Sandy petersens cthulhu mythos 203

and stall partly into the process.
Other genetic errors can occur,
and sometimes disease or heredity
affects the change for the worse.
These malformed hybrids
rarely gain a formal position
within the deep one society
but instead tend to be hangerson. The deep ones or more
fortunate hybrids sometimes
use them as tools or pawns.

Under the Sea
Deep ones are generally one
of the most socially and
magically

sophisticated

races of the sea, in their
own unsettling way. They
typically construct large and
complex cities deep under
the waves. When these are
located near a shore, the
local population is often
subverted by the deep ones
in many ways.
Deep one society is
stratified and controlled by its older, higher ranking members. One
feature of deep one biology is that, if fed sufficiently, they continue to
grow to indefinite size. Their leaders ensure that this only proceeds under

their control: only those deep ones that are needed to be huge in size are
permitted to grow unhindered. On occasion, there have been entire cities
of gigantic deep ones, but in a typical city, only a few individuals exceed
the normal size because a large population of huge deep ones requires more
food than most cities can support. Also, giant deep ones cannot breed easily
with the mortal races.
When deep ones grow to Large size, they do not necessarily stay humanoid
in appearance. Their body form can continue to mutate and adapt, and so
extremely large individuals may look very different from their smaller kin

196