Scholar Fiend [Greater Mercenary]

A scholar fiend has a human body in neat, well-kept robes topped by the snarling, fanged head of a jackal or war dog, and its face is usually twisted in hatred. As the voice of its people, it can speak and write every language.

Scholar fiends cast spells as 12th-level mages and keep a randomly determined spellbook. They favor destructive magic but always hold back defensive and escape spells. Beyond the powers common to all mercenary fiends, they can use magic missile, heat metal, telekinesis, invisibility, warp wood, continual darkness, control temperature in a 10-foot radius, shape change into any humanoid form, fly with unlimited duration, fear once a day, and advanced illusion once a day, all with great cunning.

They shun melee but can bite for 2d6 and rake with two venomous claws for 1d4 each. Every claw hit adds a cumulative -1 penalty to the victim's attack rolls, permanent unless removed by bless, slow poison, or neutralize poison. Once per day one may try to gate in 1d6 soldier fiends, 1d2 clatter fiends, or another scholar fiend, succeeding 40% of the time.

They are never surprised on the lower planes, shrug off all mind-affecting spells, and are hurt only by +3 or better weapons. Only death on the volcanic lower plane, the source of its power, truly destroys one.

Every contract the mercenary fiends sign in the endless war between demons and devils passes through scholar fiends, who keep the records and enforce the terms. By fiendish standards they are refined. They broker each bargain with baatezu and tanar'ri and openly shop one side's offer to its enemy to drive the price up. A devil host besieging a demon fortress of molten iron might offer 1,000 mortal life forces plus a year's power of death; the scholar carries that to the demons, who generally answer with a counteroffer to hire the same fiends for the defense.

Like all their kind they care nothing for racial pride, only for personal wealth and power. They live on the volcanic lower plane, drawing strength from its furnaces, and leave only briefly. The Ledger of Binding describes a potion said to guarantee success in any venture, brewed with a sliver of a scholar fiend's heart; no one knows whether it works.