Motif · Book 8, A Parade of Horribles

Ysalte

Goddess of Hopelessness and Insanity, level 250, once of the Dirt, then of Tears; the Semeru dwarves' only goddess, patron of outcasts and bards, half-sister and niece of her former lover Taranis, threatened with the Nothing by Apito and fled to Sheol; Amayon's ex and mother of his child. Sponsored by Pontifex Shine of the Nebular Balance and not driven, she arrives through Sister Ines's corpse as a young dwarf with a pickaxe and a flickering scream, turns every potion to vinegar, enslaves a Demon Prince — and is beheaded by her own totem. A memorial crystal waits on a future floor.

Segment appearances

• Chapter 35 — Eris and the five-sided coin
• Chapter 36 — Jacobus, the reverse tooth fairy
• Chapter 41 — Forty paths; Osvaldo's crystals
• Chapter 82 — Karl the dachshund; Team Sparkles ends
• Chapter 83 — The poleaxes; Britney kills Osvaldo; the Cadillac

Arc

Eris speaks of 'the pickaxe that may or may not eventually kill your friend' (ch. 35). Osvaldo's second memorial crystal is hers (ch. 41). Britney speaks in Carl's mind (ch. 79), takes the crystal from Osvaldo's corpse (ch. 83), and goes into the stasis portal with it (ch. 85); Samantha names the plinths, in the Basilica or the Vulgar Temple, that would set the goddess out (ch. 83).