Skellimaul/Mauleton

 

The skellimaul/mauleton carry its weapon - a stone maul that looks more like a greatclub because of reasons - with great disinterest; the weapon is cursed, and the skellimaul/mauleton is (almost) forever bound to it.

Skellimauls/mauletons is a by-product of the weapon's curse; the carrier is slowly transformed into its more undead appearance as time goes by, and is controlled by the parasitic weapon.

As time goes by, the wielder of the weapon turns more and more into a skeleton, turning weaker and weaker, until one day, it is unable to handle or even lift the heavy weapon, making them both stationary. When that happens, the weapon lifts its curse; the skeleton finally drops the weapon, and is free to do whatever (running away seems to be the most likely event), and the cursed maul is left alone, waiting for a new owner.

Bathroom Dungeons: Tomb of the Sit Trap

I brought a sketchpad and a pen to the bathroom before when I... Anyway, have a dungeon! I'll call this series for Bathroom Dungeons because I'll draw them when I... Anyway, have a dungeon! And yeah, there are no rooms, and no keys, and no nothing, but I figured: maybe you can fill in the blanks when you got to the bathroom and... Anyway, have a dungeon!

The crappy life infuser

Cicely de Cairn is really bad at what she does, but at least it doesn't cost you an arm and a leg.

In short, she can bring that which is dead back to life.

But as stated above, she is really bad at it.

She used to call herself a NECROMANCER, because, she thought, she dealt with the dead and so. But then that became a bad thing, so she had to relocate, and give herself a new title.

So she started to call herself a UNDEAD UNDOER, because, she thought, she dealt with undoing death. But it turned out that attracted the wrong clientele; necromancers who regretted having created certain undead and now wished to restore those to some previous state.

The combination of having your front porch occupied by zombies, ghouls, skeletons and regretful, powerful necromancers with strange, geometric hats and short temper - and being terrible at your profession - turned out to be a tad too much for poor Cicely, so once again she had to relocate, and give herself a new title.

So she started to call herself a BAKER, just to give herself a break. That didn't last long, and left deeper scars in her consumers than those necromancers would've, so once again she relocated and gave herself a new title.

Her latest title is LIFE INFUSER. Having done at least some research, she is now certain that it won't attract the wrong type of clientele.

But, as previously stated, she is really bad at what she does. But she is kind - and will have a gathering of bugs running around her feet at all times. She doesn't have any permanent residence, and will most likely be encountered in the vicinity of any settlement.

 

Cicely de Cairn is able to resurrect that which has been dead for less than two days without any side effects - if, and only if, it is at most the size of a normal sized beetle.

Trying to resurrect anything larger than that will always result in one or more negative side effects.

 

Costs of resurrection

Cicely de Cairn is an interesting one; she doesn't know how to charge people for her services, but she do enjoy a show:

1. "Present to me within a week's time a pig dressed up in attire stolen from a noble man. Return the attire afterwards."
2. "Have a man chase you here so that I may witness it. He must be upset but not violent."
3. "Come back here in two days, but you must all have switched clothes with each other, and you must pretend we haven't met."
4. "Return with the largest egg you can find. You may only speak while the egg is in the air."
5. "Escort a family consisting of no less than three people to me. You must not educate them of your matter here beforehand. They must come willingly. Afterward, escort them back safely."
6. "When I start counting, go quickly and find yourself each a good hiding place. When I reach ten, I'll open my eyes and come looking for you. ONE..."

 

Duration of resurrection

Instant. The object rises as if been awoken from sleep. Beware: no wounds will be healed, nor will any limbs grow back.

