Puppeteer, Flesh Harrower

This dark brown, 4-foot long creature has a tail that ends in two protruding, chitinous blades. Its mouth doesn’t open so much as it seems to unfold, revealing a cavernous maw filled with rows of sharp teeth.

ECOLOGY

Environment underground
Organization solitary or cluster (2-5)
Treasure none

When separated from a nest of scourges for a long time, a puppeteer can form a colony to protect itself, awaiting the arrival of its psionic masters. When it establishes a colony, it uses a host as a breeding ground, not unlike the way the scourges reproduce, but half of the numerous offspring bursting from the poor host, will be flesh harrowers. In a colony, the flesh harrower is the soldier and worker, protecting the brood mother puppeteer and its siblings. When fully grown, the flesh harrower looks like a gigantic slug where one side ends in a terrible slit filled with sharp teeth and the other in two bony, but wickedly sharp, blades. A flesh harrower also looks somewhat like a single scourge and the resemblance is striking for anyone who have seen both.

A flesh harrower will generally retreat until it has more soldiers which can help it, or if cornered or protecting a puppeteer, will target the weakest looking enemy. Flesh harrowers are quite intelligent, just like normal puppeteers and will therefore start battle by manifesting vigor, using hustle to stay away from immediate danger.

Usually, that is followed by concealing amorpha before the flesh harrower enters combat in truth, saving one manifestation for mental barrier against enemy attacks after it has been reduced to ½ its hit points.