Nagadalit

Appearance:

A nagadalit appears like a large snake, typically sixteen to twenty feet in length with the head of a human male. They are almost always constrictor-type snakes, and never venomous.

Origins:

All nagadalits, or nagadalitii, were normal men once. They fell afoul of a being known as the Lamia Matriarch and were cursed by the powerful half-serpent sorceress. They lost their human form and became serpents but retained their heads, faces, and so forth. They retain their mental capacity and memories, but many are in poor mental shape having been reduced to predatory snakes, crushing and eating their prey whole, and being completely divorced from their old lives and privileges.

The Lamia Matriarch isn't one to dole out such a strong punishment to any man who appears before her. This curse is reserved for those men who are regarded as the lowest of the low. Nagadelits were all once rapists, thieves, betrayers of their own kind, and otherwise really just the worst sort. Once cursed, they are let free to do as they please.

Limitations, Abilities, and Shame:

A Nagadalit, as a base serpent, is automatically servile to even the weakest and lowest lamia, yuan-ti, or other snake-based races. They cannot conspire against them, cannot bring violence against them, and will do anything at the command of one. If a lamia ordered a nagadalit to consume itself until it died, it would. They will willingly serve and worship lamia and other such creatures out of the dire hope of having the curse removed. A nagadalit can still communicate with humans who speak their original language and can be recognized for who they were. The compulsion of servitude prevents them from leading their former comrades against the lamia sorceress that cursed them, though a few have tried.

Former heroes, villains, and adventurers who have been cursed this way can still use their class skills and abilities, assuming they have the ability to do so. This is highly limited, so only spells not requiring somantic or material components, or combat skills that don't require arms or legs can still be used. A rogue turned into a nagadalit could be very sneaky though.

The shame of a nagadalit is that their curse is named, and if someone asks what happened to them, they are bound to speak the truth of it, that the Lamia Matriarch or another lamia sorceress cursed them, and then relay the action the lamia accused them of. The servile nature of the curse tends to remove the ability of the nagadalit to evade or gloss over their actions, or even cast them in a more forgiving light.

Variants:

Two-Headed Nagadalits exist, and were typically brothers and cursed to become one extra-large two-headed nagadalit.

The rarest nagadalits were traitorous women who were cursed. They are technically and functionally identical to the male version, and they are cross-fertile, allowing them to breed more nagadalits. As they can only find reproductive pleasure this way and no other, these female nagadalits are hunted by the male versions, and there is a good deal of violence and attempted cannibalism in these confrontations.

Hydradalits are created from bands of soldiers, highwaymen, or other organized trespassers against a Lamia Matriarch. The resulting creature has a lizard-like body the size of a small horse, a number of heads equal to the number of people in the band captured, and retains many of their abilities. Such creatures are not allowed to roam free but are kept as guardians for the matriarch and can be formidable foes. They can still talk, and carry on conversations, but their body is a servant of the group gestalt and tightly bound to serve the matriarch that created them.