Negative side effects

As previously stated, unless you're resurrecting a beetle or an ant, there will be negative side effects:

1. Shift all ability scores visually one step down on the character sheet, e.g. Strength score becomes Dexterity, Dexterity becomes Constitution, and so on (Charisma becomes Strength)
2. Drop six dice on the character sheet. Draw straight lines between the dice, forming an enclosed area. This is what the character has forgotten (including ability scores; treat them as 3). Any items within this area are unknown and scary to the character, and may not be used ever again (not even its kind, i.e. healing potions, coins of certain sort, etc.)
3. This depends on game system, but for D&D 5e:
1. Your "Personality traits" are now your "Flaws", and vice versa
   
2. Your "Bonds" are now your "Ideals", and vice versa
4. Drop three dice on the character sheet. Draw straight lines between the dice, forming a triangle. All words and numbers inside the triangle (even words that may have been cut-off and split into new ones) are highly sought after by the character; at least once per day one of these words must be found or encountered in some way, or the character dies on the spot. When found or encountered, cross it over on the character sheet
5. Take a blank character sheet, randomly choose another player in the group, and copy their sheet. Congratulations, you're clone now (although the character's voice will be slightly pitched up)
   
6. You turn into a beetle. Cicely will sigh, and then ignore the rest of the characters, as she starts packing up her things, getting ready to leave yet again. The beetle will join the other bugs, and follow Cicely wherever she goes.
   

Instead of starting in a tavern maybe just do Marvel Zombies

...where the players are infected zombies with superhuman powers and super hunger for human flesh and they just try to infect as much as possible - across the planes.

PuterOldJohnnyDeadPixels

Instead of hit points: a glass egg

Every person ever born has one hit point. This hit point is contained in a glass container, shaped like an egg. Inside, a semi-transparent gas that pulsates like cloud swept lightning can be seen.

The glass egg is your phylactery.

The gas is your one hit point.

If the egg breaks, the gas disappears and you die.

When you are born, the egg pops into existence somewhere near you. It could be the under the bed, or on a shelf in the castle, or in the well in the town square.

If you travel too far from the phylactery, your body starts to decay, accelerating the further you travel from it. But you won't die, as long as the egg is whole.

This is why many folks never move; they haven't found their phylactery, and the fear of travelling too far makes them stay put.

This is also how undead are made; regular people that travel too far from their glass egg, either driven away by force or ignorance. Remove enough flesh and soon you'll have yourself a zombie.

Pushing on even more, you'll end up as a skeleton.

And then, when the last bone withers away, you'll continue as a spectre; a pale sheet of your former self.

Liches are just powerful wizards that forgot to bring their glass egg with them. They stopped travelling when they got tired of flesh falling of their body.

The helpful necromancer in Bandar Karahc

There's a tavern located in the oldest parts of Bandar Karahc that houses a man by the name of Musahhar abd al-Baith. He keeps to himself in "his" corner of the establishment with his bottles and decoctions; potions he sells to weary travelers. He's always polite and friendly if approached.

He used to be called "the trickster" some 400 years ago, a nickname now forgotten but still relevant.

Musahhar has in his possession the dagger Ahya. Its blade, when sunken into a dead body, acts like a portal that lets an unholy spirit slip into the flesh and possess it for an unseen future. Striking a living creature with the dagger will exorcise the life essence and turn it into a restless, vengeful spirit; the body will start decaying as normal but cannot be used for possession (spirits call these bodies for "tainted vessels").

If a person asks him for help, but cannot afford any of his potions, Musahhar will gladly offer healing for free. Slowly whispering the word sudad over and over again into their ear, any life threatening injuries will heal up, all traces of poison will vanish, and all weariness will disappear.
    As life returns to the poor person, all hope will quickly disappear as he or she realizes that the helpful necromancer just placed them under a spell. As Musahhar hands over the conceiled dagger (wrapped in leather), the cursed person immediately knows what has to be done: within a week, he or she must stab a corpse with the weapon, and bring a spirit into this world.

If the spell is not fulfilled, Musahhar will get up and start searching for Ahya; for him, the dagger shines like a bright beacon, and this helpful necromancer has all the time in the world to go searching for his blade.

(Original drawing found at Telecanter's. Poorly photomanipulated by yours truly.)

Bored Undead Halfboar

(Mixed and matched using Telecanter's public domain images.)

Monster's got the blues (or God is a bard)

Once in a while, the reanimated bones of a skeleton or the rotting corpse of an undead is struck by a distant memory from its past, from before it became what it is today.

In this moment of nostalgia, it is overwhelmed with sad feelings and an urge to release this sudden sadness. A few burst into fight, some are paralysed and frozen in place, but most burst into melancholic singing for some strange reason.

Unless attacked, the undead will complete its singing before returning to whatever it was doing before the memory struck.

