| “ | Be not afraid of whirlpools, of strong winds, and murky waves. Fear the creature that dwells in the darkest depths, the ice-shackled Kraken, that threatens to surface and your soul to keep. | „ |
| ~ Erna Grcic, Beneath the Surface |
Kraken are legendary sea monsters said to have spawned from the flesh of Cthylla herself. While initially believed to have been only one, it was later revealed that there were multiple Kraken running amok in the ocean depths.
Description[]
Fearsome creatures with tentacles closely resembling a giant squid's that could sink multiple ships with the crushing grip of their appendages, and drag an entire ship's crew beneath the surface to a watery grave. The Kraken were said by some to be the length of 10 ships, but legend's of even larger Kraken exist though are less common.
The word "Kraken" was first heard in seagoing lore and mythology, referring to a creature whose many arms or tentacles could reach to the top of a ship's mainmast and could without any great effort capsize a fully-rigged vessel. The huge suckers on the Kraken's tentacles were strong enough to pull the flesh clean away from a sailor's face.
In Norse mythology, the Kraken was a creature from the sea so large that on the surface it was mistaken for a chain of islands. Seamen were often lost when they camped on what they thought was an island, only to be drowned when the creature swam back to the bottom of the sea. It had large tentacles and suckers with which it could seize large ships and drag them down. The Norse believed the Kraken would rise to the surface at the end of the world.
History[]
Origins[]
According to legend, the Kraken were the result of a union between Cthylla and the Leviathan. Rabbis believe that the Leviathan originally had a female counterpart with which to mate with, but God was concerned that their offspring would completely envelop the Earth and devour all in sight and destroyed the female Leviathan. As a result, the Leviathan took to Cthylla, the daughter of Cthulhu, and mated with her to create the Kraken. Another legend in regards to the origins of the Kraken states that they took form from the torn pieces of the Leviathan's flesh.
The Kraken existed for an unknown amount of time but were rumored to have been around for as long as there was water on Earth, though every culture had its own telling of the Kraken's legend. Legends of the Kraken go back many years of mythologies related to the sea. The word "Kraken" was first heard in 12th-century Norwegian legends, referring to a creature the size of an island, and usually depicted as a giant squid. In these legends, the Kraken normally lived at great depths, but have been sighted at the surface and have reportedly attacked ships.
Imprisonment of Rahab[]
Rahab was the Angel of the Deep who kept the Kraken at bay and prevented the beasts from assaulting the earliest seafaring humans that crossed over their territories. He also prevented Cthylla herself from going near the denizens of Hyperborea.
However, when Rahab was dismantling the continent of Hyperborea, the destruction drew the attention of not just Heaven but also the Kraken. The marine beasts would snatch any wayward Hyperborean that crashed into the ocean depths and devour them. Due to Rahab's actions and his sinful negligence, the archangel Gabriel descended from on high, whereby he ordered his host to slaughter the surrounding Kraken as he subdued Rahab himself. Afterward, he would use the corpses of the slain Kraken to bind the now fallen angel to the depths of the ocean, crafting chains from their very entrails.
A majority of the Kraken still terrorized the ocean the depths as centuries passed. Cthylla opted to raid the Heavens alongside her children by breaking through the gates of the South Wind, a gate which led to Heaven itself, undeterred seeing as Rahab was imprisoned for his crimes. When God knew of this, He made the Kraken fight amongst each other in tumultuous battles that rocked the oceans before destroying them with arrows made of "fire that could not be quelled by water". Cthylla herself was defeated by Uriel, imprisoning her within a gigantic holding cell, later a palace, known as Cthygonnaar. The surviving Kraken fled and hid beneath the depths, only to later serve the gods of other pantheons while others sought power from demonic sources since Cthylla was imprisoned. Still others remain free individuals.
War with Atlantis[]
When the legions of Dagon rose to prominence within the oceans of the world, Atlantis was one of the first civilizations asked to bend the knee to Dagon in order to be spared the horrors a war for conquest would bring. The proud Atlantean people adamantly refused to bow before the Lord of the Depths, immediately sparking a deadly undersea conflict that goes on to this day, albeit largely unnoticed by the surface world. Ancient sailors however noted that the seas were ravaged by a "terrible storm" with the storm being a product of the undersea battles between the Merfolk and Dagon's legions, the Kraken included.
A small number of Kraken (the ones that survived the slaughter during Cthylla's attempted raid in Heaven) alongside hundreds of Merrow, Raandeese, and Deep Ones under the command of Dagon have launched assaults upon the mighty city, only to be slain by the advanced technology of the Atlanteans, or devoured by the city's guardian Charybdis, who uses her massive maw to swallow Merrow whole and tear large chunks of flesh out of giant Deep Ones. The Kraken that joined also fell before the might of Charybdis and the forces of Atlantis. At some point, the Merfolk sought the Kraken that did not take part in the war for they were rather impressed by their ferocity and gave them an ultimatum: to join their ranks and protect them against those whom they once served and from the greed of man. The Kraken understood and yielded, now adopted as guardians by the Merfolk and from the blessing of Poseidon himself.
