Ascallion [Fish]

Ascallions, sometimes called scallions, look much like sharks. The female is the giant of the species, averaging 18 feet, dark gray above and pale gray below. The male, known as a shadow, runs about eight feet and is black to charcoal. Young are barely over a foot long and look harmless, usually pale gray but now and then dark gray or black; they live inside their mother's jaws and appear only when she sends them out to hunt.

A female rarely hunts alone. When she spots a victim she hangs back at a safe distance and gapes wide, and 2d6 young shoot out to tear at it with razor teeth. Once they have eaten their fill, she glides in to finish the rest, and if the prey proves too much for the brood she charges in to help. Her bite can splinter small boats, which are wrecked unless they pass an item save vs. crushing blow (3d4 points of hull damage if hull points are in use).

Males fight with their own strong jaws. Their bite falls well short of a female's, but they can still hold their own against a giant shark.

Every ascallion has a widely spread, decentralized nervous system. It feels almost no touch or pain and is completely immune to mental attacks and paralysis. The same quirk means it cannot sense vibrations in the water, so it must hunt by sight and smell alone.

Ascallions wander temperate and tropical seas, and coastal or undersea communities that meet them quickly learn respect for their bite and blinding speed. They cannot survive in fresh water, though females sometimes push a short way up broad rivers after prey.

Spawning is rare, with 2d6 young per mother. The brood shelters in her mouth for about three years, leaving only to hunt and feed. At maturity they turn on her and eat their way out, killing her. The newly grown young count as adults with half their eventual hit points; they then scatter and never rejoin their siblings. If the mother dies before they mature, they generally stay together until old enough to go their own ways.

To an ascallion, everything in the sea is food. Even sharks, which often trail other predators to share kills, leave waters an ascallion hunts. Octopi and similar creatures are special enemies, attacked on sight even if the ascallion must drop whatever else it was doing.