Rhu-Chalik

Thin tendrils trail from this misshapen sphere. A gray orb hangs beneath the creature like a bulging lidless eye.

Rhu-Chalik (CR 6)

Small Aberration
Alignment: Chaotic Evil
Initiative: +7
Senses: Darkvision 60 feet, See in Darkness ; Perception +10

Speed: 5 feet, Fly 60 feet (perfect)
Space: 5 feet

Defense

Armor Class: 18, touch 14, flat-footed 15 (+4 armor, +3 Dex, +1 size)
Hit Points: 68 (8d8+32) Fast Healing 2
Saving Throws: Fort +6, Ref +5, Will +8
All-Around Vision
Immunity: cold, disease

Offense

Melee: 4 tendrils +10 (1d4+1 plus pain touch)
Reach: 5 feet

Special Attacks: pain touch, project terror, void transmission

Spell-Like Abilities (CL 10th; Concentration +12):

• Constant- Mage Armor
  
  
• At Will- Detect Thoughts (DC 14), Invisibility, Share Memory (DC 14)
  
  
• 1/day- Modify Memory (DC 16)

Statistics

Str	Dex	Con	Int	Wis	Cha
12 (+1)	16 (+3)	19 (+4)	13 (+1)	14 (+2)	15 (+2)

Base Attack Bonus: +6
CMB +6
CMD 19

Feats: Combat Reflexes, Improved Initiative, Weapon Finesse

Skills: Bluff +8, Diplomacy +8, Fly +13, Intimidate +10, Perception +10, Sense Motive +7, Stealth +15, Use Magic Device +10

Languages: Aklo; telepathy 100 ft.

Special Qualities: Compression, No Breath

Special Abilities

Pain Touch (Ex)

A rhu-chalik secretes an enzyme that coats its tendrils. When this enzyme comes into contact with a living creature, it causes excruciating pain. Any creature that comes into contact with the enzyme must succeed at a DC 18 Fortitude save or take a -2 penalty on attack rolls, ability checks, and skill checks for 1d4 rounds. If a creature is affected by multiple pain touch attacks, the duration stacks but the penalty doesn't. Creatures that are immune to pain effects are immune to this ability. The save DC is Charisma-based.

Project Terror (Su)

As a standard action, a rhu-chalik can harness the fears of any creature it has successfully used detect thoughts on within the last minute. This effect creates visions of that creature's most terrible nightmares in the target's mind; the target must succeed at a DC 16 Will save or be frightened and take 1d4 points of Wisdom damage. The save DC is Charisma-based.

Void Transmission (Su)

If a creature takes an amount of Wisdom damage from the rhu-chalik's project terror ability that equals or exceeds the creature's Wisdom score, the creature falls unconscious as normal. At that point, the rhu-chalik can take 10 minutes to copy and absorb the creature's entire consciousness and send that consciousness through the void of space to its waiting masters. If the creature's Wisdom damage is healed and the creature is revived prior to the end of this process, this effect fails. If the creature's Wisdom damage is healed after its consciousness is successfully transmitted, the creature awakes disoriented, and takes a -2 penalty on attack rolls, ability checks, and skill checks for 24 hours. This effect otherwise doesn't harm the target, as the target's consciousness isn't eliminated, only duplicated and transmitted.

Ecology

Environment: Any
Organization: solitary
Treasure: none


A rhu-chalik, also called a void wanderer, is an alien entity that scouts for a nebulous collection of space conquerors known as the Dominion of the Black. In addition to ambitions for dominating the universe, they also engage in a curious pursuit: collecting the memories of interesting creatures in the universe into a vast repository of knowledge in hopes of unraveling every secret of existence. Though they are theoretically capable of traversing the vastness of space to make it to Golarion on their own, the rhu-chaliks encountered here arrived on the crashed spaceship Divinity. Years before Divinity crashed onto Golarion, the ship's crew discovered rhu-chaliks in a distant galaxy and became intrigued with their unique form. They collected a few specimens and set about observing the enigmatic creatures. Unknown to the scientists, these aliens had allowed their own capture in order to travel to far-flung galaxies where they could explore the thoughts, dreams, and knowledge of thousands upon thousands of races the universe over. The rhu-chaliks kept their strange abilities secret onboard the ship, content to travel in dormancy until the Divinity encountered the Dominion of the Black, at which point the creatures shredded the minds of their scientist wardens. Later, as the ship crashed on Golarion, the creatures seeped from the vessel and began their exploration of this new world flush with sentient life.

