Dwellers in the Depths (race)

The race of Dwellers in the Depths are from Ramsey Campbell's "The Horror from the Bridge". For the tome, see Dwellers in the Depths (tome).

Description

The thing had eight major armlike appendages protruding from an elliptical body, six of which were tipped with flipper-like protrusions, the other two being tentacular Four of the web-tipped legs were located at the lower end of the body, and used for walking upright. The other two were near the head, and could be used for walking near the ground. The head joined directly to the body; it was oval and eyeless. In place of eyes, there was an abominable sponge-like circular organ about the center of the head; over it grew something hideously like a spider's web. Below this was a mouth-like slit which extended at least halfway round the head, bordered at each side by a tentacle-like appendage with a cupped tip, obviously used for carrying food to the mouth.... The sketch and the Necronomicon illustration had not reproduced everything; they had not shown the transparency of the half-gelatinous flesh, revealing the mobile organs beneath the skin. Nor had they shown the globular organ above the brain.... And as the mouth fell open when they stirred the body, he saw that the being possessed no teeth, but six rows of powerful tentacles interlaced across the opening of the throat.
— Ramsey Campbell, "The Horror from the Bridge"

Large, amphibious, eyeless, octopoid horrors, sometimes compared to large Deep Ones, that serve the Xothan Old Ones from fresh water lakes and streams in the Severn Valley.

Associated Mythos Elements

• setting: Xothic Cycle
• tome: Ponape Scripture
• tome: Revelations of Glaaki
• deity: Cthulhu, Dagon and Hydra, Ythogtha, Zoth-Ommog
• race: Xothans
• race: Deep Ones
• location: Severn Valley
• cult: Cult of Cthulhu

References

• fiction: Ramsey Campbell's "The Horror from the Bridge"
• sourcebook: Malleus Monstrorum