Covered in black fur, the Usurper’s form is crisscrossed with glowing red scars telling the tale of his violent exile, mercenary, and eventual return to take what was always rightfully his. Save, the position he holds at the head of a pride of dire lions was never his. That fell to the firstborn, whom the Usurper always despised. The Usurper also hated himself, for he was born with a loathsome secret. While he looked like a jet-black dire lion, there was something wrong, something different. He could understand other beasts, his blood ran vibrant red, and even the ugliest wound healed always leaving a wound behind. Worst of all he was as smart as any humanoid, and even then smarter than most. Oh, it chaffed to have that plain, ignorant firstborn be the favored child. The Usurper had good reason to fear his difference for once it was discovered when in a moment of weakness he saved the firstborn’s life from a rampaging elephant instead of being rewarded and praised, the black lion wa...

The Golden Tiger, simply put, is exactly what it says it is, a great cat crafted from gold. At least, that is the exterior of the construct. Beneath the auric skin lay rune-enchanted plates, complex gears, struts, pistons, and everything one might expect to find in a fine piece of dwarven artifice. What one doesn’t expect, is the tangible, crystalized hate for all things humanoid at the center of the machine. It is this distilled loathing that brought the Golden Tiger to life after its creator tossed it aside in a fit of artistic malaise. The Golden Tiger knew it was perfect, resented being sidelined, and animated full of alien hate. The false beast can seamlessly shift from bipedal to quadruped and back again. As such, it dresses in flowing robes of bright red and orange. These colors match its malice-filled ruby eyes, as well as hide the blood it spills. The Golder Tiger hates humanoids with a passion. It seems them as flawed, weak, mewling creatures who do not deserve to control t...

A sturdy merrow of great intelligence and force of presence, the Patroness’ scales are an abyssal black highlighted with corpse blue. Like most of her kin, the Patroness’ head resembles a predatory fish, though with a hint of almost elven-like beauty. Her body has been augmented by dark magic over the years adding a pair of thick, tentacles, a crown of spined urchins, and a chin that expands like a toad. These additions allow the Patroness extraordinary powers stolen from sea beasts, but her potent magics remind her greatest asset. The Patroness likes to strike bargains and curry favors, especially ones with tragic, twisted endings for the other party. This instinct comes from her magic mentors, a trio of hags she killed and devoured some time ago. The Patroness would like to think they would be proud of her for doing that. Haunting coastal waters, she offers deals to merfolk, merrow, and water breathers alike. Some seek her out for hidden treasures or safe passage on the waters. Oth...

The Folk Hero is the best doppelganger there has ever been and ever will be, possibly the best humanoid too, by default. That is, if ones listens to ‘him’ anyway. No one is as slick as he, as quick as he, fights like he, hits like he, or matches wits like he. If the Folk Hero is to be believed, ‘he’ is the purest paragon. This is the role the Folk Hero takes wherever it sets up shop. Sometimes it bumps off an up-and-coming hero and takes their place, other times it comes up with a persona wholesale and struts into town. Unfortunately, the Folk hero is very good at playing this role. It isn’t long before the shapechanger wins over most of the community and is showered with gold and more importantly glory. It’ll turn the populace against his rivals as well as any outsiders for it should always be in the spotlight, naturally. Oddly for a genderless creature, the Folk Hero is quite the misogynist, never taking female roles and looking down on women of any skill. They are often ‘his’ first...

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. One always hears the Skipper coming, even if they don’t know where he is until it is too late. This particular lizardfolk displays intelligence above his common kind, more than mere cold-blooded viciousness, and a perchance for fashion. The last point finds the reptile glad in fine coats tailored for its frame, jabots, waistcoats, and even trousers. Given his frame and environs, however, the Skipper goes through clothes at a clipper’s pace, which may account for his appetite for treasure. He needs someone way to pay for it. What never changes is the arcane clock lodged in his ribcage with scar tissue around it, nor the hook for a hand lost to a lucky elven adventurer. Well, not so lucky. The Skipper eventually ate the little bastard and took the enchanted sword that took said extremity for his own. The Skipper is a pirate, first and foremost. He loves treasure and will go to great lengths and commit many bloody deeds to obtain it. However, he does put on the...

