Mummy

A mummy was an undead creature created through the necromantic ritual of mummification. Its organs ceremonially removed and its body swaddled in sacred bandages, mummies served as deathless priests, awakening from centuries of slumber to guide the faithful into the afterlife.

Description

The long burial rituals that accompanied a mummy's entombment helped protect its body from rot. In the embalming process, the newly dead creature's organs were removed and placed in special jars, and its corpse was treated with preserving oils, herbs ad wrappings. After the body was preserved, the corpse was typically wrapped in linen bandages. In order to animate properly, a mummy must lay entombed for years, sometimes centuries, at a time. Only once the mummification was complete could they rise again.
At a glance, a mummy could instill terror and visions of one's own death. Their touch was frequently laced with a necrotic disease unique to mummies, known as mummy rot. Once infected with mummy rot, the infected creature ages and ages until eventually withering away to merely dust and bones.
Under the direction of powerful priests and necromancers, the ritual that creates a mummy can be increased in potency. The mummy lord that rises from such a ritual retains the memories and personality of its former life and is gifted with supernatural resilience and spellcasting power.

Behavior

A mummy obeyed the conditions and parameters laid down by the rituals that created it, driven only to fulfill its ancient mandate and punish transgressors. Most commonly, a transgression against its tomb, treasures, lands or former loved ones caused a mummy to rise. Lesser mummies, however, were often sworn to obey the will of mummy lords, serving as vassals, servants and bodyguards when called upon.
Though they seldom bother to do so, mummies could speak. As a result, some served as undead repositories of lost lore, and could be consulted by the descendants of those who created them. Powerful individuals sometimes intentionally sequestered mummies away for occasional consultation.
In Thanatos, mummies – along with vampires and later liches – formed the upper eschelon of undead society. Mummies were the priestly caste, prepared for decades and centuries to lead the human population into death. Mummy lords were timeless advisors, pontiffs and religious figures of tremendous influence, wielding soft power over the living populace. If human acolytes were pious enough, they were very rarely rewarded with an eternal afterlife serving the church as a mummy.
As part of the ritual that created a mummy lord, the subject's heart and internal organs were removed from the corpse and placed in specially prepared canopic jars. As long as the shriveled heart remained intact, a mummy lord could not permanently be destroyed. When defeated, the mummy lord turned to dust and reformed at full strength 24 hours later, rising out of dust in close proximity to the canopic jars containing its heart. A mummy lord could only be destroyed or prevented from reforming by burning its heart to ashes. For this reason, a mummy lord usually kept its heart and organs within a hidden tomb or vault.

Notable Mummies

• Hierarch Oskamos 

Campaigns

Menagerie

• Vhakizla: While employed by Vhakizla, the Menagerie worked closely with Hierarch Osakamos, mummy lord and high priest of the dracolich's church.

Mummy

Creature Type: Undead
Size: Medium
Challenge Rating:

• 3 (mummy)
• 15 (mummy lord)
  

Features:

• Resistant to nonmagical weapons, spreads mummy rot, vulnerable to fire (mummy)
  
• Magic resistance, lair and legendary actions, rejuvenation, spellcasting (mummy lord)