Buso

Buso look like ghouls but were once a friendly people who helped humans; now they rank among humanity's worst enemies. The most common kind, the tigbanua buso, is very tall and thin, with a long body and a long neck that some can twist far enough to look behind them. They have big, bony feet, knotted fingers ending in sharp claws, dirty curly hair, flat noses, and fanged mouths. Their pale, leathery skin is crusted with filth. Every buso has a single red or yellow eye in the middle of its head.

A tigbanua buso is surrounded by a 10-foot-radius fear aura. Creatures of less than 1 HD are paralyzed automatically; others resist with a save vs. paralyzation. Victims stay frozen as long as they remain within 10 feet, and recover 3-8 (1d6+2) rounds after leaving the area, or sooner with remove paralysis or a similar spell.

These buso are not clever. They leap at lone travelers and defenseless villagers by night with clumsy but savage attacks, striking whenever they get a chance with claws and fangs. Their claws carry a terrible disease: anyone clawed must save vs. death or be infected, and the infected eventually become tagamaling buso. Despite the resemblance to ghouls, buso are living creatures, vulnerable to every attack form including sleep and charm, and all weapons hurt them normally.

Their origin is debated. Rumor says they were once a peaceful race whose advanced civilization stretched along the southern mountains of the great eastern empire. They have since spread across the eastern lands, with small packs living near graveyards, in bleak forests, and among rocky peaks. They wander without permanent lairs in search of victims and gather no treasure.

They are endless scavengers that eat any humanoid or animal flesh, though they consider corpses dug from cemeteries a treat.

Tagamaling are victims of the tigbanua's diseased claws, doomed to turn into ghoulish creatures by night. A tagamaling is shorter and stockier than a tigbanua, without the long neck and lanky frame, but otherwise shares its bony feet, claws, fangs, and lone eye.

Each sunset after infection, the victim may transform: 1% chance the first night, rising 1% per night (2% the second, 3% the third, and so on). Once changed he becomes a mindless, savage beast that attacks and eats anyone it can catch, keeping his Hit Dice and hit points. Special abilities, spellcasting included, are lost while transformed, his mind holding only rage and animal hunger. His claws and teeth are as sharp as a tigbanua's, but he spreads no disease and has no fear aura. At dawn he returns to normal and remembers nothing of the night. Cure disease or a similar spell ends the affliction, but once the chance reaches 100%, after 100 straight days of infection, it can no longer be cured and he transforms every night.