The Eschaton cultists are one of the two groups you can follow in the footsteps of in Sundered. The other group are the Valkyrie, essentially a military state, whom I will cover in another post.
Moderate lore spoilers, nothing too big, no “trade secrets” released.
Sacrifice:
A big element of their religion. The Eschaton are very eager to sacrifice and this is noted in several of their religious texts and quotes from priests:
“Sacrifice is an essential part of life.” – Ishaela Bah’gor, Mother of the Eschaton
“The Eschaton sacrifice and thus they prosper.” – The Book of Lower Gods
“One who offers sacrifice, receives power.” – The Book of Lower Gods
From these texts we can see it is obvious that the Eschaton have sacrifice, and possibly the expectation of extreme amounts of it, built into their religious code and therefore their psyches (as they are extremely pious). This essentially sets them up as the perfect group for The Shining Trapezohedron to mesh and mess with— loyal, willing to go to extremes to achieve sacrifice and power along with it— that being said, I think he does care about them, albeit minimally.
Gentle note that sacrifice for them does not mean “death outside of ritual/religion”— they do not appear to be very eager to go to war or anything of the sort., though they certainly are battle capable.
Religion/Pantheon :
The Eschaton are henothestic; they believe in multiple gods but worship only one:
“Although we have pledged allegiance to one god, there are several other deities.” – Ishaela Bah’gor, Mother of the Eschaton
This is a list of their known deities. As you can see, all of them are from the Cthulhu Mythos, so there are likely countless unmentioned gods that The Shining Trapezohedron released.
Azathoth- “Father of the Stone Giver”, guiding force
Atlach-Nacha- weaver of dreams
Ghatanothoa- war god
Z-Toggua- King of the Deep Ones
—
“Ghatanothoa guards our strength, and shall petrify non-believers!” – Eschaton Cultist
“Father of the Stone Giver, Azathoth, guides our path.” – The Book of the Lower Gods
Eldritch Deities
Nyarlathotep comes to them in his “darkness man” form, bringing The Shining Trapezohedron along with him. I am unaware of whether Nyarlathotep leaves or stays, (he likely leaves) but clearly The Shining Trapezohedron is left to commune with the Eschaton.
He seems to “care” about the Eschaton, he is horrified when the Emmit Nelson slays an entire room of women and children who are hiding, and he appears to care about the well being of their priests as well.
Since the Eschaton may have originally monolatrists (worshipped one god at a time) it is interesting to see how they might have switched to worshiping a pantheon after The Shining Trapezohedron proved his powers to them.
“We found our great god and his many servants. We relentlessly worshiped them, offering sacrifices in return for power.“ -Eschaton Scribe Lo-Ya Ygllalau, VI of VII
The Ritual/everyday rituals-
The Eschaton were almost done with this ritual that would cleanse the earth and restore their world, and possibly everything, back to normal. (Or so they thought.)
However, they were interrupted by General Waters and that is evidently when the portal Bah’gor was worked on shattered— dimensions collided, the Eschaton and the Valkyrie all turned into horrible eldritchian monsters, and Waters’ and Bah’gor fused.
This original Ritual was performed by turning on switches that would release eldritch energy when activated (via purple crystals, similar to the ones encountered during the very start of the game) however, we unfortunately never really know anything about their everyday rituals, other than the candles in Eschaton City matching those in the Sanctuary.
(The Holy City, followed by Zaekthaesz/Sanctuary)
There is also this motif with masks/heads– the Eschaton priests and priestesses could have used them during ritual.
Dominion/Krurhal Milarh does– their Guardian– and furthermore, Ishaela Bah’gor, The Eschaton Mother, literally has her robe stuffed with heads when you first see her statue in the Valkyrie campgrounds.
The Eschaton Mother has some kind of staff in her hands, standing protectively over her land. This is now Valkyrie territory.
The Eschaton’s unique art style is shown in this chamber that contains upside down robed figures in addition to a waterfall.
More robed figures behind Krurhal Milarh.
He puts on a similar mask to activate his eldritch powers, though this is his form post-fall.