Teeny Tiny Tales of Terror: N is for Nefarious

[Mangrum]

The letters L and M seem to be slow going, so to goose things along, here's the letter N. Maybe all those lycanthropes just don't "speak" to folks.

Naga, bone [Monster Manual II] Pic
Naga, dark [Monster Manual]
Naga, spirit [Monster Manual] Pic
Done! Necromental [Libris Mortis] Pic
Necronaut [Monster Manual III] Pic
Done! Necrophidius [Fiend Folio] Pic
Done! Night hag [Monster Manual] Pic
Night twist [Monster Manual III] Pic
Done! Nightmare (true) [Monster Manual] Pic
Done! Nightmare, lesser [Planar Handbook]
Done! Nightshade, nightcrawler [Monster Manual]
Done! Nonaris (gnomish vampire) [Denizens of Dread]
Done! Nosferatu (daywalker vampire) [Denizens of Dread]
Nosferatu, cerebral vampire [Denizens of Dread]
Done! Nymph [Monster Manual] Pic

Capsule Descriptions

Naga (all): Serpents with humanoid-like heads. Highly intelligent and possessed of supernatural powers. Generally found in Sri Raji.

Bone Naga: Large Undead, CR 11, lawful evil. A dark naga in life, transformed into a skeletal monster after death by another dark naga using a magical rite. They're powerful sorcerous spellcasters, and can still deliver a poisonous bite or sting. They serve the master that created them, but are highly intelligent and can choose how to follow those orders. Communicate telepathically. [Monster Manual II]

Dark Naga: Large Aberration, CR 8, lawful evil. A scheming serpant with a rubbery, purple hide, making it look somewhat like an eel. They have a poisonous bite and a stinger at the end of their tail. They're resistant to mind control and are powerful innate sorercers. Generally live in hilly terrain. [Monster Manual]

Spirit Naga: Large Aberration, CR 9, chaotic evil. These serpent have black-and-crimson banded bodies and stringy black hair on their humanlike heads. They get their name from their tendency to live in dismal, evil places. They have a posionous bite, a charming gaze, and are powerful sorcerers. A dark naga appears in Web of Illusion. [Monster Manual]

Necromental: Template Undead (Augmented Elemental), CR +1, neutral evil. A template for generic undead elementals. Necromentals gain an energy drain attack, and any elementals they drain rise again as more necromentals. (The sample creature is a Large earth elemental.) They have minimal intelligence (though they are not truly mindless). [Libris Mortis]

Necronaut: Gargantuan Undead (Chaotic, Evil, Extraplanar), CR 14, chaotic evil. Created by demons from plains of bones in the Abyss, they are sent to the Material Plane to kill everything in their path, adding the corpses of their victims to their own mass. In Ravenloft, Vecna is rumored to have acquired at least one necronaut, using it like a seige tower; another of the battlefield horrors he sent against the armies of Tovag. Because it's constructed of corpses, spells that create undead deal damage to it. Beyond that, it basically just bashes foes into paste. [Monster Manual III]

Necrophidius: Medium Construct, CR 2, neutral. A mindless but stealthy construct created using a serpent's skeleton attached to a human skull. Easily mistaken for an undead creature (such as a bone naga). its bite can paralyze, and it can daze opponents with a hypnotic, dance-like swaying. [Fiend Folio]

Night Hag: Medium Outsider (Evil, Extraplanar), CR 9, neutral evil. Fiendish, midnight-blue hags from the lower plane of Hades that trade in mortal souls. They spread disease with their bite, possess potent spell-like abilities, and can haunt mortal's dreams. Each night hag carries a magic trinket called a heartstone, which strengthens her powers. Styrix (RL Gaz II) is a night hag. [Monster Manual]

Nightmare (all): Fiendish black horses with flaming hooves and breath. They sometimes serve evil riders (such as Lord Soth).

Nightmare (True): Large Outsider (Evil, Extraplanar), CR 5, neutral evil. Native to the Gray Waste of Hades, these flame-belching horses can shift into the Astral or Ethereal Planes at will. [Monster Manual]

Lesser Nightmare: Large Outsider (Evil, Extraplanar), CR 4, neutral evil. A less powerful variant of the true nightmare, generally useful for blackguard steeds and the like. [Planar Handbook]

