Horrible Monsters That Want to Kill You

Scary Monsters

 

Cannibal Dragon

7-8' tall Draconic Shapeshifter 

7 HD  

Armor as Scale (d10) 

Alignment: Conniving

Wants: To Eat a True Dragon's Heart  

Move: Normal, Swim as Normal

Morale: 8 (Never fights to the death)

Attack: 1d8+3 Serrated Claws - 2d8+3 in Darkness, 

Str: 16 Dex: 14 Con: 14 Int: 12 Wis: 10 Cha: 12 

A two legged counterfeit Dragon. Black fire-proof Sharkskin stretched over rubbery cartilage. Instead of pinions, their forearms sport a row of serrated teeth for sawing through Dragon hide. Obligate carnivores, pathologically sadistic and self-absorbed. Like true dragons, they can shift their form at will. Most take the second-skin of a Human. They seek high station in societies; appearing from nowhere (sometimes with fabricated credentials) and using their vitality, subtle supernatural power, and sociopathy to rise swiftly through the ranks of martial culture. 

Cannibal Dragons share a biological imperative to seek out and devour the heart of one of their trueborn cousins, the bloody key to a metamorphosis into the final stage of their life-cycle: a Black Dragon. Their ill-gotten stations are inevitably put towards this end; culminating in betrayal regardless of the venture's success.

Shadow Breath: Breath Weapon. Exhale fuligin shadowsmoke in a 15' radius cloud centered on self, or 30' cone. Shadowsmoke only dissipates in daylight, otherwise lingers for weeks before settling. Cannibal Dragons can see through their own breath weapon.

Rubber Bones: Immune to Fire, half damage from blunt and slashing weapons. Can squeeze through any gap larger than 1' at full speed. 

Treasure:

• Meat: Piss-sour, drenched in ammonia. Causes extreme bowel distress. May be fermented for a year and a day inside of a gravel pit to create a mildly intoxicating and incredibly rare delicacy (that still tastes like piss.)
• Heart: Carries the blessing and curse of Dracomorphosis, if eaten while the blood is still hot. Skin-shift into a Cannibal Dragon at will.
• Hide: Fireproof. Can be made into Scale Mail (d10) or a Shield.
• Bones: Worthless, rots into gelatin in a month.
• Shadowsmoke: Thick fuligin ink that rots in daylight. Lingers thick in the air, even when it settles, enough motion will stir it back into the air. Can be kept in bags or phials to make smoke bombs. Selling this on the market will make people think you're a Cannibal Dragon and they might come to murder you and eat your heart. 
• Hacksilver: Cannibal Dragons keep smaller hoards, and are often too proud to use any magical weapons or armor they find. Roll on an intelligent monster table of the appropriate HD. 

Bloodlark

Cat-sized winged monotreme 

2d6+2 swarms 

1 HD  

Armor as Leather (d6) 

Alignment: Hungry

Wants: To drink rich blood, to tend the nest, to have many many children

Move: Normal (Flying,) Hobble at half normal when forced to land

Morale: 10

Attack: 1d4 sharp beak and spurs, blood drinking tongue. (Latches on a 3 or 4, ignores armor while latched)

Str: 10 Dex: 16 Con: 10 Int: 3 Wis: 10 Cha: 7 

Named in error, Bloodlarks are actually a kind of egg laying mammal, closely related to the Echidna. Their front and back limbs are leathery wings, and their snout is a beak. Their droning dirge-song drives domesticated animals (dogs, horses, cattle) into a frenzy, causing them to either bolt, buck their riders, or freeze. Their eyes are feeble, they navigate by the stench of blood alone; those without an open wound are safe from their hunger.

Bloodlarks eat more than just blood. In addition to snails and insects, they eat mud, wood resin, and ochre. The blood in their bowels thickens into a red paste, which they regurgitate and shape into rust-colored nests in the eaves of old churches and abandoned watchtowers, cliff faces, and the branches of Sequoias. These nests are infamous for growing large and labyrinthine, with the largest and most dangerous hosting up to a hundred Bloodlarks.

During the winter the flock hibernates- coating their bodies in a thinner layer of insulating ochre-bile and curling into a sleeping stone-like lump. A Bloodlark in winter is an ill-omen, a sign that the creatures have fallen out of balance through overpopulation or disease and must be culled before they frenzy.

Dirge: You hear them before you see them. Roll 1d4 for domestic animals (but not tamed wild animals, wolves, panthers, etc.) 1: Flee 2: Buck 3: Freeze 4: Unaffected.

Treasure: 

• Hibernating Bloodlark: Looks like a red clay lump. Sleeps like a stone. If kept in a cold space they can sleep for decades, awakening perfectly healthy, albeit ravenous. Used as traps by some cultures.
• Egg: Red Yolk and shell. Acquired taste. Shell can be ground for a rich red pigment, this hue is forbidden to adorn those not of Royal Blood.
• Guano: Can be milked from their offal and kept in a waterskin filled with oil. Sets into sturdy red concrete in seconds. 

Shot-wose

5' Elephant nosed sloth-ape

1d4 + 2 Packs, single guard-beast

2 HD  

Armor as Cloth (d4) 

Alignment: Skittish, territorial

Wants: Eat grass and snails, dominate rivals, protect the pack

Move: Normal, Climb as Normal

Morale: 6 (10 when maddened)

Attack: 1d4+2 60' ranged stone snotshot, 1d4+1 blunt claw-swing

Str: 12 Dex: 15 Con: 14 Int: 4 Wis: 12 Cha: 8

Bipedal herbivores sometimes mistaken for demi-humans. They eat thorny leaves and small snails/crabs too tough to be digested. To ease their stomachs' churning they swallow stones. When threatened, these gastroliths are quickly regurgitated into a chamber in the rear sinus, and can be launched with wicked speed and precision up to 60'. Shot-wose use the scent glands along their bushy tails to mark territory. When these demesnes are breached they take to the Redwood canopies at speed, harrying the intruder with nose-bullets. They keep small caches of stones in their knothole nests to "reload." Put to direct confrontation they retreat and regroup, preferring to take fights where they have the height and range advantage.

Gray Dwarves keep Shot-wose as guard-beasts. They are chained to alcoves and watchtowers cut into the cliffs where Gray Dwarves travel, and the lead shot (1d6+2) in their bellies maddens them to attack everything that comes into sight. Their blunt claws are tipped with steel talons (1d6+1) and their necks are fitted with wolf-collars. Those captured as pups keep enough of their wits to be trained and join skirmishes with their masters.

Treasures: 

• Meat: 1-in-6 chance it's bitter, oily, and foul, otherwise it's like lean venison. The tail can be used for soup. (Eating the flesh of an animal going insane from lead poisoning is not a correct decision to make.)
• Prism Snail Shell: Hefty enough to crack a skull when slung. Passes through magical barriers and armor. No prism snail has ever been found outside the half-digested pulp inside a Shot-wose.
• Skull: Can be loaded and fired like a blowpipe for sling bullets.
• Pelt: Too thin for armor, but their winter coat is excellent lining for gloves, boots, and cloaks.
• Musk: Ingredient for expensive perfumes. Drives away bears and wolves.