Psychopomp, Olethros

This moth-winged woman wears a spiral mask and a white, silken gown glimmering with tiny bronze mirrors.

Olethros CR 17

XP 102,400
N Medium outsider (extraplanar, psychopomp)
Init +24; Senses darkvision 60 ft., discern next of kin, low-light vision, spiritsense, true seeing; Perception +30

DEFENSE

AC 32, touch 30, flat-footed 22 (+10 Dex, +10 insight, +2 natural)
hp 275 (19d10+171)
Fort +20, Ref +16, Will +19; +8 vs. mind-affecting effects
Defensive Abilities all-around vision, cyclic energy, fated, mind blank, mirror garb; DR 15/adamantine; Immune ability damage, ability drain, death effects, disease, energy drain, poison; Resist cold 10, electricity 10; SR 28

OFFENSE

Speed 40 ft., fly 100 ft. (good)
Melee 2 fated touches +23 (10d6)
Ranged silkbow +35/+30/+25/+20 (2d6+15/19–20/×3)
Special Attacks fated touch, fateful arrows
Spell-Like Abilities (CL 17th; concentration +27)

Constantdiscern next of kin, mind blank, tongues, true seeing
At willbreath of life, greater dispel magic, greater scrying (DC 27), greater teleport (self plus 50 lbs. of objects only), prognostication
3/dayhaste, mass cure critical wounds (DC 28)
1/daymoment of prescience, plane shift (self plus 50 lbs. of objects only), temporal stasis (DC 28), wail of the banshee (DC 29)

STATISTICS

Str 18, Dex 30, Con 29, Int 20, Wis 27, Cha 31
Base Atk +19; CMB +23; CMD 53
Feats Deadly Aim, Greater Snap Shot, Improved Initiative, Improved Precise Shot, Improved Snap Shot, Point-Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Rapid Shot, Snap Shot, Weapon Focus (silkbow)
Skills Bluff +32, Disguise +32, Fly +36, Intimidate +29, Knowledge (arcana, planes, religion) +27, Knowledge (history) +24, Perception +30, Sense Motive +30, Spellcraft +27
Languages Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Infernal; tongues
SQ change shape (Medium humanoid; alter self), spirit touch

SPECIAL ABILITIES

Cyclic Energy (Ex)

To an olethros, the beginnings and endings of all things are inexorably connected, including the relationship between life and death. Olethroses are healed by both positive and negative energy effects and are immune to ability damage, ability drain, and energy drain.

Fated (Su)

An olethros adds her Charisma modifier as an insight bonus to AC and on initiative checks.

Fated Touch (Su)

An olethros’s fated touch shows her target glimpses of its own fate and draws the creature inexorably closer to its doom. A fated touch deals 10d6 points of damage that bypasses all damage reduction. This is an aging effect when used against a living target. Against undead foes, it manifests as positive energy damage. Nonliving creatures (such as constructs) and creatures that are specifically immune to aging effects are immune to an olethros’s fated touch. A creature that is critically hit by a fated touch is wracked by anguish and suffering for every bitter failure it has or shall experience, and is permanently shaken and sickened. This effect is a curse and a mind-affecting fear effect.

Fateful Arrows (Su)

Each time an olethros deals damage to a creature with an arrow fired from her silkbow, the creature gains 1 fateful arrow point. These points persist for 24 hours. As long as a creature has any fateful arrow points, it takes a penalty equal to that point total on all saving throws against effects created by a psychopomp. This is a curse effect.

Mirror Garb (Ex)

Each tiny bronze mirror woven into an olethros’s gown is a suitable focus for greater scrying, and she can view the world through them all easily with her all-around vision, allowing her to keep track of numerous situations at once. Her mind can process hundreds of streams of information simultaneously in this way. When an olethros succeeds at her saving throw against a spell or spell-like ability that targets only the olethros, there’s a 50% chance that one of these mirrors reflects the effects of the attack back upon the caster as per spell turning.

Silkbow (Su)

An olethros’s strange bow functions only for the olethros who created it. In her hands, it counts as a +5 longbow. If an olethros’s silkbow is destroyed or set aside, it collapses into non-magical silk; an olethros can create a new silkbow as a standard action. Arrows are created automatically as the olethros fires her silkbow and deal an amount of piercing damage equal to 2d6 + the olethros’s Charisma modifier.

