Mercenary

Medium humanoid, any chaotic alignment

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• Armor Class 15 (chain shirt, shield)
• Hit Points 39 (6d8+12)
• Speed 30 ft.

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STR	DEX	CON	INT	WIS	CHA
14 (+2)	10 (+0)	15 (+2)	9 (-1)	10 (+0)	12 (+1)

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• Skills Athletics +4, Deception +3, Intimidation +3
• Senses passive Perception 10
• Languages Common plus one other language
• Challenge 1 (200 XP)

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Actions

Multiattack. The mercenary makes 2 melee attacks.

Battle Axe. Melee Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d8 + 2) slashing damage.

Dragonborn Mercenary

Medium humanoid, any chaotic alignment

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• Armor Class 15 (chain shirt, shield)
• Hit Points 39 (6d8+12)
• Speed 30 ft.

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STR	DEX	CON	INT	WIS	CHA
15 (+2)	10 (+0)	15 (+2)	9 (-1)	10 (+0)	13 (+1)

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• Damage Resistance acid
• Skills Athletics +4, Deception +3, Intimidation +3
• Senses passive Perception 10
• Languages Common, Dwarvish, Dragonborn
• Challenge 1 (200 XP)

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Actions

Multiattack. The dragonborn mercenary makes 2 melee attacks.

Battle Axe. Melee Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d8 + 2) slashing damage.

Breath Weapon (1/rest). The dragonborn mercenary exhales destructive acid. Each creature in a 5 by 30 ft. line must make a DC 12 Dexterity saving throw, taking 10 (3d6) acid damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one.

Alpha Dire Wolf

Medium humanoid, any chaotic alignment

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• Armor Class 15 (natural armour)
• Hit Points 65 (10d10+20)
• Speed 50 ft.

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STR	DEX	CON	INT	WIS	CHA
18 (+4)	16 (+3)	15 (+2)	3 (-4)	12 (+1)	8 (-1)

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• Skills Perception +3, Stealth +5
• Senses passive Perception 13
• Challenge 2 (450 XP)

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Keen Hearing and Smell. The alpha dire wolf has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on hearing or smell.

Pack Tactics. The alpha dire wolf has advantage on an attack roll against a creature if at least one of the alpha dire wolf’s allies is within 5 ft. of the creature and the ally isn’t incapacitated.

Actions

Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (2d6 + 4) piercing damage. If the target is a creature, it must succeed on a DC 14 Strength saving throw or be knocked prone.

Howl (Recharges on a Short or Long Rest). The alpha dire wolf lets out a terrifying howl. All wolves and dire wolves within 60 feet of the alpha dire wolf that can hear it deal an additional 1d6 damage with their bite attacks until the start of the alpha wolf's next turn.

Hunter

Medium humanoid, any alignment

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• Armor Class 15 (studded vest)
• Hit Points 52 (8d8+16)
• Speed 35 ft.

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STR	DEX	CON	INT	WIS	CHA
13 (+1)	16 (+3)	14 (+2)	11 (+0)	16 (+3)	8 (-1)

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• Saving Throws Str +3, Dex +5
• Skills Animal Handling +5, Perception +5, Stealth +6, Survival +5
• Condition Immunities asleep
• Senses Passive Perception 15
• Languages Common, wood Elvish
• Challenge 2 (450 XP)

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Fey Ancestry. The hunter has advantage on saving throws against being charmed.

Land's Stride. The hunter is unaffected by nonmagical difficult terrain.

Spellcasting. The hunter is a 4th-level spellcaster. Its spellcasting ability is Wisdom (spell save DC 13, +5 to hit with spell attacks). It knows the following ranger spells:

• 1st level (4 slots): ensnaring strike, snare
• 2nd level (3 slots): pass without trace, spike growth

Actions

Multiattack. The hunter makes two melee attacks or two ranged attacks.

Short Sword. Melee Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (d6 + 3) piercing damage.

Longbow. Ranged Weapon Attack: +5 to hit, range 150/600 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (d8 + 3) piercing damage.

Great Hunter

Medium humanoid, any alignment

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• Armor Class 16 (studded vest)
• Hit Points 90 (12d10 + 36)
• Speed 35 ft.

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STR	DEX	CON	INT	WIS	CHA
14 (+2)	18 (+4)	16 (+3)	12 (+1)	16 (+3)	8 (-1)

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• Saving Throws Str +4, Dex +6
• Skills Animal Handling +5, Perception +5, Stealth +6, Survival +5
• Condition Immunities asleep
• Senses Passive Perception 15
• Languages Common, wood Elvish
• Challenge 4 (1,100 XP)

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Fey Ancestry. The great hunter has advantage on saving throws against being charmed.

