Vidre

Large elemental, neutral

Bright scintillating lights dance upon the cold walls of the cavern. Rounding the bend is a large humanoid made entirely of crystal. It points at your chest, and you hear its voice thunder within your head, “Your soul is mine.”

Armor Class 17 (natural armor)
Hit Points 135 (18d10 +36)
Speed 30 ft.

STR	DEX	CON	INT	WIS	CHA
20 (+5)	14 (+2)	14 (+2)	14 (+2)	16 (+3)	14 (+2)

Damage Vulnerabilities thunder
Damage Resistances piercing, slashing, bludgeoning damage from nonmagical weapons that aren’t adamantine
Damage Immunities poison, radiance
Condition Immunities charmed, exhaustion, frightened, paralyzed, petrified, poisoned, unconscious
Senses darkvision 120 ft., tremorsense 60 ft., crystal sense
Languages All, telepathy 120 ft.
Challenge 12 (8400 XP)

Special Traits

• Crystal Sense. The vidre automatically detects other creatures in touch with the same crystalline structure as it, as though it had blindsight 120 ft.
• Crystalline Hibernation. The vidre may meld with any sufficiently large crystalline structure it touches. The crystal must be large enough to accommodate the physical form of the vidre. Dubbed so by the more common beings of the underworld, the name of this feature is a bit of a misnomer-the vidre remains completely cognizant of whatever happens in the vicinity of the crystal, though it does not consume souls while inside the crystal. The vidre may exit or enter a crystal at any time as its Action.
• Soul Growth. Every foe slain by the vidre or absorbed by its soul crystal increases its power. For every 100 Hit Dice worth of souls, the vidre’s maximum Hit Dice increase by 1. After absorbing a total of 1000 Hit Dice worth of souls, the vidre turns into a being of pure energy and seemingly vanishes, becoming a new, unknown entity. The vidre consumes 1 Hit Die worth of soul energy per day of prolonged activity, which is why the vidre spends a lot of its time in crystalline hibernation.

Actions

• Multiattack. The vidre can use its crystalline gore attack or two slam attacks or use its soul searing ray and use its gore attack or use its soul searing ray and one slam attack.
• Gore. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (1d12+5) piercing damage and the target loses 5 hit points from bleeding at the start of each of its turns for 5 rounds unless it receives magical healing. Bleeding damage is cumulative; the target loses 5 hit points per round for each bleeding wound it’s taken from the vidre.
• Slam. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 11 (1d12+5) bludgeoning damage.
• Soul Searing Ray (Recharge 5-6). The vidre emits a beam at one target within 60 feet. The target is knocked 20 feet back and must succeed on a DC 15 Dexterity saving throw or be knocked prone. A portion of the soul of the creature stays in the space the target originally was in, and acts as a shadow under the command of the vidre. Unlike a regular shadow, this soul echo is a being of light. Exchange all reference to necrotic and radiant damage in the soul echo’s stats. The creature also does not suffer from sunlight weakness. If the creature hit with the soul searing ray flees the encounter, it feels hollow and gains 1 level of exhaustion that cannot be mitigated for 1d12 days before the soul echo fades. The soul echo steals the body of the creature of origin if that creature is killed during the encounter; in that case, the creature’s alignment shifts to neutral and it falls under the command of the vidre. The original creature immediately loses its level of exhaustion if the soul echo is slain. A creature can only have its soul seared by this ability once per day, even if hit by multiple rays of two different vidre, but the creature can be knocked back multiple times.

About

Vidre do not generally engage in combat unless they are in a period of “soul growth” in which case they require a steady supply of humanoid souls to maintain and increase their power. Vidre drain souls at the rate of 1 per day of regular activity, but if completely motionless it only expends 1 soul per week. When 10 or more vidre bond together using meld into crystal they freeze their consumption of souls and slow the rate to a degradation of 1 soul per month. Being entirely powered by souls and lacking any of their own, a vidre’s existence ends when it dies.

Soul Crystals or “Vidrefacte”

Soul Crystals allow the vidre to cheat their way to attaining energy ascendance. Soul crystals may be bound to a group, house, family, or other organization tied to a symbol. All who wear that symbol upon dying give their soul to the crystal. The power created may be used by powerful priests, wizards, or sorcerers but the part of the deal the leaders of the devious and power hungry organizations are not aware of are as follows: vidre are always bound to their soul crystal and may drain half of the souls obtained by it at any time. When full, a soul crystal is often physically retrieved by a vidre seeking all of the souls. There are very few ways to sever such an agreement with the vidre, but there are ways. A soul crystal may be created by a vidre which has reached its halfway mark to energy ascendance (500 souls) at the cost of 100 souls.