Klefttion ((Clea-fft-eeon))

The ruins had the hair on the back of my neck standing on end, and the only reason I did not turn and flee was because my traveling companion blazed her way forward, and I was hesitant to leave her to the darkness. The halls were cramped, the dull metal walls beginning to give way to the weight of the mountains atop them, the air was stale and tasted of must and old rot. I was so distracted by my fear that I nearly missed the shifting of something in the dark and the horrible squelching sound that faintly rang on cold metal. A scream echoed through the halls as a humanoid creature emerged from a side hall. What looked hauntingly like a yellowed human skeleton, malignant black ooze writhed where the organs and muscles should have been, tendrils spilling out of the eye sockets. A gurgled cry preceded the creature's reckless charge, its bones clacking against the floor, its jaws stretched wider than any humans should have been able to. If not for my traveling companion blasting its body with a billowing fire, I might have fled into the darkness. -Magna Moribus       The Klefttion, in its natural state, is a large volume of thick black liquid that is sticky and acidic. This goo is sentient, to some extent, photosensitive and capable of rapid movement. It is rare, however, to find a Klefttion without its gruesome dress. Like a hermit crab with a shell, a Klefttion's viscous body bonds itself to the corpses and skeletal remains of animals, forming crude tendons and muscles with which to move the corpse.   Klefttion, aside from their ability to puppeteer their host, which may be an instinctual trait of the species, appear to have some amount of intellect and the ability to learn; having been observed to alter their behavior to better hunt their prey. Their acidic bodies are both a form of self-defense and the method by which they eat their prey, as well as being able to extend from their host and form constructs like webs.   When on the hunt, Klefttion implore several strategies. Some stalk through ruins or the surrounding land under cover of night, shambling their hosts in alarming, unnatural jerking motions. Others lie in wait, frequently on ceilings or the underside of trees, suspended by webs made of their viscous bodies, and wait for movement underneath them to spring. With either method, they use their host to attack, bludgeoning, biting, and cutting with reckless abandon.   When a Klefttion has sated its hunger, they will split off a small portion of themselves and leave it in available remains for their offspring to inhabit. Due to their method of multiplying, and the abundance of old and new bones across Elgis, they pose a potentially great threat.   While they are located primarily in pre- Andier  ruins, where they can inhabit the nightmares of unfortunate Ruin Divers, Klefttion have been known to prowl outside the ruins on occasion; sometimes finding themselves in cemeteries. Due to the potential danger of an unrestrained Klefttion loose in a graveyard, most graveyards are patrolled frequently, in search of misplaced bones or reanimated denizens.