Sayona
Sayonas, also known as weeping vampires, are a powerful type of undead that drain the youth and vigor of the living via their blood.1[citation needed]
Appearance
A sayona resembles a walking, withered, ancient corpse, utterly desiccated with skin like dry, grey parchment. Sayonas normally dress in the provocative fashions of youth that is then draped over lifeless skin with their ancient bones painfully visible beneath. Only when they have fed sayonas regain the appearance of life and youth, something they crave above all else.1[citation needed]2
Ecology
Sayonas are quite similar to vampires, hence the common name of "weeping vampires". Sayonas, like vampires, crave blood; however, their reasons and methods fundamentally differ. A vampire drinks blood like sweet nectar, but a sayona absorbs blood directly through its thirsty skin leeching the area around it, sucking blood from any open wound that is nearby.
Vampires drink blood as sustenance, whereas sayonas drain blood to restore the illusion of life and vigor to their desiccated forms, which becomes their driving obsession. When a sayona has drained enough blood, they can revert their form to that of a youthful living creature for a single day. Those fully drained of blood by a sayona rise again as a ghoul.1[citation needed]
History
The first sayona is said to have been a fatally vain woman who was obsessed with youth. She took a younger lover who eventually left her for someone else, a woman younger than her. This spurned woman eventually had her revenge, waiting years before slaughtering the children of her former lover and bathing head to toe in their blood before finally killing herself. Condemned to undeath for all eternity, this progenitor is said to have spawned all other sayonas. It is said she still wanders the world preying on beautiful young women to drain them completely, which briefly restores her withered beauty and condemns her victims to share her awful fate.1[citation needed]
On Golarion
Sayonas are a threat across the Arcadian nation of Xopatl.3
References
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- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 . “Monsters A to Z” in Bestiary 4, 231. Paizo Inc., 2013
- ↑ The non-canon source Bestiary 4 suggests that all sayonas are female-presenting creatures. However, the male-presenting sayona Ultor appears in Black Stars Beckon, so this detail is intentionally omitted from this article.
- ↑ . “Xopatl” in Borne by the Sun's Grace, 65. Paizo Inc., 2019