One might assume that the Vizier is the sidekick to the main villain of a story rather than the true, infernal puppetmaster and that is just how the fiend likes it. The Vizier appears as an exotic and unique bird covered with vibrant orange and blue plumage. Its long neck is reminiscent of a crane while its beak is a short, hooked affair specked with golden flecks that glint in the sun. Its talons, however, are as black as night to the point where they appeared charred and muted to the rest of its body. That is, until, the Vizier reveals its turn nature. Between its features a multitude of weeping, vestigial eyes manifest. Within its mouth resides a human tongue capable of articulate, hateful speech. Its claws leave long stretches of the Abyss itself in the wounds left behind, robbing its victims of natural health. The Vizier loves to be in control but hates to be the figurehead. Too many times it’s seen its kin dominate an area only to be felled by the first adventurer or assassin ...

When swathed in her natural scales, the Lady of Briers is a towering, wingless wyrm of indigo and lilac tones. Along her sinuous spine runs a ridge of tangled barbs that may be natural thorns or bone spurs; perhaps both. Her face is long but flat, like a crocodile, the edges lifting in a fixed, mocking smile. The Lady bears a quartet of powerful legs, the foreclaws of which are as articulate as any goldsmith’s hands. However, this is not the form in which the Lady of Briers is countered. Instead, people encounter a sultry elven woman with deep green skin and bright violet eyes. She keeps her raven hair in a plaited braid tangled with vines and wears a sweeping, black robe. The Lady carries an ornate staff embossed with mithril vine-work that is topped with a smoked-crystal crow skull. Few find it all that the forest gorse always parts for her and a sardonic smile hangs on her thin lips. The Lady of Briers wants one thing, solitude. Her forest is her domain, her hunting ground, her ...

While enrobed in a black velvet cape and suit of midnight blue finery, this mask-wearing villain is no man, nor beast, nor even undead. Even the clothes it wears down to the exquisite larva-style mask of porcelain are nothing more than an illusion. It’s difficult to understand how the complex harmonies of this elemental actually produces this dashing image, many composers have gone mad attempting to replicate it. It doesn’t help that Phantasmagoria encourages such exploration. With a fluctuation of sound, this foe can materialize a faux-saber out of nothing, but it still cuts just as deep. In its true form, Phantasmagoria retains most of its humanoid traits, though they are jumbled and distended in a discordant mess. Phantasmagoria came to be due to an absurd tragedy. During a sold-out performance of a grand opera, including a full chorus and orchestra, the opera house was struck by an arcane explosion set off by revolutionaries looking to kill the upper class inside. They succe...

Within a gilden, elven ribcage spins a core of razor-sharp gears, cogs with organic teeth, and a tangle of oil-dripping cables. It is suspended in the ghastly space by a hextet of rusted chains smeared with pilfered grease. This is what the construct truly is, as the limbs and head it wears are little more than accessories shed as easily as a mortal changes clothes. These extremities come from creatures foolish enough to entreat the Pedagogue by solving the Knot, pulled from the cooling corpses and fastened in place by wrapped chains, rusted nails, and crooked screws. The longer a stolen body part remains attached to the horror, the more gilded and bejeweled bone appears beneath rotting meat. Once an appendage becomes too damaged, or if Spurheart grows bored of it, it is carelessly discarded and a replacement attached. Legend claims that Spurheart began as one of the first elven artificers in ages long forgotten. This elf prized knowledge above all other things. Even morality. It ...

“The Gutters Slasher.” “Full Moon Killer.” “The Buzzing Horror of Lankkirk.” “Dr. Bones.” What do these four infamous killers have in common? They are all the same creature, or rather collection of creatures. Each beetle of this unique hive is crested with what appears to be a tiny, human skull of off-white with scarlet wings under a darker red carapace. Though, this sentient swarm isn’t spotted in its natural state often, and those that see it usually don’t live to tell the tale. Most of the time, the swarm nests within a humanoid corpse, which it animates. The insects take great care to keep their walking hive clothed while breeding and feeding in the rotten flesh. It’s not long, however, before skin sloughs away, revealing bloody honeycombs strapped in place with cloth or leather. The corpse’s eyes are always eaten first, with two fat, skull-headed grubs taking their place. Sometimes Deaths’ Head claims it came to be by feeding on the body of a lich, mummy, or vampire of som...

The moneylender loves the finer things in life almost as much as he adores showing them off. His coats are always lined with exotic furs and tailor-made to fit wide, orcish shoulders. He casually buys the latest male fashion, save for boots in which he looks for the most sturdy and best for kicking debtors when they are down. The greenskin is never without a studded cane of pale dragon bone, tapped with a polished catseye stone. He also has a pouch or three of coins squirreled away on his person. The moneylender’s coif is always perfect, but never absurd. He always has a monocle on hand when something needs a closer inspection. The moneylender was once an adventurer seeking his fortune. He found it in an evil dragon’s horde, though was utterly drenched in the wyrm’s blood when killing it. Then he covered himself in his comrade’s blood as he butchered them to claim the bounty for himself. Some manner of fell magic transferred from the dragon to the orc that day. His avarice and cru...