Nightshade, Nightcrawler: Gargantuan Undead (Extraplanar), CR 18, chaotic evil. Nightshades are massive, powerful undead composed of cold and darkness, native to the Plane of Shadow. All nightshades emit a desecrating aura and are adverse to sunlight. A nightcrawler is a wormlike nighshade with the size and power of a purple worm. It has a poison stinger, can swallow foes whole, can summon undead minions, and has powerful spell-like abilities. A nightcrawler is trapped by its sheer size in the Temple of Apophis in Sebua; Tiyet believes the fearsome horror to be the god Apophis himself. Desert legends claim the monster guards a great treasure, or perhaps even a portal to another world. (In fact, it guards Sebua's heart, though it does not serve Sebua in any way.) [Monster Manual]

Night Twist: Large Plant, CR 12, neutral evil. Ancient night twist: Huge Plant, CR 20, neutral evil. A monstrous, leafless, black tree that lurks in marshes (generally Souragne). It lures in its prey with a sorrowful song. Those who fall under the song's influence, but are physically restrained from seeking out its source slowly waste away. When victims reach the night twist, it batters them to death with its branches and feeds on the carrion. Also possesses useful spell-like abilities and the ability to produce a powerful gust of wind. When killed, a night twist powerfully curses its destroyer, resulting in nightmare-wracked sleep. [Monster Manual III]

Nonaris (Gnomish Vampire): Template Undead (Augmented Humanoid, Vampire). The sample nonaris is a gnome Ill5, CR 7. A gnomish vampire strain that drains blood and Dexterity. Its flesh is withered and taut, robbing them of the ability of speech. They can induce insane laughter with their rictus grin and can assume a spectral form. They are immune to illusions and metal weapons pass right through them. [Denizens of Dread]

Nosferatu (Daywalker Vampire): Template Undead (Augmented Humanoid, Vampire). A vampire variant that lacks an energy drain attack, but possesses a powerful ability to charm its victims and is weakened, but not harmed, by exposure to sunlight. Inspired by the literary tradition of Byronic vampires, including Dracula. Baron Urik von Kharkov is a nosferatu vampire. The sample nosferatu is a human beguiler 5. [Denizens of Dread]

Nosferatu, Cerebral Vampire: Template Undead (Augmented Humanoid, Vampire). A nosferatu variant that drains cerebral fluid (Intelligence) rather than blood. All cerebral vampires are the creation of Daclaud Heinfroth (aka Dr. Dominiani), and as such are generally encounted in Dominia or sailing the Sea of Sorrows. Cerebral vampires are featured in Bleak House. [Denizens of Dread]

Nymph: Medium Fey, CR 7, chaotic good. An incredibly beautiful, female fey that shares nature's mercurial temperament. So great is their beauty that it can blind mortal onlookers, and they can stun with a glance. Also potent innate druids. Animals are drawn to nymphs, but nymphs turn their fury on those that despoil nature. (Very rare in Ravenloft.) [Monster Manual]

[cure]

NECROMENTAL

“The thing that did this was for a century confined within sewers and charged with the gathering of bone. The night that birthed Necropolis undid its chain and its life, bequeathing freedom and undeath upon what had been a corrupted elemental of water. It fled the power that arose to command the slain and made the Musarde and its tributaries, save for the Vulchar to which it does not return, its abode. Its passions are strong currents, rushing waters, and living bone. The ivory of its victims it dons as you or I might a fine cloak. The cloak does not make the man, but the man makes much of the cloak. Listen for a soft chattering. Listen for a rattling roar. And where man, woman and child are flood caught, their screams cut short are its sign.”

-Count Strahd von Zarovich XI, instructions for the hunt of Old Bones

[cure]

NIGHTMARE (TRUE)

“You seek a gift for your lord, one worthy of the count, a stallion, black, the fiercest there be. Put away your two score gold pieces. We will not fetch it from the land of the cat for that. Nor for far more. But promise me a favour and I will name the place, the night, the hour of the beast’s coming.”

-Madame Eva receiving Boris von Zarovich, distant relative of the lord of Barovia

[ChrisNichols]

Doesn't the dread nightmare already have a blurb?

Chris Nichols

[Mangrum]

Doesn't the dread nightmare already have a blurb?

Yes; my error.

“But Uncle Bela, why must we never seek for horses at night?”
“Because, darling Karov, at night the Horses of Hell — the Nightmares — ride across the planes. They may look like mortal horses at a distance — and fine and spirited ones, to be sure — but their manes and hooves burn with the fires of damnation, and their coats are blacker than the Devil Strahd’s heart.”
—Dialogue between Equaar apprentice and master on a trip to Nova Vaasa

[ChrisNichols]

Nymph [Monster Manual]

"We'd being tracking some of the kobolds that had been attacking patrols on the Seelewald road when it happened. I got separated from the group... mistled, right? I wandered in the forest for days."

