COUNT ABYSS' shadow creatures
COUNT ABYSS' shadow creatures
Classification: Extradimensional creatures
Location/Base of Operations: Unrevealed;
formerly Count Abyss' fortress in the realm of Egolix-7
Known Members: None identified
Affiliations: Formerly Count Abyss (Milos Abyss)
Enemies: Infinity Watch (Drax, Gamora, Maxam, Moondragon/Heather Douglas, Pip the Troll, Adam Warlock), Maya
Aliases: Shadow Demons
First Appearance: Warlock and the Infinity Watch#16 (May, 1993)
Powers/Abilities: Soulless beings perhaps composed of the Darkforce, ectoplasm, or some other form of energy and/or matter, the shadow demons could alter their density, passing though solid rock or telekinetic fields at will.
Although they could be damaged or torn apart by physical assaults, such assaults did no actual harm, and the creatures could almost instantly reform themselves at will.
The creatures were also immune to telepathic and telekinetic assaults, as well as "karmic blasts" that assault the soul.
The shadow creatures generate an intense, other-worldly cold. It is
soul-chilling, metaphysical freeze, a virtually undeterable assault.
Traits: The creatures single-mindedly pursued a goal, and they would use numbers of overwhelm their targets.
It is unrevealed whether they were sentient creatures or just creations acting via the will of Count Abyss.
Type: Bilaterally symmetric semi-humanoid shaped bipeds (possibly composed of Darkforce or other energy)
Eyes: Two (solid white)
Fingers: Two (plus opposing thumb)
Toes: Two (forward-facing, with a toe-like spike on what would be their calcaneus; this may have functioned as a third/opposing toe)
Skin color: Black
Average height: Approximately 5'10"?
History:
(Warlock and the Infinity Watch#16) - Seeking to claim Adam Warlock's Soul Gem, Abyss sent a group of
his shadow creatures (see comments) to Monster Island to assault the Infinity Watch.
A group of them first encountered the simple-minded Power Gem-possessing Drax the Destroyer, whose associate, the Space Gem-possessing Pip the Troll told him to hold the fort while he sought reinforcements.
Despite the vast power at his command, Drax could not physically harm the shadow creatures, whose soul-chilling cold incapacitated him and left him covered in ice.
Reporting demons in the rec room, Pip sent Moondragon and Gamora to
join the fight and then located and informed Adam Warlock as well.
Gamora decapitated one of the shadow creatures with an axe but then was grabbed by a number of the creatures until Moondragon telekinetically extracted her.
After Moondragon's telepathic blast had no effect on the creatures, she and Gamora fled while she put up a telekinetic wall between them and the creatures, but the shadow beings passed right though it.
A direct telekinetic assault similarly had no effect.
Warlock then arrived, initially driving the creatures back with his staff, but he found continued use of the staff had no effect. He then tried a karmic blast from his Soul Gem, which likewise proved utterly ineffective.
Realizing that this meant the creatures had no souls, Adam switched to a physical assault, only to see the creatures almost instantly regenerate from his attacks.
Warlock next fled into the castle, hoping to temporarily lose his pursuers by zig-zagging through the castle's near-endless corridors, but the creatures thwarted this by passing through the walls.
Blasts of masonry did nothing against the creatures, and Adam Warlock was briefly overwhelmed before a recovered Drax arrived and briefly drove them back before they began to freeze him again.
As apparent creations of a dead soul, Warlock finally reasoned that he
could use the Soul Gem's ability to read how pure a spirit a being had
to vanquish the creatures. After one of the beings fell under the cold
light of truth, Warlock was again overwhelmed before he could strike
again.
However, once his teammates caught up to him and occupied the creatures, Warlock gained the time to use the power on the other creatures in succession, and they were either destroyed or banished back to Count Abyss' stronghold.
(Warlock and the Infinity Watch#16 - BTS) - Count Abyss subsequently appeared himself, demanding the Soul Gem and revealing the many other servants at his command, but Warlock refused to yield the Gem.
(Warlock and the Infinity Watch#30) - Abyss sent his mutated Egolan minions and a number of shadow creatures to Earth to battle the Infinity Watch (which now included, at least as an ally, Maxam).
During this distraction, Abyss captured Maya and returned her and his minions to his fortress.
Comments: Created by Jim Starlin, Tom Grindberg, and Keith Williams.
I don't think the "shadow demons" from Warlock and the Infinity Watch were Egolans transformed by Count Abyss but rather soulless creations of his.
The Egolans were subsequently returned to their normal forms after Count Abyss' defeat. The fate of the shadow creatures, unless they were also mutated Egolans, remains unrevealed.
Profile by Snood.
CLARIFICATIONS:
The shadow creatures of Count Abyss should be distinguished from:
images: (without ads)
Warlock and the Infinity Watch#16, pg. 2, panel 6 (freezing Drax);
pg. 5, panel 2 (vs. Gamora);
pg. 7, panel 4 (vs. Warlock-facing reader);
pg. 8, panel 3 (vs. Warlock-facing away from reader);
pg. 11, panel 4 (passing through wall);
pg. 12, panel 1 (dropping down from wall)
Appearances:
Warlock and the Infinity Watch#16 (May, 1993) - Jim
Starlin (writer), Tom Grindberg (pencils), Keith Williams (inks), Craig
Anderson (editor)
Warlock and the Infinity Watch#30 (August, 1994) - Jim
Starlin (writer), Patrick Olliffe (artist), Craig Anderson (editor)
First posted: 11/21/2022
Last updated: 11/21/2022
Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.
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