Noble Dao [Genie]

Noble dao rule the earth genies, commanding common dao, earth elementals, xorn and slaves who dig for the gems they covet; toward everyone else they are simply callous. Bald and stocky, they wear turbans, earrings and heavy necklaces, and males sculpt their beards and mustaches into absurd curls, points and blocks. Skin spans every hue of earth and stone, from white and tan through brown and gray to ebony. Ears are pointed, and retractable claws of pure metal, tough enough to rip armor, make their fingers look stiff and pudgy in any shape they take.

A noble dao fights only when the outcome is already settled. It stacks every advantage beforehand with spies, bribes and hired swords, and never bleeds itself when mercenaries can do it. Caught off guard, it summons help and stalls while an ambush or crushing counterstroke is readied.

Three times a day each, one at a time and at 24th level, it can use detect good, detect magic, change self, polymorph self, gaseous form (looking like a dust cloud or sandstorm), invisibility, misdirection, passwall, spectral force, wall of stone, and grant a Prime Material creature's wish in some perverse way. Sand whisper and dust curtain are at will, rock to mud works six times a day, dig twelve, and repulsion, stoneskin and domination once each.

It carries 2,000 pounds untired; double tires it in three turns, plus a turn per 200 pounds below 4,000, then it rests six turns. It burrows at 9 through earth but not worked stone, unable to take living creatures. Earth magic and maze spells cannot affect it, but holy water deals triple damage.

Nobles hold rift estates across the Sunless Delve but often attend the khan, and processions between estate and court multiply to dozens a day in troubled times as they defend mining and trade rights. A distant mazework typically holds 8-80 slaves forever widening the estate, plus 4-40 common dao and 1-6 nobles.

The khan's capital, the Coiled Labyrinth, is miles of magically warped passages that baffle even minotaur slaves but not noble dao. Nobles are honored with paying for new additions, so it grows cheaply, while outdated wings are filled with rubble. It touches every element and has gates to the other elemental planes. Walls faced with hematite, pyrite, mica and cut stones keep the light dim; bright flashes mean alarm, colored glows summon servants.

A seneschal's wing might house 2-12 minotaurs, 10-100 slaves, 4-24 common dao, 2-12 noblewomen and 1-6 noblemen, with summoned elementals as overseers or pets; a provincial noble's town wing has half. Females run slaves and digs but cannot choose where to dig, and though some become atamen, all trade is barred to them as vulgar and risky; a few lend money by the khan's leave.

Seneschals squeeze atamen and hetmen, who in turn drive their slaves to the limit. Ruthless hagglers, nobles probe how far a mercenary can be pushed before he betrays them and value others only for profit or power. Gloating over others' misfortune is a court custom; rivals obstruct new wings and sabotage successful human traders, though most would rather steal a prize than smash it. They hate marids and djinn, trade metal and minerals with efreet and exploit everything else.

The khan of all dao bears a long string of grand titles hailing him as master of trade, stone and wealth. He has 25 Hit Dice with maximum hit points, every noble dao power, each sand-province spell once a day, maze once a month, and suggestion at will simply by speaking for a round without gestures. Metal and stone weapons cannot harm him; wood does. Fat and weak-limbed but sharp, he loves new inventions in optics, gearing, alchemy and mining, and builder genies, merchant and warrior dao and nobles always attend him.

His mirrored audience chamber, the Veiled Pivot, lies so deep that even some nobles cannot find it. Supplicants pay bribes of 10-80,000 gp, wait 1-4 weeks, then are led blindfolded for hours to face a hundred reflections of him while he peppers them with questions. He prefers humble, poor visitors and invites finely dressed ones to donate their riches. He leaves only for vital caravans of 10-100 dao and 1-3 nobles, often in disguise. His arrival on the Prime Material is heralded by an earthquake strong enough to topple walls and reroute rivers; he tunnels through hills rather than climbing them, and in the desert his train of 2-16 dao and no fewer than 2-200 jann raises a vast sandstorm.