WEBVTT - The Monstrefact: The Ettin Ceremorph

0:00:03.320 --> 0:00:06.399
<v Speaker 1>Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.

0:00:10.119 --> 0:00:12.360
<v Speaker 2>Hi, my name is Robert Lamb And this is the

0:00:12.400 --> 0:00:15.280
<v Speaker 2>Monster Fact, a short form series from Stuff to Blow

0:00:15.320 --> 0:00:20.360
<v Speaker 2>Your Mind focusing on mythical creatures, ideas, and monsters in time.

0:00:24.560 --> 0:00:27.600
<v Speaker 2>In today's episode, we return to the rich world of

0:00:27.800 --> 0:00:31.720
<v Speaker 2>Dungeons and Dragons to discuss another creature from its various

0:00:31.720 --> 0:00:34.640
<v Speaker 2>monster manuals, and I have to say it's one of

0:00:34.680 --> 0:00:37.800
<v Speaker 2>the weirder ones they've ever rolled out. It is the

0:00:37.840 --> 0:00:41.520
<v Speaker 2>Eton Sarah Morph. To back up, we need to establish,

0:00:41.600 --> 0:00:44.440
<v Speaker 2>first of all, what an eton is named after? A

0:00:44.560 --> 0:00:48.040
<v Speaker 2>giant from French traditions, The d and d Eton is

0:00:48.080 --> 0:00:51.360
<v Speaker 2>a two headed giant whose main superpower is that two

0:00:51.440 --> 0:00:53.600
<v Speaker 2>heads are better than one, at least when it comes

0:00:53.600 --> 0:00:57.880
<v Speaker 2>to wisdom, perception checks, and related saving throws. Their exact

0:00:57.920 --> 0:01:01.680
<v Speaker 2>origins were told in the fifth Monster Manual may involve

0:01:01.760 --> 0:01:04.959
<v Speaker 2>cursed Orcs and a temple to the two headed demon

0:01:05.040 --> 0:01:10.319
<v Speaker 2>lord Demogorgon, But who can say for sure that's the Eton?

0:01:10.640 --> 0:01:14.440
<v Speaker 2>But what is a seramorph eaten? To answer that question,

0:01:14.520 --> 0:01:17.119
<v Speaker 2>we have to enter the world of the mind flares,

0:01:17.720 --> 0:01:21.160
<v Speaker 2>more formally known as the Alithids. They're an alien species

0:01:21.200 --> 0:01:24.800
<v Speaker 2>that once dominated the inner planes, depending on their own

0:01:25.280 --> 0:01:30.600
<v Speaker 2>terrifying psylonic powers to enslave humanoid species and also utilizing

0:01:30.640 --> 0:01:35.560
<v Speaker 2>their astral planes spanning not alloid vessels. Individual mind flares

0:01:35.880 --> 0:01:41.040
<v Speaker 2>resemble purple fleshed humanoids with heads like tentacled cephalopods. Despite

0:01:41.080 --> 0:01:44.520
<v Speaker 2>their power, they are a civilization in decline, reduced to

0:01:44.600 --> 0:01:48.160
<v Speaker 2>plotting and studying in their under dark colonies as well

0:01:48.200 --> 0:01:52.520
<v Speaker 2>as other far flung locations in the multiverse. Christian and

0:01:52.560 --> 0:01:55.280
<v Speaker 2>I devoted an entire stuff to Blow your Mind episode

0:01:55.480 --> 0:01:59.120
<v Speaker 2>to these fantastic creatures back in I Believe twenty sixteen

0:01:59.200 --> 0:02:02.480
<v Speaker 2>titled The Body Lithid Science of the mind Flares. So

0:02:02.520 --> 0:02:05.360
<v Speaker 2>go back and find that if you want a more

0:02:05.400 --> 0:02:08.639
<v Speaker 2>in depth rundown. We can't possibly go into as much

0:02:08.720 --> 0:02:11.200
<v Speaker 2>detail today. But the key thing to keep in mind

0:02:11.200 --> 0:02:15.280
<v Speaker 2>about the mind flares is their method of reproduction, as

0:02:15.320 --> 0:02:19.280
<v Speaker 2>detailed in Volo's Guide to Monsters and Lithids are hermaphroditic

0:02:19.480 --> 0:02:22.200
<v Speaker 2>and lay eggs at key points in their life cycle

0:02:22.400 --> 0:02:26.240
<v Speaker 2>before succumbing to old age or injury and being dissolved

0:02:26.280 --> 0:02:28.680
<v Speaker 2>into the brine of the elder brain, which serves as

0:02:28.720 --> 0:02:32.200
<v Speaker 2>a kind of librarian that rules over the tomes of

0:02:32.240 --> 0:02:37.280
<v Speaker 2>their collective memories. Parasitic larval tadpoles hatch from these eggs,

0:02:37.760 --> 0:02:41.200
<v Speaker 2>and each vital specimen is then inserted into the brain

0:02:41.360 --> 0:02:45.520
<v Speaker 2>of a comatose humanoid. There it feasts on the host's

0:02:45.560 --> 0:02:49.600
<v Speaker 2>original brain tissue and eventually grows to become the host's

0:02:49.720 --> 0:02:53.560
<v Speaker 2>new brain, attaching to the old brain stem, taking over

0:02:53.840 --> 0:02:58.560
<v Speaker 2>altering the body in the process. This process is called seramorphosis.

