still at it…
–

SPOOKTOBER DAY 18 – WATER/NAUTICAL
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  STRANDED/DESERT ISLAND

TITLE:  THE QUESTION OF SUBSTANCE

Premise:  Philosophers, clerics, and mystics have long sought to understand the basis of the world, whether that be the literal support upon which it rests – elephants and turtles – or what primal matter everything is ultimately comprised of.  The scientific discovery of quantum superposition reveals that the deeper one goes the more uncertain everything becomes.  The quest for substance came to find that everything that once seemed solid and certain rests on a nigh-infinite realm of abject chaos – and via entropy, that those solid things will to chaos be returned.  Dissolution.

Why are we even looking in the first place?  As soon as a primate figures out that it can figure things out -resolve its curiosities- that sets it on a path to greater curiosities, greater mysteries, and any answers to those mysteries can in turn become questions.  It makes sense that there would be a last answer at the end of it all.  The questions that brought you to that threshold all had answers, didn’t they?  But perhaps it’s an erroneous assumption.  Or maybe the final answer will just be inherently disappointing.  You found it, now what?

Charlie Benaud turned his back on physics after facing too much racism in the program, even in a supposedly liberal place, the San Francisco bay area.  He fell in with a bad crowd of hope-to-die rich kids shooting smack in expensive places.

One day on a little private island his buddy Boudica inherited from an amazon cashout fucklord, everybody was was getting hella faded, sinking into the sand.  The water came in, and the ambiguity of this experience combined with the chemicals in his head to trigger a philosophical awakening.

Charlie gained the power to choose how he interacted with particles and waves in the world around him.  But he also had to make a conscious decision about all of those interactions, whether he wanted to or not.  Fortunately he didn’t have to devote thought to millions of photons per minute; he could feel it out in masses.  Even so, he was overwhelmed by the experience, and took all his friends along for one final, terrible trip.

Horror Element:  Have you ever tried, as a layperson, to understand physics?  Fuck that shit.  Have some poorly translated demonology instead…

Some Nonsense:  Now of the kings we deal with Paymon, and what is known of this great Paymon.  He better served the will of Lucifer than his other kings, and is not counted among that vast legion which broke his surging desire for equality with God – the pride for which he was cast into exile.  This Paymon is compelled by divine virtue and appears in many forms.  However when he comes in the presence of the exorcist, he rides on a dromedary, crowned with a very bright crown, with the countenance of a dark person.

And he proceeds before the exorcist with trumpets and cymbals and with all types of attendants, coming with enormous clamor and roaring.  Otherwise he is very serene, just as Exeuponticha excellently described in The Art of Solomon.  Furthermore this Paymon’s language is not easily understood by the exorcist.  But if they are as fearless as they are distinct and clear in all the questions they ask, Paymon regales them truly of all the philosophies yet classified, and of all that is arcane and occult, and with knowledge of how the people of the world are comprised, and how the earth is composed and what holds it, what exactly water is, and what is an abyss, and the place the water runs out, and what is the wind from whence it comes, and other things still.  He speaks of how things are.

He consecrates books to such an extent, and any other things.  He gives great dignities, and all who resist are made humble and desirous of satisfying the exorcist.  And above that he gives the best familiars and knowledge of all that is remote.

Note that if the exorcist commands Paymon into their presence, they should take care to face toward nothing but the north wind, for that is his dwelling.  At the coming of his presence, truly show no fear with and make all courtesy, and when he is questioned and beseeched for wishes, without a doubt they will be obtained.  Therefore the exorcist should not fear his creator, the one who promised to bestow forgiveness.

There are some who say Paymon was from the order of Dominations, but he is of the order of Cherubim, and has forty legions – part from the order of Virtues and part from the order of Potestates.  Paymon comes alone when summoned by use of some frankincense or sacrifices.  But when called together, he will always come with two great kings – namely Belial and Basaam – and other kings great and powerful.  Twenty-five legions also follow in his path, although not all of those will come unless compelled by divine virtue.

