Cleoid



"The spiral shell was partly translucent, revealing a mass of gelatinous slime wrapped along the tight interior path. Then a portion of it emerged, spreading spiny water wings, a whipping tail, and a hideous face whose gaze drank minds."

- a passage from Darnet's Exploration Journal

Cleoids are vengeful, undersea creatures formed from tainted artifacts.

Background
The legacy of a dead race survives concealed within "tainted" cyphers and artifacts as psychic seeds. Victims who use these devices are slowly transformed into massive monsters of slime and hate, partly enclosed in a protective shell. Dubbed "cleoids" by Ninth World explorers, these creatures want revenge against all living things for their genocide.

What cleoids call themselves is a term that's no longer and more ominous, and one that can be conveyed only by telepathic contact. Victims hear this name each time they're psychically attacked by a cleoid, though most fail to appreciate the underlying meaning.

Motive:
Restoration of the cleoid race; revenge

Environment:
Almost anywhere underwater

Health:
27

Damage Inflicted:
6 points

Armor:
2

Movement:
Immediate; swim a short distance each round

Modifications:
Speed defense as level 4 due to large size; tasks related to insight, detecting falsehoods, and knowledge related to psychic phenomena and psychic engineering as level 8.

Combat:
A cleoid's main mode of attack is a psychic assault, which it can use against a single foe's mind within short range. The attack inflicts 4 points of Intellect damage (ignores Armor), and a victim must make a second Intellect defense roll or lose its next turn. A creature that would be killed by a cleoid instead falls into a 28-hour coma, during which time the victim is slowly transformed into another cleoid.

Interaction:
Vastly intelligent and filled with hate or other living things, cleoids generally don't design to communicate telepathically with other creatures.

Use:
A strange plague afflicts a fishing community. Investigators find that those who succumb to its effects are slowly transformed and finally wake as cleoids.

Loot:
A tainted cypher or two, such as a mind rejuvenator or life rod, can usually be found near cleoid infestations.