Statue Spawn

A statue spawn is an alien lifeform that in nature creates a shell for itself from rock. It is so named due to the tendency of sorcerers to infect the inside of a statue with the thing, allowing it to burrow and grow inside it. A spawn is amorphous and can be divided into several smaller spawn that eventually grow into additional spawn.

The spawn can be tamed by the use of chemicals so that they recognize their masters by their smell. The sorcerer usually carries two flasks of liquid, one of which is a blue one that makes the spawn complacent, allowing them to hide almost indefinitely, immobile in the statue. This chemical can also calm them down after they have frenzied.

When exposed to air around spawn, the liquid in the red flask cause them to enrage, followed with their statue shells cracking to allow movement, after which they attack anything in the area until everything is dead or they smell the green chemical again.

The spawn are usually moved to a different statue after they have once enraged, due to the obvious cracks and holes it creates in their shells, revealing the glowing purple spawn inside and ruining the element of surprise. In addition, oxygen is slightly toxic to the creatures and if not within a mostly airtight shell, the spawn dies out in 1 - 10 days depending on the size of the cracks.

Unlike normal animated statues, the spawn don't really use the limbs of their stone shells as nature intended and therefore are sometimes concealed in unconventional forms (such as pillars, orbs, or walls) that might fool someone looking for more obvious guardians.