| Dragon | - | Monsters | - | Dragon #96 |
| - | - | Notes | - | - |
The Gulguthra,
or "Dung Eaters" (the
otyugh and neo-otyugh), are
strange and
deadly creatures indeed.
I asked Elminster
about them some time ago,
and it happened
that upon his next visit
the house was --
unexpected by us both --
full of children; a
captive audience to any sage
worth his
tongue. Elminster did not
disappoint.
"Gather
round," he said with a twinkle in
his eye, "and I'll tell you
of Erammon and
the Kitchen Midden." He waited
until the
small whirlwind of visiting
nieces and nephews
had settled at his feet,
and his pipe had
drawn into life, green smoke
rings rising
from it. I had introduced
him as "Uncle
El," and he was enjoying
the role gleefully
-- although he had muttered
an aside to me
that it had better only last
this one night.
I'll set down the tale as
he told it -- although,
of course, without the voices'.
(Elminster is a master vocal
mimic when he
wants to be.)
Erammon was a minor lordling
of the
eastern Dales -- of Harrowdale
on the
Inner Sea. even then a sleepy
farmer's land.
His father, the Lord Oraun,
was wise and
just, strong in battle, and
well respected in
the Dales. Erammon was a
young prince
like any other, reckless
and fun-loving and
full of himself. He longed
for battles and
ravening monsters and fell
wizards so that
he could swing his shining
sword and win
the day and walk into the
taverns in Harrowdale
to a hero's welcome (and
not the
usual hushed, wary silence).
One day he
asked his swordmaster why
Harrowdale was
so tranquil (that was not
the word he used)
and why his father was so
respected as a
fighter, since Oraun never
seemed to fight.
The swordmaster,
old Thaeron, replied:
"Harrowdale's at peace because
it's strong,
boy, and it's strong because
of your father. I
fought with him, in the wars
with Thar and
with the outcasts of Sembia;
he's a man to
be feared over blades."
"But why
then does he not fight? Erammon
persisted. "Why does he not
raid into
the elven-woods, or strike
down the upstart
in Scardale?"
Thaeron
fixed a cold eye on the prince
and said, "The wise man fights
only when
he has to. The fewer enemies
made,. the
fewer to come at you all
at once."
"But father
has
enemies," said Erammon.
"Scardale, and Featherdale
--
e v e r y o n e ? s
a n e n e m y o f A r c h e n d a l
e . . . . ?
? A y e
, b u t t h e y a r e e
n e m i e s w h o f e a r h i m
m o r e t h a
n t h e y h a t e h i m .
R e m e m b e r t h a t ,
b o y ?
w h e n t h e h a t e o v e r c o m
e s t h e f e a r ,
y o u ? l l s
e e t h e i r s w o r d s . B e s i
d e s , y o u r f a t h e r
p r o t e c t s
t h e d a l e s t o t h e
s o u t h f r o m t h e f e l l
e l v e s , a
n d t h e b r i g a n d s w h o
l i v e i n t h e
w o o d s a l
o n g t h e r i v e r L i s . ?
? B u t
I ? v e n e v e r e v e n s e e n
a n e l f , o r a
b r i g a n d ! ?
E r a m m o n p r o t e s t e d .
? H e
d o e s a g o o d j o b ,
t h e n , ? r e p l i e d
T h a e r o n ,
w r i n k l i n g h i s m o u s t a c h e
i n t o
w h a t m i g
h t h a v e b e e n a g
r i n .
? B u t
h o w d o t h e o t h e r
l o r d s t h i n k t h e s e
b r i g a n d s ,
a n d t h e e l v e s , s o
d a n g e r o u s ?
a n d H a r r
o w d a l e ? s f o r c e o f a r m
s s o s t r o n g ? ?
t h e p r i n
c e d e m a n d e d .
T h a e
r o n w a s s i l e n t f o r
a m o m e n t , a n d
t h e n s a i
d , ? T h o s e w h o c o m e
t h r e a t e n i n g
y o u r f a t
h e r , o r , c o m e u n i n v i t
e d , h e d o e s n o t
p r o t e c t
? a n d t h e y v a n i s h ;
t h i s t h e o t h e r
lords know.?
? B u t I ? v
e n e v e r e v e n s e e n
a n e l f , o r a
b r i g a n d ! ?
E r a m m o n p r o t e s t e d .
? H e d o e s
a g o o d j o b , t h e n , ?
r e p l i e d
T h a e r o n ,
w r i n k l i n g h i s m o u s t a c h e
i n t o
w h a t m i g
h
t h a v e b e e n a g r
i n .
