The Marshlight Leviathan

Below is a monster that is incredibly large to the point it forms an unstable and dangerous landscape for adventurers to explore. This is similar in theme to the Cosmic Moth found in In The Hills It Lies.

The Monster

The Marshlight Leviathan is a gargantuan creature hidden by bog or marsh that has grown over its body. The creature is much like an octopus or jellyfish with huge thick tendrils that root it into the crust of the earth. When close to death or at the point it mates, it uproots itself and sinks deep into the mantle of the world to mate with other Leviathans, causing great tremors and earthquakes.

The creature's body is a thick shell of dirt, swamp water and deep craters of acidic slime. It sticks slime covered tendrils from the earth with faint white lights to attract prey into the water. It digests anything that is foolish enough to slip and drown in the water of the bog. The Leviathan mates once in its lifetime. As it gets closer to this time, it needs more food to prepare itself for the journey into earth's mantle; it deploys its tendrils to actively devour prey.

Female Marshlight Leviathan's use the living carcasses of victims to incubate its eggs and keeps them in caverns beneath its skin.

The Marshlight Leviathan's method of attracting a mate involves decorating its huge body with vast amounts of molten metals and jewels. It greedily gathers treasure and stores in its central body cavern in the middle of the marsh to later melt into its body for mating.

The mouth of the Leviathan is a great circle of huge teeth with a mighty tongue often coated in moss and dirt. Every two hundred years the tongue shifts, creating a thick black soup of dirt designed to suck everything directly down into the creatures gullet. This earth then solidifies and grows bountiful flowers, causing people to settle villages there until the next shift of the tongue. These usually jut out in plain site, creating a huge stone circle admired by foolish settlers.

The Marshlight Leviathan has one huge tendril between its eyes, which remain closed until it is ready to leave or close to death, which can hang on a mighty stalk in the sky and create a false moon. The Leviathan's breath creates a thick fog over the marshes and swamps that form the Leviathan's body to keep it moist and its minions hidden.

The Minions

The Lures and Lightstalkers are a part of the Leviathan's anatomy however they have minds of their own. These minds are driven by one feeling; hunger.

The Lures 

Lightstalk Lures are highly intelligent and will not attack unless attacked themselves. Lures are long thick tendrils coated in stinking moss  green sludge. They always stay far enough away to be hidden in the mists. They light the pathways of the Leviathan's back through towards pockets of acidic sludge where victims become trapped.  Folktales have named them Will-O-Wisps. Lures will assist other minions by tricking victims into entering their domain. They are reactive hunters.

Lures, if threaten, act as boa constrictors. The white pale orb that forms their eye and the lure is protected by a circular mane of ivory hooks. All over the body of these lures are tiny mouths which suction to the body of victims and assist the Lure in dragging victims into the marsh.

These suction cups can rip the skin off of victims and leave festering wounds which are easily infected from the dirty marsh water.

Players will need to roll a Save vs. Magic (or a Will save depending on the system) to avoid being compelled to follow the soft white lights in the fog.

The Lightstalkers 

Stalkers are more devious than the Lures. They have an easier handle on the Leviathan's hunger and are aware of how to hunt intelligently. They are proactive rather than reactive. Unlike the Lures, they have millions of tiny flashing orbs over their thick and scaly skin to disorientate their prey. Players will need to make a Save vs. Paralyse to avoid being stunned. Stalkers can only Stun once per day.

The Stalker has a great budge in the centre of its stalk which contains its primary intelligence, and its teeth.

These bulges can detach from the Leviathan's stalk. They are a domed, leathery creatures that walk on six bone legs, sharp and pointed. They impale their victims. Their inner body is covered in hundred of needle teeth which can suck the innards from any creature smaller than a horse and they leave the empty husks on the ground. They must return to the tendril, filled with their victims viscera, to feed it back to the Leviathan.

If the Leviathan is female, these stalkers will take living creatures back to their nests be used as egg-sacs.

Stalkers hunt from behind and below. They will try to separate groups. Their host tendril and the their leathery backs are incredibly tough. Give this creature a high armor class for its back, and a weak armor class for its innards.

The most disturbing thing about the Stalkers is their ability to mimic human voices. They use this to trick groups of players or lone adventurers into approaching them.

The Weaknesses

The Leviathan has hundreds of Stalkers and Lures, killing these will not hurt the Leviathan deeply. It may notice if many Stalkers are killed and send more to deal with the problem. If aggravated the Leviathan will move causing landslides, flash floods and sinkholes into cavernous mouths across its great body. It's waters will become acidic and the fog more disorientating to the players; causing strange effects.

The Leviathan's weakest point is its eyes. These are located close to the middle of its body near the great stash of various metals and jewels it keeps close. Destroying or poisoning the Leviathan's eyes is not easy and they are a red herring, a deadly one. Injuring these will cause the Leviathan to flee into the crust of the earth rather than kill it, uprooting the entire marsh. The Leviathans true weakness is located above each eye. There are holes which lead into the skull of the Leviathan. Here, the players can locate a brain stem covered in hundreds of small white orbs.

Each of these orbs contains the screaming soul of a human being. Touching one of these stems allows that tormented soul to attach itself to the player. A Save vs. Magic will be needed to stop the player from being consumed by that soul of a Marshlight victim.

Severing the brain stem will kill the Leviathan, its body will try to reject the intruders and Stalkers are able to follow the players into the brain.

If the players are not quick enough, upset the Leviathan before they can kill it or put it to sleep, or steal its treasures, the Leviathan may flee into the mantle of the earth destroying anything on its body.

Artwork by Kathryn Jenkins