Original generation · R21 Media Group
The Purser
Medium undead, lawful neutral
Harbour law records what a port owes. The purser records what the sea is owed, and the sea keeps books too — every drowning in the Reach is an entry, and every entry is collected eventually. The purser walks out of low water in a pressed coat, states each soul's balance politely, and offers terms: passage now, or passage later with the interest. Saltspire's clergy hate it, because it is never wrong, and the muster obeys it, because it signs their release. It has never once taken a soul that was not owed.
Armor Class 16 (grave-ward robes)
Hit Points 252 (24d8 + 144)
Speed 30 ft., fly 60 ft.
- STR
- 20 (+5)
- DEX
- 14 (+2)
- CON
- 22 (+6)
- INT
- 17 (+3)
- WIS
- 20 (+5)
- CHA
- 18 (+4)
Saving Throws Cha +8, Con +10, Wis +9
Skills Insight +9, Religion +7, Persuasion +8
Damage Resistances necrotic, radiant; bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing from nonmagical attacks
Condition Immunities charmed, exhaustion, frightened, poisoned
Senses truesight 60 ft., passive Perception 15
Languages all, telepathy 60 ft.
Challenge 12
Traits
Legendary Resistance (3/Day). If the purser fails a saving throw, it can choose to succeed instead.
The Manifest. The purser cannot be permanently destroyed while its manifest — the sea's ledger of souls owed in the Reach — exists anywhere in the world. When reduced to 0 hit points it dissolves into brine and reforms beside the manifest in 1d10 days. The manifest is not carried; finding it, and finding someone able to amend it, is the only way to be rid of the purser for good.
Soul-Sight. The purser knows roughly how close to death each creature it sees is, and how long each has left to live within a season. It is never crude about this. It simply never bargains blind.
The purser opens every encounter with terms rather than violence. A bargain it strikes functions as a magical obligation: the debtor must deliver the named soul — rarely their own — to the water by an agreed date, and until then the purser treats them as a client, not a meal. Breaking terms hands the debt to the muster.