This bothered me for a long, long time. There really isn't a
good mechanical reason for prohibiting Hell from producing more Grigori
shy of ruling that unlike normal celestials, the Grigori only
reproduce sexually, and even that has problems. One could say Hell has
no Grigori, but it seems rather unlikely that, once outcast from Heaven,
no Demon Prince could offer a Grigori enough Forces, attunements and
Distinctions to sign up -- if Hell wanted to breed 'em, the first
breeder'd be almost as valuable to them as a Malakite.
But I think I have a decent solution.
The Demon Princes don't reproduce Skulkers because it keeps the
Grigori out of Heaven. Sure, having the variety would be nice, but
Lucifer, Baal and Asmodeus are ultimately very, very well aware that if Hell
kept right along producing Skulkers, or produced more to take advantage
of the Grigori's status, eventually one of them would try to redeem.
Novalis is already on record as thinking a permanent banishment
is too severe. Yves isn't about to stand idly by if a hellborn Skulker
walks into Heaven, repents his evil deeds, renounces his masters and
begs to be redeemed: it'd be pretty farking dissonant. Michael isn't
about to stand idly by while Hell produces hordes of Servitors that
Heaven can't redeem, either-- it's militarily unacceptable (plus he's
kinda cheesed at Dominic's judgement anyhow)-- and the pragmatic Elohim
would undoubtedly stand by him. David's got an oath which binds him to
"never abandon faith, even in the lowest of the fallen, until I have no
choice" -- turning a Skulker away would be dissonant. Even Dominic, who
outcast the Choir in the first place, would be hard pressed to justify
keeping the permanent ban on Grigori in place when faced with a
blameless Hellborn Skulker attempting to enter Heaven.
Heaven will simply not allow Hell to breed a race of
unredeemable anti-Malakite Servitors if it can prevent it.
So, by choosing to put an edict into place banning the
reproduction of Skulkers, Hell trades off a useful tool, but Heaven has
to do the same and they lose access to however many hundreds,
thousands or millions of Forces are occupied in the exiled Grigori -- an
entire eighth of the Host! Perhaps when there are sufficiently few
Outcast-Grigori remaining (like, say, now), Lucifer will review this
policy and consider revoking it, and letting the political turmoil in
Heaven turn out as it may...
Which is not to say one of the more rebellious princes --
Malphas, Saminga and Valefor spring to mind -- might not have a private
squad stashed away. Heck, Kronos proves it's difficult to know what band
a Superior belongs to if he tries to conceal it -- any of the post-Fall
DPs could secretly be Grigori... waiting... watching... skulking from
the shadows...
Back to the INC Mainpage.
Back to the Theories page.
Send mail to the Curator