A weeping friend. A localized tempest screaming in the Rockies. A long-forgotten ziggurat rising from the mud of a primordial dream-world. Welcome to Evil Dead: Echoes of Ereshkigal, an uncompromising actual play campaign pitch set in the modern urban dark fantasy universe of Ævum Malum. Utilizing a customized adaptation of the classic In Nomine d666 system, this campaign forces ordinary mortals—and dormant Soldiers of the Symphony—into a terrifying race against a rogue Sumerian entity. When reality begins to warp, what starts as a grief-stricken camping trip becomes an agonizing struggle for the very survival of the waking world.
About Evil Dead: Echoes of Ereshkigal
What was meant to be a quiet getaway to support a grieving friend quickly turns into a localized disaster. Trapped in the Rocky Mountains by a sudden, unnatural storm, a group of ordinary humans are dragged into the shifting sands of the dream realm. There, in the ancient city of Kandar, they must confront the rise of Ereshkigal, an ancient pagan deity seeking to overwrite reality.
About Ævum Malum
Ævum Malum is a modern, urban dark fantasy where hidden powers, forbidden knowledge, and living myths collide in a world held together by lies, secret societies, and the desperate effort to delay an inevitable unmaking. It was created by Adam P Campbell in 2025.
About In Nomine
In Nomine is a role-playing game designed by Derek Pearcy and published in 1997 by Steve Jackson Games, based on the French game In Nomine Satanis/Magna Veritas. The basic game mechanic is to roll the d666, or three six-sided dice. Two dice determine success by rolling below the target number, and the third indicates the degree of success.
Transcript
Cold Open
“The dead will outnumber the living.” When the skies above the Rockies bleed, the line between waking life and ancient nightmares dissolves entirely.
Intro
Welcome to Eviliv3 Play, a celebration of my favorite tabletop role-playing games. This is a sister channel to Eviliv3. Subscribe if you’re new to the channel, because today we are descending deep into the dark. Ævum Malum is a modern, urban dark fantasy setting where living myths collide to delay an inevitable cosmic unmaking. If you are looking for a campaign rooted in slow-burn investigation, psychological dread, and visceral horror, you are in the right place. In this video, I am giving you a comprehensive, complete tour of the central cast, the mechanics, and the ancient, dream-warped locations of an actual play campaign, Evil Dead: Echoes of Ereshkigal.
Discussion
This is based on an actual play I ran using the Army of Darkness tabletop roleplaying game. To bring this visceral horror to life, we are adapting the classic In Nomine tabletop system. Your characters start as ordinary, fragile mortals rolling the d666—three six-sided dice. While the first two dice determine your base success or failure, the third dice acts as the Check Digit. When you navigate the dream-logic of the Ethereal Realm, this Check Digit measures just how severely reality bends to your will—or how quickly it shatters under the weight of ancient pagan influence.
Our descent into madness begins with a classic catalyst: the people caught in the crossfire of a sleeping god’s awakening. This can be played with pre generated characters to help in the adventure setup or custom characters. They just need to have a connection with each other.
First, there is Jen, your grieving friend. It is her profound sorrow that draws the group deep into the wilderness, unaware that her pain is acting as a beacon for a dormant metaphysical rift. You decide to get her out of the city and get her mind off her troubles by going camping in the rocky mountains for a quiet nature-filled weekend.
Then, we have Chet, the chosen one; he is a mortal Soldier of the Symphony, wielding ancient relics and fighting with holy conviction—until a corrupted artifact strikes him down. He shows up at the end of the first scenario when the deadites have awakened. This is the catalyst which pushes your characters into the role of the chosen one.
And finally, lurking in the primordial dark, is Urigan, the High Priest. Trapped in a permanent trance, he is merely a puppet drafting a dark tome fueled by human suffering to anchor a realm of death to the waking world. This is the first Necronomicon and he is a tortured soul. You must stop him from finishing his dark purpose.
The setting itself shifts from the biting cold of the mountains to the suffocating heat of ancient myth. Let’s take a tour through the primary locations your investigators will navigate:
- The Rocky Mountain Trailhead: A remote campsite where a heavy sense of wrongness hangs in the air, culminating in a violent, unnatural sleet storm that cuts you off from all civilization.
