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Karam Gruul, the Hand of Death, is the main villain and final enemy of the Fighting Fantasy gamebook Moonrunner. He is the rogue Inquisitor General of the kingdom of Brice, wanted everywhere for his war-crimes during the gruelling War of the Four Kingdoms, with an unspecified score with the player character tracking him down. He is a powerful wizard and an exceptionally intelligent mastermind, conspiring to restart the war and take over the world of Titan.
Karam Gruul is an homage to Fu Manchu, who must be caught as in a detective story instead of a fantasy quest.
Appearance[]
Karam Gruul looks just like his inspiration: a tall and lean man with slanted eyes, angular face, bald head, a long and thin moustache, and long and pointy nails, wearing elaborate oriental robes and a cap. He is very frail, needing his magic to be a threat, and disdains physical fighting. Oddly enough, his ears are pointed.
Powers and Abilities[]
Karam Gruul was a talented general, rising to the top in a few years with brutally efficient policies. In addition, Gruul is a considerably skilled expert in both biology, alchemy and sorcery, who mixed the three to create his own brand of dark magic called the Notura. He is also adept enough in necromancy to raise zombies slaves.
He performs magical and scientific experiments, using innocents as guinea-pigs not unlike Dr. Moreau.
Notura draws energy from the very rare Ectoplasmic Lurkers spirits, and is linked to several relics. With it, he became powerful enough to rival the mightiest dark wizards of Titan. It has a wide field of applications, ranging from powerful curses and mind-control magic to mutation, and creation of many powerful sentient monsters or deadly substances.
Gruul displays the abilities to expand his lifespan; to summon ethereal beings; to set magical traps unleashing fiery devastation; to see and speak through an effigy of himself; to transform people into monstrous beings bound to his will; to implant timed brainwashing spells in minds to activate at his leisure; and to animate or bewitch objects.
Personality[]
Karam Gruul appears as someone poised and confident, always imperturbable no matter the situation. He has a courteous and dignified, albeit haughty, demeanor. He cannot stand opposition of any sort, though he enjoys a challenge and genuinely respects worthy opponents, delighting in outsmarting them. To the point that he is willing to confront them himself, but always under a sort of disguise.
But to his core, Gruul is a monster of the vilest kind, horribly cruel, unforgiving, ruthless and sadistic. He commits war-crimes just because he can, and stops at nothing to keep doing so. He fans the flames of conflict and revels in the fear he spreads. He relishes in gruesomely tormenting, torturing or killing people. Worse, he enjoys breaking his foes' spirits, dooming them to all sort of dire fates. He plans to rule Titan, likely to expand his playground.
More importantly, Karam Gruul is doubtless the smartest villain of the Fighting Fantasy franchise. He is diabolically intelligent, scheming, cunning and devious, always three steps ahead of his foes. He needed just a few years to build and expand a secret society, to the point of ruling a city through its criminal underworld.
He devised many layers of covers and smoke-screens to hide it, ruling every faction from behind the scenes through seemingly independent puppet kings, and hides his ambitions of conquest behind "simple" warmongering.
Also, he is very cautious, hiding behind disguises, false identities, and decoys. He often plants false clues to lead his foes into the wrong track, or deadly traps he devised and rigged to prevent escape, when he does not frame them for his crimes. He knows how to entice or blackmail people he needs, to undermine enemy factions before acting, and to erase all evidence. Only a hero of equal intelligence could take him down.
Background[]
Karam Gruul is a native of the kingdom of Brice, but where and how he lived is never disclosed. He is stated to have lived over three-hundred years, using Notura to expand his life-span.
As the continent of the Old World was almost being torn apart by the gruesome War of the Four Kingdoms between the nations of Gallantaria, Femfrey, Brice and the Northlands, Karam Gruul rose in ranks in the Brician secret services. He gained the trust of the king himself, who appointed him as his Inquisitor General.
Always remaining in the shadows and showing his face as rarely as possible, Gruul had to conform the army to the warmongering king’s high standards. Yet, he eventually started arresting Brician citizens too pacific for his taste, and executing generals who dared opposing him.