? B u t h o w
d o t h e o t h e r l o r d s
t h i n k t h e s e
b r i g a n d s ,
a n d t h e e l v e s , s o
d a n g e r o u s ?
a n d H a r r
o w d a l e ? s f o r c e o f a r m
s s o s t r o n g ? ?
t h e p r i n
c e d e m a n d e d .
T h a e r o n
w a s s i l e n t f o r a
m o m e n t , a n d
t h e n s a i
d , ? T h o s e w h o c o m e
t h r e a t e n i n g
y o u r f a t
h e r , o r , c o m e u n i n v i t
e d , h e d o e s n o t
p r o t e c t
? a n d t h e y v a n i s h ;
t h i s t h e o t h e r
lords know.?
? B u t I ? v
e n e v e r s e e n a n y
f i g h t i n g , n o r
a n y s t r a
n g e r s w i t h s w o r d s . ?
? O n l y b r
i g a n d s t h r e a t e n w i t h
s w o r d s ,
b o y , ? T h
a e r o n a n s w e r e d . ? L e a r n
t h a t , i f
y o u l e a r
n n o t h i n g e l s e f r o m
m e . ? T h e
s w o r d m a s t e r
p a u s e d , j e r k e d h i s h e
a d i n t h e
d i r e c t i o n
o f t h e f e a s t i n g h a l l ,
a n d s a i d ,
? C o m e . ?
? T o t h e
h a l l ? ? E r a m m o n a s k e d ,
f o l l o w i n g
h a s t i l y .
"T h i s i s
w h e r e a l l g u e s t s c o m e
, i s i t n o t ? ?
T h a e r o n
r e p l i e d , w a v i n g a n a r
m a t t h e
g r e a t h a
l l , w h e r e s e r v a n t s w e
r e s c r u b b i n g
a n d d u s t
i n g a n d f i l l i n g l a m p s
w i t h o i l f o r
t h e e v e n
i n g a h e a d . ? A y e , ? E r a
m m o n s a i d ,
n o t u n d e
r s t a n d i n g w h y t h e s w o
r d m a s t e r
had brought him here.
"And then they go to your
father's chambers
for wine and sweets, do they
not?"
Thaeron continued.
? A y e , ? s
a i d t h e p r i n c e a g a i n
? a n d t h e n
h i s m i n d
l e a p e d a h e a d . ? Y o u m e
a n . . .
p o i s o n ? ?
A t t h a t , T h a e r o n t u r n
e d o n h i m a
l o o k o f
s u c h c o l d d i s g u s t t h a
t t h e p r i n c e
r e c o i l e d
a s t h o u g h m e n a c e d b y
a d a g g e r thrust .
? N o ! Y o u
t h i n k t h e o t h e r l o r d s
h a v e n o
s p i e s i n
o u r k i t c h e n s ? N o r y o u
r f a t h e r i n
t h e i r s ?
N o o n e d a r e s t o
u s e p o i s o n i n t h e
D a l e s , l
e s t a l l t h e o t h e r
l o r d s r e t a l i a t e . ?
? W h a t , t
h e n ? ?
? S o m e v i
s i t o r s d i s a p p e a r , d o
t h e y n o t ? ?
t h e s w o r
d m a s t e r a s k e d , r e t u r n i n g
t o h i s
e a r l i e r
l i n e o f d i s c o u r s e . E r
a m m o n n o d d e d .
? S o , e v e
n y o u h a v e n o t i c e d
t h a t , ? t h e o l d
w a r r i o r
s a i d s a r c a s t i c a l l y .
? A n d h o w
n o t ? ? s a i d E r a m m o n i n
a n
i r r i t a t e d
t o n e . ? W o r d s p r e a d s ,
a m o n g t r a v e l e r s a s w e
l l a s a m o n g t h o s e
w h o l i v e i n
H a r r o w d a l e . ?
? A y e , t a
l k t r a v e l s , ? T h a e r o n
a g r e e d .
? T h o s e w
h o d i s a p p e a r a r e b r i g
a n d s , o r s o
y o u r f a t
h e r t e l l s t h e g o s s i p s
. ?
? B u t ?
n o b o n e s ? N o c o r p s e s
o n t h e
b a t t l e m e n t s ? ?
E r a m m o n a s k e d , s t i l l
b e w i l d e r e d . T h e p a i r
k e p t w a l k i n g t h r o u g h
t h e
h a l l , a n
d T h a e r o n m a d e a
g e s t u r e t o w a r d
t h e f a r
e n d .
? T h e k i t
c h e n s ? Y o u m e a n w e
eat . . . ??
The prince gasped and began
to go pale.
Thaeron shook his head. ?One
so dense
will not hold Harrowdale
for long, helmhead!? he barked. ?What is a corpse but
garbage? And where do the
kitchen-maids
throw the garbage??
