Lesser Magma Drake [Dark Sun]

A magma drake is a gigantic worm with a pair of claws set just behind its head, its body sheathed in thick scales of many reds. Two big black eyes sit high on the skull above a flared snout, and tough flaps of skin seal its eyes and nostrils when it swims through liquid rock. Its gullet can take a creature up to 12 feet long.

It strikes from below, bursting out of a lava pool to catch prey by surprise, and can snatch at targets up to 20 feet overhead this way. Anyone near the pool's edge when it leaps is splashed with lava for 1d8 points of damage unless a Dexterity check succeeds.

It opens with a bite. If the attack roll beats its THAC0 by 4 or more, it swallows any creature under 12 feet long. Inside, the victim can use only psionics, and digestive damage begins on the third round. Each claw deals 1d12+6. The tail hits for 1d12, and if that roll beats the THAC0 by 4 or more the drake has coiled around the victim and may squeeze for another 2d8 each round until the victim slips loose with a successful bend bars/lift gates roll.

When it can, a magma drake fights from inside the lava. Foes must win initiative to strike it at all, or it slips under before they can attack. If weapon speed factors are in use, it gets a +12 modifier to initiative.

Psionic sciences: mind link and probe. Devotions: contact, danger sense, ego whip, feel sound, mind bar, psionic crush and radial navigation, plus the innate lesser drake devotions. It finds prey with life detection.

Magma drakes den in caves in or beside active volcanoes and are at ease in the lava, able to stay submerged for up to three hours.

They covet anything red and have a value system all their own. Red cloth pleases them most, though it baffles and enrages them by falling apart in the lava. Any red object makes a good bribe, but cloth works best.

Earth drakes are their mortal enemies, hunted whenever the chance arises. The magma drake makes up for weaker psionics with sharper wits, readily attacking with psionics and using mass domination to force other creatures to help. A victorious magma drake is grateful to those who aided it.

Mating happens every second year. The female tucks her eggs just below the skin of a live lava pool, fastened to its rim so they will not sink, and the young can fend for themselves minutes after hatching. Hide, teeth and claws fetch high prices anywhere, though collecting them is likely to cost more lives than they are worth.