"Watch out for that branch!" screamed Lady Ablasta as Dreelix piloted his flying carpet through the forest with his usual skill. Her normally well-coiffured hair already sported an abundance of leaves and twigs from several other close calls with low-hanging branches during the trip thus far. Silently, she vowed that if she survived this wild journey, she'd be sure to sit in the back in future. Or better yet, in the
portable hole with the others, where it was safer!
"Why don't you fly above the treetops?" she groused.
"I only know the way to the grove from ground level!" responded Dreelix, swerving his carpet to the right to narrowly avoid yet another tree.
"Yipes," commented Zantoullios, as they crested a hill and the monster's path of destruction became visible. A meandering trail of overturned trees, their branches denuded of leaves and even most of their bark, marked the creature's recent wanderings. It rambled this way and that with no apparent rhyme or reason, but even Dreelix could tell that it was headed in the general direction of Azurielle's grove.
"We're getting close," he said, skimming the carpet along the winding path of devastation. That much was obvious; on the ground between the toppled trees the four Monster Hunters could detect a glistening trail of still-moist slime.
[5]
"I'm taking us down," Dreelix announced. Unfortunately, his landings weren't much better than his intraforest piloting skills: The flying carpet touched ground before slowing down sufficiently, pitching the Monster Hunters forward with considerable speed. Lady Ablasta found herself sprawled face down in the slime with Zantoullios' lanky form piled on top of her. Dreelix didn't fare any better: All 300 pounds of Grindle the Coin-Counter barreled into him from behind and sent him sliding on his belly through the creature's slime-spoor like a kid on a water slide. He came to a stop some 30 feet from the others.
"Not one of your better landings," observed Zantoullios, getting to his feet and reaching a hand to help up the Conjurer Ablasta. She slapped his hand away in irritation and stood up without his assistance.
"True, true," admitted Dreelix, not at all happy with the situation but not wanting to dwell on it because it was, after all, his fault and he could see no immediate way to successfully deflect the blame onto anyone else. "But we can't let a little mud distract us from our goal, can we?" He brushed at his robes somewhat fastidiously, to little effect.
"I just wish it was only mud," mumbled Zantoullios to himself, wiping disconsolately at his robes.
Grindle, meanwhile, pulled his
portable hole from a pocket. Spreading it out flat upon the ground, he reached in a pudgy hand and pulled out Azurielle, followed in turn by Willowquisp, Rhionda, and Buntleby. Looking at the disheveled state of the others, Buntleby observed, "Looks like the 'cheap seats' were definitely the way to go this time." Lady Ablasta just scowled at him and wiped her filth-covered face with her hand. She flung the residue to the ground in disgust.
"Well, anyway, I'd say it went thataway," said Buntleby cheerfully, pointing down the obvious path of destruction. "So, what's the plan, Dreelix?"
"Quite simple: We'll let Rhionda put her hydra-slaying skills to good use, while we wizards back her up with offensive spells, as necessary. I don't anticipate any problems."
"You seldom do," remarked Buntleby dryly. "That in itself is one of our biggest problems."
Willowquisp was investigating the slime trail. "Are you absolutely sure it was a hydra you saw?" he asked Azurielle. "This looks much more like the spoor of a giant slug."
"I don't know what you'd call it," replied the nymph, "but it had six reptilian heads on long, snakelike necks. I'd assume that would be a hydra." Willowquisp shrugged in reluctant agreement, trying to imagine how in the world a hydra could manage to mate with a giant slug.
[6]
"Look over here," said Rhionda. She pointed out the imprint of a four-clawed foot
[7] in the soft dirt alongside the slime trail. "I'd say that's a hydra print, all right. Big one, too."
[8]
As if to accentuate the point, a loud crash came from over the next rise, followed by the crunch of multiple branches being chewed by multiple sets of teeth. "Let's go," said Rhionda with enthusiasm, pulling her longsword from her back and heading eagerly up the hill, toward the sound. The others followed suit.
Before long, though, Rhionda's brisk pace slackened down to a slow stumble, then came to a complete halt. "What's wrong?" asked Buntleby, before stepping into range and immediately receiving his answer. It was just about the worst smell he'd ever encountered - and that was saying something, what with his familiarity with
stinking cloud spells, troglodyte bladders, flumph-spray, and Grindle's personal hygiene. He wrinkled his nose in disgust.
