Wight

A wight was an undead creature given a semblance of life through sheer violence and hatred. They could drain the life energy out of victims by touch, turning them into new wights upon death.
==Description==
Wights appeared as weird and twisted reflections of the forms they had in life. They existed in a state between being alive and being dead, which was likened to being a corpse possessed by an animating spirit. Their mummified flesh covered the twisted skeleton, the hands ended up in deadly claws, and teeth were sharp and jagged like needles. Wights spoke in wheezes, gasps, and moans.
A wight's eyes were calcified and useless for vision—in fact, what little light could penetrate a wight's eyes was painful to it—however they were still able to perceive life energy. When attacking their prey, wights' eyes glowed like white-hot embers.
Most wights were humanoid.
==Personality==
Wights were evil undead creatures brought back to unlife by their vanity, evil deeds, and desires. Upon the ends of their mortal lives, the dying spirits reached out to Orcus or another evil deity, receiving undeath in exchange for spending eternity, hating and trying to destroy all living beings.
Wights retained their personalities and memories in their undeath. While they possessed free will, they were also bound to perform the bidding of the evil powers that brought them back and were subject to dark cravings for the life energy of living victims that was akin to an addiction.
Wights were territorial creatures. They rarely traveled away from their burial places, or locations they knew in life unless commanded by their masters, although some exceptions to these rules indeed existed. Scholars theorized that wights' attachment to their tombs was due to its reminder of their condition, which was more of a source of pride rather than sorrow. Another theory was they dwelled in catacombs simply due to the tactical benefits of winding corridors and shadows. Regardless, a wight would quickly come to learn the layout of their catacombs in exacting detail.
As a byproduct of their ability to "see" life energy, wights could also "see" an aura of the psychic value that living beings placed onto their valuables. This led to a behavior in which wights would collect such valuables seemingly for the aesthetic value of these auras. Because they did not take care to preserve the physical objects, anything that was not both durable and non-rusting tended to deteriorate in a wight's possession, which could leave them carrying small troves of gold, silver, and gems.
==Combat==
Upon touching someone living, wights drained the life out of the victim, even through their flesh, clothing, and armor. They preferred to move stealthily or hide in the shadows before springing surprise attacks on unsuspecting victims.
Wights were sometimes known to serve other stronger undead creatures like wraiths and other evil beings. When they followed a leader, they often avoided strategy and planning, relying on their drive for death and destruction instead.
A slaughter wight was able to release a death wail when slain. That ability whipped surrounding undead creatures into a frenzied attack.
Like other undead, wights were resistant to harmful necromantic energies and to wounds dealt by non-magical or non-silvered weapons. They were likewise immune to poisons and were unaffected by sleep, charm, hold (or similar) spells. Holy water was deadly to them, and the raise dead spell was said to instantly annihilate a wight.
==Variants==
;Aquatic wight: Also known as sea wights, were wights that dwelled in bodies of water and were capable swimmers.
==Ecology==
Wights were active at night, retreating away from the hated sunlight into crypts, tombs, burial mounds, where they dwelt during the day. Unlike vampires though, wights simply disliked the sun, not harmed by it. Their lairs were easily detected by eerie silence surrounding the area, abandoned by birds and wild animals, and abundant dead plant life. Contrary to wide belief, wights could be "born" anywhere, not necessarily in crypts and burial mounds. There were rumors of aquatic wights, returning to unlife among shipwrecks, possibly relating wights to lacedons.
Wights were deathly silent in their movements and very good at camouflaging with the dreary walls of the tombs in which they dwelt, which allowed them to attack from hiding. Less experienced adventurers were known to panic when this happened, believing that the stealthy monsters were instead "emerging from the walls".
Like other undead, wights did not need air, food, drink, or sleep. Due to their particular undead nature, wights existed simultaneously on the Prime Material as well as on the Negative Material planes, which granted them their powerful life-draining abilities. A lot of animals could feel the presence of these evil dead creatures: dogs growled and howled, horses stopped and refused to move forward feeling the creatures, birds, and insects fell silent. 
===Life Draining===
Even though wights hungered for living beings' energy, they did not require it as a source of sustenance, although some scholars speculated that it was used to help them animate their undead bodies. Regardless, wights could retain their undeath while trapped in tombs for centuries, staying completely motionless until a living being entered their lair. Some sages theorized that when a wight drained a victim's life energy, it received a rush of mortality, euphoric reminder of their mortal existence, and that chasing that feeling led to extremely depraved actions by wights. Other sages believed that the life energy allowed the wight to mature in strength and willpower, allowing it to gain some control over its urges. Wights that absorbed enough life energy could take command over lesser wights, and were called great wights.
