Despite its shrub-like appearance, the roots of the Assassin Root extend deep underground and are not so unlike their viney predecessor. Assassin Roots have become an unfortunate part of the subterranean ecology.

Instinct: Fertilize with flesh

• Entangle someone in strangling roots
• Attack from any crack or loose soil
• Encapsulate unconscious creatures in root balls

The shriek of metal on metal howls out as an eight-legged mass of chains drops from the ceiling. Made entirely of cruel hooks, barbed chains, and jagged iron, its metal screams as it moves. The chains turn and twist on each other as knives and barbs dance.

The Hellchain Weavers whirling blades scratch against each other. The noise is terrifying and scintillating. Webs of chain appear from nowhere, entangling the unwary, ensnaring the panicked. A severed limb re-attaches when touched to the body of the Hellchain Weaver.

Instinct: Chase prey for hours to heighten the thrill of the hunt

• Spin webs of chain
• Seize the unwary
• Produce an unholy din
• Flay a hapless victim
• Whisper words of despair and agony
• Terrorize and brutalize

Anger, remorse, guilt. Some emotions live on after death, coalescing into an invisible, malevolent entity. It lashes out, hurling objects and creatures with destructive force. Invisible, incorporeal, and vicious, a barabashka seeks to harm those who trespass on its haunt.

Instinct: To drive away

• Fool the senses
• Unleash a whirlwind of destruction
• Throw something

This lithe creature about the size of a human child bears it teeth preparing to attack. With red gleaming eyes and froth around its mouth it charges.

Instinct: Gnash and gnaw

• Vicious bite

Eyes gleaming with bloodlust, the man before you brandishes a broadsword and has a wicked looking knife on his hip. His fetid breath repels you, his unwashed body reeks with stench.

Instinct: Protect the cargo and defend the ship

• Waylay the unsuspecting
• Rally round the mast
• Climb the mast and rigging
• Brawl

An order of monks cremate their dead. Some of their master monks have the ability to animate the ashes their bodies have been reduced to, and act as deathless guardians for the order's sacred places. If their funerary urns are disturbed they swirl forth as a whirlwind of grey dust, dust that continually forms and reforms into a manlike shape that seems to only be solid while delivering flurries of furious blows.

Instinct: Guard the orders sacred places

• Whirlwind of blinding dust and ash
• Choking cloud of ash and wind
• A shadow of the man I once was

Once the favored apprentice of a wizard, Stanus is furious with his master's choice to be interred here with his diadem rather than pass it on. He has come to reclaim it, selling an eye and his soul for giant size and monstrous allies.

So far he has not found it, and he grows more frustrated and anxious by the day. Stanus spends his days breaking into the niches, raging, and indulging his pica - a habit he began while tending the wizards hearth. He has so far eaten the ashes of fourteen kings, nine queens, and sixteen sorcerers. Their vengeful spirits now infuse him, driving him further into obsession.

If he is injured and bleeds, or if any portion is severed, the spirits within him it will animate it as (d6)

1. writhing worms, seek food and darkness
2. glistening abomination, 2' long, seeks warmth
3. terrified, hairless rats, seek safety
4. tiny nude despot, d3' tall
5. a ghoul, former tyrant, demands obedience
6. a wight, former sorcerer, seeks thralls

Instinct: To claim his inheritance

• Cast a spell of darkness and decay
• Spawn a creature from its blood
• Destroy something

Grey-green, sinewy and slick-skinned. Stoops to 6' on land, but in the water as lithe and fast as a seal. He clings to the low places, grubbing about for oysters and fish. The tiny island has made Molluck stir crazy, and he will relish the chance to overturn boats or strangle swimmers.

Instinct: To bloody the waters

• Overturn a boat
• Strangle a victim
• Glide ripple-less through water

Abasha's lifelong ambition is to be higher than all she can see. With nails of iron, she climbs the ruin spider- like, and spends long days at the top leering through the drizzle. She throws stones accurately twice the length of the island, and from the tower can spy all but the lower stair and east overhang.

She will welcome noisy boaters with determination. She craves tribute from terrified subjects, and the taste of brain lapped from a freshly cracked skull.

Instinct: To reach new heights

• Hurl a stone
• Make a gruesome threat
• Scurry like a spider

These three things, sisters grim and vicious, hunt the woods on the outskirts of town, hiding not among the trees as much as inside the shadows between the trunks and branches.

Their whispers rustle, gentle night breezes that make promises, tempting offers whose prices involve revenge, betrayal, and cruelty. By these means, they sow seeds of strife, waiting for the community to erupt into chaos before they exit the darkness to feed.

Instinct: To corrupt

• Manipulate shadows
• Reveal something terrible
• Offer a wicked exchange