CROW CULT

Membership: None identified

Purpose: To worship the night-god

Aliases: "The night-god worshipers," "The night worshipers"

Affiliations: The night-god

Enemies: Conan, Nyx, Scarlet Witch (Wanda Maximoff)

Base of Operations: Shadizar

First Appearance: Avengers: No Road Home#6 (May, 2019)

History: (Avengers: No Road Home#6 (fb) - BTS) - A cult that worshiped the so-called "night-god," what became the Crow Cult originally began as a bat cult but after the bat was killed, the worshipers changed to the Crow Cult and settled in the town of Shadizar. After a group of bandits stole a darkness shard of the Olympian goddess Nyx, unaware of what it was, the Crow Cult tracked the darkness shard to the bandits' camp near the Illitese River and slaughtered the bandits to acquire the shard.

(Avengers: No Road Home#6) - Also tracking the shard, the barbarian Conan and the time-displaced heroine Scarlet Witch found the bandit camp and investigated, finding the camp slaughtered and one remaining Crow Cult member. Recognizing the Cult member's skull insignia as a symbol of the night-god, Conan deduced where the rest of the Crow Cult had taken the shard as the Cult member seemingly faded away after remarking on the glory of the darkness in Scarlet Witch's blinded eyes. Making their way to the town of Shadizar, Conan and the Scarlet Witch purchased an adept's cloak to keep Nyx from seeing through Scarlet Witch's eyes and when the shopkeep remarked on the Crow Cult, Conan asked more information. The shopkeeper then provided Conan with information on the Crow Cult and when Conan asked where they might be found, the shopkeep remarked that he shouldn't say more or risk sending Conan and Scarlet Witch to their deaths in his fine cloak. When Conan ripped the magic lacing from the cloak for Scarlet Witch to use a blindfold, the heartbroken shopkeep provided more information on the Crow Cult's location, figuring he no longer had qualms about sending Conan to die after he tore apart the cloak. Using the shopkeep's information, Conan and Scarlet Witch ventured into Shadizar's underbelly and soon found the sacrificial chamber that the Crow Cult used as a base. Finding the Crow Cult in the midst of a sacrifice with the darkness shard, Conan rushed and skewed the Cult leader with his sword but during the battle, the Cult leader dropped the darkness shard and it scratched the sacrificial woman's arm, releasing blood that summoned a bird-like god. Unfortunately, the woman ran into the arms of Scarlet Witch and gave her the darkness shard, which drew Nyx to Scarlet Witch's location. As Nyx teleported on the scene, Conan slaughtered many of the Crow Cult members and the others were killed by Nyx's violent arrival. Nyx lamented the Crow Cult members' deaths, however, commenting that she had freed them of misguidedly worshiping anyone but her.

(Avengers: No Road Home#7) - Scarlet Witch and Conan stood among the Crow Cult's corpses as Nyx prepared to acquire the darkness shard. The corpses remained on the ground as the Avenger Spectrum revealed Nyx's children "Apate" and "Dolos" to be disguised Avengers Hercules and Vision, whom Nyx had earlier thought she had killed.

Comments: Created by Jim Zub, Mark Waid, Al Ewing and Sean Izaakse.

It was not clear if the Crow Cult existed in the Hyborian era of Earth-616 or if it was another reality. You see, Marvel's previous Conan books (circa 1970s-1990s) were traditionally included as part of reality-616 but the current Marvel Conan books do not seem to reference the previous history of Conan and Marvel so it's possible that the currently-appearing Conan is from the Hyborian era of another reality. It's also possible that the 2015 Secret Wars storyline altered 616 Conan's history when the multiverse was reborn so that some of the older adventures did not take place or had not yet taken place at the time of his appearance in Avengers: No Road Home. Until more is shown that more firmly explains this, I am treating this profile as if it is the Hyborian era of reality-616.

Profile by Proto-Man.

CLARIFICATIONS:
The Crow Cult has no known connections to:

images: (without ads)
Avengers: No Road Home#6, p24, pan3 (Crow Cult sacrificing, main image)
Avengers: No Road Home#6, p25, pan4 (Crow Cult headshots)
Avengers: No Road Home#7, p1, pan1 (Crow Cult, deaths)

Appearances:
Avengers: No Road Home#6 (May, 2019) - Jim Zub, Mark Waid, Al Ewing (writers), Sean Izaakse (art), Tom Brevoort (editor)
Avengers: No Road Home#7 (May, 2019) - Jim Zub, Mark Waid, Al Ewing (writers), Paco Medina (art), Tom Brevoort (editor)

First Posted: 10/11/2019
Last updated: 10/11/2019

Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.

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