Phantom

A guilty face at a family reunion, an imposter in the king's court, a elderly merchant fearing what they might soon do when their sickness takes them.

As a phantom, you worm by the cold hand of death by offering it another life in your stead. When created, a phantom takes the form of a specter. Whatever dark force of nature or necromantic ritual created you, you begin your new life searching for a viable body to inhabit, often in a feral haze. Once found, the phantom kills its prey and warps the body into a husk for it to claim as its own.

Husks

A husk appears almost imperceptibly like the recently dead body it was made from. When a phantom finds and kills its prey, it leaves its corpse largely unharmed. It then severs the mystic threads which bound the prey's body and soul and warps the corpse into a living husk. The phantom can then inhabit the husk as if it was its own body either permanently, or until the husk has died.

Husk age and requires all of the things it did when it was inhabited by its natural owner. Including breathing, eating, drinking and resting if surviving in its previous life required these actions. When the husk dies the phantom is expelled from it, becoming a specter (Monster's Manual P279.) If as a specter the phantom reduces another creature's hit points to 0 using its life drain ability, the specter may turn the creature's body into a husk over 1 minute then inhabit it. A phantom cannot create a husk from a body if in life it was permanently resistant to radiant damage, permanently vulnerable to necrotic damage, or not a humanoid.

If the phantom's prey is sleeping when targeted by the specter's life drain ability, it must succeed on a Wisdom saving throw or have their sleep remain undisturbed. The DC for this save is set to 10 + half the player's level. In its specter form, the phantom knows instinctually when the body of a living creature would and would not make for a viable husk.

Creating a Phantom

When inhabiting a husk, the phantom benefit from all features granted by the husk's race. Your stats remain consistent no matter what body you are inhabiting as your influence alters you husk's physicality and mental ability. This process can be either immediate of gradual. A husk once belonging to a strong and powerful warrior withers away to match that a frail wizard's. The muscalture of the seditary merchant's body bolsters and toughens under the influence of the phantom's barbaric spirit. The DM determines how long this transformation takes place.

The creature type of your husk remains humanoid even after you inhabit it, however the phantom within remains an undead creature. You are considered both for the purposes of determining the results of spells and effects or undead if one or the other must be chosen. When the target of divination magics to detect your undead influence, you must succeed on a Charisma saving throw or have the undead presence within revealed. The DC for this save is set to 10 + half your player level. On a success, the source cannot attempt to detect the undead presence within you for 24 hours.





Living as a phantom

The husk you inhabit for all intents and purposes is a living creature and you cannot willingly expell yourself from it once you have begun inhabiting it. Still your occupation is neither natural nor perfect. While you inhabit the husk, you and it gain vulnerablility to radiant damage and resistance to necrotic damage. In addition, you have disadvantage on saving throws from spells and effects which cause the husk to gain the paralyzed or exhausted conditions.



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Dying as a Phantom

If the husk you are inhabiting dies, you are expelled from it and you appear as a specter occupying and available space of your choice within 15 feet. If your specter form is killed, you die. At DM's discretion, a dead husk can be considered still viable if the damage that killed it wasn't too severe. Over an hour, the phantom can heal the husk's wounds and restore its life with unholy energy. If a husk is restored in this fashion, it and its phantom gain 4 levels of exhaustion, lose all remaining hit dice and become stable at 0 hit points. While this exhaustion persists, the husk will appear outwardly undead, gaining pale skin, dark veins, slowed speech, and become prone to distant staring.