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SPOOKTOBER DAY 19 – CLONES/DOPPELGANGERS
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  WEDDING

TITLE:  THE BRIDE OF RESIAH

Premise:  Ressae had bore only one child before her husband died defending himself against highwaymen from the Hexwood, so she had high hopes for the boy.  The holy priests always said don’t consort with oracles, that scrying could only lead one to doom, but she couldn’t resist.  She asked a witch about his future.  He was fated to die by his own hand.

Everyone knows that the future can be changed, but how could that ever be prevented?  A person has so many ways they can kill themselves, nobody can protect you from yourself forever.  Also, it was too sad, knowing he loved himself so poorly.

She met a blackfriar at the crossroads and made a deal to change his fate.  The hell priest drew out the boy’s self loathing, creating duplicate of him, and for his price, he merely took the evil clone for his own purposes.

But when Ressae sought his fortune again, it had changed.  Now he was going to die by his wife’s hand.  That’s easy enough.  Let him know that and he’ll never get married, right?  She resolves to let him know this, but falls ill from an infected wound where she gave blood for the ritual.

Little Resiah is adopted by the holy priests of her village.  They aren’t allowed to wed, and as he is surely going to join the priesthood…  He doesn’t join the priesthood, becoming a scribe for a merchant.  Resiah grows up to be pathetic nerd of the kind no woman would marry, so he’s still good, right?

Horror Element:  Dark Resiah was raised to be a blackfriar in the service of Father Woe, endowed with the powers of hell.  But he didn’t have the knack, being a sickly nerd of no use to anyone.  His patron kicks him to the curb, and he steals into the city as a ragged beggar.  He sees himself in the merchant’s clerk and wants revenge for being made to exist.

No woman would have that dork, and so he hatches a scheme to become a woman and steal into his graces, to murder him at the height of his happiness.  He goes back into the Hexwood and makes a deal with his patron.  The cost?  Good boy Resiah must be sacrificed in the name of Father Woe.

Some Nonsense:  Andras, or Vandras – a great marquis – appears in angelic form, with a head similar to a great night raven.  He rides on a strong and powerful wolf, carrying a large and sharp sword.  From him comes bloodshed and discord -he knows well how to sow these- as war between brothers, or among master and servant.  And under him are 30 legions.

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SPOOKTOBER DAY 20 – SOUTHERN GOTHIC
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  CRIME & CRIMINALS

TITLE:  KEEP AUSTIN WEIRD

Premise:  Any given city is part of the world, with people flowing into and out of it from anywhere.  They tend to have stronger relationships with some towns over others – Brooklyn people moving to Philadelphia or San Francisco to Seattle – and their own local cultures are subject to much more change than regional pride would let on.  Why would assholes in rural Washington state speak with a generic southern accent?  Learned it from country music, or from whatever relationships they have with more properly southern places.

But there is a more truly local experience you can find beneath the surface, as Julie Delpy said of Paris in Killing Zoe.  The local music scene connects to the drug scene connects to other criminal enterprises connects to the cops connects to city hall connects to every business in the city connects back to the people.

“Keep Austin Weird,” say the hipsters innocently, not knowing the darker side of that weirdness.  There are a handful of parallel indie music scenes with a little crossover, and a Romeo and Juliet type situation emerges from a punks vs hipsters collision.  The punks are generally cool but their reckless drug use and self-destructive ways cause problems for the more socially acceptable musicians, and it blows up into overt conflict.  Young innocents new to their respective scenes get together and spark a bit of a gang war.

Horror Element:  At first the punks are the horror.  People get hurt or get dead in the recklessness.  But the intrigue pulls the strands of the whole web across the star-crossed lovers, and they could easily get killed for knowing too much.

Wow that was a lot of words to not really say shit lol.

Some Nonsense:  Nuduch, or Concubine Andrialfis, appears in the likeness of a peafowl, and making great noises.  And upon taking human form, she teaches geometry fully, and all arts pertaining to it.  She makes men wise in arts, and changes them into kinds of birds.  She has beneath her thirty legions.