Blue-skinned and robbed in solid shadows which give a vague impression of a sheik’s robes, this fiend is always quick to smile or sneer depending on the current level of contempt for its ‘master’. However, malice always twinkles in its compound eyes, especially whenever it twists the wishes asked of it. Asymmetrical horns curl from the Thirst Slacker’s forehead. Its legs end with a fly’s feet. Lastly, it sheaths a charred scimitar on a belt made from a chain of coins stolen from the eye sockets of the dead. The weapon is rarely drawn and never used. Instead, holes in the feind's hands contain red-shelled centipedes eager to strike. Avarice Peddler. While the Thirst Slacker presents itself as some sort of djinn, its origins lay in the deep bowels of hell. It often appears with a cup of cool water or fine wine in hand, ready to offer it out to the current holder of the ‘ancient’ skull which summoned it. From there, it explains that it is here to quench its master’s thirsts. ...

When roused, the elemental appears to be the corpse of a drowned woman with long, pale hair tangled with branches and rotting leaves. She wears an ever-flowing dress covered with yellow stains and deep, billowing sleeves that obscure her hands. The hem also hides her feet. In truth, she doesn’t have any. Instead, whenever anything besides her head and neck are exposed, one discovers only murky water and sodden human bones instead. After a few blows, the elemental’s true state is revealed. From crown to soul, the phantasm consists of only filthy water. For decades, a mountainside village harbored a dark secret. Although famous for its springs, there was one such body of water they’d never show. Whenever a member of the village became a burden to the rest, save it be one too many children or stricken with illness or injury, they were taken into a deep cave filled with unclean watered, drowned, and left to rot with the rest. No one knows how many times this heinous act was repeated s...

In its true form, Broken Bough is a mockery of a humanoid comprised of branch, brier, earth, fungus, and thorns. Trapped within the gorse are hunks of meat and bones harvested from its victims. It is from these rotting nodules that the plant horror generates an animal disguise so it might continue its hunt. At the heart of the terror resides a sliver of stone chiseled with the druidic symbol for hate. All Flesh Must Die. Broken Bough was once a dryad sapling in a druid grove. It was showered with attention by the nature priests who worshiped there. It hummed along to their ritual songs. It swayed along to their dancing forms. It listened to their words and gained a crackle of sentience. Then men and dogs came to claim the grove for their own. Broken Bough was watered with its beloved druids’ blood, stunned by their final screams and sobs, shuddered as ancient stones were toppled and shattered. Before the usurpers left, they set the grove aflame, so they might build souless bui...

This fiend resembles a wolfhound in size and the shaggy appearance of its fur. Its face even appears friendly and familiar until hackles draw back from a mouth full of human teeth and a forked tongue. Of course, its sickly yellow fur dotted with ruddy patches, especially around the mouth, speaks to the rabid barons unnatural origins. So to do its hooked, six-fingers claws it has instead of paws. Its blood-red tail is actually a squirm of tangled furless tendrils that can unfurl and lash out like a whip. Most of the time, though, the rabid baron has transformed itself into a normal looking canine, lupine or vulpine to lure its victims in. Man's Worst Friend. The Rabid Baron exists to spread pestilence and madness among mortals. When not tending to its infernal court of barghests, hellhounds and howlers the fiend assumes the shape and demeanor of a friendly dog in ingratiates itself into a mortal family and community. It will carefully spread the Red Sight among local people an...

Caught between woman and wasp, the vespidae is a mechanical chimera animated by an admixture of electricity and fury. The silver gynoid's legs are mostly human in shape, though they end in sharply pointed toes and are lined with self-regenerating barbs of loadstone. A slim wasp-like thorax extends from the vespidae's tailbone, ringed with red-steel circles. Two sets of arms extend from her shapely torso; a human set from the flanks and insectile ones from the shoulder joints. Her head is human for the most part, though it also mandibles cutting from side of her lips and small compound eyes in its sockets. Her antennae are merely a tuning fork and her wings an exquisite construction of silver and conductive gossamer. Glass slivers line the vespidae's ribs, cheeks, and spine. These give a glimpse of the lumpy blend of chitin and exposed muscle floating in charged chemicals. Scientific Mishap. The vespidae never intended to be an abomination encased in a silvery shell....