#seugathi

Greetings humans. I would like to share with you the gloriously complex and superior life cycle of the Illithid species.

this will be a multiple-repost series, so if you are interested in more, check the notes periodically.

I hope this will make your kind appreciate the great honor your species is going to be given, to be incorporated into this cycle.

OK, so lets start with something important. The life cycle of the common illithid is not actually the natural life cycle. This should be clear upon analysis of our breeding habits. Our current life cycle is the result of a symbiotic relationship with a species known as the Elder Brains, the mature form of an Intellect Devourer. So in this post, I will cover the natural life cycle first.

An illithid is produced as a batch of tadpoles from the parent. In most cases, this tadpole is excreted from what was once the genitals of the host, which have since been adapted to tadpole production. The tadpole is excreted into some water-based fluid, and if it survives long enough without being euthanized, eaten, or taking a host, it matures into a Larva, seen below.

These larva will remain barely sentient without any consumable grey-matter. They will, however, continue to grow in size and power. Eventually they will attach to a sentient host and consume it, gaining full consciousness in the process. However, since their prey is typically dead when it is consumed, the larva will be driven insane. The influx of psychic energy triggered by the introduction of sentience will in turn trigger massive physiological changes, resulting in the next form, a Seugathi, seen below

Over time, the Seugathi will increase in size, intelligence, and psychic power as it continues to consume not just grey matter (like a respectable Illithid) but the rest of the body as well. Eventually it will reach the next stage in it’s development, a full grown Neothelid, seen below:

Once again we come to another sentient worm creature and we’re still not finished with that trend.  Ok so I have to explain myself on this one, as this might be blaspheming to some people.  You remember how I said that the neothelid was difficult to place and an entry down the line might explain why.  Well this is that entry.  The reason being that the seugathi are in a lot of ways, lesser neothelid.  Both from a lore and power standpoint.  Nowhere else on this list do we have a creature that was created by another aberration ranking higher than its creator.  The ugothol are lower than their creator, the neothelid are lower than their creator (yes this is a spoiler if you look into it but a spoiler most people can guess anyway).  And so it seems odd, in some ways, to have the seugathi, minions to the neothelids to rank higher on a list of Big Bads than their creators.  Their creators certainly wouldn’t be happy.  But hopefully as you stick around you’ll see the minor reasons why I considered the seugathi just a slight step above.  

A seugathi is packed with all of the gear to irritate the party for a long time and the capability and potential to do even more than fits into their stat block.  With a manipulatable tail, a seugathi can hold onto weapons that can make them far fiercer combatants than a simple bite and tail whip combo and boy oh boy can they wield magic weapons with expertise.  In fact, not only can seugathi wield magic weapons with ease but they have the compatibility to equip and utilize any magical device with ease and have a certain preference towards wands and staves.  Even without such tools at their disposal, a seugathi already has a decent array of spells that cap off with mind fog to whittle down a foe’s psyche for its infamous aura and phantasmal killer for a targeted removal.  Stack on top of that some mind-affecting spells which only improve after dropping the mind fog and a dispel magic which is always handy and the seugathi looks pretty decent at diverting foes and making room for an escape or simply incapacitating enough to give it room to kill.  This is not even including its most infamous tool, the aura of madness that constantly lingers around it and can confuse those near it and if not dealt with, have the possibility of making a creature lose their mind.  This is a lot for a CR 6 creature, maybe even too much.  All of these things only get an upgrade with the seugathi savant, which also gets to somewhat expand its spell list into the psychic realm.  CR 6 is not that high either which means a seugathi in a lot of situations could be a canvas monster, even it is one with a lot of perks from the get go.

Seugathi are spawned solely for the purpose of being the mouthpieces and taskmasters to the neothelids, but that doesn’t mean that that’s where their journey begins and ends.  When created, a seugathi are given a series of bizarre quests that they must fulfill that often seem to have no relevance to other creatures and may well just be a manifestation of the madness of the neothelids.  To me, these exercises are another chance to delve into weird fiction style adventures.  These missions do however often loop back around to calling down impossibly powerful creatures from the Dark Tapestry.  Many become obsessed with the tasks that they are assigned.

While seugathi often spawn up from deep underdark and enact many of their tasks within this beneath, do not mistake this as them being unable to interact with the outer world.  As the mouthpieces to the neothelid, the seugathi do not exhibit the same immediate vitriol that their creators do.  In fact, seugathi are designed to be able to carry out diplomatic missions in spit of their looks and are able to expertly infiltrate into social circles.  To do so, they can suppress the madness aura around them and rely on their suggestive magics as well as their ability to read minds.  They also can speak telepathically to those that they wish at any given time.

This diplomatic streak must be used on occasion to temper their feeding habits.  While a seugathi can subsist and flesh and fungus, its preferred meal is in the sustenance it gains by driving other sentient beings mad.  Seugathi even have a subtle control over those affected by their delusional presence, and this can allow them to push others even further towards the edge.  The venom of their bites can make targets even more receptive to this curse.

Seugathi have their own sort of faith that is reliant upon the Dark Tapestry.  Interestingly though, this faith is more centered around the figure of Yog-Sothoth.  I am not actually particularly familiar with Yog-Sothoth, it is one of the few most famous Lovecraft Old Ones that I’ve not done much research on myself.  But it is interesting that the suegathi fixate on a different entity of the Dark Tapestry than that of their creators.

Socially, seugathi have a number of ties available to them and far more than the neothelids.  For one, they are used in a proxy war that the neothelids constantly wage against the intellect devourers, stemming from their initial rivalry (in some ways its better that Neothelids came first in this list because explaining some of this in reverse would’ve been even harder).  They also form alliances with many different underdark entities from worm that walks, who have a similar master, derro, who are just as mad as them, and drow.  In fact, seugathi have a culture beyond their designers and even go on to do things on their own.  Seugathi keep pets of their own (ahh) and also have established their own communities in city sewers and ghoul locales as well as a small contingent that works out of the abyss.  They make alliances under other powerful beings as well, such as the runelords.

The seugathi savant is also a step above its fellows.  It forms when a seugathi realizes that the tasks it has been given are impossible to follow through on but wish to continue seving the neothelids.  When this happens, they enter a manic insanity and forced to come to a greater contemplation.  In order to do so, they hunt down philosophers and mystics, expanding their minds through their thoughts well all the while causing them to fall into madness.  Once they have achieved such wisdom, they ask their neothelid masters why their task was impossible, often being told it was specifically to make them stronger and achieve this form.  After this, they are given more insight into the grander schemes of their masters and achieve higher status over their fellows, who they percieve as beneath them.  The other seugathi revere these savants as older and wiser siblings which tends to annoy them (its just like a real older sibling).  Personally, I think this is oddly kind of cute that the seugathi are like ‘Yay! Older bro/sis!’

Which, by the way, and I know this is an odd place to bring this up.  But anytime you see me comment about any creature being evil or really anywhere on the alignment chart please take that with a grain of salt.  This Big Monster Evil Guy series is attempting to look at the creature solely based on RAW.  That does not mean that I recommend, and in fact I would actively discourage you, from keeping all of a singular monster type within their pre-designed alignment role.  My own world for instance specifically runs by the rules that any creature can be of any evil, to the extreme that there are Lawful Good demons and Chaotic Evil archons, so you know that I’m not treating monsters in that way.  Just as a note to keep in mind.

But back to the seugathi, I find them incredibly compelling, dealing with elements of weird fiction, madness, infiltration, and Lovecraftian entities all in one package, all while having their own individual culture.  I really like minions that can carry themselves and either be incredibly loyal or rogue entities depending on the need.