Animental

Sages hold that the elemental realms mold the mortal world, yet now and then the current flows the other way. A beast that dies on the Prime Material usually sends its spirit to whichever Outer Plane suits its nature or alignment, very often the plane of beasts. Sometimes a scrap of its life force is left over and slips into the Inner Planes instead, probably through a vortex into an Elemental Plane. There, like a reflection on still water, it builds a copy of its old body out of whatever element surrounds it.

Travelers in the Inner Planes have met birds of fire, snakes of smoke, wolves of water and elk of ice. Monster animentals are less common but real: griffons of crystal, basilisks of air, dragons of lightning. The pairings are usually surprising and rarely 'logical'; a fish of water or a bird of air turns up no more often than any other combination.

For reasons sages have not worked out, no humanoid animental has ever been seen, whether human, elf, dwarf, orc, gnoll or ogre. Rumors persist anyway: tales of animental giants (unproven), claims that humanoid animentals were the true ancestors of genies, and whispers that dao slavers round them all up. All of these seem wildly unlikely.

An animental fights just like the beast it mirrors, only slightly better. It keeps the original's Intelligence, Hit Dice, attacks per round and THAC0, but its elemental body adds heat, choking fumes, stony impact or blasting wind to its blows: +1d4 damage per attack for size S or M, +1d6 for size L, and +1d8 for anything bigger. Its Armor Class is two steps better, thanks to an intangible body of flame or steam, a tough body of stone or crystal, and so on.

An element-based special attack, such as a petrifying stare (stone) or fiery breath (fire), survives only if the animental is made of the matching element. When it loses such an attack, there is roughly a 25% chance it gains a fitting new one instead: a fire medusa's gaze might turn victims into pillars of flame, obsidian or ash, and a blue dragon remade in ooze might spit corrosive slime rather than lightning. Other special abilities such as poison, disease or regeneration have about a 50% chance of carrying over, and spell-like abilities a 30% chance.

Every animental flies or swims through its own element with ease but otherwise moves at its original creature's rate. Killed, it collapses back into raw element (a stone bat crumbles to gravel, a smoke dragonne drifts apart) and leaves no trace.

Being copies of life rather than life itself, animentals have no culture. They are true natives of their elements and cannot leave their home planes except in rare cases, such as being summoned by an unusual spell into a place full of their element. Most elemental beings dismiss them as phantoms, though a few keep them as pets or guards.

Do not assume they are mindless. An animental keeps its original Intelligence, so if the living creature could talk, use telepathy or otherwise communicate, so can its elemental echo.

Animentals are anomalies that break every rule, and they squeeze into whatever niche the strange elemental realms leave open. Most of those planes have no plants, so even former grazers turn carnivore, hunting visitors and natives alike. They are no longer flesh, and no longer bound by earthly instincts; only their looks recall what they once were. Many sages think they are not truly alive at all, merely reflections with no more substance than a mirror image. That may go too far, but it is something to think about.