He later brainwashed a captured Gallantarian officer and turned them into the powerful, werewolf-like, titular Moonrunner, who disappeared after many carnages. He also killed thousands by setting magical traps of fire at the border. So many war-crimes earned him infamy all over the Old World.
After the war ended, Gruul disappeared. Every great war-criminal ended up in jail where they belong, aside from him, and the absolute condition for a total armistice is to bring him to face an international court representing all Four Kingdoms. However, he faked his death and the grudging Brician king was all too happy to believe him dead, and diverted more effort to erase all trace of him in History than to search for him, just as he planned.
Years after, many soldiers and bounty-hunters are still searching for him all over the Old World. With many factions yearning to restart the war, true peace cannot be achieved as long as he is at large…
Role in the Story[]
Introduction[]
The playable character is a veteran bounty-hunter who has been tracking down Karam Gruul for years without respite. They can chose four useful special skills between acrobatics, climb, combat (hitting many opponents at once instead of one after another), con (bluff and lies), lock-picking, sleight of hand (pickpocketing and dissimulating objects), sneak, and tracking, that prove handy in difficult situations.
The gamebook plays as a detective game in which the hero needs to investigate as discreetly as possible, look after clues, solve riddles, and beware of many traps and false leads, not to mention the assassins sent after them. The story begins when the hero is called to the crime-ridden and dangerous city of Blackhaven, a frontier town connecting the nations of Gallantaria, Brice and Mauristasia. At night time, Bennett the Guard Marshall informs them that Karam Gruul is in league with a secret society called the Cabal of the Werewolf, whose every member bear its mark. This means that he is plotting something big enough to risk exposure.
Only Bennett and the High Council of Royal Lendle, the capital of Gallantaria, know of their mission, for there is a traitor in the guard, and only a single and skilled enough agent could investigate without getting immediately spotted by Gruul’s spies. Alas, Bennett is immediately murdered by a poisoned dagger thrown through the window, and the hero is framed by the traitor. Investigating the manufacturer of the dagger only leads to a deadly trap of drowning pit.
Starting the Man-Hunt[]
The fearsome Corpse Master.
The hero must jump through the window after the orc-assassin, who can use an Alchemical Sphere devised by Gruul to release corrosive fumes. The Sphere can be taken, but the coach is a trap thrown down the river.
The orc assassin hides in Rohmer Theatre, where he is disposed of by the Corpse Master: a rhyme-sprouting undead based on the Phantom of the Opera. The hero can trick him into believing that Karam Gruul sent them to dispose of him.
- The Corpse Master is a dangerous foe with 9 in skill (power level) and 15 in stamina (life-points), whose hordes of rats cost the hero 1 in skill for the battle and 1 in stamina for each attack round, and wound them if they flee. He fights with a bone dagger, and his cursed gaze complicates any test of luck the hero might try.
Following Bennet's directions, the hero must investigate Craven Asylum. They must refuse refreshment for they are poisoned, speak to inmates to gain a medallion from one of them, and speak to Matra Ouspenkaya, a reformed cabal member who was committed to be silenced.
The director Doktor Welsh, whose true name is Kauderwelsch, is the son of a mad scientist killed by the hero who defeated Voivod and the Shadow Warriors. Welsch is a servant of Gruul, who put his mother's brain in a Frankenstein's monster lookalike and intends to transplant it in the hero's body.
- If the hero freed the inmates, they destroy the lab and the monster. If not, the monster is a powerful foe with 11 in skill and 14 in stamina, who can break the hero's weapon and reduce their skill.
The hero can investigate the suspected traitor, Conrad Zaar: a man-orc guard who reports to Karam Gruul through a crystal ball. Conrad is a weak foe, with only 7 in skill and 6 in stamina, who can be killed without fight by burning the mill with a torch. If fought normally, lightning turns him into an indestructible undead, perhaps due to Notura.
- The undead Conrad is a powerful foe with 10 in skill and 12 in stamina, who dons a mask and wields a machete, being a homage to Jason Voorhees. He rises again when defeated, cannot be fully destroyed, and tracks down the hero without respite. Throwing him down the river bound with heavy chains is the only way to get rid of him.
