Possibly the most well-known D&D creature is the Beholder: a fleshy, bulbous thing with way too damn many eyes. As a species, they’re a fascinating look at some of the darkest corners of D&D lore. As an enemy, they’re horrifying brain suckers that require skill to defeat. There’s at least one citadel of the Mind Flayers in Faerun, Oryndoll, deep in the Underdark. They’re either alien refugees from a future they’ve forgotten, or some terrible evolution now scattered through time and space. Their in-universe origins are filled with troubling uncertainties. Mind Flayers even have a ruling class of Elder Brains that are kept safe within their secret cities. Mind Flayers’ lore also borrows from Lovecraft’s Mi-Go and the Mi-Go brain cylinders. Actually,m Gary Gygax was reading a Brian Lumley novel and came up with Mind Flayers on the spot. Intelligent, telepathic spellcasters with rubbery, octopus-like features, their design was clearly inspired by H.P. It’s a recognizable monstrosity that appears throughout the franchise multiverse, including the sci-fi-themed Spelljammer setting. The Mind Flayer is one of D&D’s core monsters. The lore of the Forgotten Realms goes so far as to suggest that there’s only one Tarrasque alive at any time, and it may even be a weapon left behind by old gods. It exists as an “oh crap” device a Godzilla-level terror that only the luckiest and most prepared parties can hope to defeat. It’s so difficult to fight that it’s never been featured in a major video game or even a tie-in novel. Like Dune’s sandworms, it’s a force of nature that rises out of its slumber only to destroy everything around it. It’s a lizard-like creature of titanic proportions, armored with a thick carapace that’ll slow down almost any party of adventurers.
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