Vishap

Vishap

(Creature)

Type

Dragon
(extraplanar)

CR

19

Environment

Any

Alignment

LG	NG	CG
LN	N	CN
LE	NE	CE

Source: Bestiary 5, pg(s). 270

Vishaps are four-winged, crocodile-headed dragons that watch over and protect ley lines.

Appearance

Vishaps are distinguished by other dragons by their four wings, the fish-like fins at the end of their tails, and their crocodilian heads. Their scales tend to be bright blue in color.

Abilities

Vishaps are closely attuned to the ley lines they care for, an attainment magnified by the presence of a vishapakar standing stone. A vishap with access to a vishapakar can meld directly into a ley line, swimming through it to re-emerge into the physical world at the location of another vishapakar.

Vishaps are also highly venomous. They can transmit their venom through their bites, but contact with their blood can poison other creatures.

Ecology

A vishap's life revolves almost entirely around seeking or caring for a ley line network. Vishaps claim their territories based on the shape and extent of their chosen networks, often leading to complexly shaped claims that seem nonsensical to other creatures. Vishap territories sometimes consist of multiple disconnected areas far away from each other, but which the dragons' ability to travel through ley lines allows them to traverse with ease. Multiple vishaps are capable of living peacefully close to each other as long as their chosen ley line networks remain separate, but if their wards merge with each other the dragons will often fight to the death for their control.

Each vishap mates only once in its life. When one of these dragons feels the need to mate, it melds with the ley lines and drifts aimlessly along their network until it encounters a similarly drifting vishap. The two vishaps then merge and explode in a burst of ethereal motes. These motes then merge with each other to create eggs, which drift along the ley lines, sometimes for millennia, before hatching into infant, and already fully conscious, vishaps.

External links

• Vishap (real-world mythical creature) on Wikipedia