Dreadful Resurrection

4th-level necromancy

Casting Time: 1 minute

Range: Touch

Components: V, S, M (a drop of blood from a humanoid or undead creature)

Duration: Instantaneous

You touch a humanoid or undead creature that has been dead for no longer than 1 minute. The creature immediately returns to life as an undead thrall under your control. The thrall is friendly to you and your companions and obeys your commands to the best of its ability.

The creature retains no memory of its former life and its alignment becomes neutral. It gains undead traits and is immune to poison damage and the poisoned condition.

At higher levels: When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 5th level or higher, you can animate an additional undead thrall for each spell slot level above 4th.

Note: The undead thralls created by this spell are not zombies or skeletons but instead retain the appearance and abilities of the original creature. The thralls also have the ability to speak and understand languages that they knew in life.

Balancing: This spell provides the ability to quickly create powerful undead thralls, but requires the caster to have access to a fresh corpse and a 4th level spell slot or higher. Additionally, the thralls are immune to poison damage and the poisoned condition, but they can still be destroyed by other means. The spell is balanced by its high spell slot requirement and the fact that the thralls are neutral and have no memory of their former lives.