Mummy (5e Race)

Mummy

“	There are many ways you can attempt to become immortal. One is to let your acts become legend, betting people will tell your tales. Other is to become a Lich, betting you can forever tell your tale. Other is to become another kind of lich: A lich created not by self sacrifice into darkness, but by making your body persist beyond the natural course until Gods reward or punish you with eternity. Less despicable, but more demential: You are basicly betting your infinite Gods care about your finite causes.	”
—Fragment of "Filosophy for the dead" by Devisha, the Insane. Page 13

After a thousand years of wind moving the shifting sands, she awoke in the sarcophagus. Confusion, then, a sudden realization. So... the tales of the funeral rites granting immortality were true... Not what she expected. Somehow, she still felt empty. Something... yes, something important was missing...

This is the start of life as a mummy. Born from the Gods will to give a mortal a new chance with their same body, mummies are here with the purpouse to complete a mission: Not always evil, not always important,that task is there for them. And they have all eternity to fulfill it or lose their existance.

Physical Description

"My dear, you are marvelously well kept !"

Although usually considered members of the deserts, mummies are one of the most varied existing beings in existance. In general, a mummy appearance is of a partially rotten corpse which may or may not have a smell of decomposition. On difference to zombies, their wills and intelligence are intact, so they excert their will into their doings. On one similarity to them, they have not many memories of their past, if any.

Back into physical appearance, it is more frequent that the body passes a preparation ritual of mommification to become a mummy, but some of them become mummies naturally because their body was conserved by the intense cold of the mountains, the heat of volcanoes, the absence of air of mud or very dry terrains that dehidrate them, for saying a few ways.

Even while their origins might differ, after becoming revived mummies start covering themselves, both in an attempt to draw attention away from them and to give themselves the closest they can to an appearance. Even then, most of them are covered in bandages with varying degrees of putrefascence stuck in them, tend to cover their bodies in parfumes or nice smelling oils and get masks to cover their faces. Some times parts of their body get preserved so magnificently that they show it as a mark of their origin, although this cases are rare and usually from very expensive mummification processes. The eyes, if not conserved, are usually substituted by glass orbs that actually get linked to the body and seem pretty natural, although there are mummies that prefer the golden, white, silver or green shine of their empty sockets. They usually wear light clothes that cover all the body except the best conservated parts, although only using the bandages or even not using anything but their rotten body is not unusual.

History

Mummification rituals have been used by all the races in the multiverse since the first texts were written. Usually only the very wealthy or influential can afford such extensive death rites as the ones that might create such a being as a Sacred Mummy. Thus, influential wizards, priest, nobles, or even rulers of the past are the sort of people who end up wrapped up. But living mummies are not as frequent as mummificated bodies.

The first known recorded living mummy is of Amsador, the old; an otherwise unknown human that died in the top of mount Fridnih, almost 30 thousand feets tall, around 6 thousand years ago. It started "living" around 2000 years ago. It traveled to the kingdom of Seleric, that was under the reign of Salitha IV, the Holy; where it revealed a lot of information about the cultures of the time. The queen, impressed, decided that a being that smart could not be anything evil and gave it the name of Amsador and nominated him one of the first scholars of the then new College of Devonthrone. It died again about 1000 years ago, attacked by a horde of hungry wolves.

Tales like this are not that frequent though: Most mummies are inherently evil, considered despicable by races or even confused with zombies, so their bodies are generally destroyed at the first sight of them. This is why most members of this race are solitary or grouped in very small communes, usually in places where no one would dare go.

Society

As rare as they are, the few mummies adapted to making a life in other societies tend to do incredible jobs as curators or teachers, usually getting as far as possible from fire, humidity or any other element that may start rotting them. When they are in a commune of mummies, usually they keep a very strict code of conduct and social structure, where the best conservated are usually leading. This communes tend to be xenophobic and isolated, although some of them are known as the only places where certain death rituals can be realized, including of course mummification ones, so this ones tend to be "houses of the dead": places where a dead person can find mummification and, as such, immortality.

As they do not need to eat, to drink or to sleep, they spend most of their time researching or developing magic and studying ancient rituals. There are rumors that some powerful necromancy spells, such as clone, were developed by mummies, although it has never been proven. Death is something they fear, revere and adore at the same time: While they are the last holders of certain rituals, dying again as a mummy means the final dissapearance... And the end of their existance, something they fear dearly.

Mummy Names

As a mummy, they keep names simple: they have aboundance of a's, e's and i's and usually use strong sounds like k's, f's and n's. They give themselves a name after they awake as mummies.

Male: Nefer, Thoutmos, Ankanon, Kamehd, Sashta Female: Ankara, Akana, Teferi, Nefer, Isis

Mummy Traits

A conservated animated body wrapped in bandages.
Ability Score Increase. Your Wisdom score increases by 2 and your Intelligence score increases by 1.
Age. Age varies based on the age of which the mummy was buried. But appearance is determined by the age of death which depends on the race you were when you were alive. Also determined by your state of decay or lack thereof. As long as the divine magic animates you and the body is conservated adequately, you are immortal.
Alignment. Mummies retain the alignment of their past lives.
Size. You are usually a humanoid, but the mummification process tends to make you shorter, usually from 5 to 6 feet tall. Your size is medium. As most of the processes done to conservate your body require you to substitute organs and/or dehidrate you, you are a lot lighter than your average humanoid. you weight from 80 to around 150 pounds.
Speed. Your base walking speed is 25 feet.
Darkvision. You can see in dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can't discern color in darkness, only shades of gray.
Sacred Wrappings. If you are using bandages or masks, you consider them part of your body cannot be removed by any non magical means. When you aren't wearing armor, your AC is 10 + your Dexterity modifier. You can use your natural armor to determine your AC if the armor you wear would leave you with a lower AC. A shield's benefits apply as normal while you use your natural armor.
Antimagic Susceptibility. You are "alive" because of magic. You are incapacitated while in the area of an antimagic field. If targeted by dispel magic, you must succeed on a Constitution saving throw against the caster's spell save DC or fall unconscious for 1 minute.
Undead. You are technically dead. You count as an undead creature for all spells and abilities that affect the undead. You do not need to eat, sleep or breathe and you can't even if you want to. You can't be put to sleep by magical means.
Poison Resilience. You have advantage on saving throws against being poisoned, you have resistance against poison damage.
Languages. You can speak Common and two other languages you knew in life. Mummies often know Celestial or Draconic, given the complex rituals needed to mummify a body.

---

Back to Main Page → 5e Homebrew → Races