Land's Stride. The great hunter is unaffected by nonmagical difficult terrain.

Colossus Slayer. Once per turn, when the great hunter hits a creature with a weapon attack, it takes an extra 1d8 damage if it's below its hit point maximum.

Spellcasting. The great hunter is a 6th-level spellcaster. Its spellcasting ability is Wisdom (spell save DC 13, +5 to hit with spell attacks). It knows the following ranger spells:

• 1st level (4 slots): ensnaring strike, hunter's mark, snare
• 2nd level (3 slots): pass without trace, spike growth
• 3rd level (3 slots): conjure animals, water walk

Actions

Multiattack. The great hunter makes two melee attacks or two ranged attacks.

Volley. The great hunter makes a longbow attack against any number of creatures within 10 feet of a point it can see.

Short Sword. Melee Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (d6 + 4) piercing damage.

Longbow. Ranged Weapon Attack: +6 to hit, range 150/600 ft., one target. Hit: 8 (d8 + 4) piercing damage.

Spirit Tree Dryad

These dryads, which inherit sacred trees filled with nature spirits, have absorbed their power. Their ability to protect their friends and their homes has increased past that of ordinary dryads.

Kinship of the Spirits. It's not always clear why certain trees become spirit trees. Some spirit trees have outlived their kin and seen countless generations pass. Others have become home to a particularly wide variety of animals, nurturing family after family. Others still became the favourite resting places of travelling druids in bygone days.

However it happens, spirit trees become host to ancient, unnameable nature spirits. The dryads that live in these trees form bonds with the spirits.

Sacred Fruits. The bark, leaves, and fruit from spirit trees contain powerful, primordial magic. The trees are therefore in high demand among mortals. Spirit tree dryads often give out bits of fruit or bark to mortals that help them. On the other hand, those who try to take from spirit trees without permission will suffer the dryad's wrath.

Watchful Guardians. While they don't seek out conflict, spirit tree dryads defend their homes with deep determination. They're always aware of the goings-on around their trees, and they're almost never surprised by an oncoming threat. By the time they decide they're going to act, a spirit tree dryad has likely already cast spells like barkskin and shillelagh on themselves.

Never Fight Alone. Spirit tree dryads nurture a community of animals and spirits within their home trees. In times of need, they don't hesitate to call on other woodland beings to come to their aid.

The Cult of Bel Otha

Ages ago, before the land rose from the sea, the aboleth ruled the world — or so they say. To hear them tell it, they were once gods and slavemasters unto an empire of primordial life-forms. With their terrible powers, they dominated the minds of select few and used them to enforce order and servitude from all living beings. Then the land rose from the sea, and the gods brought peace and order to the world, and the aboleth were banished, bereft, to the depths of the ocean.

Always, the aboleth scheme to regain their lost empire. Even a single aboleth, with sufficient cunning, can lure a few unlucky individuals to its aquatic lair and control their minds. Then it can use the enslaved few to preach to the desperate with the same psychological tricks as any other cult. That is exactly what the aboleth did, and the result was the cult of Bel Otha — the first province of a new aboleth empire.

A False God. Bel Otha, or so the scripture goes, is a god that's older and mightier than the gods of humans, elves, dwarves, gnomes, or halflings. The gods may forsake their followers and bestow misfortune on them, be it for their sins or for their mysterious agendas. Bel Otha, however, will grant its blessing to anyone. All it demands in return is absolute faith and loyalty.

Bel Otha, of course, doesn't exist. It's a fiction the aboleth have created in order to manipulate their followers. Just because it isn't real, however, doesn't mean it isn't powerful. Cultists, whether out of desperation, altruism, selfishness, or fear, pledge their lives to this nonexistent elder god.

Warped Minds. The rank-and-file cultists of Bel Otha have been psychologically manipulated and tormented to the point that they'd give their lives for the false god. They have no idea the aboleth even exist. They only swear allegiance to Bel Otha, and more directly, to the ministers that developed a psychological hold on them.

Like any other cultists, the followers of Bel Otha don't think of themselves as servants of evil. They think they've been saved from the problems in their lives by an ancient god of infinite mercy. Far from cackling villains, Bel Otha's cultists are simply desperate people exploited by the cunning aboleth to become mindlessly loyal subjects.

Fell Ministers. The ministers of Bel Otha are directly under the influence of the aboleth's mind control capabilities. Their conscious minds have been suppressed for a long time. Now, they're nothing but mouthpieces for the aboleth controlling them.

The ministers are so deeply enslaved that even mortal danger can't break the aboleth's hold over them. Only magic that ends charm effects, such as greater restoration, can free the ministers from their mind control.

