BONUS MONSTER 15:

Parading Putrescence
GASHUNK

CLASS: WORMBRAIN

Free, additional supplementary monsters for the Mortasheen Tabletop RPG Core Rulebook, created by Jonathan Wojcik, additional writing and all gameplay stats by Bonnie Saucier. For use with the gameplay system by Morgan Mullins!

Description:
This monster resembles the corpse of a shark, walking about on two oversized humanlike legs that protrude from a slit down its underbelly.

BIOLOGY:
The Gashunk is seemingly derived from the Junjo and shares a great deal of its physiology, albeit much larger, cultivating a body modified from the genetic information of a deep ocean shark. Like the Junjo, this outer body immediately begins to decay once it has finished growing and is periodically shed, though this pseudo-shark will continue thrashing and biting reflexively until the last of its rudimentary nervous system fully decomposes. Its spongy tissues constantly leak a dark, putrid-smelling liquid few monsters can tolerate, and it can squirt the substance in a high-pressure jet from the back of its throat.

The livelier inner body of the Gashunk consists only of its humanoid legs, a few crude organs in a small sack of tissue and a large, swollen, cystlike bulb, actually the true source of its noxious ichor. Also like the Junjo, the control hub for its microbial parasite brain is a crustaceoid symbiote modified from an isopod-like ancestor, which remains attached to the inner body between molts.

BEHAVIOR:
These confounding hybrid beasts were present in small numbers throughout the first recorded Junjo legion, and seem to serve a similar role to the "soldier castes" in eusocial fauna, protecting smaller Stinkfish by engaging aggressive predators or scavengers. A Gashunk appears to be even less intelligent than Junjo, obliviously plodding forward through even the most injurious obstacles and hostile terrain as its parasite colony ignores much of the outside world. Regardless, their vessel's inherent personality shows through whenever harm comes to a weaker ally, snapping the Gashunk into an uncharacteristic frenzy of aggression.

Concept Notes:

A pretty old one by now that was never fleshed out much, and I'm not sure if people will like the new, less chunky design or not, but most if not all of these will get another do-over someday. Maybe I'll eventually end up finding a middle ground between the two iterations of Gashunk, or the bigger heavier "walking shark" design will evolve along a different path into a different monster? Its cousin the Junjo does appear in book one, if you were wondering!