As a lich, how can I preserve my animal companion?

Question

As the only requirements for gaining the lich template are a caster level of 11 and the Craft Wondrous Item feat, our entire party (all of whom are classes that get at least 6th level spells) has been considering making this transition.

However, I have a beloved animal companion (from the bonded mount revelation), who I would prefer to also be able to join me in this next stage of my eternal struggle against entropy. How can I let my animal companion ignore the ravages of time, ideally in a manner that also lets me return it to an active state if it is destroyed?

I am interested in any template, spell, or class feature that will let my animal companion "live" forever, but the less resource investment it requires, the better. While something that makes my animal companion undead would be ideal from a thematic standpoint, other methods are also acceptable. I am an oracle (nature mystery) and would like to avoid multi-classing if at all possible.

Answer 1

Deathtouched

Ask your GM about the Deathtouched Companion Archetype which can be found in Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Ultimate Wilderness or here on the SRD.

Whether the result of a partially successful attempt at revival, a strange blight, or repeated exposure to undead, l deathtouched companions are living animals with a trace of the undead.

(emphasis mine) Accompanying a party of liches would certainly satisfy the "repeated exposure to undead" option here.

While the animal companion will remain a living creature (see below), many of the changes essentially make it a "half-undead" so it is reasonable to assume that the lifespan would be extended to accommodate such a partial change (as the living creature dies off, the undead portions preserve it through unlife). There are no rules on the lifespan of animal comanions (see this question) so this would be entirely up to your GM overall

Negative Energy Affinity (Ex)

Though a living creature, a deathtouched companion reacts to positive and negative energy as if it were undead—positive energy harms it, while negative energy heals it.

Keep in mind this will mechanically change your companion somewhat as some of its Special abilities (specifically share spells and devotion) are replaced with others.

Answer 2

Turn your mount into a mummy lord

Considering that the Mummy Lord template was originally created for humanoid creatures, but actually has no restriction on creature type, there are quite a few advantages on applying that template to your mount:

• It gains a lot of strength (+8) and hit points (+6 to charisma and toughness);
• It gains a breath weapon;
• It can try to control other undead (including your team mates, mind you);
• Its attack has a powerful curse;

And the best part, it will automatically rejuvenate within 1d10 days if completely destroyed.

The largest drawback is the despair aura, which must be saved against at least once per day and there is nothing that prevents this other than becoming immune to fear and/or mind-affecting effects. Once afflicted, you are immune to this aura for 24 hours.

Unlike many other templates (such as zombie lord, juju zombie or skeletal champion), this template actually has a price attached to it (similar to lichdom):

“Mummy lord” is an acquired template that can be added to any living corporeal creature (referred to hereafter as the base creature) that has at least 8 Hit Dice. The process of creating a mummy lord requires 50,000 gp worth of rare herbs, oils, and other mummification materials. The mummy lord retains all of the base creature’s statistics and special abilities, except as listed below.

Bear in mind that, unlike druids who must pick animals as their companion, the Nature mystery's power (Bonded Mount) has no such restriction, similar to a cavalier's mount instead. So, unlike a druid (see Nature Bond), who would be forced to retrain into an archetype that allows creatures with the undead type as companion, you simply have to use one of the listed animals for your creature's size, a horse or camel for a medium-sized oracle, or pony, dog, wolf or boar for small-sized oracles. There is no restriction saying that your horse cannot be an undead horse.

For a cheaper alternative, you could look into the Mummified Creature template, which, while not as powerful as a template, is much easier to apply to your mount:

To create a mummified creature, a corpse must be prepared through embalming, with its internal organs replaced with dried herbs and flowers and its dead skin preserved through the application of sacred oils. Unlike with standard mummies, a mummified creature’s brain is not removed from its skull after death. Injected with strange chemicals and tattooed with mystical hieroglyphs, a mummified creature’s brain retains the base creature’s mind and abilities, though the process does result in the loss of some mental faculties. Once this process is complete, the body is wrapped in special purified linens marked with hieroglyphs that grant the mummified creature its new abilities (as well as its weakness). Finally, the creator must cast a create greater undead spell to give the mummified creature its unlife.

Note that Create Greater Undead should be available at 11th level, and the template simply expands the possibilities of the spell, which already includes the possibility of creating juju zombies and skeletal champions, as mentioned earlier.