Page 76 - Lords of Madness: The Book of Aberrations

psychoportive powers to teleport or travel astrally to a target To improve the odds of bringing in a large batch of slaves

location. Once there, they either set up an ambush or burst in efficiently, raiders travel below ground as much as possible.
upon their victims for maximum surprise. After feeding, they Twisting caverns beneath the surface are more extensive than
return home and the raid is over. most surface dwellers realize. By planning their raids carefully

Such raids have wiped out entire villages over the course of and undertaking some judicious engineering, mind flayers

months when several mind flayers decide to return repeatedly can restrict the distance their raiders need to travel on the
to the same location to feed. Ten mind flayers, each taking a surface to a few miles. Emerging from natural or thrall-dug

victim a week, kill one hundred and thirty people in a single cave openings, the thrall warriors and their illithid overlords
season. Because they almost always take the strongest first, a strike a village in the darkness, slaughter indiscriminately

village’s ability to resist (typically inadequate to begin with) to spread terror and subdue the survivors, round up the best
can be wiped out before the inhabitants even understand what’s men and women, and, with a hard push, are back underground
attacking them. Once the leaders and strongest warriors are again before the sun comes up. To militias and feudal leaders FLAYERS CHAPTER 4
gone, those who don’t flee to safer havens live only until a unfamiliar with mind flayers and their tactics, such a raid THE MIND

raiding illithid tracks them down. appears as a terrifying and inexplicable incident.

Mind flayers are careful to cover their tracks. They don’t By sticking to meandering, subterranean pathways, the
leave bodies lying about with emptied skulls to testify to the raiders might lengthen their journey by a hundred miles or
identity of the attackers. A town under this kind of mind more. The added travel time is well worth it for the greater

flayer attack simply experiences mysterious disappearances. security and chance of success that it provides. If pursuers
Knowledgeable hunters of illithids can estimate the number follow the captives into the underground, they must deal with

of illithids involved by counting the disappearances in a week, mind flayers on the illithids’ own terms—never an attractive
assuming that all the missing are reported (which might not proposition.
be the case in a city or large town).
From the raiders’ perspective, raids for captives prove much EXPANDING KNOWLEDGE
more complex and require a great deal of logistical planning. Mind flayers gather knowledge in four ways: They purchase it

The chief problems include the difficulty of transporting from traveling merchants, steal it directly from the minds of

thralls to the site of the raid (since thralls are needed to round traveling merchants, absorb it from the brains of their victims,
up and manage the captives), and the means of bringing the or read it from the minds of their captives. None of these

captives back to the mind flayers’ home without suffering methods are ever used in isolation. More than any other race,

reprisal attacks. mind flayers are aware of the ways in which faulty perception

These tasks are typically beyond the mind flayers’ psychic and personal interpretation can distort facts. They always seek
capability. Too many people are involved. For a raid projected to verify important information with multiple sources.

to capture one hundred able-bodied adults, mind flayers would Mind flayers are most interested in news about happenings

want to bring along at least twenty thralls, and possibly as on the surface of the world, what the drow are plotting, any-
many as fifty if resistance is expected. For a raid targeted at a thing having to do with githyanki or githzerai, news involving

town 200 miles from the illithids’ home base, a sizable caravan their own activities, and important astrological or magical
must travel undetected to the raid site and then home again discoveries. They are interested in everything else, too, but
with unwilling captives in tow. On the outward journey, the these subjects command their attention.
target could be reached in four days, but the return journey
involves much greater danger. The captives are driven hard INTERFERING IN POLITICS

to cover 30 or 40 miles a day. To keep the caravan light, they Few surface dwellers understand how and why mind flayers
are fed very little. Many die of exhaustion, exposure, or grief involve themselves in the affairs of surface realms. Most would

along the way. A hundred-captive caravan racing 200 miles to be even more surprised to learn that the illithid influence is not
safety might expect to lose as many as half its captives by the entirely negative. Mind flayers have been known to intervene

time it reaches its destination. to prop up failing governments or aid weaker societies against
Such an undertaking carried out on the surface and through encroachment or invasion by someone stronger. Of course,
inevitable cycles of day and night exposes mind flayers to much it’s impossible to aid one society in that way without acting

greater danger than they are willing to accept. To reduce the at another society’s expense, so “positive influence” depends
danger, they seldom travel with the captives. Herding is left on the point of view. If a society is plunged into anarchy and
in the hands of conditioned thralls. The illithids use psionic desolation to allow another to expand, the interference that
or magical means to travel instantly and safely. They might brought about that change of fortune can hardly be considered
check on the caravan nightly, when they feel more secure on positive.

the surface. Otherwise, they are unlikely to be found in the Mind flayers find it surprisingly easy to influence surface

company of a slave caravan. politics, using their tremendous psionic ability to read and
implant thoughts. Their machinations are always behind the
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