Clockwork Beetle

A creature that subtracts itself from the board as it works. Entering with two counters means it shows up as a 2/2 for one mana, a body well above the usual rate for the cost. The cost is built into the swing: each attack or block strips a counter once combat ends, so the thing that hits for two this turn hits for one next turn and falls off entirely the turn after. The clock runs whether you want it to or not, and the only way to wind it back up is outside help, a proliferate effect or something that hands counters back. What it really models is a depreciating asset: an artifact built to spend itself in combat rather than persist there. That puts it at odds with the usual instinct for cheap artifact creatures, which is to find a body that stays repeatable; this one is repeatable only as a target for counter-manipulation engines, not on its own. It descends from the older Clockwork creatures that wound down as they attacked, the same core idea (a creature that runs out of moves) scaled to a one-drop and rebuilt around the +1/+1 counter framework instead of bespoke clockwork counters. The design tension is honest: you get an oversized body now and pay for it on the back end, one counter per combat until there is nothing left to remove.