Ochre jelly

Ochre jelly
(Creature)
Common N Large Mindless Ooze Level 5 Alignment LG NG CG LN N CN LE NE CE Source: Bestiary, pg(s). 255 Type Ooze CR 5 Environment Temperate underground or marshes Alignment LG NG CG LN N CN LE NE CE Source: Bestiary, pg(s). 218

Ochre jellies are a species of yellow-orange mindless oozes.

Appearance

Ochre jellies are amorphous blobs hued a sickly combination of yellow, orange and brown. They stand about six inches tall, spread out to a little over ten feet in diameter, and weigh more than 2,600 pounds. In the deepest underground, ochre jellies can grow to enormous sizes. When moving, they often ball up into quivering spherical shapes and almost seem to roll. When in combat, they tend to pile up upon themselves and exude long, dripping pseudopods.

Ecology

An ochre jelly's specialised acid, which only dissolves flesh, is the source of curiosity for many alchemists. The results of their experiments are special weapons that target the living body in wicked ways, including a slow poison that breaks down the cellular walls in living creatures, whose creator guards the secret with his life.

Due to their amorphous bodies, ochre jellies can fit into small cracks and holes, which have to be sealed up by underground dwellers to fortify their lairs against ochre jellies. It is rumoured that some ochre jellies have developed additional methods of capturing prey, like poisoning foes with a touch or exuding noxious gases that burn the eye and throat.

Sometimes, when an ochre jelly infiltrates a colony of giant bees or wasps and eats a queen egg, a strange reaction might occur, turning them into tyrant jellies, intelligent oozes with strange powers over vermin.

Society

Some forgotten cultures use ochre jellies in their burial practices. The ochre jelly is sealed alongside the corpse in a stone sarcophagus so it can dissolve the body and then the jelly is placed in a canopic jar. The items entombed with the body are preserved, and it is believed that the dead's essence still rides along with the ochre jelly.