The hero can visit the informant Silas Entador, only to find him murdered by a female Xen Viper, a shape-shifting and venomous snake-hybrid assassin. They must avoid a trap in the stairs and never touch the letter addressed to them without an antidote, for it was written and bewitched by Gruul himself to fatally poison them at contact. They must go to the Last Octopus tavern, a front to the Cabal of the Werewolf.
Karam Gruul himself confronts the hero with a veil on his face, if they followed two leads at most. He offers them much gold to give up their quest, but this is in fact an electrified animated statue of himself that must not be touched, for it shocks the hero to death. In the tavern, the hero must beware the poison and the dark elf assassin, but can meet Professor Van Heldenghast, an elderly woman who studied Notura for years to take down Karam Gruul. With her intel, the hero has nine hours to find six Wards of Notura taken from Gruul's tower after the war ended.
Collecting the Wards of Notura[]
One of the Jai-Hulud, Gruul's elite mage assassins.
The first Ward is found in the Shrine of Belthegor, a forgotten minor deity cursing anyone who take his Mask from the altar without solving a puzzle. Beware of the Obisian Predator sent by Gruul to kill anyone who takes it.
- The Obisian Predator is a powerful monster with 11 in skill and 10 in stamina, immune to normal weapons, whose blows cost 3 in stamina instead of the regular 2. It can only be destroyed by diverting a lightning bolt to strike it.
The Shroud of Angevin, used to wrap the head of a decapitated undead, can be bought from a collector of strange artifacts named Hollmann. The Hand of Glory is the wooden hand of a hanged criminal at a gibbet of Gallows Square. It can be gained by either bribing handsomely or bluffing the corrupt man-orc provosts, but its power can only be restored by bringing it to the surprisingly benevolent necromancer Mawn Pretagorus.
The Blood of Baron Milescu, one of the Vampire Lord of Vannan, can be bought from the curiosity salesman Kiennar, but should the vial get broken in battle the vampire resurrects. Fighting him means that the Ward of Notura is lost.
- Baron Milescu is a dangerous foe with 9 in skill and 15 in stamina. A cross or a successful test of luck can thwart his hypnotic gaze, lest he drains the hero's blood before turning to a bat and flying away, dealing a dice-roll of damage. The hero must stake him after defeating him, otherwise he flies away.
The hero must go to the Old Gaol, the collapsed, abandoned prison in which Argolis, a female undying Demothrax demon has been sealed, and take the Chain binding her. Doing so frees her and she must be dealt with for good.
- With 8 in skill and 13 in stamina, Argolis is strong but not much. Still she remains deadly, for her blows cost 4 in stamina instead of 2 and she escapes if she strikes twice in a row. The hero must cast her in the bottomless pit.
The Skull of Mora Tao is found in a vault in the graveyard, accessed by hiring the shady body-snatchers Hogg and Kilmarney (who look like Laurel and Hardy) to dig a grave. But they are greedy and deceitful, and must not be trusted. In the vault, the hero must resist the Skull's compulsion to give it blood, and never give it to the dying old knight.
Radu the Magus, Gruul's right-hand.
The hero can follow a cloaked stranger into a derelict temple, in fact Radu the Magus, Karam Gruul's right-hand who conjures three floating spheres, trapping them here and harming them until they break the one with the lock.
The hero will have to destroy the Shocker, a dangerous monster with 9 in skill and 13 in stamina, likely born from Gruul's Notura, who killed many people and causes supernatural shocks costing 3 in stamina and 1 in luck.
They must not follow the member of the spotted in the crowd, lest they get overwhelmed and killed by the Jai-Hulud, Gruul's Praetorian Guard of elite mage warriors. The same fate awaits the hero if they followed too many leads. If they get captured, Karam Gruul and Radu will torture them with rats, and they can only escape with the sleight of hand skill.
