Planar Bestiary
An altered state of consciousness draws gologoths from the edge of existence. Sleep qualifies, but unconsciousness, extreme exhaustion, drunkenness, and especially hallucinations can draw a gologoth like a fly to excrement. Those who survive their initial attention may wish to avoid comprehending that the horrific vision they experienced was something invading their minds from outside the cosmos. However, once a bridge between a gologoth and a victim has been created, that victim is likely to be visited again and again until nothing remains of them but a mindless shell.
A nightmare or hallucination, even one born of normal circumstance, can shake a victim all by itself. Magnify that by ten, and that's what a gologoth victim experiences. The gogoloth is an anathema of shape: a churning being whose insides and outsides replace each other without purpose, with eyes like poison emeralds, ebony scales etched with unknowable runes, and most nausea-inducing of all, a nest of twining tendrils that lash and grasp.
A gologoth usually leaves the mind of a creature they have infested once they have drained them of half their maximum health or Pool points. However, if the victim is under attack by enemies, they may infest a victim's mind until the mind dies, then remain in the corpse for hours or days longer.
Gologoths originate from Marrow, a secret realm within the Astral Plane ruled by the Night Lords.
Motive: Hungers for minds, knowledge of the cosmos
Environment: Anywhere in the multiverse, usually alone
Health: 15
Damage Inflicted: Moderate wound (5 points)
Armor: 2
Movement: Short; short when climbing
Modifications: Speed defense as level 4 due to large size; climbing, perception, and stealth as level 6
Combat: The gologoth can attack twice each round with an intrusive tendril, targeting creatures within immediate range. A target takes damage and on a failed Intellect defense task hallucinates or falls asleep (as the gologoth chooses) for about a minute. Another creature can spend an action attempting to shake a target from their hallucinations or sleep. Each time an attempt is made, the victim can attempt another Intellect defense task to wake up or stop hallucinating.
As an action, the gologoth can disappear into the mind of a sleeping or hallucinating creature within short range. The only telltale sign is the gologoth's eyes, usually appearing on the infested victim's palms. While inside a victim's mind, a gologoth can't be targeted by any attack, spell, or other effect, even if the eyes are targeted. The gologoth regains 3 points of health each round the infestation lasts.
The infestation lasts until the host body wakes up, stops hallucinating, or the gologoth leaves as part of another action. When the infestation ends, the gologoth reappears next to the victim.
Each round a victim hosts a gologoth, they take 2 points of Intellect damage (ignores Armor) on a failed Intellect defense task. This damage doesn't wake the host from sleep or end the hallucinations, though the host may scream in a way that horrifies listeners.
Interaction: Just as sages and wizards of the multiverse strain their minds to learn more of the Far Realm, it seems that some force, entity, or group of beings from that incogitable domain wants to know more about our cosmos. Maybe. If so, gologoths could be horrific dimensional explorers that are cast out like psychic fishing lines, seeking to learn what they can by consuming the minds of those they snag.
Use: Someone in the next room at the inn begins to scream in their sleep in a horrifying manner but can't be woken by shaking.
GM Intrusion: The character that ousted the infesting aberration suddenly becomes certain that the gologoth left something behind in their mind, something that waits and watches…