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SPOOKTOBER DAY 21 – WEREWOLVES & BEASTS
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  SURVIVAL HORROR

TITLE:  ROAD RAGE

Premise:  The city has always been full of vehicular violence.  Happens every day.  Can’t you see I’m a reasonable man?  Look what you made me do?  People get up in the morning, slug down motor oil and shredded sparkplugs, leave slamming their front doors so hard they hang off the hinges.  Nobody’s going to steal anything.  They’re too busy jockeying for position on the blood-soaked streets.  Work doesn’t last long, punching clocks and flipping switches and angrily doing confusing things while being told they’re doing it wrong and are going to get fired although they never do, because it’s all just a framing device for the only life that matters – the Commute.

Horror Element:  The hell of those who killed in traffic.  There are cooler heads here as well, trapped in somebody else’s eternal torment.  Where’s the justice in that?  They establish private enclaves and carefully scurry through back alleys trying not to get hit, scrounging things edible to human beings – mostly rats, pigeons, and dandelion greens.

Understandably, they let the toughest among them do most of the fighting and running.  Leon Kennedy types GTA around the environment, scoring cool points with acts of audacity and bravado.  But past a certain point, might they become monsters themselves?

I was really charmed by the unreality of the merchant and shooting gallery segments in Resident Evil IV Remake, and thought it would be fun to see this kind of thing in other forms of fiction.  Gotta work that in somewhere as well.  Maybe a Katamari Damacy-flavored minigame.  Roll up those rats.

Some Nonsense:  Margoas – or Margodas, or Mardoas, or Margutas – is a great marquis, appearing in the likeness of a strong wolf, his tail a serpent.  He spits the tail out of his mouth and with human form leads armed men; he is the best warrior.  He gives fully true responses to all questions, and is faithful to all demands of the exorcist.  He was of the order of Dominations and has under his power thirty legions.  He looks after twelve hundred years to return to Heaven, which is not believable.

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SPOOKTOBER DAY 22 – ECO-HORROR
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  ROAD TRIP

TITLE:  BURN ASPHALT

Premise:  In the early eighties, two FBI agents are investigating a series of arsons and murders at rest stops and small towns along highways.  They encounter increasingly terrible scenes as they get further from civilization and reasonable means of calling for help.

Horror Element:  Surprise threequel to Fire Red and The Smokers.  I’m done making cops be good guys so these dudes should suck ass and die hard.  Basically, the radiation-stoked fire demons from the first two stories are at it again, mixed with the winnebago world of Race With the Devil.

Some Nonsense:  Ascaroth, a duke great and strong, appears in the form of an angel with foul breath, riding upon an infernal dragon – in his right hand a viper.  He gives fully true responses of the present, past, and future.  Of occult things he speaks freely, of his service to God, and how he sinned and fell from above.  He makes a person marvelous in all liberal arts.  The exorcist that binds this Ascharoth beware, for all that is holy, come not near the intolerable fetor that proceeds greatly from his mouth.  Knowing of this enormous defect, they should proceed with caution, lest they be overwhelmed.  The exorcist must hold themself daring – and suffused with sandalwood.

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SPOOKTOBER DAY 23 – LOVECRAFTIAN/ELDRITCH
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  SOAP OPERA

TITLE:  DENHOLM IS BACK

Premise:  Denholm Forsythe walked among the wealthy but was always unsatisfied with the games of politics and corporate greed.  For him, the lust for power and conquest was only truly gratifying if it was against people he personally knew.  And so he wove a web of deceit and games and elaborate ploys to ruin lives and steal fortunes, all while getting away clean.  After all, who would believe you replaced Jackson Colquhart with a Venezuelan pirate that had been made into a look-alike with plastic surgery, or that you’d arranged for Heathcliff Devereaux to hang-glide into a herd of rabid elephants?

At last enough people got wise that his fourth wife Jessica slashed his throat with a priceless diamond tiara and pushed him out of a cessna at two thousand feet sans parachute, whereupon he landed in a pit of venomous snakes.