Finally, the hero must return to the Last Octopus tavern to meet the elusive Eternal Fraternity of the Rosy Chalice, worshippers of the demon Baphet (a nod to Baphomet) and a front to the Cabal of the Werewolf. After either faking their death with a Stage Knife or succeeding the female Imperator's initiation, they head to Penkhull, a village overrun by zombie-like Fogwalkers created by Karam Gruul, spreading a deadly plague that kills the hero if they get infected.
Now the hero must take the Hexalpha, a zombie-repelling star symbol, from the moneylender, and ring the belfry tower to repel the Fogwalkers. In the Fraternity's lair, they must dodge a trap pit of deadly alchemic substance, to confront Karam Gruul at last, speaking with Radu the Magus about the Ethereal Projector: a Notura-powered weapon of mass destruction with which he plans to destroy Royal Lendle and take over Titan.
Confronting Karam Gruul[]
Gruul surrenders with deceptive ease, for it is in fact a Mandrake, a shape-shifting plant-monster based on the Pod People serving as a body double. The real Gruul kills the hero with the Ethereal Projector if they take it away. The hero survives if they fight it, he has only 7 in skill and 8 in stamina.
Radu escapes to the Tower of Inquisition, which is being rebuilt by zombie slaves. The hero must chase him there, but hide when the entire Cabal of the Werewolf heads towards it, lest they get trampled to death.
The hero needs to sneak or disguise themselves to enter the tower, but risks stumbling into an Ectoplasmic Lurker that Gruul keeps captive as a fuel. It is a powerful foe with 10 in skill and 8 in stamina, who is better avoided. The hero needs a disguise or an Alchemical Sphere to avoid fighting the Cabal, but they get killed if they cannot climb to Radu or lock-pick a secret door.
It now becomes clear that Radu always was Karam Gruul himself, under a fake identity! The Hand of Death fights with his power of Notura, and the hero must resist until he exhausts his power score (Which is set by a dice-roll between 7 and 12). Gruul’s attacks are also set by a dice-roll:
1) He summons a giant amoeba that devours the hero whole if they lack the Skull of Mora Tao. 2) The hero needs a Hand of Glory against his mind-control, but without adverse effects for now. 3) His Skein of Undoing spell makes the hero forget their special skills without the Blood of Baron Milescu. 4) His energy blast costs 3 in stamina without the Shroud of Angevin. 5) His curse of Ill Fortune costs 1 in luck without the Chain of Argolis. 6) He conjures a Force Wall costing 1 in skill without the Mask of Belthegor. If the hero turned the Corpse Master against Gruul, he appears after the first spell and attacks his former liege, who wastes his power to destroy him. Either way, hero wrecks the Cabal with the Ethereal Projector and captures their tired archenemy.
The hero heads to Royal Lendle with their captive, revealing that they were the Gallantarian officer he turned into the monstrous Moonrunner during the war. Learning this, Gruul activates the hypnotic spell dormant in each of his servants' mind. If the hero could not ward off his hypnosis before or cannot resist now, they become the Moonrunner again and Gruul takes over Titan, with them as his brainwashed general.
Karam Gruul faces justice at last.
The hero departs leaving the Cabal in disarray, but they must decline to help a Gallantarian patrol in routing the remaining ones, and head straight to the capital before they rally to rescue their liege, to safely win the game.
If they do so, Gruul will escape and must be captured again, lest he obliterates the hero and the Gallantarian troops with the Ethereal Projector. In the same way, the hero and his comrades must flee at once or Gruul's servant use the Projector on them.
At long last, the hero brings the Hand of Death to Royal Lendle where he stands trial and is found guilty, sentenced rot in a gloomy dungeon for the rest of his wretched life. With the Cabal and the Projector destroyed by the soldiers, the hero declines the King's offer to join back his military, and gets honourably discharged. They can now return to their family, to enjoy a well-deserved peace for the rest of their days.
Karam Gruul is with Feior one of the rare Fighting Fantasy villain to be jailed instead of killed in battle, as in both cases the author wanted to focus on the hero proving better than the villain. In this case, the author Stephen Hand mirrored the Nazi hunts and the Nuremberg Trials after World War II.
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 Villains
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Dark Gods Demon Princes of Titan Allansia Khul Old World Others | ||