History
The Ghouls -- also known as "Devils of the Mist" -- are subterranean creatures of unknown origin. There are two variants to their race, their differing sizes telling them apart.
According to one account, they have been on the Earth's surface as early as 2060 BC, when they attacked an undisclosed location near ancient Greece. They were forced to retreat back underground, however not before capturing at least one woman who would be their prisoner for many centuries, her life enduring due to some unknown age retarding properties of their underground kingdom. Beneath the surface, they conquered a city, possibly connected to Netherworld, where they lived the next four thousand years.[1]
In 1940, an opening between the surface and the realm of the Ghouls opened in the Blue Ridge Mountains. The race of smaller ghouls surfaced and began capturing human women for the purposes of sacrificing them to the volcano that have let them on ground. These abductions caused the people in the area to organize a group of hunters to track down the monsters. The Ghouls's activities also attracted the attention of the costumed hero known as the Angel. He saved a young girl from one of the creatures and tracked them back to their cave. There, the Angel was overpowered and captured by the creatures and tied up along with the previously captured women. However, when volcano started to erupt in the cavern, it frightened the creatures. The Ghouls tried to get underground through the crevices in the cave, but lava caught them. The Angel freed himself and with the aid of the hunters got women to safety. However, a rock fall knocked the Angel back down into the pit where he narrowly avoided landing in lava himself.[2]
The Angel was captured and imprisoned by the larger species of the Ghouls in their underground city. There, he was revived by the Grecian woman captured centuries earlier. She gave him the Cape of Mercury to use in escape from the city through a hole in their cavern, before ending her life by exposing herself to sunlight. The Angel stopped the bigger Ghouls from reaching the surface, but their battle caused an earthquake. He was able to fly past the creatures and escape just as the earthquake buried the creatures under tons of rock.[3]
If any of the Ghouls (of either variety) survived remains to be seen.