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Well, you call this guy. He isn't just ''one'' bug, he's ''[[The Swarm|millions]]''! Millions of tiny creepy crawlies make up his body, as if his entire body is composed of [[Synchronized Swarming]] controlled by a [[Hive Mind]]. Sometimes it's worms, sometimes it's insects - [[Everything's Worse with Bees|bees]] are always good - and sometimes it's just any creepy thing you can think of. Don't worry; The Worm That Walks can make them all into [[Nightmare Fuel|fuel for subconscious terrors]].
Monsters like this aren't always the most lethal, but are often very hard to hurt. Trying to punch one is like trying to punch water (only far more disgusting). In some cases, they are almost impossible to kill, because if even one of the creatures that makes up its body survives, there is the possibility that [[From a Single Cell| it will return]] (though it may take a while). [[Kill It with Fire]] is often your best bet.
An extreme version of the [[Totem Pole Trench]]. See also [[Combining Mecha]] for the mechanical counterpart of this trope.
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** He also gives us the 'throng-bear', an unintelligent variant from ''[[Iron Council]]''.
** Don't forget {{spoiler|Skool, who is a bunch of fish inside a wetsuit. He's also a rare heroic version of this.}}
* In [[Terry Pratchett]]'s ''[[Discworld]]'', a vampire can only change into a single bat if they've been feeding on human blood, since it takes great magical power to change one's bodymass in the setting. Belonging to the teetotaller Black Ribboners, Sally in ''[[
** Also in a Discworld book (''[[
** A more comical example from ''A Hat Full of Sky'', reappearing in the subsequent book ''Wintersmith'', is [[Totem Pole Trench|the Nac Mac Feegles disguising themselves as a human (singular) by stacking themselves up inside several stolen items of clothing]].
** Borrowing a swarm of bees is a [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]] for Granny Weatherwax in ''[[
** A minor version of this occurs in the character of Hex in the Unseen University... a 'computer' controlled by the ant colony living inside it... a similar type of machine can be seen in the Glooper in "Making Money", although that one is controlled by water and tides and the economy...
* The Vermiform in Steph Swainston's ''Castle Circle'' series is one of these.
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:* An undead human corpse infested by maggots is also a possibility, since the verse is presumably supposed to refer to the long-dead ancestor of the protagonist who escorts him to the rite under Kingsport.
* ''[[Dungeons & Dragons]]
** Ravenloft has the Maggot Golem. Every bit as gross as this sounds - its body consists of flies, eggs and maggots held together with magic and usually is created from a maggot-infested corpse. Despite this, the design is actually quite clever: the living maggots that make up the golem's body continually grow into flies (which swarm around the golem, constantly) and so long as the maggots and flies can feed on rotted meat (usually provided by creatures it kills) the flies lay eggs on the golem, which hatch more maggots, creating a continual cycle that give the golem a powerful regenerative ability.
** In the [[Epic Level Handbook]]'', and [[Pathfinder]] Bestiary (part II), there is a monster called "Worm That Walks", a dead spellcaster that has become the [[Hive Mind]] for an army of worms - gaining insect-related powers and a great deal of additional resilience. Usually it's the evil ones that choose this method of life after death.
** Players can actually turn themselves into a Worm That Walks, although it carries a chance of failing and just leaving them as a rotting corpse.
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** The Worm That Walks shows up again in 4th Edition as the "Larva Mage." Not quite as evocative...
*** The Larva Mage has some cousins, too. The Larva Assassin is the soul of a [[Psycho for Hire]] given form through a swarm of hornets and centipedes. Larva Snipers were [[Cold Sniper]]s (or at least sadistic marksmen) in life, now an undead composed of wasps. Larva War Masters were [[General Ripper]]s, [[Blood Knight]]s and similar depraved, insane warriors in life, their souls called back and thrust into undeath as the [[Hive Mind]] of a swarm of carnivorous beetles.
*** And Kyuss himself is back, one of the [[Eldritch Abomination]]s of the ''Elder Evils'' sourcebook, plus the one on the cover art.
** The [[Call a Pegasus A Hippogryph|Lamia]] from 4th Edition [[Dungeons & Dragons]] is an evil fey creature which is a seething swarm of scarab beetles wrapped around the flesh-stripped bones of a powerful fey creature. Many lamias take the form of eladrin that they've hollowed out this way.
** The great-granddaddy of all these D&D Worms That Walk was the cifal ([[Fun with Acronyms|Colonial Insect-Formed Artificial Life]]), a rather forgettable colonial-insect monster from the 1E ''Fiend Folio''.
*** Whom they just dumped into the recent{{when}} version of ''[[Gamma World]]'', along with [[Our Monsters Are Weird|all the other effed-up D&D monsters]]
** A rare Good-aligned version appears in, of all places, the [[Eldritch Abomination]]-filled ''Lords of Madness'' 3.5 sourcebook, with the silthilar—sentient swarms with just a touch of the [[Mad Scientist]] when they fuse into their solid form.
** Roach thralls in ''D20 Modern''.
** Yet another version from 3.5, in the ''Exemplars of Evil'' book (for designing villains) is the former archmage of the Tolstoff family who researched the deceased god the Worm That Walks, learned evil spells, acquired foul magic items, and made pacts with dark entities. Eventually the deity noticed him and "rewarded" him with its filthy blessing, an attack of ravenous worms and maggots that ate his physical body but which absorbed his soul. Sealed in a vault within the catacombs beneath the mansion by his horrified daughter, he then proceeds to whisper and corrupt his grandchildren into evil servants who will stop at nothing to free him from his tomb. He later appeared in the aforementioned ''Elder Evils'' as [[The Dragon]] to Kyuss.
* ''[[Werewolf: The Apocalypse]]'' includes the Ananasi, werespiders who, in their animal form, turn into their weight in spiders. Since they can eventually regenerate their entire bodies from even one of those spiders, it makes for a great escape technique.
** Also in ''Werewolf'' are the Hollow Men, a breed of fomori (humans under the thrall of [[Demonic Possession]]). The Hollow Men specifically are humans who were killed and whose bodies were mostly emptied out (hence the name), the insides replaced by a swarm of small animals controlled by the demonic spirit in question. Doesn't have to be insects/arachnids; reptiles and rodents are also popular choices. They're capable of speech and can ''try'' to pass themselves off as fully human, but generally, even other fomori find them creepy as hell.
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:Invertebrate Index]]
[[Category:Evil Is Visceral]]
[[Category:Villains]]
[[Category:Horror Tropes]]
▲[[Category:The Worm That Walks]]
{{DEFAULTSORT:Worm That Walks, The}}
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