?In the midden,? Erammon said,
following the swordmaster up to a stout, barred
wooden door.
?Have you not wondered why
the balcony of your father?s audience chamber
overlooks the stink of his
kitchen midden??
Thaeron asked, unlocking
the last chain and
hurling its bar aside.
?Oh.? Erammon thought for
a moment.
?Yes . . . yes, so it does.
But why??
Thaeron swung open the door
and
pointed out into the fetid
pit beyond, ringed
by a stout palisade of weathered
timbers.
?Look out to the base of
the wall there . . .
look hard, and look for an
enemy.? Erammon peered into the midden as he had been
told, and suddenly realized
that he had
locked gaze with ?
?An eye!? he cried. ?An eye
? coming
up from the ground like a
worm!?
Thaeron was already pulling
the door
closed, but an instant before
it slammed
shut, Erammon saw the festering
garbage
ripple, undulating right
before his wide eyes
as though the refuse itself
was alive.
?But ? but ? what is it, out
there??
Erammon fairly screamed.
Thaeron fastened chains and
set bars in
place for a long time before
he turned to
face the prince. When he
did, his face was
blank, his eyes cold and
level. ?Only your
father can tell you that,
Erammon,? he said.
?And if I were you, I?d make
sure he was in
a good mood when I asked
him.?
The children were petrified,
or thrilled,
or asleep when Elminster
finished the tale.
They were tucked into their
beds, and
?Uncle El? and I took up
mugs of cocoa
and sat for a time in silence,
enjoying the
peace of the evening by the
fireside. Then I
broke the quiet, opening
a discussion I
could wait no longer to have.
?That was an otyugh in the
midden?? I
asked, for the benefit of
my hidden tape
recorder.
?Was,? Elminster replied.
?It turns out
that Lashan, at least, knew
of it ? when he
overran Harrowdale, his archers
emptied
flasks of oil and then quiversfull
of flaming
arrows from that balcony
until the whole
midden was aflame.?
?What about Erammon??
?He lives, some say, hiding
in exile, but
has not come to reclaim his
seat since
Lashan?s fall. Certainly
his body has not
been found. Thaeron died
fighting Lashan?s
armies . . . and of course
Oraun died of
heart-stop some winters ago.?
The sage
stared into the fire and
shrugged. ?Interesting times, indeed. But I have more than a
tale to answer your query.
I have brought
with me a certain document,
and know
more besides. Bend thine
ears, then ? and
be sure that recording instrument
you hide
so well is working properly.?
I flushed a bit, shifted in
my seat to hide
my embarrassment, and leaned
forward
attentively as Elminster
began to read. . . .
From a report by Phiraz of
the Naturalists to the Commissioner of Public Sewers
in the city of Scornubel:
. . . The greatest of the
nuisance crea-
tures that will plague your
system is the
?dungheap? or otyugh, a scavenger
of the
strangest appearance and
habits. The otyugh and its larger cousin, the neo-otyugh,
share the form of a pile
of festering dung
with a toothed maw set into
it. An otyugh?s
body is lumpy, mottled purple,
green, and
(primarily) brown, and the
creature stumps
about on three fat legs of
similar appearance. From this delightful bulk ? which the
creature is wont to bury
in piles of rubbish
and dung ? protrude two long1
ridged
tentacles with large, heart-shaped
gripping
ends, and a flesh-colored
and segmented
wormlike stalk containing
two yellow-purple
eyes. A buried otyugh watches
its surroundings constantly by means of this stalk, so
look for it when you suspect
that one of
these creatures is near.
An otyugh is never surprised
by the
approach of a creature; take
care that you
or your men are not in turn
surprised by
one lying in wait. Otyughs
often happily
attack and kill parties of
three people or
less; they will eat fresh
meat as readily as
they consume carrion, dung,
or offal. Beware this predator!
Otyughs are terrifically strong,
able to
snatch warriors off their
feet, armor and all,
and fling them aside as children
throw dolls.
They are under no circumstances
to be
fought a1one.2
The otyugh is most often solitary,
but
may exist in symbiosis with
another (often
more dangerous or energetic)
creature, such
as a doppleganger, ettin,
will-o-the-wisp, or
even a beholder. For such
creatures they
serve to guard treasure,
which they always
conceal at the very bottom
of their offal
pile, hidden from view beneath
the otyugh
itself. Encountering an otyugh
is bad
enough ? but if you do see
one, be sure to
look around for another even
more fearsome foe!
