Degolified

Even with reports of agents who have succeeded in their investigations, the phrase that repeats itself as a legend awakening Fear by all agents of the Order is: "If you see long black hair floating towards you... RUN."

Paranormal Order RPG Playbook^[1]

The Degolified^[2] is one of the most feared paranormal creatures in the universe. It has all the known Elements, with its main one being Fear, thus being comparable to a direct manifestation of the Other Side.^[1]

All manifestations of a Degolified are strongly connected to terrible tragedies involving young people who died cruelly directly involved in paranormal rituals. According to the Play Book, it develops and distorts more each time it manifests itself in Reality.

Its first appearance was in the 1st episode of The Paranormal Order, being a manifestation of Gabriel Opspor in Agatha Volkomenn's body.^[3] After causing the main deaths in Nostradamus High School, the creature only dies after Elizabeth Webber solved its Enigma of Fear.^[4]

Appearance[]

The main variation of this creature appears to oscillate between some states of matter, sometimes being physically visible and sometimes having a certain degree of transparency.^[5]

Physically has the appearance of a child or teenager with black, straight and long hair that covers its face and runs down its body to the ground. Its spine is twisted and lean and reverses in the area of the abdomen making Its thin. Its arms and legs seem to hang from Its body as it slowly floats a few inches above the ground.^[3]

The creature carries a lot of fog wherever it goes^[6] and its clothes are the same as the victim at the time of death. Its face has empty eyes and its mouth is sewn with a material similar to its own skin, but it is not possible to see because of bands covering it. These bands also run through part of its arm, and its skin appears to have visible cracks. It's possible to see in the Paranormal Order RPG Playbook that the creature has other variations of its appearance, each with a themed Element; but only one of these versions came to appear in the RPG, being this the Blood one.

The Blood variation, named Devoured Degolified, has an extremely large and muscular curved body made of flesh, with arms that have two extra pairs that come out of the original and smaller. Its hair is much smaller compared to the body and limbs, and from its head, the mouth opens disturbingly running through its torso, possessing throughout this extension an absurd amount of teeth, in addition to having a considerable amount of blood throughout the body.^[7]

The Knowledge variation, named Gnostic Degolified, possesses a body resembling its original version, but its hair curls the entire body and forms a kind of halo on top of its head that also resembles ornaments seen in paintings of saints. The Gnostic Degolified has no sewn or capped mouth, with it trying to open from the skin seams. Possessing several sigils shining on its skin, along with a golden aura that runs through it.

The Energy variation, named Disturbed Degolified, replaces its entire physical form and clothing with an Energy material that shines in purple, having a feature that emanates despair, just like other Energy creatures. The hair, instead of being an extension of your body, merges with the Energy material and its roots act like flames that throw themselves up and curl around the arms.

The Death variation, named Decrepit Degolified, is very similar to the original version, but its body becomes a bare skeletal physiognomy of gray color. The face becomes a skull with a spiral at the top, and it runs through the black ooze characteristic of Death.

Behaviour[]

The Degolified gets around floating clumsily with its hair covering its face as it seeks as much as possible to approach its victims. The long strands of hair are used as the main way to attack your targets, strangling them, exploding from the inside out, or crushing the head.

It can break through the fence in its mouth, releasing a powerful deafening cry in all those close to its, usually bringing terrible auditory consequences.^[8]

It cannot be defeated by direct confrontation normally. Instead, the cause of its manifestation must be investigated and used to confront Degolified, thus solving its Enigma of Fear. Only after this revelation can the creature be dispelled or defeated.

Cases[]

Gabriel Opspor[]

Its first appearance was when Agatha Volkomenn lured Gabriel Opspor to the hidden bunker at the Nostradamus High School library, where both studied, performing there a ritual that made them switch bodies before Agatha killed Gabriel. Mathew Geleerd and Gustavo, Gabriel’s friends arrive with the camera hoping that his friend would make Agatha confess to killing the other students, however they witness what appeared to Gabriel killing his colleague. With the Veil already weakened due to the deaths of the other students, the body where Gabriel Opspor lived undergoes a transformation and becomes the Degolified, killing Gustavo while Agatha and Mathew flee.^[9]

Nina[]

Its second appearance was at St. Menefreda Orphanage in the dormitories' area. It is discovered that Nina was the target of a terrible death at the hands of some other orphans, being the main among them Gal, Nubi and Henri. After that, she reappeared as Degolified, haunting the right part of the building.^[10]

To dispel the Degolified, the agents had to join the two parts of Nubi’s favorite bunny, thus making the creature disappear.

Abilities[]

Fly: Degolified has the ability to move floating through the air.^[3] In pursuit, the creature was shown to move faster as it advanced, facilitating its approach.^[11]

Ripped Scream: The Degolified is able to tear the tissue trapped in its mouth to perform a deafening scream, affecting the target’s eardrums. This can cause one-to-two hearing loss, temporarily or permanently.^[8]

Grab and Choke: The Degolified uses its long strands of hair to grab his victim, wrapping him around his neck and strangling him.^[12]

Regeneration: By only being defeated by solving its Enigma of Fear, the creature, by taking damage, regenerates quickly. If too much damage is done, its physical form dissipates in the air, but returns over time and will continue to return until the unknown ends.^[13]

Metamorphosis[]

Depending on several factors, Degolified can undergo physical mutations directly linked to one of the Elements, changing its main element when transforming.

Devoured Degolified: By absorbing a grabbed target after killing it, the Degolified turns into a Blood form bigger and more aggressive.^[7]
Decrepit Degolified: When there's much time dedicated to the Degolified trying to attack it, it turns into a Death form more skeletal and twisted.
Disturbed Degolified: In case the Degolified drives someone insane, it turns into an Energy form more ghostly and intangible.
Gnostic Degolified: If someone fails to confront the Degolified with the cause of its invocation, it turns into a Knowledge form more golden and shiny.

Hosts[]

Gabriel Opspor in Agatha Volkomenn's body: The manifestation of the Degolified on Agatha’s body appears to be a twisted female humanoid figure, wearing a school uniform and a red skirt. Its hair was long and black, and covered its entire face, which was with an X-shaped tape in its mouth. As time went by and the veil was damaged, the tape gave way and a huge mouth with powerful teeth was revealed, an appearance similar to the Devoured Degolified.

Nina: The Degolified manifests as a twisted female humanoid figure with a large hole in its waist revealing its viscera, with long black hair floating in front of it, and wearing a brown outfit. That is Nina's spirit, a child who died during the fire, not by the flames, but in the hands of Gal and his friends, being Henri's first victim.

Trivia[]

During The Paranormal Order, Cellbit passed several references, also called "Moodboard", for the understanding of the ambience of the RPG to the artist. Those in which they had some references and inspirations for the arts of the Degolified and Nostradamus High School.^[14]
- The image features an art by Tim Burton in the center, showing a boy, likely reference to the appearance of Gabriel Opspor.
- The image has three photos depicting abandoned schools and a photo depicting a floor full of ashes, since the school had been burned.
- The image also consists of two photos of the gameplay of two games, specifically Fatal Frame III: The Tormented, in the left corner, and Fatal Frame IV, in the right corner.
- At last, the image also has a photo of "The Whispering Woman", one of the stories of Junji Ito.
Degolified was the first creature of Paranormal Order to have an official illustration.
It is known that at some point the Degolified had only 4 Elements: Blood, Death, Energy and Fear.^[15] However, because of its consecutive manifestations in Reality, it acquired the Element of Knowledge.