Vargouille

D&D 2024 monster: Vargouille. Source: Mordenkainen Presents: Monsters of the Multiverse. challenge rating 1, creature type Fiend, Tiny size, speed 5 ft., fly... Shrieking, flapping, and hideous to behold-with a body like a severed head and wings in place of ears-vargouilles boil out of the Abyss to infest other planes of existence, such as Carceri, where they are a menace. Each vargouille carries a disease that creates more of its kind; a flock of vargouilles on the wing is a plague of chaos and evil. Swarms of vargouilles flap through the caverns and skies of the Abyss. They are given little regard by powerful and intelligent demons since vargouilles can do them no harm. Even the weakest demon, such as a manes or a dretch, fears vargouilles only if they appear in great numbers. In the Lower Planes, vargouilles rarely get the chance to eat live prey other than vermin. More often, they lap up the ichor left behind when one Fiend kills another. Because of their hunger for living prey, vargouilles are eager to escape the Lower Planes. On rare occasions, summoning a demon to another plane can bring a vargouille along for the ride, attached like a tick. The precautions a mortal takes to control a summoned demon rarely account for a stowaway, enabling the vargouille to escape into the world. Vargouilles that roam free on the Material Plane are a dire threat to all creatures. Their awful shrieking can paralyzed other creatures with fear, which also makes the creatures susceptible to the vargouille's curse. If the curse is allowed to run its course, an abyssal spirit invades the person's body, causing a gruesome transformation. Over a period of hours, the victim's head takes on fiendish aspects, such as fangs, tentacles, and horns. At the same time, the person's ears grow larger, expanding into wing-like appendages. In the final moments, the victim's head tears away from the body in a fountain of blood, becoming another vargouille, which often then eagerly laps up the bl...