Horror Element:  Little did Jessica know, the snake pit was a sacrificial ground, where the secret ingredients to work the magic just happened to be slashing a guys throat with a diamond and dropping him from a height greater than fifty feet into the magic circle.

Denholm was reborn in the service of Hlagkagadag the Inexplicable.  Now he’s back, to drive Jessica insane.

Some Nonsense:  Bonoree, a great marquis and duke, appears in the likeness of a monster.  He makes people marvelous in rhetoric, gives the best understanding of all languages.  He gives the grace of friends and enemies, and has nineteen legions in his dominion.

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SPOOKTOBER DAY 24 – GOTHIC
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  DISASTER

TITLE:  THE FATE OF THE ANIMALS

Premise:  In a remote Sachsen forest circa 1910, an ancient noble estate has fallen into disrepair.  The young lady of the estate is haunted by visions of animals in mortal terror running in masses, sparks at their hooves.  Premonitions of a forest fire, or stress from misogynist abuse?  If they could just get her married to a suitably wealthy manjob…

Horror Element:  Rotating list of jerk suitors facilitated by jerk parents, whilst being haunted with ghosts and health problems.  Culminates in a fall of a house of (insert embarrassing German name here) from a forest fire, that turns out to be an early offensive by the Tsar.

Some Nonsense:  Paragalla, a great marquis and count, appears in the likeness of a soldier, his head like that of a lion and his horse like a flame of fire.  He has power over birds and animals.  And let the exorcist have made a soldier of bronze, carrying a sword in his hand, and let it be sharp.  And let him command Paragalla to consecrate the aforementioned soldier: it has power to wound or to kill with a sword, or merely with a knife, by piercing.  Then it may be placed in the house of the king, amid those who quarrel, such as between man and wife.  And he has beneath him thirty legions.

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I am holding to my vow to only do the covers after I compose the ideas, in an effort to have less jokey or BS concepts.  You can judge.  These covers are very dashed off.
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SPOOKTOBER DAY 6 – CURSED OBJECT
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  DISAPPEARANCE

TITLE:  THE GRYPHON

Premise:  Why are all the airline pilots dudes?  It’s because women must never learn the power of flight.  It awakens their inner witch.  Captain Iris Lichter came to see the truth of the sky.  It is the abyss into which all things become clear, and become lost forever.  Fools think it’s the cold hard ground, but ground turns to dust, and dust blows away.

She flies for hours and days, staring ahead into the void, knowing that is where all the chattering monkeys must ultimately go.  (ok but srsly the numbers on that profession are wildly fucked up; probably needs serious correction from regulatory bodies.)

Horror Element:  Iris fashions a magical gryphon talisman and leaves it where people can find it.  Each in turn takes the thing and experiences weird symptoms of uncontrolled levitation, of objects and pets flying out windows never to be seen again.  At last they are ripped away into the sky, where they cease to be.  But the metal of that talisman is heavy, and it returns to earth, to begin the cycle anew.  I have this mental image of a sky witch walking through something like a sculpture garden, but all the sculptures are people balanced on some narrow body part, spinning slowly in place like a top, limbs splayed like they’re underwater.  She can pick them up like balloons.  Dunno how I’d work that in, if I did.

Some Nonsense:  Torcha, a great marquis and strong duke, appears in the likeness of a griffon.  However, when he assumes human form, he speaks duplicitously with a harsh voice.  And he is able by his own power to bind all flying creatures, and all creatures that move swiftly above the earth and in the air.  If the exorcist is wise, let them have made a bird of bronze, and consecrate it with the power to bind all birds under their will.  Thus all birds taken together in this power will be found only where they are placed – and produce their sweet songs, and be tame and polite, and willingly obedient in all ways.  Note that the exorcist can capture all birds he pleases by the beak.  He truly gives dignities, and from his mouth confirms them.

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SPOOKTOBER DAY 7 – UNDEAD
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  BURIAL

TITLE:  聖人キラー サイモン aka SAINT KILLER SAIMON

Premise:  In an anime world where saints are ghoulish undead who lord over brainwashed villages, driving them toward apocalyptic self-flagellation and human sacrifice, those who long for secular prosperity hire a Yojimbo-like mercenary who has the power to put these undying clerics in the ground – Saint Killer Saimon.

