The-holy-crusade-of-an-oil - Ligma

Kallamar the Coward

Thinking about Kallamar in Cult of the Lamb, with how the lore and even his own siblings taunt him for being a coward and he even tries to bargain and sway you away from getting your revenge and killing him, even ready to throw Shamura under the bus to save himself, but then when you finally push him into a corner and he's forced to fight he not only busts out a bunch of weapons and starts quad-wielding them but he was once regarded by the fandom as being among the hardest bosses of the base game.

It got me thinking, was he always like this? Narinder certainly thinks so, but there's bias there. It's easy to just write him off as always being a mess like this...

But there's no denying he's the second in power after Shamura, Anchordeep is known for its beauty, he takes personal pride in the way he took care of his cult/area, and when in Purgatory out of all the bishops he's notably the most lucid/aware of where he is.

So I present this: After Narinder's sealing, Shamura was in no state to lead or give orders. The Bishops all had massive injuries that refused to heal. Who out of the 4 would immediately be assumed to be the one to take a leadership role? Who had comparatively more "manageable" injuries to take care of the other 3? And who would you assume is most likely to have medical experience to at least try to lessen the impact of all of their wounds?

Kallamar, Pestilence and Cure.

Early on after The One Who Waits was sealed away, Kallamar would have had to effectively take over the Old Faith while also caring for a broken beyond repair older sibling, who had always been the "Wise" one that the others blindly followed, yet was now barely even there at the best of times, and two younger siblings, one who was now permanently blind (and young/weak enough that they couldn't even muster a single Curse towards the Lamb before being crushed within days of their resurrection even years after the sealing, so just imagine how new to godhood they were back when this all started), and another who had had her throat torn out, all while downplaying his own wounds.

What if, then, at some point, he simply broke?

He resents Shamura, even potentially sincerely blames them for causing the entire thing (which Shamura confesses to), both leading them to turn on Narinder and also for leading everyone to killing the Lambs. He's still fond of Leshy, but from how quick to take charge Heket is, it's clear that after he proved unable to take the stress of it all, she was next in line as the "leader" of The Old Faith. There's gotta be some resentment there on both ends because of that, particularly with how quick he is to criticize how she took care of her territory.

And then compare how he is as a bishop to how he is as a follower. I think it's very very interesting that he goes from a dirty coward and absolute pathetic mess of anxiety and fear, to pleading directly to his own executioner for help, to being almost perfectly happy and content to simply be a Follower of the Lamb's cult. The others (minus Shamura, due to their condition) are resentful and quick to give sharp words to the Lamb, but Kallamar? It's like all his anxiety is gone with his godhood. He has nothing to fear anymore, and is almost ridiculously quick to be friendly to the Lamb and share his tastes in decor and pride in appearances with them. Not even in the "kissing up" way, he talks like they're equals. Is this what Kallamar was like, before everything? Is he actually HAPPIER as a Mortal now that all of the responsibility and fear of death is gone? Even secretly grateful?

There's no denying his cowardice. There's no denying it crossed a line when he was ready to betray Shamura when his nerves reached their limit. There's no denying that as much as he'd like to believe that he is absolved of guilt for The Old Faith's sins simply because he was just doing what Shamura told him to even if he claims he thought it was a bad idea.

But you also have to wonder what caused that cowardice to form, and what other feelings motivate his actions besides fear.

(tldr: sad squid was not ready to become the responsible one, especially not after going deaf and being traumatized. Has a mental breakdown halfway through raising the others due to not being able to actually deal with going deaf or being traumatized because it turns out being the god of physical health is different from mental health. Little sister ends up having to step up and be the mom now. Their relationship never recovered because of it, and he now blames the eldest for failing them and also for his own failures to cope. As a bonus developed an attachment to his own killer out of some weird warped perception of them "rescuing" him from his stress and then from death itself.)

get eaten alive, idiot

they’re all faggots…

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Follower Awaits Indoctrination