"It was in the deep woods where no one ever goes that I saw her. Beautiful, beautiful, like an angel. No... more natural, like dawn on a meadow. Like a cool brook... I can't describe it, seeing her. But, I saw her, bathing in a pool in that glade, and she saw me."

"For five years, I've searched the Seelewald, trying to find her again. You wouldn't think a blind man could. After all, the army didn't want me any more and punished me for it - a hobbled leg, a crushed hand, and a scarred face. But I learned. Left my wife, left my children. I learned. Five years and I still haven't found her. My love. My life."

"But I'll find her, one day, bathing in her pool in the grove. And then... then, I can die happy."

- interview with Echer Degault in the Kneeling Mage, Aerie, Falkovnia

[cure]

NONARIS (Gnomish Vampire)

There is no want of things to fear in the prisons of Falkovnia. Yet this was a terror unto itself. It hunted both inmate and guard. The grim stones and iron bars held fast not it in the least but rather its ill-fated prey. It would take a lone individual by surprise and leave as its sign a bloodless corpse. It would enthral groups with an inspired pantomime, bringing a brief respite of joy to the bleakest of lives. But the laughter it birthed would spiral beyond measure. The revellers would die of their very merriment as it rubbed its hands, a leering grin painted upon its face. Its stature and appearance was not constant, but more often than not that of a slight human boy dressed as though taking the stage in some garish comedy. Beneath this mask was a small withered form, that of a female gnome, hideous to the eye and restless in her grave.

-Working note, Van Ritchen’s Guide to Vampires

[cure]

Nightshade, nightcrawler

We fled into a narrow valley of red sand and towering cliffs, running the risk of ambush to escape the teeth of the storm. A lone edifice stood among the ruins. By every evidence it was a temple long abandoned. None of us hesitated upon its threshold. But the nerve of the surviving crewmen quickly frayed. Our torches seemed feeble indeed, overawed by the vastness of the place, barely able to hold back its suffocating darkness and its enervating chill. The captain, defiant as ever, sought to fortify his men by declaring that it was the will of the Lawgiver that this place of pagan worship be sacked and that each man would be rewarded in proportion to his effort. No sooner had he finished, than the shadows, which had been playing cruelly upon our imagination, gathered themselves up and swallowed him whole. The nightmare had begun and with it, I believe, Raoul's descent into madness.

-The Wreck of the Albatross, Juno Luteum, Darkonese adventurer

[cure]

Nosferatu (daywalker vampire)

I paused for a long moment. The three-quarters moon had attained the zenith. The sun had crept very low in the sky, its rays dancing along the storefronts. The other patrons, chased off by the autumn chill, were safely inside. I returned to my notes, reorganising my questions, devising my plan of attack. And then he appeared as from nothing, startling me, arriving well in advance of the appointed hour. The man was tall, gaunt, pale, his dress every bit that of a Dementlieuse aristocrat, but his curious accent, not quite Balok, marked him as a foreigner. I invited him to sit, poured him a glass of wine, and we exchange the requisite pleasantries, where after he came straight to the point. His eyes seized hold of mine and he said: "Were you a lost wanderer upon the burning sands of Har'Akir, parched beyond measure, mad with thirst, and you came upon an oasis, would you not drink?" I nodded slowly, thoughtfully. He continued, "Come with me, let me show you." He was irresistible, or nearly so, a second Dominic d'Honaire, but cut of a less urbane, tougher stuff.

-Interview with a Vampire

[cure]

Necrophidius

"Captain Weathermay was to the end, and even beyond, a collector of curios. A crate arrived for him the very morning of our departure. I had little right and no reason to examine it, so had it stowed in the hull and hoped that its sizable trinket might bring his wife and children some solace. Too late I learned that it had excited the avarice of several crewmen. Three nights out of Sri Raji they pried it open and set loose the contents. These I encountered when a loud thump brought me out on deck. There the men had sprouted roots, their eyes held by the swaying, indeed the dancing, of a giant serpent. Only it was indecently clothed in neither skin nor even flesh. The thing was bare bones, a complete skeleton of a great constrictor, save for the substitution of a human skull. Blade wielding men, skeletons of men that is, accompanied it and were making mincemeat of my deckhands. I rang the general alarm and, at length, we prevailed, albeit by the narrowest of margins. At dawn we roused ourselves to wipe down the deck. The thing's fanged skull was discovered and I examined it. Judging by the broken and poorly healed jaw bone, the man to whom it had belonged had been a brawler or at least had suffered some terrible accident. Then I thought, like Captain Weathermay had long ago, whose body we had just left behind, buried in the soil of that fell land . . . ."

