Ghattambah (Art by Amamidori)
Ghattambah, also known as M'Rohoj or OoP-3004, is one of the Ogdru Hem and a deity worshipped by the Shan.
Description[]
Like most of the Ogdru Hem, Ghattambah's visage is incomprehensible and utterly eldritch and those who lived long enough to get a glimpse of it describe it as insectoid. Ghattambah seems to resemble the extinct Cicadetta luculenta, albeit with a much more colorful wing pattern than what has been described.
History[]
Origins[]
Ghattambah was one of the Great Old Ones and existed in a dimension above baseline reality. It survived by feeding off the faith of lesser entities, becoming stronger depending on the belief of those whose faith it fed on. It originally resided on the planet Shaggai where the Insects from Shaggai also lived and extensively worshipped the Insect God. When Ghattambah beheld a premonition of Shaggai's destruction, it sent out a telepathic link throughout the hivemind of the Shan, informing them that they must prepare an exodus. Ghattambah would leave pieces of its molt like bread crumbs for the Shan to follow though it presumably took them millions of years.
Ghattambah arrived on Earth but was met with the Elder Things and the Shoggoth on the precipice of war. To preserve its life, Ghattambah reverse-pupated itself and entered a larval form though it was buried deep in the coldest regions of the arctic. According to FBC agent Timothy Lutterman, Ghattambah's physiology was what led to the emergence of unnaturally large insects dubbed as the Megalomorpha. The Megalomorpha developed some sort of psychic link with Ghattambah, acting as its terrestrial agents on the ancient Earth but a majority of them were wiped out after the Chicxulub asteroid hit the Earth.
Arrival on Earth[]
Millions of years later, the larval body of Ghattambah was unearthed by the Australasian Antarctic Expedition in the year 1913. This was the discovery of the century and they began to load the ice unto the cargo for Miskatonic University, although even dormant inside the ice, Ghattambah's presence was making the sled dogs immensely uncomfortable and has purportedly caused two members of the expeditions to go mad. As they loaded the cargo on a plane, the black box from the plane's radio revealed that the pilots were attacked by one of the passengers who was raving like a lunatic about a "cicada god". This eventually caused the plane to crash. Authorities could not find traces of the specimen nor the pilot and passenger with Miskatonic believing that the specimen was destroyed in the ensuing crash.
However, it was later revealed that Ghattambah survived and sent out a signal to the insects of Shaggai who began to make preparations in taking over the planet but their operations were discovered in 1942 by Richard Carnby and Emily Hartwood alongside biologists who were researching on a body belonging to one of the Shan. The Shan were destroyed in the ensuing conflict between them and the humans, leading to Ghattambah to lay low for a while, burrowing beneath the town of Margrave, Georgia. Little by little, the town falls under the grip of a cult centered around Ghattambah's worship, founded by the Mondrago family. There, the Mondragos call forth people to the Chapel of Ghattambah in their expansive mansion where they eat the "body of Christ" that forces them to undergo a horrific change, transforming into grotesque humanoid insects.