Erlin
Erlin | ||
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A blood-stained sickle and hog-slaughtering knife, crossed over an orb of night sky glittering with stars. | ||
Alignment | Chaotic Evil | |
Divine Rank | Unknown, he may not even exist | |
Pantheon | None (Malevolent Deity of Ravenloft) | |
Portfolio | Death, trickery, mischief, malice, cruelty, murder | |
Domains | Chaos, Death, Evil, Trickery | |
Home Plane | Unknown (Demiplane of Dread) | |
Worshippers | Gundarkite Rebels, Necromancers, Murderers, Madmen, Tricksters | |
Favoured Weapon | Battleaxe |
Erlin is a very minor malevolent deity in the Dungeons & Dragons setting of Ravenloft. Introduced in the first Ravenloft Gazetteer, Erlin is an all-but-forgotten god once worshipped by the denizens of Gundarak; although his worship was dying even with Gundarak's Darklord was alive and enforcing him as the state religion, it has begun to experience a revival as the growing movement of rebellious Gundarkites, pissed at being conquered by another vampire, have begun using him as a cultural symbol to rally around.
Indeed, the idea that he may have budding clerics starting to gain power amongst the rebels, is presented as a Dread Possibility - a bit of "optional" canon left to the individual DM to decide if it applies to their setting or not.
What little we know of the god portrays him as a malicious, scatter-brained trickster, who created death as a cruel joke by tricking the first mortal into believing it was inevitable. Whilst he has authority over the dead, it's the sense of a farmer tending a flock of sheep or a herd of cattle - worse, he's a slacker with a tendency to just let the dead run free until they catch his attention, which is where the undead come from.