Medium
Fiend
CR 2
Chaotic Evil
Morlath Veilmonger
Envious Facemaker
The Morlath Veilmonger is a creeping demon of petty theft and intimate malice: it does not merely steal gold, it steals likeness. It skulks through alleys and between hovels, pressing its cold, flexible palms to faces until a neighbor's skin peels away like a glove. Wearing a borrowed visage, it moves through towns with uncanny familiarity, whispering jealous suggestions and setting distrust between friends. Its true face—an expressionless, puckered ring of teeth and glassy eyes beneath a shroud of stretched skin—is a thing the old dread in children's nightmares.
Armour
13
natural armor
Hit points
52
8d8+16
Speed
30ft
Challenge
2
450 XP
STR
12
+1
DEX
14
+2
CON
14
+2
INT
12
+1
WIS
13
+1
CHA
16
+3
Saving throws
CHA +5
Skills
Deception +5, Stealth +4
Senses
darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 11
Languages
Understands Common and Infernal but cannot speak with its own voice; it can perfectly mimic voices it has heard
Multiattack. The Morlath makes two Claw attacks.
Claw. Melee Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d6+2) slashing damage.
Facewarden (Recharge 5-6). The Morlath reaches toward one humanoid within 10 feet. The target must succeed on a DC 13 Wisdom saving throw or the Morlath instantly assumes that target's outward appearance and voice for 1 hour (as the disguise self spell but without a spell slot). While disguised as that target, the Morlath has advantage on Deception checks to pass as the target and can mimic any voice or handwriting it can see. Additionally, the affected target suffers a surge of paranoia: it has disadvantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks and attack rolls against the Morlath for 1 minute as its confidence in what it sees falters. If the Morlath uses this ability on a corpse of a humanoid whose face it can touch, the effect requires no saving throw and lasts until the mask is forcibly removed.
Mirror Shriek. When a creature the Morlath can see hits it with a melee attack, the Morlath emits a high, glassy shriek. The attacker must succeed on a DC 13 Wisdom saving throw or be frightened of the Morlath until the end of its next turn.
Morlath are said to be spawned from envy given form; where a community festers with petty rivalries, a single whisper of covetous thought can invite a Veilmonger to linger. They favor walled towns and farming hamlets where everyone knows one another, for their power grows with the trust they can corrupt. Local records from Granwell keep careful notations of sudden neighbor feuds and mysterious disappearances of heirloom portraits — the signature of a Morlath's passing. Scholars of the occult like Archivist Hesturn of the Ashbridge Conservatory argue that Morlath are minor fiends bound to the Court of Mireth, a soft-spoken demon whose domains are slights and small resentments. The Order of Lorn, a secretive guild of household guardians, keeps a list of methods to spot a borrowed face (ask about a private joke, observe the blink reflex). Legends tell of one Morlath named 'Riv's Shade' that wore the mayor's visage for a fortnight and triggered a civic purge simply to watch the town tear itself apart; the Veilmonger left when the people were too busy killing one another to notice its final, hollow smile.
About human-sized and unnervingly lithe, a Morlath Veilmonger stands hunched with too-long forearms and thin, nimble fingers built for peeling and sewing likenesses. Its skin beneath the masks is waxen and elastic, mottled gray with faint veins like dried riverbeds. When not wearing a stolen face, the demon's countenance is a circular maw-ring of tiny teeth rimmed by several lidless, glassy eyes set in concentric rows. The masks it wears are perfect, stitched seamlessly to its scalp with near-invisible sutures; hair and stubble of the original cling to the edges. Its limbs are scarred where old masks were torn away. Overall scale: roughly the size of a human (about 5–6 ft tall), with hands and face noticeably wrong — long-fingered and glossy where flesh should be matte.
Made with the free LoreKeeper Monster Generator · D&D 5e-compatible stat block · Free to use at your table · Licence
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