Humanoid victims of a wight's life draining powers were reanimated as zombies—sometimes called "half-wights"—controlled by their killer. In some cases, creatures that were killed with the life-draining attacks came back as enslaved wights themselves. If the master was slain, the wights that were created regained their malicious free will. Bringing a wight back to life was nearly impossible.
==History==
The word "wight" meant "person" in the Realms' past. Centuries later, the word came to be exclusively used to describe these catacomb-dwelling undead creatures. There was no known spell that could create a wight, and the legends that described their origins were contradictory.
As of the mid-to-late 14 century DR, one of the foremost experts on wights in Faerûn was Jilda the Sage, however her writings on the subject were often flawed due to both her lack of any adventuring experience and her social biases as a daughter of royalty. Some of the faulty claims which she promulgated included the idea that wights were exclusively noble-born men and women whose bodies were possessed by evil spirits, that they were prolific burrowers, and that they could only communicate with each other by communing their spirits at close range. She and other scholars at the time also claimed that it was unheard of for wights to use weapons instead of their own claws.
The ancient barrow burial locations where wights could be often found could be found all over North-Western Faerun, namely the Moonshae Islands, Dalelands, and Rashemen. The Battle of Bones spawned a plethora of wights and undead over the years as well. In 1357 DR wights could be found infesting the Burial Glen in Myth Drannor along with other undead creatures. 
As of 1371 DR a group of ten undead Purple Dragons wights roamed the High Road in Cormyr looking for the “enemies of Cormyr". In their twisted undead state, of course, the enemies were all living beings.
==Notable Wights==
* Na (wight) was a raised shell of a "resurrection agent" only knows as Harlot in 1463 DR.
* Akar Kessell was a mage in Icewind Dale who attempted to conquer the region using Crenshinibon. He returned as a wight in 1485 DR attempting to poison the region with Black ice.
* Hedrun Arnsfirth was the chosen of Auril that was turned into a wight after her defeat, and consequential imprisonment by the Red Wizards of Thay in 1485 DR.
==Appendix==
===Background===
The name "wight" is of Germanic origin. It began as a general word meaning "being" or "creature", but over the years it was increasingly applied to spirits of either good or evil until it was connotated with the supernatural.
===Appearances===
:;Adventures:
::Desert of Desolation • The Shattered Statue • Tales of the Outer Planes • Lords of Darkness: The Tombs of Deckon Thar • Curse of the Azure Bonds • Halls of the High King • Undermountain: Maddgoth's Castle • How the Mighty Are Fallen • Vale of the Dragon Oracle • Pool of Radiance: Attack on Myth Drannor • Into the Dragon's Lair • The Twilight Tomb • Shadowdale: The Scouring of the Land • Scepter Tower of Spellgard • Ghosts of Dragonspear Castle • The Rise of Tiamat • Curse of Strahd • Storm King's Thunder • Tomb of Annihilation • The Tortle Package • Waterdeep: Dungeon of the Mad Mage
:;Novels:
::Extinction • Realms of the Dead
:;Comic Books
::Telling Lies
:;Video Games:
::Pool of Radiance • Pools of Darkness • Treasures of the Savage Frontier • Spelljammer: Pirates of Realmspace • Dungeon Hack • Icewind Dale • Icewind Dale: Trials of the Luremaster • Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor • Neverwinter • Icewind Dale: Enhanced Edition • Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear • Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms • Dungeons & Dragons: Heroes of Neverwinter
:;Board Games
::Tyrants of the Underdark: Aberrations and Undead
:;Card Games
::AD&D Trading Cards • Dragonfire • 
:;Organized Play & Licensed Adventures
::At the Foot of the Lighthouse • Corruption in Kryptgarden • The Courting of Fire • Blood Above, Blood Below • Chelimber's Descent • The Ark of the Mountains • Over the Edge • Fester and Burn
===Gallery===
Wight Alt AFR.jpg|A depiction of a wight from Adventures in the Forgotten Realms.
Battle Wight.png|A battle wight from Heroes of Neverwinter.
===Further reading===
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===References===
Category:Creatures found in the Negative Energy Plane