- The Slough of Kandar: A muddy, debris-filled marshland in the Ethereal Realm, littered with the remnants of your camp and overlooked by a looming, terrifying Ziggurat.
- The Cells of Kandar: A subterranean dungeon beneath the Ziggurat, where the stone walls are scrawled with desperate, blood-slicked warnings from past victims.
- The Corrupted Cedar Forest: A dark, whispering woodland reclaiming the northern reaches of the pocket realm, guarded by skeletal manifestations and ancient entities.
- The Cathedral of Flesh: Hidden deep within the Ziggurat, this inner sanctum is where the boundary between pain and pleasure is erased, and victims are drained of their Essence to write a blasphemous, reality-binding text.
The campaign can be broken down into three distinct acts beginning with a very normal camping trip and ending in a different realm of experience fighting for the future of mankind! We start with the first act, heading into the Rockies for a campaign trip. The campsite is actually the site of a previous deadite massacre. You come across a family who is also taking a camping trip and a fisherman out for some relaxation. Suddenly a hyper-localized, unnatural “Sunder Storm” completely cuts the party off from the outside world. Dream-logic begins to bleed into reality, subjecting the players to horrific waking nightmares of nearby campers self-mutilating and going mad. The campsite is attacked by corrupted, possessed locals. A rugged hunter named Chet saves you from the worst of the attack, talking about the Necronomicon needing to be found and stopped in the Ethereal Realm, only to be brutally impaled from behind by a corrupted artifact—the Spear of Destiny. As Chet dies and becomes corrupted, a spiritual vortex completely destabilizes, tearing the environment apart and sucking the players into a blinding maelstrom of raw energy.
The second act takes them directly into the Ethereal Realm. They are stuck in a localized pocket sustained by the collective memory of Ancient Sumeria (circa 3000 BCE) by the Void. Through their investigation of this new eerie reality, they discover that the ancient Ethereal Goddess of Death, Ereshkigal, is trying to use this pocket realm to anchor herself back into the waking world. The players are immediately hunted, captured by Sumerian cultists, and thrown into the dungeons of a massive Ziggurat. In the cells, they meet a rebel spirit named Shemhasa. He reveals that the High Priest Urigan is writing a dark, suffering-fueled tome to permanently anchor this nightmare realm to the Rocky Mountains. You must escape, assisted by the mythic spirit Enkidu, and flee to the witch-spirit Khulanna. She has knowledge on how to stop Urigan. Through a grueling ritual, they secure the spiritual blessings of the goddess Inanna and the sun god Utu, giving them the divine shielding and light needed to fight back.
The final act involves the players returning to the city completely consumed by spiritual warfare. To buy them time, Enkidu and the freed rebel spirits launch a massive frontal assault against a horde of nightmare creatures. The players must fight their way up the steps of the Ziggurat, where they face a tragic obstacle: Evil Chet. The hunter who tried to save them in Act I is now a completely possessed demonic husk holding Shemhasa hostage! After defeating Chet, they breach the ritual chamber to find a horrific sight: human essence (represented as blood) being drained to write the dark anchor tome. The high priest Urigan is in a trance, guided by the shadow-demon Beletseri. The players must banish Beletseri and confront the broken High Priest. With the dark book secured and the anchor disrupted, the remaining energy is used to reverse the vortex. The dream realm collapses, and the PCs wake up gasping for air at their sunny, quiet Rocky Mountain campsite—alive, but forever changed.
Do you think you have what it takes to survive the threat of the Evil Dead?
Outro
Thank you for watching today’s Ævum Malum episode. Subscribe and ring the bell if you are new to the channel. Don’t forget to click the like button and comment to let others learn about this dark and engaging, modern urban fantasy tabletop roleplaying game campaign setting. You can join my actual plays and get $10 by signing up to StartPlaying.Games, and even pick up other tabletop roleplaying games using my affiliate link in the description below.
Thank you Creator Patrons Aaron Hardy & D. Robert Handy, Producer Patron David Galindo, and Developer Patrons Chris Androu & Sam Ruiz!
And as always, remember that evil spelled backwards is live, so get out there and Be Evil!