Paramecia Coloniex

BG Graveyard and Mardu Food are the only two homes that take this seriously, and they want it for different reasons. For BG, this is a P1P4 to P1P6 staple: a turn-two body that stocks the bin by three and pre-pays for its own Gravedigger trigger, which is exactly the curve the archetype is trying to assemble. Mardu sacrifice cares less about the mill and treats the death trigger as a delayed creature tutor onto the library, so the rate there drops to fourth or fifth in colors.

The format is kind to it in two specific ways. Stomped by the Foot and Bot Bashing Time both clean up 2/2s cheaply, which means the worm dies on schedule rather than rotting in play, and a medium-speed format gives you the turns to actually cash the deferred return. The one card that genuinely punishes the recursion is Dimensional Exile: an aura that exiles the worm directly skips the death trigger entirely, denying the second installment you paid for up front. Conventional removal like Grounded for Life is a fine trade for the opponent but not a blowout, since destroying the worm only feeds the dies clause you wanted anyway.

The mill matters more here than the baseline read suggests. TMT has only five mill cards by count, but the format's deep legendary uncommons and Disappear creatures make a stocked graveyard a real resource rather than incidental decoration. The top-of-library return also stings less than usual: Scry commons and cycling give you more ways than most formats to convert that pre-set top-deck into immediate tempo.

Maindeck in BG, maindeck in Mardu, sideboard nowhere.

Self-mill plus a delayed creature recursion at two mana puts this squarely in the graveyard-value lane, the kind of effect that wants a reanimator or sacrifice shell, not a midrange goodstuff pile. Meren of Clan Nel Toth is the clearest home: she lives on creatures dying and on recurring them, and the worm feeds both halves, filling the bin on entry and then, when it dies, setting up the next reanimation target before Meren's end-step trigger or a sacrifice loop brings something back. Muldrotha, the Gravetide in its Sultai recursion builds also wants the body, though Muldrotha would rather the creature land in a permanent zone than on top of the library, so the return clause is somewhat redundant with what she already does. Mono-black commanders like Tergrid, God of Fright are less interested; Tergrid wants opponents losing permanents, not a slow self-mill.

This is a Bracket 2 card, comfortably casual and budget. Expect sub-$1 once it settles; it is a common-rarity value piece, not a chase. The role is the eighth or ninth graveyard enabler in a Meren list, the slot that fills the bin and leaves a creature card waiting, not a curve play or a finisher.

Against the in-archetype alternatives it sits below the floor of optimized reanimator lists. Stitcher's Supplier mills three for one mana and dies more easily; Satyr Wayfinder digs for lands. What the worm offers over those is the back half, a Gravedigger-style return tucked into the death trigger, so it is two cards in one slot. The trade is tempo: the returned creature goes on top, costing you a draw, and the recursion is one-shot because the self-exile spends the card. Outside graveyard decks it does nothing worth a slot.

A two-mana self-mill body for black graveyard decks that want to stock the bin and buy back a creature later, the kind of slot Modern fills with Stitcher's Supplier and Satyr Wayfinder. Those put three cards in the yard for one mana and ask nothing in return; this costs two and only returns a creature once it dies, to the top of your library rather than your hand. Legal but yet to register in tracked play. There is no Modern deck asking for the deferred Gravedigger half at this rate.

A two-drop self-mill body for black graveyard decks in Standard that want a creature in the bin and a Gravedigger-style return stapled to the same card. The mill stocks the yard, the return cashes in later when the worm dies, but the staggered payout and the put-on-top-of-library clause mean it competes for slots with cleaner recursion and more aggressive two-drops. Legal, but it has not registered in tracked tournament play this season. It goes in the mill-and-recur builds that want both halves on one card; the decks that prioritize speed cut it.

A two-mana value body for black graveyard decks in Pioneer that want a creature to fill the bin and hand back a creature later. The mill-three-then-return-on-death split reads like a Commander card more than a Pioneer one: the deferred half is slow, the return goes to the top of your library rather than your hand, and you spend a body and a draw step to get a creature back. It is legal but has yet to register in tracked play this season. The black graveyard shells that exist already run faster engines, and there is no Pioneer deck currently asking for this.

A 2-mana Gravedigger-on-delay in a format where Bazaar of Baghdad fills the graveyard for free and Dredge does not want a 2/2 that mills three and asks to die first. The recursion is too slow for a deck whose payoff is already on the battlefield, and too small for any deck paying the Power Nine's tempo math. Legal, but yet to register in tracked tournament play this season.

A 2-mana 2/2 that mills three on entry and returns a creature to the top of your library when it dies. The recursion half is Gravedigger's job, and Gravedigger at least puts the creature in hand; this one costs a draw step to deliver it. Legacy's black recursion is priced by directness, and Reanimate gets a creature straight onto the battlefield for one mana while this asks for a body, a death, and a draw to net a single card back. The mill is incidental self-fill, not a payoff that any tracked graveyard deck wants over Entomb or its own cantrips. Daze on the way in for a card that does this little is the easy answer. Legal, but yet to register in tracked tournament play, and nothing about the rate suggests that changes. Does not clear the bar.