ECOLOGY

Environment any
Organization solitary, pair, or thread (3 plus 3–8 morrignas)
Treasure standard

Psychopomps embody the natural cycle of birth and death; while most psychopomps are focused mainly on the transition between death and the afterlife, olethroses focus on birth, death, and the fate of those hanging in the balance between them. Olethroses are among Purgatory’s most powerful agents in the mortal world, and they work outside that plane’s normal hierarchy, answering to only the psychopomp ushers and the enigmatic goddess of death herself. They move among mortals in disguise, watching the strands of fate interweave and acting to promote their view of fate and stymie those who fight against fate’s flow. An olethros might appear in the guise of a wise midwife or a person’s former mentor, offering words of wisdom or advice that open up new possibilities.

Olethroses often see themselves as extraplanar rivals to the fey norns, though stories tell of at least one star-crossed romance between a norn and an olethros. Although inveterate meddlers themselves, olethroses can’t abide lipika aeons, disapproving of their manipulation of the cycle of life for some alien sense of karma. Occasionally, a shadow war of manipulation breaks out between an olethros and a lipika that can span lives, families, and even dynasties. Among psychopomps, morrignas look upon olethroses with respect and adulation, while nosois sometimes consider them bossy. Yamarajes respect their independence but sometimes requisition one to serve as an expert witness or an advocate during a particularly difficult judgment. Olethroses never refuse such a requisition, but most chafe at being assigned such tasks more than once in a long while.

While all psychopomps loathe undead, olethroses only incidentally spar with those abominable exceptions to the cycle. Instead, the focus of their enmity is upon sahkils. Olethroses sometimes use their plane shift ability to hunt their traitorous kin on the Ethereal Plane. While none know for sure precisely why olethroses fixate on sahkils, legends say that one of the first sahkil tormentors to rise was an olethros who went rogue.

Many psychopomps use manufactured weapons, such as scythes or staves, in their war against those who would endanger the flow of souls to the afterlife, but olethroses use strange weapons that function only for their kind. These are silkbows, ranged weapons built from diaphanous strands of cloth and silk that function as magical longbows.

While most psychopomps are forged from mortal souls in Purgatory, olethroses are born from other olethroses via rarely occurring immaculate conception. Olethroses claim that new members of their kind are born when a new branch of fate forks off, and the newcomers are destined to study and nurture that branch and the lineages involved. Whatever the case, very few olethroses become pregnant in this way, but those who do grow enormously in power. Olethros mothers range in CR from 20 to 25. A few of the more powerful olethros mothers advance with levels in a spellcasting class (typically cleric), but most of them advance by gaining additional Hit Dice and unique powers over birth, fate, and death. Olethros mothers occasionally use weapons other than their usual bows, either because they have developed the ability to create a different sort of weapon or because they’ve acquired a particularly powerful weapon and augmented it with their own powers. Such olethros mothers trade away the silkbow and fateful arrows abilities for amazing abilities related to their new weapons.

Olethros mothers are much more likely to have subsequent daughters than an ordinary olethros is to have a first daughter, so olethros mothers are far less common than other olethroses. Each one develops her own distinct specialty, and in that area of expertise, even yamarajes defer to her; in fact, the most powerful olethros mothers serve as advisors and near peers of even the psychopomp ushers themselves.

A typical olethros stands only 5 feet tall and weighs 100 pounds. An olethros mother is much taller; it is not uncommon for such powerful psychopomps to be nearly 8 feet in height and weigh 250 pounds.

Section 15: Copyright Notice

Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Bestiary 6 © 2017, Paizo Inc.; Authors: Robert Brookes, Benjamin Bruck, John Compton, Paris Crenshaw, Adam Daigle, Crystal Frasier, James Jacobs, Thurston Hillman, Tim Hitchcock, Brandon Hodge, Jason Keeley, Isabelle Lee, Jason Nelson, Tim Nightengale, F. Wesley Schneider, David Schwartz, Mark Seifter, Todd Stewart, Josh Vogt, and Linda Zayas-Palmer.

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