There's a 5 % risk the singing will sadden anyone in its direct vicinity (that is listening). The affected person will be unable to act properly up till one minute after the singing ends.
All actions are performed with a penalty due to watery eyes.

The sad song is...

1. ...gibberish words. Babble. But sad.
2. ...the one about the farmer who fell in love with his scarecrow
3. ...about a ghoul who was a fool to fall in love with the dove he just ate from a plate
4. ...one food related word after the other
5. ...about the dragon that ate a bride on her wedding day - over and over again, because they were stuck in time
6. ...about how much it misses its mother
7. ...about the boy who fell in love with the most beautiful person in the world, only to discover it was his own reflection (this is a duet)
8. ...about the decline of a now long gone empire
9. ...filled with words that rhymes with "love"
10. ...about the dead hero who was resurrected by an evil necromancer, to serve as his minion for all eternity

If the undead lacks a tongue (and/or a throat), the song will be sung in silence.

(Image source)

Short note to self: the flesh of zombies

What if zombiism were a disease that made you...

1. Slow as a turtle
2. Afraid of people
3. Tough as granite
4. Naturally long lived
5. Hunted for your flesh as it's believed it can cure diseases when digested

These zombies would eventually look like half-eaten corpses as people would try to chip of pieces of "medicine" from your body.

The trapped ex-lich

Background
Everybody knows of the Ruler of the Undead and Unholy, the lich of the west. The king that rules from his necrotic land of walking corpses, reanimates and ghastly horrors. Something as simple as touching the rotting ground with your feet may result in death, or worse. That's why you'd take the long way around.

One day, a fat pigeon takes flight from the mouldy green castle placed in the centre of the land - high seat of the undead king. It heads directly in the direction of the nearest larger settlement, with a carefully folded letter tied around one of its fat legs.

A furry, one-eyed bone behemoth watches the pigeon disappear into the horizon. Birds make great stew, the behemoth thinks before returning to its black cauldron of unmentionable flesh.


The letter

To you: have you ever rescued a trapped KING? Follow the directions of the map. Find me, get me out and to SAFETY, and I'll REWARD you greatly. But HURRY!

The rest of the small letter is covered with a crude but surprisingly accurate map of the undead land, with notable land markings and suggested short cuts ("purple pit = good hiding place", "bone behemoth patrols here and here", etc.).




Potential hooks

• The players stumble upon the oversized, dead pigeon on the side of the road. It has a letter tied around one of its legs. Animals avoid the pigeon because of its necrotic state.
• The pigeon finally loses it and starts attacking the party until it is killed, revealing the letter. A brain parasite changed its otherwise friendly nature.
• The pigeon is taken and eaten by a farmer's cat, letter and all. During the night, the cat is affected by magic residue left on the pigeons body, rendering it hairless the morning after. The cat is later taken by an eagle, and fed to its chick, who after the feast loses all its feathers.Two days later it falls out of the nest, hitting one of the players.
  Examining the little bird reveals that the left wing holds the letter, while the right wing holds the map, very much like a tattoo.
  (yes, this one is pretty far fetched...)

So what's the deal with this guy
Before turning into a king of all things undead, George William was a bored nobleman living in the city. He spent his days dabbling with potion making and torturing vermin.

One late evening, after losing a bet to his drunken friends, George William swallowed down a strange concoct of past days experiments, turning him into a powerful but undead version of himself: the Ruler of the Undead and Unholy, the lich of the west.

Not being recognized any more, he fled and took refuge in a deserted piece of land no one seemed to care about. Over the course of the following hundred years, he slowly shaped it into his own liking of death and decay. The undead inhabitants of his new kingdom were bred from captured farmers forced to drink his experiments.

He built his green castle and surrounded himself with strange beasts to protect him. He was untouchable, like a baby in a cradle of bone.

But one morning, the king of the undead awoke to a mirror reflection he hadn't seen in years. He had reverted back to his former self; a normal, pale 17 year old nobleman with blonde hair. He even got his pimples back.

But now he was stuck in a necrotic land inhabited by hollow monsters, that lived to serve and protect the green castle where their beloved frightful ruler up until yesterday lived.