Nkulu Zao

The Nkulu Zao are one of the minor legacies of Laibon. The childer of the nearly extinct line of Zao-lat, the Nkulu Zao's numbers are few after their legacy has been hunted down for centuries. Their very name is in honor of their founder; Nkulu Zao is Bavili for "dead souls of Zao-lat". In order to hide from the magi who decimated their numbers, the Nkulu Zao remain highly secretive. So secretive, in fact, that even they do not know how many of them remain in Africa, let alone the rest of the world. They remain solitary, desperate to survive, to the point they have let the Tremere's rumors come true. The Nkulu Zao are genuine soul-suckers, taking the soul of any who threaten their safety. The Soulsuckers do not even trust one another, so Embraces are extremely rare; those few who are were chosen for no reason other than their sire saw them as capable of saving the Nkulu Zao from themselves, perhaps even through Final Death.

The Nkulu Zao's weakness is that they may only take blood from a willing subject; those Soulsuckers who force vitae from a target recieve no sustinance from it, and may even degenerate. Unlike their Western counterparts, the third eye that Saulot's progeny are known for has mostly disappeared from the bloodline, although a rare Nkulu Zao may actually have a functional one.


 * VTM: Kindred of the Ebony Kingdom, p. 200-201