"I think I'm going to be sick," said Rhionda, just seconds before proving herself correct--all over Buntleby's boots.
"I told you: the smelly kind," reminded Azurielle.
"By the gods, you weren't kidding!" replied Dreelix, holding his nose. Lady Ablasta pulled her perfumed handkerchief from her sleeve and held it to her face, her normal scowl intensified tenfold by the vile stench. Zantoullios buried his nose in the crook of his elbow; Willowquisp, his face turning an alarming shade of green, followed suit. Grindle, meanwhile, sniffed the air to see what all the fuss was about and shrugged, unimpressed.
"This is going to change our strategies somewhat," observed Buntleby. "It looks like our fighter is out of action, and we can't very well be casting spells with one hand over our noses, can we?"
"No, I'll be fine," argued Rhionda from her hands and knees, her stomach heaving violently. "Just--give me a minute, Bunt."
"You know, you do kind of get used to it," observed Dreelix, taking his hand from his nose and breathing in a couple of tentative sniffs. The others followed suit - all but the Conjurer Ablasta, who refused to remove her perfumed handkerchief from her face.
"You'll have a hard time casting spells that way, you know," pointed out Buntleby.
"I'll be just fine," snapped Lady Ablasta. "Never you mind about me!"
"Come on, we're the bold and mighty Monster Hunters!" cried Dreelix, trying to booster up morale. "Are we going to allow a little unpleasantness get in the way of our plans?"
"No."
"Of course not."
"By no means."
"I suppose not."
"Well then, onward to victory!" cried Dreelix, marching over the top of the hill and forgetting in his exuberance that he usually preferred leading from the rear, not the front.
NOTES
5. A gulguthydra's slime trail remains visible for 1d4 hours before drying up. Even after the moist mucus portion of the slime has dried, though, the bodily wastes leave behind a brownish dirtlike trail quite visible over most terrain. Tracking a gulguthydra is therefore generally not a problem (+15 circumstance bonus to Track skill checks) until the next hard rain.
6. Speaking of unlikely unions, no one's quite figured out how a hydra and an otyugh managed to mate in the first place - or why they'd even want to, for that matter! However they did it, the gulguthydra is the result, and they've managed to propagate their species ever since.
The mating process among gulguthydras is not what you'd expect, although upon reflection it would seem that mounting a mate who's covered in slippery, fecal slime might not be the easiest of tasks, especially for a creature dripping with the same substance himself. Gulguthydras have therefore taken a cue from octopus reproduction: The male secretes his spermatozoa into the cup of one tentacle and inserts it manually into the female's genital opening. It's not pretty, but it gets the job done.
A few weeks after mating, the female deposits 1d4 eggs in an out-of-the-way area and then abandons them, resisting the urge to later eat them being her only nod to motherhood. The eggs, perhaps foreshadowing the type of creature that will later emerge from them, smell rotten from the day they're first laid; the rancid stench keeps most predators at bay long enough for the creatures inside to hatch and have a fair chance at survival.
7. Although possessing sharp claws, a gulguthydra cannot bring them to bear as weapons because of its awkward build. Due to its bloated belly, a gulguthydra's short, stubby legs just barely reach the ground as it is; the creature uses its claws to pull its vast bulk along on its coating of glistening slime.
8. Perhaps because of their hybrid natures, gulguthydras grow to be much larger than any of the "true" hydras. This is counterintuitive, for otyughs are generally much smaller than hydras; however, the biggest otyughs (those with 15 HD) grow to Huge size and it is these larger beasts - often referred to as "neo-otyughs" and once believed to be a separate species - that spawn with hydras to produce gulguthydras.
The standard hydra is about 20 feet long and weighs 4,000 pounds, while a normal-sized gulguthydra can easily reach 30 feet and tips the scales at 6,000 pounds. Gulguthydras effortlessly reach targets up to 20 feet off the ground with their long necks.
Gulguthydras are better off than either of their parent races in more ways than just size. They are stronger (20 Str), tougher (24 Con), smarter (6 Int), and more forceful (15 Cha) than either standard six-headed hydras or otyughs.
![:]](http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/devious.png "Devious :]")
