Xorn

Xorn come from the elemental plane of Earth. Its wide body seems carved from pebbly rock, with a great mouth on top. Three long, taloned arms are spaced evenly around it, with large stone-lidded eyes between them that together see in every direction. Three short, thick legs stand beneath the eyes. The whole creature is built to burrow, mouth first.

Unable to digest flesh, xorn attack fleshy beings only in defense of themselves or their belongings, and they bear no special malice toward Prime Material folk. The exception is anyone carrying a good quantity of precious metal or gems, which a xorn can smell at 20 feet. Food is scarce on the Prime, and there a normally peaceful xorn can turn aggressive, demanding a fair share as the price of safe passage and attacking 90% of the time if refused.

Against one foe it crouches on the two legs nearest the enemy, tilting its body so all three arms and its bite reach the same target. Against several, each arm strikes a different foe and one of them also takes a bite as it leans down.

Blending its color into the stone around it and moving through rock, it can impose -5 on opponents' surprise rolls, though it usually just ignores a party or asks openly for metal. Once fighting starts, it may sink into the nearest stone, often the floor, vanish for 1-3 rounds, then burst from the rock, often right under a foe, attacking with mouth and three arms. It can repeat this indefinitely. A phase door cast on it while it is passing through stone kills it instantly. If losing, it retreats into the nearest stone.

Fire and cold, magical or natural, have no effect. Electrical attacks deal half damage, or none on a successful save. Edged weapons deal half damage, but blunt and piercing ones do full damage. Move earth hurls it 30 feet and stuns it for a round. Rock to mud or stone to flesh leaves it at Armor Class 8 for a round as its body reverts, though it keeps attacking. Passwall deals it 1d10+10 damage.

A xorn appears on the Prime Material only when summoned by force or stranded by some planar mishap; underground it seeks broad expanses of stone. At home xorn are as mild as grazing animals. They are intelligent, but live simply in small foraging clans that roam the stone, leaving empty pockets wherever they finish off a vein. What humans call treasure, a xorn calls dinner, and it stores its food in nearby air pockets.

On the Prime Material xorn are mere visitors with no ecological role. On their home plane they gather and eat minerals, and the hollows they leave quickly fill with other creatures. Dao hunt them for sport and often keep them as slaves.

Xaren are smaller, shinier, almost metallic cousins of the xorn with identical combat abilities. They hunger for magical metal, which they can smell at 40 feet, and permanently gain 1 hit point per plus of enchantment eaten, to a maximum of 45; they still need regular magical metal to stay healthy after that. They demand enchanted gear from those carrying it and attack if refused, preferring iron, then copper, silver, gold and electrum, and they nibble ordinary ore too.

A xaren struck at with an enchanted weapon may snap at the blade itself, attacking against Armor Class -2; if it connects, the weapon is ruined unless it saves vs. crushing blow. Xorn and xaren are indifferent to each other and seldom cooperate. Dao hunt xaren but do not enslave them.