Carbocán is a faction of the Mega-Dungeon that offers protection and knowledge in exchange for blood, speaking through a mechanical dragonfly; its voice proved to be that of the heretic technomage Kerbog Khan.
| Type | Faction (speaking through automata) |
| Place | The Great Cavern |
| Voice | Kerbog Khan |
| Chronicle | AV |
| Spanish entry | Carbocán — los que pactan por sangre |
The dragonfly
The day after the throne changed hands, it came buzzing down from the heights of the Great Cavern: dog-sized, eyes like headlights, dragonfly wings, a razor stinger beneath, legless and condemned to flight, mechanical and insectoid, far more complex than the clockwork toys disparaged in Ardis Vala. Its metallic voice was choppy like a badly tuned transmission; someone spoke through it.
The pact
“The Carbocán observes all, gives protection to all. If you give blood, allies. Those who are not allies are enemies.” The Seekers offered the blood of the old king they had just overthrown, and the new king pricked his palm on the stinger. Asked about the witch across the lake (Lady Deino), it answered: semimortal; over three hundred years old; possible phylactery, location unknown; heavily protected. It does not haggle or lie: it charges blood and delivers files — the only faction that treats the living as suppliers.
Later appearances
It returned to an auction, where the automaton envoy earned the nickname Bípedo 2; to collect a pending payment; and fifteen years later as a four-armed doctor with a Varumani skull for a head, saying “I listen and obey”. Then the voice was recognized as Kerbog Khan’s — the technomage who defends fusions of man and metal as new, possible organisms of creation, asked for “a league of shadows” against the corrupt empire, was expelled as a heretic by the Priscians, and laid the bomb-egg (the Egg of Ritornelo) over Ritornello. When his metal automata failed, his trail was lost.