Horror Element:  Standard horror anime, from which Goat Princess is a spin off.  Real life catholic saints include some dubiously historical freaks who were folded spindled and mutilated in fabulous ways, often taking a miraculously long time to die from it.  Saimon has to engage in a bit of the old ultraviolence.

Some Nonsense:  Bille, a strong duke appearing in the likeness of a dragon, has three heads – the third similar to a human – and speaks in a raucous voice.  He changes the bodies of the dead from place to place, and makes his demons appear and congregate over their sepulchres.  He brings opulence and all wealth, and makes you eloquent and wise.  He gives true responses to all inquiries, and has under him twenty-six legions.

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SPOOKTOBER DAY 8 – BIG CITY
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  OFFICE

TITLE:  THE GAZELLE

Premise:  Billionaire tech mogul Orlac had enough luck with ruthless maneuvers over the years that he began to believe his own hype – that he was a genius who could do no wrong.  But unlike other men in that position, he didn’t just assume that meant he could rule with the flick of a wrist, barely moving.  He knew he had to stay in motion, keep up the work, adopting the latest corporate philosophy bullshit and implementing it in the cruelest ways possible.

One day he became taken with the works of trust fund kid cum dubious business guru Asher Skerritt, who warmed up some rehash of the old wolf pack idea.  But Orlac came up with his own rehash of that, after reading a science article about an especially sadisitic alpha who sent the pack on raids where they killed the puppies of competing packs.  He decides that to make OrlaCo great again, he has to become a murderer.

Horror Element:  Every team and section at the city-wide corporate campus operated under vicious pressure from above, from a culture of backstabbing and petty sadism.  But nobody suspected one particular office was suffering under the direct supervision of the CEO, who played with their lives like the kid killing ants with a magnifying glass.  He had them threatened with firing constantly, given arbitrary and impossible goals and punished them for failing to meet them, found the people who most needed work-life balance and robbed them of their life with overwork.

And after becoming the Alpha Wolf, he began to actually murder them.  He used “robust cooperation” with the police to get close enough to sabotage any investigation.  While the victims were all chosen for the job on the criteria of being nervous people who were afraid of failure, one random woman lied through the process enough to gain employment in victim team with her idgaf intact.  This proved an irresistible temptation, and his most elaborate torture and murder plot was set in motion…  No way I’d let him win, if I ever wrote this.  You know how she’ll do.

Some Nonsense:  Alphas, or Malapas, is a great president, appearing in the likeness of a crow, and in human form, he speaks with a raucous voice.  He builds marvelous houses and towers, and quickly convenes the most artificers.  He destroys houses and smashes towers, and gives the best familiars toward this destruction.  He eagerly receives sacrifices and burnt offerings, and deceives people into breaking their contracts with him.  He has under him twenty legions.

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SPOOKTOBER DAY 9 – LIMINAL HORROR
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  WOMEN’S LIT/CHICK-FLICK

TITLE:  THE EDGE OF GONE

Premise:  Leah is pushing fifty, single, and has run out of friends.  Life is just going to work, avoiding trouble, and staying alive.  Looking forward to the eventual day she is alone and unable to care for herself, she’s pulling a lot of overtime and saving up considerable stacks of cash.  To avoid potential muggings and worse, she tries to stay as far away from other people as possible on the way home.  That does carry the risk of finding unexpected danger when too far away to cry for help, but she can’t bring herself to try the other tactic – staying close to whatever safer looking randos the night provides.  Too shy.

One night she keeps seeing sketchier and sketchier guys and groups of guys, each in turn pushing her to go into a further subway car, a further platform, to take unfamiliar routes, until she is deep into a poorly lit metro station she’s never seen before – that she can’t even locate on the map.  A group of guys appears out of nowhere, hissing like snakes and threatening her more explicitly than any of the others had before.  But a woman appears, in her 30s and built like the hardest bartender you ever saw.  She has a cobra tattooed on her chest, peeking out of a black scoop-neck tee, and scares them off, even kicking one in the ass as they go.

