Beithir

The Beithir is a lumbering draconic reptile with deep blue scales that moves like a snake, despite its dozen squat legs. Upon its approach, the Beithir stinks of ozone, as it generates a field of prickling, static electricity that causes hair to stand on end. Beithirs carve out solitary lairs in cliffsides, cavern mazes, and stone-throated pits, shaping vast territories that span hundreds of square miles. These cryptids like to constrict prey with thick bodies to crush and suffocate their victims before swallowing them whole, unless the meal is too big to swallow in one bite, in which case they rend them with their talons into fleshy hunks. The creatures are semi-intelligent, but driven primarily by instinct.

In play, Beithir are lone threats that use their vertical lairs to their advantage, where speed and climbing ability grant leverage over those unfamiliar with their terrain. Beithir are pathologically territorial, not just towards humanoids but all other monsters, and only affiliate with other Beithir to mate. A devious GM might have his adventurers get caught up in a clash between a Beithir and another monstrous intruder to demonstrate the creatures’ destructiveness. Alternatively, the Beithir’s belly-hoard, which can contain undigested treasure, can be a source of quests involving the retrieval of MacGuffins the Beithir devoured. To alchemists, the creature’s body parts and eggs are extremely valuable, as they can be used to create magic items that resist or conduct lightning or powerful elixirs of regeneration.