The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: Gwaahrg

This post is part of the Immortal Naturalist's Guide series. The explanation for that series can be found in this post.

    While there are many strange sounds one may come across in the wilderness, one of the strangest is Gwaahrg's bellowing scream. Able to be heard from miles around, Gwaahrg spends her days travelling the Damp Plains in search of its favorite prey, the field moose. Field moose are rather large and difficult to hunt, but the five-foot Gwaahrg is able to take them down just fine with her screaming. These screams are the only exposure most residents of her territory get, and that seems to be how Gwaahrg prefers it, doing her best to avoid people as much as possible. I was able to gain her trust be following the screams and offering some food when I got close enough for the creature to see me. I eventually followed Gwaahrg back to the burrow she sleeps in, at which point her tolerance for my presence failed and she drove me off.

    In driving me off, I almost got to be on the receiving end of Gwaahrg's deadly scream. She is able to produce a sound so powerful that only can it be heard for miles, but at close ranges the scream can stun, knock out, or even kill. Gwaahrg's horns act as magical sound amplifiers that turn what would be regular screams into the deadly waves of sound that they are. Luckily, these screams are only lethal if Gwaahrg can open her mouth or if she has clean horns. If she can't scream, Gwaahrg cannot harm anyone, and too much dirt on the horns prevents them from being able to conduct sound properly. Luckily for Gwaahrg, most creatures of the Damp Plains are unable to capitalize on this weakness, and very few people are aware of it.

    Eating nothing but field moose seems to be fine for Gwaahrg, but she does not seem to eat the antlers. Strangely, she does not leave the antlers behind when she hunts, begging the question of what happens to these antlers. My theory is that she keeps them in her burrow. While I am not sure what she does with them, I am certain that she has a small fortune in antlers, ready to be used by anyone who wants to risk the trip into Gwaahrg's burrow.