Thankfully, otyughs mate only
seldom
(perhaps once in every seven
years or so),
traveling by night and subterranean
routes
to bonepits deep under the
earth, where the
remains of many ancient creatures
lie in
vast layers. There they mate
in mass gatherings with others of their kind who have
made the same journey. 3
1. Elminster
provided precise details of a
gulguthra?s reach (tentacles
can grow up to
14 feet in length, fully
extended) and senses.
An otyugh can communicate
telepathically
with creatures up to 4? away;
the neootyugh?s telepathic range is 6?, and the
higher intelligence of the
latter creature
enables it to communicate
on a more sophisticated level with creatures it encounters. Only rarely,
however, will a gulguthra
initiate such communication,
for it has little
to "say" to any other creatures.
The eyes of
a gulguthra have infravision
and ultravision,
both out to a range of 9".
Both eyes
are positioned on the same
side of their
stalk, but this does not
contribute to any
lack of alertness because
the eyestalk continually
swivels, periscope-style,
and any
creature that comes within
range of its
visual powers is instantly
detected. (The
creature does sleep, but
only when it is not
threatened, and even in this
semi-dormant
state, its eyestalk and eyes
function as
though it were awake, for
the purpose of
detecting approaching creatures.)
The eyes
function very well in gloom
or darkness, but
narrow to mere blurred slits
in bright sunlight --
for which reason the creature
lives below ground.
The presence of a torch or
the casting of a light spell
can sometimes
so disconcert these creatures
that they do no
attack. Gulguthra cannot
smell with any
acuity, probably due to the
dung and decay
that customarily surrounds
them, and so they cannot
track prey, nor reaily discern
the true natures of disguised
creatures.
2. Phiraz,
never having fought a
gulguthra and having viewed
only one such
encounter through the eyes
of a sedentary
scholar and not a fighting-man,
is both
vague and brief as to their
fighting style and
abilities. Elminster has
other sources, and
their information boils down
to this: When
it is attacking, an otyugh's
tentacles erupt
from the concealing pile
of offal and slap
victims with force equivalent
to 18 (no
percentile) strength for
purposes of matching
the creature's grip or the
force of its
thrust against the strength
of an opponent.
A tentacle does 1-8 points
of damage on a
slap that hits its target,
and can also curl
about an opponent within
range, constricting
for 2-4 points of damage
per round until
the hold is broken. The otyugh
can lift a
grasped opponent and hurl
the victim into a
pit or against a wall; the
more intelligent
neo-otyugh also likes to
use a grasped creature
as a shield, flailing the
victim about to
fend off attacks from other
adversaries.
Either
sort of creature can sense when a
grasped opponent is weakened
or disabled,
and will try to push such
prey into reach of
its suckerlike, toothed mouth.
Due to the
creature's favored habitat
(proximity to
dung and carrion) and its
digestive system
(wastes are spat back out
of its mouth),
anyone bitten will suffer
both 2-5 points of
damage and a 90% likelihood
of contracting
typhus (treat as a
parasitic infestation; see
pages 13-14
of the DMG). There are no
known cases of gulguthra
suffering from
any such diseases carried
in waste and filth
themselves, and they are
thought to be
immune or at least highly
resistant to these.
3. Phiraz
again is vague; his research had
gone so far as to confirm
at least the partial
truth (periodic journeys
far underground) of
a legend concerning gulguthra
mating --
but, having a mistrust of
legends, he merely
reported it briefly and without
comment.
Elminster checked with the
sorcerer known
as Jovriam of the Mines,
and certain
svirfneli, and was able to
glean the following
facts and observations.
Every gulguthra is bisexual.
Each produces,
oncce every seven winters,
a jellylike
"eggmass" and travels underground
(in a
slow, patient journey) by
instinct and memory
until it reaches others of
its of its kind. Then
it regurgitates the eggmass
from a secondary
stomach and wanders off,
that part of its
task done. In some manner
not yet understood,
another gulguthra can fertilize
any
eggmass (except its own)
by taking it briefly
into its mouth, or perhaps
some internal
organ, and expelling it again.
An eggmass
that is fertilized, if left undisturbed,
will develop in one week's
time into
a miniature version of the
parent that provided
the eggmass. (An otyugh eggmass
will
only produce another otyugh,
and likewise
for the neo-otygh, even though
either
species can fertilize any
eggmass) This
"newborn" creature is driven
by by an instinctual
urge to find warmth and food,
and will
wander off to seek its own
"fortune," returning
to its birthplace years later
to breed
in its turn.
Gulguthra
young are smaller (3-5 HD)
and weaker (damage of 1-6/1-6/1-4.
tentacle
strength of 16) than mature
specimes, bu
are otherwise identical to
their parents, and
grow to maturity within 4
months.
