Grezza the Cleft, Compilation on the Daedra Lord

All research is henceforth to be suspended on the daedric entity known as “The Broken Prince”. This is a compilation exists for scholarly purposes only and must be accessed at the discretion of the Archmage.

“The Broken Prince” is sometimes identified as a Demiprince, yet no evidence supports mortal lineage. To further complicate things, no mage has been able to go through formerly reliable channels to acquire any data: Fa-Nuit-Hen claims his memory to be foggy on this particular Daedroth, Mora is not interested in making any deals regarding his records concerning The Broken Prince, Worm Cultists hush up when our spies ask about him; never has it been so difficult to draw out reliable information. The only sources that exist (that can be accessed) are either old, passed down through generations, a result of mass-murder events, or deep in Argonian swamplands.

The Broken Prince Goes by “The Grotesque One” among reachmen, “Dro’ztaka” in Northern Elsywer, and “Xrotka” by the Saxhleel. In those lands, he is mostly infamous for one thing- mutilation and deformity. Say a Saxhleel farmer looses a finger to a rowdy guar, the villagers often will comfort her by assuring her that Xrotka took her finger as payment to Sithis, so she may live a few more seasons. Among the Khajit, cultists to Dro’ztaka are thought to intercept caravans and sever the tails of merchants. What they do with these tails is a matter of debate- some say the tails are part of a ritual, some say they consume the tails, some believe they sever the tails and then dispose of them. Despite Reachmen often being complicit with foul things, The Grotesque One is nearly always seen as an adversarial god to the people of the Reach. He is seen to be responsible for children that are born with monstrous birth defects or misshapen bodies (e.g. twisted limbs or small heads).

The term “Broken Prince” comes from a short-lived cult composed of widowed and divorced noblewoman. They claimed to have been contacted by their deity either after the death of their spouse or separation from them and instructed to join the cult. They posed little harm for the first few years of their operation- ranting about the importance of traumatizing one's children or murdering one's spouse on street corners- but it was not until they had been connected to a series of kidnappings and tortures that the covens were systematically hunted down and destroyed.

It would seem that The Broken Prince deals not only in physical mutilation, but also spiritual disfigurements such as divorce, tortured minds, and the practice of lichdom. In a text recovered from a raided Worm Cult barrow, Mannimarco is said to have contacted a Daedroth after gaining inspiration for lichdom from the dragon priests of Skyrim. He claims that the Daedroth introduced itself as “Grezzga, the Cleft”. This Grezzga seems to have demanded sacrifice in exchange for his hidden secrets; but, instead of wanting victims dead, he simply wanted them mutilated, tortured, or blinded and then let go. Mannimarco details that he was not sure if the Daedroth would yield anything useful, but he performed the tasks on the slim chance that he might.

Grezzga granted insights into cleaving one’s soul into multiple pieces, thereby giving one more freedom to tinker with it as one might with a victim’s soul. Several powerful necromancers have been intercepted trying to attain lichdom by connecting portions of their soul to a phylactery- a process that infamously involves the cutting off portions of one’s own soul. This does not imply that this Daedroth governs over the process of becoming a lich, but it does imply that he is in some way related to it.

Master Necromancer Cradun and Restoration Expert Licks-Her-Wounds were commissioned by the guild in the beginning of the 3rd Era to journey to journey to Black Marsh and attempt to study the only extant Xrokta worshippers the guild was, and still is, aware of. The Headless Chanters are usually given a wide berth by the native Argonians, and they were even reluctant to speak about the cult in general terms. Our mages eventually found the Ziggurat that constituted the community of the Headless Chanters and stayed hidden for the duration of their observations. They stayed only six days, observing from afar until Master Cradun (who prefers incorporeal necromancy to incarnomancy) informed his partner that he was unable to stay and observe their rituals.

The cultists numbered over two hundred, and consisted of Saxhleel, Kothringi, and some unidentifiable members. The Kothringi were some of the oldest cultists and had all been decapitated and yet were still ambulatory, produced sound, and interacted with other cultists. The Argonian cultists had their eyes gouged out, and were often missing limbs as well. A few older Saxhleel specimens also had their heads removed as with the Kothringi cultists. They exhibited abnormal strength and agility despite their mutilations (and perhaps because of them). The cultists engaged in ritualistic intercourse, mutilation, cannibalism, and torture. On one occasion, one of the more “intact” cultists gave birth upon their altar to a grotesquely disfigured child who was then quickly consumed by other cultists (this was the event that made Master Cradun insist on leaving).

The mages transcribed chants they heard and writings they found around the settlement. Upon analyzing their notes, they concluded they had made an extraordinary discovery on the Broken Prince. Repeatedly, the cultists would invoke the name of their god, “Xrokta”, but nearly one-third of his invocations included the term “he’henmo Namiran” after his name. It was concluded through making parallels to Old Saxhleel that the phrase meant “Xrokta, Branch of Namira”. The implications make quite a lot of sense, Xrokta’s sphere seems to involve the immediate and involuntary disgust that relates to much of Namira’s doings, but is far more specific in its scope- as it is resigned to mutilation and deformity. The fact that The Broken Prince may be Namira’s “son” leaves with one of two possibilities- either he really is a Demiprince or he is related to Namira much like how Molag Grunda is to the King of Strife.

Nothing is known of any realms of Oblivion associated with The Broken Prince or his avatars in the mortal realm. Mages are heavily discouraged from attempting to contact the Daedroth for any reason, even academic; mages who contact this daemon learn little and are often horrifically mutilated within a few days after having done so.