Homebrew Templates

Sarcophagus Knight:
As rare as they are powerful, the Sarcophagus Knight is a hallowed undead that results from the oft-fanatic devotion and fervor that servants of the divine find themselves slipping into. The pinnacle of the path of serving a higher power, the Sarcophagus Knight is a being who has chosen to shed his life as a method to cheat death by becoming undead, so that they might embody the ideals of their chosen idol or deity for all eternity, serving as the Paragon of their faith they often believe they are. While many who reach such heights of devotion, piety and faith frequently stop at nothing to prove their devotion and faith, the idea of becoming a Sarcophagus knight is something few creatures of faith can stand. Entombed forever within iron and rock, bound to live forevermore in the material plane in the service of a higher power with neither feeling nor pleasures of the flesh, The process involves the extraction of the worshipper’s life-force and its imprisonment in a specially prepared sarcophagus—the worshipper gives up life, but in offering up his life to his god he also offers up his death, and as long as his sarcophagus remains intact he can continue on in his sermons, faith-spreading, and work without fear of the passage of time.

The quest to become a Sarcophagus Knight is a lengthy one. While construction of the magical sarcophagus to contain the worshipper’s soul is a critical component, a prospective Sarcophagus Knight must also learn the secrets of transferring his soul into the receptacle and of preparing his body for the transformation into undeath through rigorous mummification and embalming to ensure his form stays long-lived even without divine assistance, neither of which are simple tasks. While other transformation rituals rely more on the prospective candidate for transformation, the process to become a Sarcophagus Knight is one that places the highest importance on the approval of a worshipper’s chosen idol or deity. It is their approval, their help, assistance and promise of acceptance that allows a worshipper’s soul to be bound to the receptacle, and without such a promise and favor, the process is doomed from the start. Further complicating the ritual is the fact that no two bodies or souls are exactly alike—a ritual that works for one worshipper might simply kill another or drive him insane. The exact methods for each worshipper’s transformation are left to the GM’s discretion, but should involve expenditures of tens of thousands of gold pieces, numerous deadly adventures in the service of their god to curry their favor for the binding of their soul to the sarcophagus, and a large number of difficult skill checks over the course of months, years, or decades to prove to their chosen idol or deity that they are, in fact, worth the effort to create a servant capable of carrying out their will for eternity.

Rarely, a Sarcophagus knight is created naturally when a creature or being dies that, in the eyes of a certain Deity, Minor Deity, Powerful outsider, or similar idol that being worshipped or venerated in some way in their lives, dies or perishes in an act that their object of worship deems suitable to merit the reward of becoming a Sarcophagus Knight. In such rare, rare cases, the being who died is often given a choice...accept a reward in the afterlife, or return to life as an undying pastor and servant of their object of worship. In such cases, all cost and expense is waived by the object of worship, though the Sarcophagus Knight’s Code of Conduct is a bit more stringent than it otherwise would be, as it is not decided by the Sarcophagus knight itself.