[Day 03] The Prophet Fly and the Singing Maggot

Note: the maggot has a guest starring role in my Esoteric Enterprises campaign. Players take heed. 

The Prophet Fly and the Singing Maggot

The adult prophet fly is about the size of a fat pigeon. After all there is enough rot and corpse-meat to dine on in our afflicted world. Workshy scholars with nothing better to do have determined that the prophet fly can see up to five minutes into the future. It deftly avoids calamities which no one could have foreseen, save through a miracle.

This means that it is next toimpossible to catch, except in cases where the weather (which it can predict but not prepare for) has made the animal sluggish.

Some cunning individuals have tried keeping it as a pet, tied to their person with the finest string. Using it to predict dangers to their safety has met with very limited success. It turns out that a bound fly’s instinct isto flee, prophet or not.

The larval state is much more interesting. The singing maggot is about as long as a man’s hand, and fat with it. Its head-part has a dull golden sheen. Through some perverse god’swill the maggot has the gift of song as well as prediction. This ability is less honed in the larval creature, and less focused on survival.

When it is encountered by a human, it’sreaction will invariably be singing (roll 1d6)

1: A lilting air about its fear of being eaten.

2: A dirge about how hungry it is.

3: A bawdy ditty about its discoverer’s shortcomings (all true!)

4: A ballad about its discoverer’s admirable traits (slightly exaggerated)

5-6: A plaintive song about buried treasure (true, but incomplete)

When asked a question about the future it will answer truthfully and largely correctly, albeit obscured by the poetry of its medium (roll 1d6)

1: It exaggerates the positive in hope of getting fed.

2: It uses dated circumlocutions and imagery.

3: It focuses on the wrong thing (danger or food, usually)

4: It voices its doubt in the questioner’s abilities.

5: The song is full of retetions and choruses.

6: The song veers into a prediction of the world’s doom.

The exceptions are when it is hungry or fearing for its safety, in which cases the songs will be about these matters exclusively.

As such a singing maggot is widely sought after.

Prophet Fly

HP 1, Bite damage 1

Special: You can’t really hit it, unless it is sluggish or you have some marvelous way of hiding yourself from its prophetic knowledge.

A live fly will fetch 100s, a dead one maybe 10s

Singing Maggot

HP 1, Bite damage 1

Special: Roll 1d6. If a 6 is rolled this particular maggot has eaten of a mandrake root. It may emit a scream which does 2d6 damage to all within earshot.

A live maggot will fetch 1d6x100s, but a dead one is worthless.