Acidic Hallucigenia

This subspecies walks on dry land and carries the family's odd body plan: rows of paired legs, the front three pairs stiff and spiny, seven tentacles each ending in a small pincer, and a hollow, tube-shaped tail.

Unlike its more passive relatives, it hunts actively. Once a quarry is cornered, or if something attacks before it has time to turn, it lifts its forebody on the four hindmost pairs of legs and lunges. From that stance it can lash out with all three spiny front pairs and every one of its seven pincered tentacles in the same round, each hit dealing 1d4 damage. Soldiers in the companion science-fiction rules call the result death by paper cuts.

The tail doubles as a nozzle. Three times a day the creature can fire a narrow jet of acid, a few inches across, at a single target up to 30 feet (ten meters) away. The stream deals 2d8 damage, and a successful save vs. breath weapon avoids it completely. Its unusual body chemistry makes it immune to all acid-based attacks.

After a kill, the hallucigenia hoses the carcass with the same acid to break the flesh down. Its tentacle pincers, which are its true mouths, then pull the softened meal apart and eat it.