-Extract from the testimony of Lieutenant Hawthorne Wescote of the HMS Retriever

[cure]

Nightmare, lesser

The cost to himself, if not to others, of his crusade could no longer be put out of mind. It loomed over him. It had come in answer to his summons. It was manifest in the stallion. And before that dark mirror, with one last chance to save his soul, he chose to become the monster that he was.

-The Black Knight, forbidden Nidalan folktale

[cure]

NIGHT HAG

"As your soul is about to be dispatched to eternal torment, I thought that you might appreciate a truth or three. The beautiful girl in the dream, who gave herself to you night after night before leading you here, well that was me. That thing on the floor over there that so disgusts you, that is what remains of your cuckolded husband. And oh yes, your daughter, you know I was going to eat her too, but then I thought that a lifetime, short though it will probably be, of servicing the sailors at the local brothel would be so much more fitting."

-Styrix playing with prey, before feeding it as fuel to her Rift Spanner

[Nathan of the FoS]

Naga, spirit[Monster Manual]

Volek helped me down, and we waited there for several minutes to allow our eyes to adjust to the dark. There was something pale a few meters off--a long, thin veil, seemingly of white leather. After a moment Volek said, "It's a snake skin!"

The realization made it an object of horror; I guessed that to cast a skin of that size the snake must have been twenty feet long and as big around as a man at the waist. "We should be careful," I muttered. "It's probably still here."

"Yes, it is," someone hissed from behind us. Turning, I saw it...the woman's head, blank-eyed and horrible, and the black python body scrawled with red runes.

Janna Yarlsdottir, as recounted to Perseyus Lathenna


Nosferatu, cerebral vampire [Denizens of Dread]

Dr. Heinfroth was quite unlike what I had imagined--a tall and heavy man, with sharp, even lupine features...as he showed me around the asylum I ventured to opine that such spartan surroundings seemed unlikely to be really conducive to the recovery of the many unhappy souls housed there--surely a place of more physical comfort would be more salubrious?

"Now then, my good man," Heinfroth replied, smiling. "It has been said that man cannot live by bread alone. All those physical comforts are merely distractions. Personally, I have always found the greatest sustenance in the life of the mind."

Mattias Mikkelson to L. Weathermay-Foxgrove, private correspondence

[Nathan of the FoS]

Naga, dark [Monster Manual]

Every year there is pilgramage made to that shrine, the shrine of the death goddess Kali; and they make there offerings intended to placate the monsters over that dark goddess holds sway. In addition, two times in every cycle of the moon her priests stake there a goat-kid for the benefit of the guardian of the shrine, which they say is a great snake, with a scorpion's sting in its tail and (most strange and wonderful still) the head of a man, which converses sensibly with the priests who serve its mistress, and withal is a most fell watchman.

Catalog of the World Entire

Night twist [Monster Manual III]

Away down deep in the swamp, deeper than the Green Maiden, deeper than ol' Chicken Bone, deeper even (some say) than the Lord himself, that's where Old Man Willow grows, singing to himself about all the wrong done in the world, and all the wrong yet to do. It's a sad song, and a cruel song; don't never harken to it, child, because them that do find theyselves always turning a little deeper, always turning a little deeper, until they find theyselves at the foot of an ol' black willow tree without any leaves on him, an ol' black willow tree watered in blood and grown on dead men's bones. And then you may cry, you may scream, you may run, but you'll never come home again, and your bones will lie mouldering between the roots of Old Man Willow.

traditional Souragnian

[Nathan of the FoS]

Naga, bone [Monster Manual II]

"I am my brother's slave," the bone-naga whispered, and its bones rattled like the castanets of a dancer as it wound its way around the pillars of the temple chamber. "He has commanded me that I shall slay all who enter the antechamber of his abode."

"All who enter the antechamber," Suri said. "Then if I came into your brother's house by another way?..."

"I guard the antechamber," the bone-naga replied.

Then Suri knew what she should do. "Kali bless you, Wise One," she said, "and send you rest."

The House of the Naga, Amrit Sri Kefnan


Necronaut [Monster Manual III]

The Third Battle of Nevasham Gorge was the turning point of the battles of that summer. The Third Corps had feinted at the Road of Bones and drawn an army into the hills after them, which they proceeded to destroy from their redoubts and positions of strength; but there position was broken when the Enemy summoned forth a great war-engine, unlike any seen up to that time; like all his engines composed principally of dead men's bones, and capable of binding all who fell before it (whether valiant foe or craven slave of the Enemy) to its own obscene will. Rending the wall of the redoubt in two places, it gapped the defences and forced the Third Corps to retreat, ending all advance into the enemy's territory for that year and much of the year after.

From History of Tovag, volume II