In order to prevent anyone from breaking their enslavement, the aboleth keep the ministers far away from civilization. Ministers never appear alone. They're always guarded, be it by deadly traps, devoted cultists, or monsters the aboleth have tamed.

Bel Otha Cultist

Medium humanoid, any alignment

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• Armor Class 12 (cult robes)
• Hit Points 22 (5d8)
• Speed 30 ft.

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STR	DEX	CON	INT	WIS	CHA
10 (+0)	12 (+1)	10 (+0)	10 (+0)	11 (+0)	10 (+0)

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• Skills Deception +2, Religion +2
• Senses passive Perception 10
• Languages Common plus one other language
• Challenge 1/4 (50 XP)

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Dark Devotion. The Bel Otha cultist has advantage on saving throws against being charmed or frightened.

Bel Otha's Thrall. The Bel Otha cultist's Dark Devotion feature doesn't apply to charm or fear effects originating from an aboleth, and it has disadvantage on saving throws made to resist effects originating from an aboleth.

Actions

Dagger. Melee Weapon Attack: +3 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 3 (1d4 + 1) piercing damage plus 2 (1d4) poison damage.

Minister Valmiese

Medium humanoid (human), lawful neutral

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• Armor Class 13 (16 with mage armour)
• Hit Points 58 (9d8 + 18)
• Speed 30 ft.

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STR	DEX	CON	INT	WIS	CHA
9 (-1)	13 (+1)	14 (+2)	18 (+4)	15 (+2)	18 (+4)

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• Saving Throws Con +5, Int +7
• Skills Arcana +7, Deception +6, Persuasion +6, Religion +7
• Damage Resistances bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing from nonmagical attacks
• Condition Immunities charmed, diseased, frightened
• Senses passive Perception 12
• Languages Common plus one other language
• Challenge 5 (1,800 XP)

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Aboleth's Slave. Valmiese is enslaved to an aboleth's will. She is vulnerable to charm, disease, and fear effects caused by an aboleth, she have disadvantage on saving throws against an aboleth's actions, and she automatically fails saving throws against an aboleth's enslavement.

Undead Thralls. When Valmiese creates an undead with a necromancy spell, its hit pont maximum is increased by 9, and it adds 3 to its damage rolls.

Spellcasting. Valmiese is a 9th-level spellcaster. Her spellcasting ability is Intelligence (spell save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). Valmiese has the following spells prepared:

• Cantrips (at will): thaumaturgy, toll the dead
• 1st level (4 slots): bane, command, mage armour, ray of sickness
• 2nd level (3 slots): blindness/deafness, enthrall, suggestion
• 3rd level (3 slots): animate dead, fear
• 4th level (2 slots): blight
• 5th level (1 slot): danse macabre

Actions

Multiattack. Valmiese makes two attacks with her sacrificial knife.

Sacrifical Knife. Melee Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 4 (1d4 + 2) piercing damage plus 9 (2d8) necrotic damage.

The Enslaved Necromancer

Valmiese was a peaceful necromancer that kept to herself at her oceanside cottage. She studied the boundary between life and death, practicing her necromancy using the corpses of long-dead sailors on the rocky coast. Should she receive a living visitor, she would treat them hospitably before sending them on their way.

Unfortunately, Valmiese was in the wrong place at the wrong time and ended up enslaved by an aboleth. She is now a minster of Bel Otha, her voice twisted to speak the aboleth's lies.

When she's not under the control of the aboleth, Valmiese becomes a CR 4 creature. Her Charisma score becomes 10, and she loses her damage resistances, condition immunities, and Aboleth's Slave feature.

Valmiese's Skeleton

Medium undead, lawful evil

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• Armor Class 13 (armour scraps)
• Hit Points 22 (2d8+13)
• Speed 30 ft.

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STR	DEX	CON	INT	WIS	CHA
10 (+0)	14 (+2)	15 (+2)	6 (-2)	8 (-1)	5 (-3)

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• Damage Vulnerablities bludgeoning
• Condition Immunities poisoned
• Senses darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 9
• Languages understands Common but can't speak
• Challenge 1 (200 XP)

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Undead Thrall. Raised by Valmiese Nightingale's danse macabre spell, the skeleton has increased hit points, attack bonus, and weapon damage, all of which are included with its listed statistics.

Actions

Shortsword. Melee Weapon Attack: +8 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 12 (1d6 + 9) slashing damage.

Shortbow. Ranged Weapon Attack: +8 to hit, range 80/320 ft., one target. Hit: 12 (1d6 + 9) piercing damage.