Palimpsest

This predator is a single enchanted page of paper or parchment that has soaked up the power of the runes written on it for so long that it has become semi-sentient, mobile and carnivorous. It rustles across desks and bookshelves as if blown by a stray breeze, and otherwise looks exactly like any other page.

It shows its nature only when feeding. Lurking in books, scroll cases or folders of loose sheets, it senses sound and motion and strikes only when its prey is still or making small movements such as writing or sketching, surprising on 1-8. An attack roll that beats the needed number by 4 or more begins pulling the victim into the page, where his features take shape as a drawing or illuminated figure. Absorption takes 2 full rounds, during which it is helpless to act otherwise and exposed, so it prefers lone targets. A hit that fails to absorb leaves 1d3 points of deep paper cuts that keep bleeding for hours; the blood soaks in and leaves no trace.

Once fully absorbed, the victim's life force is slowly eaten away, taking one day for each of his levels or Hit Dice, after which only a wish can restore him; even resurrection fails. A palimpsest can hold one victim per Hit Die, so a 3 HD specimen can digest three together, yet it can pull in no more than one per 2 rounds. While digesting, victims become part of its decoration: mice squealing in the margins, a scribe shrieking amid the scrollwork.

Raise dead and limited wish do nothing for a trapped victim. Short of a carefully phrased wish, the only cure is a sequence: remove curse animates the illustration, abjure lets it be lifted from the page, and resurrection restores true form. Otherwise the victim stays a bright, lifeless paper doll. Destroying the creature leaves its victims beyond help except by wish.

Edged weapons and both normal and magical fire cannot harm it, but electricity can free partly absorbed victims. A shocking grasp frees one 20% of the time, though the caster risks being absorbed unless he channels it through spectral hand. Lightning bolt has a 50% chance, and chain lightning a 90% chance to free the latest victim plus a 10% chance each of freeing any other still pictured on the page.

Palimpsests live alone and have no society. They do not mate, but reports suggest that big magical libraries or plentiful food make them divide often, like amoebas.

They actually originate on the Ethereal Plane, and rather than drawing power from other planes to a wizard, they do the reverse, dragging wizards into other planes. Some say void merchants create them to harvest magical energy; others call them agents of a power of magic sent to punish offenders. Rumors persist of an entire false library made of them, its tempting spines labeled with names like Libram of Gainful Conjuration, Manual of Bodily Health, or an ancient sage-wizard's black book.