Quick Links
In Cult Of The Lamb, the protagonist's power is granted by an eldritch deity called The One Who Waits Below. Usually shortened to The One Who Waits (or simply him), the god of death has influence over the world despite being chained into his realm by the Bishops of the Old Faith.
As the Lamb's Crusade progresses, you'll learn more about the history of The One Who Waits and his relationship to his captors. Usually imparted by the sage Haro, these stories hint at a much deeper setting and lore than what is seen in the game.
This article contains major spoilers for Cult Of The Lamb.
The Old Faith
During the Lamb's first meeting with Haro, the sage reveals that there were once hundreds of gods ruling over what are now the lands of the Old Faith. Based on what we see during the game, it seems that any mortal creature can attain godhood by cultivating worship and sacrifices from others. No doubt the smaller cults merged over time as their gods were defeated, forgotten, or cast down.
By the time of the Lamb's Crusade, the Old Faith has been the dominant religion in the area for at least a thousand years — likely much longer, as Heket refers to that last millennium as a short while by her immortal reckoning. The Old Faith came from a unification of five sects, each dedicated to a different god called a Bishop:
|
Bishop |
Pronouns |
Species |
Domain |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Heket |
She/Her |
Frog |
Famine |
|
Kallamar |
He/Him |
Fish |
Pestilence |
|
Leshy |
He/Him |
Caterpillar |
Chaos |
|
Narinder |
He/Him |
Cat |
Death |
|
Shamura |
They/Them |
Spider |
War |
The Bishops refer to themselves as siblings, though it is unclear whether they are related by blood.
Narinder And Shamura
As Haro tells it, Narinder was an outlier among the Five Bishops. His siblings were, by their nature, agents of change, but as the god of death Narinder's role was always the same. All the other Bishops' machinations would eventually lead to him, and he would always be there, waiting for souls to cross into his realm.
As the millennia wore on, Narinder grew restless. He wanted to expand his domain and try new things. Shamura admired their brother's ambition, growing to love and respect him for it. Shamura was also a god of wisdom, so they sought to impart gifts of knowledge on Narinder to help him further his goals.
While it's not confirmed entirely, Heket seems to suggest that the Red Crown was a gift to Narinder from Shamura. This would make sense, as the Red Crown holds much of The One Who Waits' power and the Bishops seem just as frightened of it as they are of their brother.
Blessed with wisdom imparted by Shamura, Narinder began to experiment with new rituals and magic. Ultimately, however, death is absolute and irreversible; it cannot grow, evolve, or change. Narinder persevered nonetheless, attempting to break fundamental laws of nature that even gods must obey. Seeing their deity's folly, the worshipers of the Old Faith began to question the pantheon.
The Chained God
Shamura recognized that their gift to Narinder had created an existential threat to the Old Faith, and possibly the world. They approached their other siblings — Leshy, Heket, and Kallamar — and proposed a ritual to bind Narinder to his realm of death for eternity, preventing him from walking the earth or using the full extent of his powers.
Each of the Bishops made a sacrifice of their flesh for the ritual; Leshy had his eyes gouged out, Heket's throat was slit, and Kallamar cut off his ears. Shamura, as leader of the rite and the one to blame for Narinder's instability, paid the heaviest price of all — their skull was split open, robbing them of a portion of their divine wisdom. As gods, the Bishops are able to live with these wounds largely unimpeded, but they have been bleeding and bandaged for the entire millennium since the rite took place.
Narinder was cast into the afterlife and bound there with four chains. Each chain was linked to one of his siblings, and cannot be broken as long as its controlling Bishop lives. To ensure that he could not exercise power through his followers, the Bishops then hunted down and slaughtered all of Narinder's worshipers.
The Prophecy Of The Lamb
Before losing their knowledge, Shamura received a prophecy that a Lamb would be the final vessel of the Red Crown, rekindling Narinder's cult and destroying the Old Faith. The Lamb would free The One Who Waits Below by killing the four Bishops, and usher in a new age.
Desperate to prevent the prophecy from coming to pass, the Bishops spent the next thousand years offering up sheep in sacrifice to keep Narinder chained below. They nearly succeeded, but The One Who Waits had other plans.
When the killing blow was struck on the last living Lamb, Narinder used all of his available power to intervene. As the God of Death, he was able to transport the Lamb to his side. He granted the Lamb the Red Crown, a vessel containing most of his divine power, and instructed them to return to the world of the living and build a cult dedicated to The One Who Waits.
The Lamb's Crusade
Wielding the power of their deity, the Lamb fought their way out of the Old Faith's territory and built a temple with the help of the last surviving priest of The One Who Waits, Ratau. The Lamb gathered worshipers disillusioned by the Old Faith, creating a small but fanatical cult.
The Red Crown also made the Lamb fearsome in combat, and Narinder's will could resurrect his prophet if the Lamb fell in battle. The Lamb made frequent Crusades into the Old Faith's territory, ultimately cutting down the Bishops one by one.
Should You Bow Or Refuse?
With the death of the final Bishop, the chains binding Narinder were broken at last. The One Who Waits gathered the Lamb and their followers and demanded the return of the Red Crown, along with the mass sacrifice of the entire cult.
The Lamb refused, keeping the Crown's power for themself and defeating Narinder in battle. Had the Lamb chosen to bow instead, they would have been killed along with the rest of the cultists and The One Who Waits would reign supreme.
With Narinder defeated, the Lamb's final decision of the Crusade was the fate of the fallen deity. Some say the Lamb struck Narinder down, preventing him from ever returning. Others claim that the Lamb spared The One Who Waits, and that the deity pledged himself to worship the Lamb for all eternity as a Follower in the Cult.
In either case, it is indisputable that The Lamb now holds more power than any single god before them. Of course, there are many strange and mysterious things in the forests, older and more terrible than any deity...