Deepspawn

Deepspawn were infamous horrors that give birth to many other varieties of monsters; a single deepspawn could make a vast area dangerous, even for alert, well-armed adventurers.

Description
Deepspawn looked like large, rubbery spheres of mottled grey and brown. Six arms projected from their bodies; three were tentacle-arms, and three were jaw-arms, ending in mouths of many teeth. A deepspawn also had over 40 long, retractable, flexible eye stalks, but it extended only three or four at a time, well away from harm.

Ecology
For a deepspawn to give birth to other monsters, it first needed to devour one. It made an exact "record" of the creature, and replicated the creature using ingredients from the surroundings. If the deepspawn could claim resources from the dead and dying on a battlefield, it could produce a new spawn every three days. Typically, it gathered materials from the wild and could only produce offspring at a much slower rate.

Only exact duplicates could be created by a deepspawn. They had an intense, inborn loyalty to the parent. They were sent away to live on their own unless there was sufficient food in the area to support them. There were typically 1–4 spawn kept around as general servants.