0:03:00.240 --> 0:03:03.400
<v Speaker 2>There are limits to what anlithid tadpole can do, We're told.

0:03:03.680 --> 0:03:07.560
<v Speaker 2>There's a reason adult mind flayers are generally medium sized humanoids.

0:03:08.200 --> 0:03:12.800
<v Speaker 2>Seramorphosis simply doesn't work on larger bodies, and attempts to

0:03:12.840 --> 0:03:16.000
<v Speaker 2>grow giant mind flayers via the introduction of a tadpole

0:03:16.040 --> 0:03:20.560
<v Speaker 2>into the brain of various giant species have ended in failure.

0:03:21.480 --> 0:03:25.680
<v Speaker 2>The exception, however, is the eaten seramorph the result of

0:03:25.680 --> 0:03:29.840
<v Speaker 2>introducing not one, but two eilithid tadpoles into a single

0:03:29.880 --> 0:03:33.240
<v Speaker 2>eaten one for each of the host organism's heads and

0:03:33.280 --> 0:03:38.240
<v Speaker 2>therefore brains. As Bigbe presents Glory of the Giants describes,

0:03:38.720 --> 0:03:42.280
<v Speaker 2>each tadpole devours one of the eton's brains and grows

0:03:42.320 --> 0:03:45.360
<v Speaker 2>to replace it, as you might expect, But then one

0:03:45.400 --> 0:03:49.400
<v Speaker 2>of the two eaten heads begins to sink into the body,

0:03:49.440 --> 0:03:53.480
<v Speaker 2>finally looking more like some sort of grotesque starfish attached

0:03:53.720 --> 0:03:57.920
<v Speaker 2>to the giant's torso. Meanwhile, the other head, complete with

0:03:58.040 --> 0:04:02.040
<v Speaker 2>idlithid tentacles, takes on a central position atop the shoulders.

0:04:02.560 --> 0:04:06.200
<v Speaker 2>The sunken head controls the eaten seramorph's body, while the

0:04:06.240 --> 0:04:12.000
<v Speaker 2>other head handles cognition and psionic powers. While not psionically

0:04:12.040 --> 0:04:15.720
<v Speaker 2>as powerful as a typical lithid, the eaten sera morph

0:04:15.760 --> 0:04:19.400
<v Speaker 2>makes up for this with physical size and strength, often

0:04:19.480 --> 0:04:22.839
<v Speaker 2>serving as a guardian of one form or another within

0:04:23.320 --> 0:04:28.280
<v Speaker 2>a hidden a lithid colony. It's a wonderfully weird monster,

0:04:28.360 --> 0:04:31.560
<v Speaker 2>and I love the illustration provided in Big Piece. The

0:04:31.600 --> 0:04:34.839
<v Speaker 2>idea of a second brain that controls the body is

0:04:34.880 --> 0:04:38.719
<v Speaker 2>an interesting concept, and one that I assume stems from

0:04:38.760 --> 0:04:42.800
<v Speaker 2>the real life nature of the octopus nervous system. To

0:04:42.839 --> 0:04:46.200
<v Speaker 2>be clear, discussion of multiple brains within a single organism

0:04:46.240 --> 0:04:49.440
<v Speaker 2>can get complicated, in part depending on what you define

0:04:49.600 --> 0:04:53.120
<v Speaker 2>as a brain. The octopus, for example, only boasts a

0:04:53.160 --> 0:04:57.360
<v Speaker 2>single central brain, but each arm has neural cells that

0:04:57.440 --> 0:05:01.520
<v Speaker 2>seem to act as partially independent many brains to handle

0:05:01.520 --> 0:05:05.320
<v Speaker 2>the creature's complex limbs. As Nora Bradford explained in a

0:05:05.360 --> 0:05:09.080
<v Speaker 2>twenty twenty three article for Scientific American, how octopus arms

0:05:09.120 --> 0:05:11.760
<v Speaker 2>bypass the brain, It would all seem to enable a

0:05:11.800 --> 0:05:15.760
<v Speaker 2>form of decentralized coordination. We can point to cases in

0:05:15.760 --> 0:05:20.520
<v Speaker 2>insects and anaalids as well that raise similar questions regarding

