Inadequate Protections
[August Derleth's Cthulhu Mythos]

Moreover, these “Great Old Ones” are malevolent, and it should be recognized that the barriers which stand between mankind and the paralyzing horror which they represent are purely arbitrary and wholly inadequate. [Lurker]

Seals that Are Dislodged

The star-stones that imprison the Great Old Ones can be dislodged, whether by earthquakes or by human activity:

The professor made his way cautiously forward until we came to a portal, before which lay many lesser stones, from among which the professor picked up a curious stone in the shape of a five-pointed star and gave it to me, saying: ‘The earthquake evidently broke away the encrustation of these talismans put there by the Elder Gods when Cthulhu was imprisoned. This is one of the doorways to the Outside.’[Curwen]

Those Elder Gods imprisoned the evil ones by the power of the five-pointed stars, their magic held the things at the bottom of the lake until the dredging operations broke the powerful star design on the lake floor. [Depths]

Spells That Weaken

The star-stones and the protective spells of the Elder Gods are weakening:

. . . but even as the stars wane and grow cold, as the suns die, and the spaces between the stars grow more great, so wanes the power of all things—of the five-pointed star-stone as of the spells put upon the Great Old Ones by the benign Elder Gods . . . [Curwen][also paraphrased in Lurker]

the impregnable Elder Gods who must ultimately awake and renew the spells which bind this evil spawn and which are now weakening as the aeons pass since their initial imprisonment." [Curwen]

Additionally, there are those who shall learn to break the protective spells:

. . . while the Elder Gods sleep, dreaming, unknowing there are those who know the spells put upon the Great Old Ones by the Elder Gods, and shall learn how to break them, as already they can command the followers waiting beyond the doors from Outside. [Lurker]

When the Stars Are Right

The Great Old Ones (3) will rise again when the stars are rightly positioned:

. . . and legend has it that ‘when the stars are right,’ which is to say—when the stars are once again in the position in which they were at the time of the vanishing of the Great Old Ones: a cycle, as it were—they will rise again, the way having been prepared for them by their servants on earth. [Gorge]

. . . the incredible legendry of the Elder Gods and their banishment of the Great Old Ones . . . all waiting upon the propitious time . . . [Gorge]

. . . ye Cycle returneth, and He [Cthulhu] shall be freed to embrace ye Earth again and make of it His Kingdom and defy ye Elder Gods anew. [Lurker]

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