take care of Ingu'lumin and learn from him. Yeenoghu's last words to Ingu'lumin were:

See that they don't rip each other's throats out, and that they become something great.

- Yeenoghu, to Ingu'lumin - "Destined for Greatness"

Under the tutelage of Ingu'lumin they did eventually become something great with the founding of the Drugnod Dynasty and then the empire Yagamph. Ingu'lumin never lived to see these empires, dying five centuries later from the wounds he suffered in Yeenoghu's rage. Ingu'lumin instilled enough discipline in the gnolls to curb their entropic leanings and gave them a system of education that lasted till Yagamph. After that empire, the gnolls have experienced a regression that is slowly making them more bestial with each generation.