Ravid

Picture a mouthless snake 6 feet long with one thin, spidery arm. It shines with golden light equal to a continual light spell.

It hails from the Positive Energy Plane, which produces surprisingly little life. Some sages think life sparks everywhere there but is instantly burned away by sheer vitality, its essence feeding new creation in an endless cycle. On its home plane the ravid simply blends into the life force and counts as common. Only when one leaves does anyone notice, and then they notice hard: the ravid is creation itself, and its presence is extremely dangerous.

Unless threatened, a ravid will not fight. If it must, its arm hits for 1d4 and its lashing tail for 1d6, and each blow carries an energy jolt; a victim who fails a save vs. paralyzation suffers a randomly determined jolt effect, and being hit by both attacks means two jolts. Oddly, a jolt can even heal the damage of the very attack that delivered it.

Far worse is its unthinking gift of life. Every round, something within 10 feet, a whole object or just a piece, gains permanent life, mobility and an Intelligence of 3d6-2, behaving as under animate object. With nothing in range, the surrounding ground or air instead churns into a small elemental creature. Each new being has a 30% chance of hostility toward bystanders, adjusted by what it is; a living sword is more likely to lash out than a living chair.

The new creations see the ravid as their maker, never harm it, and defend it if attacked. The ravid ignores them, lacking the wits or desire to command them, so they may follow it or wander away. Animating a corpse does not resurrect it; the body moves, but its soul stays where it went.

Energy drain magic, or contact with a life-draining being such as a wight or spectre kills a ravid outright, though undead that do so are destroyed in turn.

A ravid matters only once it leaves home, whether summoned, wandering through a portal or following careless planar travelers. On a new plane it explores timidly, seeing a lonely world in need of life and setting out to animate as many objects as possible. For that reason ravids tend to avoid things already alive, other ravids included. Visitors may never glimpse the creature, only stumble into a desolate place where everything moves, the ravid long gone or hiding.

Ravids dread undead and flee them on sight. Intelligent undead hate them and will try to kill one even at the price of their own destruction.

A ravid eats nothing; it only gives energy away. Ravids arise spontaneously on their home plane and cannot reproduce.