Lesser Jabberwock

Few beasts have inspired as many legends, poems, songs, and myths in as many cultures, as this bizarre draconic creature. The jabberwock hails from the fey realm of the First World and is part of a group of powerful First World creatures known collectively as the Tane.

Like all members of the Tane, jabberwocks are living creatures that age, eat, drink, and sleep, but do not reproduce normally. Instead, they are created directly by the godlike Eldest who rule the First World, and they serve at the pleasure of these capricious and mysterious entities. Believed to be the most powerful of all the Tane, jabberwocks are typically only ever created with one purpose: to wreak destruction and havoc upon the Material Plane. One of the Eldest might send a jabberwock to devastate a country, continent, or even entire world in order to get revenge for some slight made against them by a single mortal. Sometimes, no specific insult or injury is required, as some of the Eldest resent the very existence of the Material Plane and periodically create jabberwocks simply to express the wrath of the First World against its younger and less chaotic sibling.

Once a jabberwock arrives on the Material Plane, its first order of business is to seek out a lair. It prefers dwelling in remote forest locations about a day's flight from civilization-the more dangerous the woodland is to those who might eventually come hunting it, the better!

The relationship between jabberwocks and vorpal weapons is the subject of much debate and speculation among scholars, and the various poems, songs, and legends about the jabberwock do little to clarify the issue, conflicting and diverging on this point. Some believe that vorpal weapons were first created specifically to combat jabberwocks, but others take the story one step further. They cite evidence in certain ancient myths that there may once have been only a single, unique jabberwock, so powerful that nothing could so much as scratch it-nothing, that is, except for the first vorpal sword, crafted for that very purpose. So epic was the resulting battle that it created strange echoes throughout reality, and as a result, these echoes, in the form of vorpal weapons, can now be found on many worlds. Those who subscribe to this belief claim that the jabberwocks seen today are but pale imitations of this proto-jabberwock, and they speculate that only the combined efforts of several Eldest would be sufficient to create such a creature again.

Variant JabberwocksThe Eldest have sometimes altered certain aspects of the jabberwocks they create. Some of the more notorious or legendary variant jabberwocks include the following.

Frumious Jabberwock: Frumious jabberwocks have two heads. They are level 24 and gain an extra action on each of their turns they can use only to make a jaws Strike.

Mimsy Jabberwock: Typically hailing from wintry regions of the First World, mimsy jabberwocks have glowing blue-white scales, resist cold instead of fire, and have eyes that burn with blue flames that deal cold damage instead of fire damage.

Slithy Jabberwock: Wreaking destruction beneath the waves, these sinuous and slimy jabberwocks are amphibious, have a swim Speed of 80 feet instead of the normal fly Speed, and do not have a wing Strike. A slithy jabberwock's whiffling aura is activated whenever it swims, makes a tail Strike, or Burbles.