Leah goes from running away to running after, spending the night going the long ways into who-knows-where, hoping to run into Gomorrah again.  It works. Leah and Gomorrah get to know each other and fall in love.

Horror Element:  Leah also comes to realize she is literally going beyond the borders of reality in order to find Gomorrah each night.  These train stations really aren’t part of the system that humans built.  What the hell does it mean?  Gomorrah has some ambiguities in her backstory that Leah is hesitant to press – like finding out something concrete about her young lover will cause her to vanish.  Worse, knowing that she’s going into liminaland, she knows there’s no guarantee she’ll ever find her way back.

Gradually it becomes clear she has to choose Fight Club style between the Ikea nesting instinct and self-destructive freedom.  She lets herself become lost, and when the story shifts perspective to the real world, nobody remembers she ever existed.

Some Nonsense:  Gomeris, or Cayim, a strong and powerful duke, appears in the likeness of a most beautiful woman, crowned with a ducal crown, riding upon a camel.  For truth he gives full responses about the present, the past and the future.  He is the prince and keeper of hidden caverns wherein serpents appear.  He gives the best love of women and has under him twenty-one legions.

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SPOOKTOBER DAY 10 – DARK FANTASY
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  KILLER ANIMAL

TITLE:  CURSE OF THE WOLFSWORD

Premise:  A medieval prince was wronged by his family, and righteously sought revenge.  A wolf came out of the forest, a sword through its body but still miraculously alive. It bowed to him, offering the sword.  The prince took the sword and used it for his vengeance.  After the fact, he found out about the curse.  No miracle at all.

Horror Element:  The sword wolf grants you revenge but curses you to die from the same.  It takes the sword back to the wilderness and returns to offer it to another wronged soul – this one a victim of the prince’s rise to power.  She can use it to get revenge on him, but finding out about the curse before she fulfills it, does she have a chance to break the cycle?

Some Nonsense:  Boab, a great president, appears in the likeness of a knight, his head similar to a lion’s, riding on a great black horse.  His eyes shine like fire, he speaks with a raucous voice, and he has large teeth.  He gives the best understanding of all things natural, even the barking of dogs.  He gives full, true responses of things occult and of all questions about the present, past, and future.  He has forty legions.

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SPOOKTOBER DAY 11 – MEDICAL
OPTIONAL CHALLENGE:  CREEPY KID

TITLE:  THE COST

Premise:  One terrible year ten infants die one night after another, in the maternity ward of a hospital.  Nurse Christine was in the depths of a terrible relationship which made it hard to give her full attention to work, so she wasn’t tracking on everything people were saying, or what happened with her coworkers.  One year later, babies start dying one per night, and she begins to remember incidents from that time before which lead her to investigate.  Turns out some of her fellow nurses had been quietly disappeared and even murdered to conceal the true causes of death.  They’d all experienced symptoms of rabies.

Horror Element:  Right above the maternity ward is a special child, kept in isolation due to immunocompromise.  Or is she?  A hospital administrator used sorcery to ensure his daughter’s success in life, the price of which was ten innocent souls per year that she lives.  Lil’ girl is beginning to show powers of her own, besides the annual event of puking up ghostly mutant bird-things that infect the babies downstairs.  I think Christine was abusing drugs during the first outbreak and enough people know that they can blackmail her into silence or other indignities, which makes her hesitant to seek allies.  Maybe some cool doctor breaks thru her distrust and there’s a romance under pressure story.

Some Nonsense:  Cambea, a great count, appears in the likeness of a faun.  He understands the strengths of herbs and precious stones.  He makes birds descend to earth and fly before the exorcist.  And likewise they will fight and play according to their nature as if, indeed, domesticated by the exorcist.  He has twenty legions under his dominion.

Cambea is also known as Decarabia in sources later than the Geomanticarum, which seems etymologically connected to “ten” and “rage” – which is also used for rabies.  Cambea could mean “change” as in metamorphosis or “exchange” as in trade.

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