Brood Lord

The brood lord was a powerful flying strain of the Zerg Swarm, a massive manta-like creature that served as the Swarm's aerial siege unit and was fielded only in the largest of conflicts. It was morphed from the corruptor, and in battle it disgorged a steady stream of living broodlings onto the enemy below, replacing the guardian that the Swarm had relied upon in earlier wars.

Origin and physiology#

The brood lord was originally morphed from the corruptor, and much of its anatomy is a re-purposing of that creature's biology. The glowing bulbs on its back are an evolution of the cancerous growths found in the corruptor's tentacles. Through alterations at the genetic level, those growths became sacs capable of rapidly spawning large batches of broodlings. The brood lord's tail is likewise derived from the corruptor, specifically its statocyst, and its structure, including the spikes, forms a large biological gyroscope that keeps the creature level and oriented. Because the tail is directly linked to the brood lord's sensory organs, it also sharpens the creature's ability to locate prey.

Bone spikes on the frontal section of the wings house an advanced glandular system that emits and receives high-frequency electrical pulses. With each pulse a massive spherical field radiates outward, coating the brood lord's surroundings and targets in bio-electric energy, after which its acute receptor glands gather and process the returning data. During deep-space flights these glands mutate to detect sources of radiation, electromagnetism, and light. The brood lord is also capable of adapting its biology to its theater of combat. During the invasion of a planet with exceptionally large seas, brood lords evolved to be better suited to aquatic combat, allowing them to pursue prey deep into the planet's trenches. Brood lords of the Leviathan Brood retain that brood's predisposition for spikes, possibly as a result of Abathur's experimentation.

Living ammunition#

The brood lord releases biological symbiotes onto ground targets. These small creatures regulate some of the brood lord's biological functions and can also serve as living ammunition. At any given time clusters of broodlings squirm beneath the brood lord's carapace. In combat the brood lord supercharges their aggression and metabolism, turning them into short-lived but highly effective air-to-ground weapons. Each broodling begins as a projectile that inflicts impact damage, then, once on the ground, enters a frenzied melee assault, tearing through personal armor and vehicular plating with ease until it reaches the end of its short lifespan or is destroyed.

Left unharmed, a brood lord disgorges a steady stream of broodlings capable of ravaging even large armored units in quick succession, and brood lords have also been known to ram ships with their mouths. They are not durable, however, and are vulnerable to aerial-strike combatants. Because the broodlings can attack while the brood lord stays out of reach of most ground defenses, a relatively small group operating with air support can inflict catastrophic damage on an enemy position, but on their own brood lords are slow and easily brought down once attackers get beneath them.

History#

The brood lord was one of the latest additions to the Swarm, replacing the guardian that had served as the Zerg aerial bomber in previous conflicts. During the Second Great War the Swarm fragmented and the genetic templates for multiple strains were lost, including those for both the corruptor and the brood lord. The brood lord's template was reacquired from feral brood lords at Sigma Centari, a Terran Dominion defense platform, and along with the viper it became one of the strains rebuilt from the mutalisk.

By 2505 the brood lord was once again evolved from the corruptor, this time by way of the genetic remnants of corruptors preserved in greater spires. A small number of brood lords were integrated into the primal Zerg packs, producing a strikingly different creature most notable for its unusual claws. During the Defenders of Man Insurgency, a number of feral brood lords were lured to Antiga Prime by the Defenders of Man's psi-emitters.