0:05:20.560 --> 0:05:23.039
<v Speaker 2>what is and what is in a brain. But with

0:05:23.160 --> 0:05:26.039
<v Speaker 2>the Eden Sarah morph we might think of one brain

0:05:26.120 --> 0:05:30.120
<v Speaker 2>becoming dominant and the other essentially becoming a mini brain

0:05:30.400 --> 0:05:35.039
<v Speaker 2>to handle the larger body. Now, this notion also raises

0:05:35.080 --> 0:05:39.440
<v Speaker 2>the specter of an outdated hypothesis, that of the dinosaur

0:05:39.480 --> 0:05:44.440
<v Speaker 2>butt brain. Yes, the dinosaur butt brain. Riley Black points

0:05:44.520 --> 0:05:47.640
<v Speaker 2>out in the twenty twelve Smithsonian Magazine posts the double

0:05:47.680 --> 0:05:51.240
<v Speaker 2>dinosaur brain Myth that this was a nineteenth century hypothesis

0:05:51.440 --> 0:05:54.160
<v Speaker 2>that argued that a canal in the vertebrae over the

0:05:54.240 --> 0:05:57.440
<v Speaker 2>hips of the Stegosaurus was larger than the cavity for

0:05:57.520 --> 0:06:01.960
<v Speaker 2>the dinosaur's brain, and therefore it might serve as a

0:06:02.000 --> 0:06:05.120
<v Speaker 2>place for a secondary brain or a brain like neural

0:06:05.240 --> 0:06:08.719
<v Speaker 2>mass to be located to coordinate the creature's hind, legs

0:06:08.720 --> 0:06:12.320
<v Speaker 2>and tail. After all, body is big and the tail

0:06:12.560 --> 0:06:15.680
<v Speaker 2>is complex, so perhaps it just needed some extra neural

0:06:15.760 --> 0:06:19.880
<v Speaker 2>power back there. Now, that cavity in question still remains

0:06:19.880 --> 0:06:22.760
<v Speaker 2>something of a mystery, but palaeontologists are pretty sure it

0:06:22.800 --> 0:06:26.400
<v Speaker 2>didn't house a second brain. Could an a lithoid put

0:06:26.440 --> 0:06:29.120
<v Speaker 2>one in there, though, well, we'll have to think about that.

0:06:29.880 --> 0:06:34.320
<v Speaker 2>Of course. The idea of the pre seramorphosis eaten is

0:06:34.360 --> 0:06:38.480
<v Speaker 2>in ways a fantasy extrapolation of real life cases of

0:06:38.560 --> 0:06:42.000
<v Speaker 2>polycephaly or multiple heads on a single body, which does

0:06:42.040 --> 0:06:45.960
<v Speaker 2>occur in the natural world. But division of control between

0:06:46.360 --> 0:06:49.599
<v Speaker 2>individual brains in these cases seems to vary greatly depending

0:06:49.640 --> 0:06:52.839
<v Speaker 2>on the exact case in question. And of course you

0:06:52.839 --> 0:06:54.479
<v Speaker 2>don't have to go this far to think about two

0:06:54.520 --> 0:06:57.680
<v Speaker 2>brains in a single body when you consider the two

0:06:57.720 --> 0:07:01.480
<v Speaker 2>hemispheres of our own brain. Things like dual brain theory

0:07:01.839 --> 0:07:06.080
<v Speaker 2>and some fascinating studies concerning split brains in human beings.

0:07:06.880 --> 0:07:09.680
<v Speaker 2>These are enough to make you wonder, well, maybe we

0:07:09.760 --> 0:07:13.640
<v Speaker 2>are all eatens to a certain extent, but I digress.

0:07:14.240 --> 0:07:17.160
<v Speaker 2>It all makes something like the eaten Sarah more, while

0:07:17.200 --> 0:07:21.080
<v Speaker 2>a creature of pure fantasy, an interesting contemplation point, for

0:07:21.200 --> 0:07:26.960
<v Speaker 2>considering purpose, identity, and plurality when it comes to brains.

0:07:27.800 --> 0:07:30.040
<v Speaker 2>Tune in for additional episodes of The Monster Fact, The

0:07:30.120 --> 0:07:33.760
<v Speaker 2>Artifact or Anomalia Stupendium each week. As always, you can

0:07:33.800 --> 0:07:36.520
<v Speaker 2>email us at contact at stuff to Blow your Mind

0:07:36.960 --> 0:07:46.840
<v Speaker 2>dot com.

0:07:46.960 --> 0:07:49.920
<v Speaker 1>Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For

0:07:50.000 --> 0:07:52.800
<v Speaker 1>more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app,

0:07:52.960 --> 0:07:55.720
<v Speaker 1>Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.