A rhu-chalik is approximately 3 feet across and weighs only 30 pounds.

Ecology

Rhu-chaliks' anatomy is as alien as their motives. The creatures resemble spongy masses of jet-black tissue, with lidless, pupil-less, grayish-white eyes at their center and four thin tendrils extending from their mass. Rhu-chaliks can hover in atmosphere or float in the dead vacuum of space; they don't need to breathe. They're capable of remaining motionless for decades, and some claim that their life spans may outlast even the stars themselves.

It's assumed that rhu-chaliks are the least powerful of their strange race and exist merely to transmit the minds of interesting creatures they encounter far into the depths of their masters' domain-a starless void beyond the edge of the universe. Those few who have studied rhu-chaliks and survived with their minds intact theorize that these creatures are carefully sculpted to suit their task, and it's likely that their original form has been drastically altered by millennia of specialized breeding into their current dread incarnation. There is no existing information about how these creatures procreate, and it is assumed that they are artificially crafted by their dark masters.

Void wanderers don't feed in the traditional sense, and they lack a mouth or any other orifice that can accept food. Some records retrieved from Divinity suggest that the creatures use their tendrils to absorb nutrients through osmosis, but this is incorrect. Rhu-chaliks maintain their bodily form and sustain their lengthy lifespans by feeding off the thoughts and fears of sentient beings. Every emotion has a different flavor to these creatures, and since their feedings are harmless to the sources of their meals, many rhu-chaliks have been observed to dine continuously from the same mind endlessly, prodding different emotions to elicit a new taste as if they were ordering a new course at a banquet.

Habitat & Society

Rhu-chaliks are the lesser cogs of a collective of star-spanning overlords far beyond the powers of Golarion. Rhu-chaliks serve as scouts and traveling collectors that wander through civilizations in search of minds that they can twist with fear and agony. Their ultimate goal is to copy the minds of those they encounter and send the consciousnesses beyond the stars to their masters.

As observers, rhu-chaliks prefer to maintain stealth for as long as possible. These small creatures can compress their spongy bodies into a fraction of their normal size, and then lodge themselves into tight hiding spots so that they can sift through the thoughts of nearby sentient creatures. If discovered, rhu-chaliks leave their hiding places, but they are quick to return once they're confident that they can reestablish secrecy.

Millions of these strange horrors are cast out from their dark domain every moment, hurtling through space until they encounter some alien race or world not yet probed by the dark masters of their native space. From their far-flung redoubt, rhu-chaliks observe the churning cosmos, gathering every speck of information and every thought ever birthed by the minds of a thousand races of alien species.

In the dark space from which they hail, catalogs of entire civilizations hang in a surreal miasma of misplaced minds shrieking out in disembodied agony for all eternity, with their every desire, fear, secret, and scrap of understanding exposed like raw nerves for invasive perusal. The creatures who survive having their consciousnesses copied and transmitted are often unaware of the transmission, and little realize that their most private moments will be pored over endlessly by alien minds.

Rhu-chaliks serve their masters tirelessly, and are as patient as they are long-lived. They rarely make an uncalculated move, and seek only the most prized intellects to cast into the dark beyond for their master's delectations. When exploring distant worlds, rhu-chaliks are not social beings, and they avoid other rhu-chaliks in hopes that their predations won't cause too much overlap in the mind collection clouds of their masters. However, back in their native space, rhu-chaliks number in the billions, and the creatures feed off a countless number of disembodied minds.