Brood & Bloom is a bestiary of sixty-one creatures whose lives run through other bodies, living, dead or built. Like The Waking Garden, it is published here in full and free to read, and it is built into the console.
An infection can remain with the party after the fight ends.
Three broods that want different things
The three broods are unrelated. They infect different hosts and places:
| Brood | Chapter | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| Inquiline | 2 | Infects one person. What a party carries away |
| Sporophore | 3 | Infects ground and buildings. What a party walks into |
| Necrophore | 4 | Wants nothing from the living. What a party leaves behind, in its dead |
The first two broods use counters the console can hold for you. The Inquiline tracks Depth, which never recedes on its own: the graft has to come out. The Sporophore tracks Spore Load, which clears with rest and distance from the colony. The Necrophore uses neither counter; it inhabits the dead the party leaves behind.
Read chapter 1 first
Several creatures affect their hosts between encounters. Their stat blocks rely on chapter 1 for classifications, counters, disease stages, and the spells that help. One spell can worsen a particular case; chapter 1 explains that interaction too.
That framing chapter is also where the order lives. The Lazaret has been writing this down for longer than anyone remembers. Its three ranks have stat blocks: a Registrar at CR 1, a Prosector at CR 4, and a Lector at CR 5.
From nothing to an apex
The Inquiline opens on a CR 0 latchling and ends on the Exemplar at CR 17; the Sporophore runs from a driftling to the Nave; the Necrophore from a cinder nit to the Lychfield. An appendix lays all three life cycles out together, showing what grows into what, where it settles, and which hosts it uses.
Using it at the table
Open Settings in the console and tick Brood & Bloom. Its creatures join Add creature with everything else.
The counters are worth setting up as you go. Select the
character, click Apply effect, set Duration to Counter, and type Depth or
Spore Load into Reminder. It starts at 0 and sits on their row as a badge with the
number in it, with +1, −1 and Reset beside it in the controls.
You change the counters manually. Use the library’s disease rules to determine what happens at each value.
What you may do with it
The stat blocks and game mechanics are under CC BY 4.0, so share and adapt them, commercially included, with credit and a note of any changes. The lore, the chapter text and each creature’s description are © 2026 Nicola Mustone, all rights reserved.
Start with the overview, or read the broods for the rules the stat blocks assume.