The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Uncertain Creature

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

    People along the Scarlet River tell tales of a bizarre beast that swims in the deepest, widest portions of the river. Despite being a nearly ubiquitous tale in Scarlet River culture, however, not a single person seems capable of giving a clear description, leading me to dub it the Uncertain Creature. Despite the fact that no one seems to know what the creature looks like, all versions of the story agree on its behavior and diet. The Uncertain Creature spends most of its time under the water in calm sections of the river. There the beast sits in wait, snapping up any animals that try to swim by. This poses a danger to any people who swim or boat by, as the Uncertain Creature is apparently quite large and has no issue dragging people under. Due to its size, the Uncertain Creature is unable to go too far upriver, but that means that its attacks, mostly attributed to accidental drownings rather than a folk tale, are concentrated on less than half of the total length of the river, which coincidentally is where more than half of the people living along the river are located. This honestly makes the fact that most people consider it to be nothing more than a legend somewhat shocking, and I suspect it is due to the fact that no one knows what it looks like.

    As it turns out, the inability to describe the Uncertain Creature is due to a natural magical effect that causes the creature to appear blurry and amorphous, certainly a useful trait for an ambush hunter. Locally, there are bushes that grow along the river with berries that look like human eyes, called eye bushes. When the berries are crushed and the pulp rubbed on one's eyelids, they grant the ability to see through illusions such as the Uncertain Creature's blurriness. Any other method of seeing through or dispelling illusions ought to work, but failing those, eye bushes are quite common and fruit throughout the year. Looking through the illusion reveals the awkward beast that is the Uncertain Creature, with flippers, a shell, horns, and prehensile whiskers for grabbing prey. Unfortunately, the Uncertain Creature seems to have an innate sense for when something sees through its illusion, triggering it to try to run away from or fight the viewer, depending on how easy each option is in the moment. 

    Having been attacked and needing to fight off the Uncertain Creature a few times during my observations, I discovered an interesting quality of the beast's blood. After the fights, in which the Uncertain Creature fled after seeing that I could hurt it, I would be splashed with the creature's blood and other people told me I looked a little blurry until I washed off the blood. My theory is that the Uncertain Creature's blood carries its magical ability, and if one were to be completely covered in its blood, they would become indescribable, like the Uncertain Creature. That being said, I believe it would be quite difficult to get useful amounts of blood from the creature without seriously harming it, and I cannot fathom how a temporary magical effect is worth killing the only known creature like this.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Terror of Farport

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

    In the city of Farport, there is a statue of a terrible creature, fifteen feet tall with tusks, horns, and claws, which the locals call the Terror of Farport. The statue exists to remind people of an event that most of the world still writes off as a mass delusion. If one believes the people of Farport, and I do, a beast emerged from Bluesalt Marsh to the west of the city several decades ago and went on a rampage. This rampage wasn't very deadly or damaging, but resulted in every single piece of food in Farport being eaten by the beast. Because of this, the statue that stands in the city today is an almost perfect recreation of the beast based on many eyewitness accounts. Unfortunately, the Terror's eating spree resulted in many people starving to death as there was simply no more food around. Since the beast's trip to Farport, it has never returned and seems to show no interest in returning for some time. Apparently, the beast only eats once every hundred years, and that one meal can make an entire city go hungry. The rest of the Terror's time is spent wandering the Bluesalt Marsh collecting feathers.

    While the beast's bizarre metabolism is certainly the result of magic, so is what it does with the feathers it collects. Plucking feathers from living birds in the marsh, the Terror of Farport takes them back to its nest in the middle of the marsh where it weaves the feathers into ropes with the ability to move and attack anyone who injures the creature. While the lengths of rope do not move at all except to defend the Terror, the creature itself seems to be quite forgetful and frequently leaves all of its magical rope in its nest. While this constitutes a weakness for the beast, its biggest weakness by far is the fact that it is terrified of its own appearance. Today, Farport always has plenty of mirrors on hand at the city gates to ward off another rampage from the Terror.

    One of the bright sides of the Terror of Farport frequently being away from its lair and frequently leaving all of its magic rope behind, is that it is quite easy to go into the nest and steal as much rope as one can carry. The magical ropes change loyalties with relative ease, lending their defensive capabilities to the last person to wear a given piece of rope. Whoever injures the owner of a piece of magic rope will find the rope slithering after them, restraining them, and trying to strangle them until they die, or the owner calls off the rope. Either way, these ropes offer an interesting, beautiful, and discrete method of self defense. If the Terror of Farport happens to return home while one is robbing it, however, it will most certainly attack, using its natural weapons to their full extent. Additionally, anyone who attacks the beast, even in self defense, is going to be mobbed by all of the feather ropes in the area, making retreat the safest option if the Terror spots someone stealing its ropes.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Spire Crawler

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

    Climbing and scaling the golden pillars of Goldspire Island is a mysterious giant ape known as the Spire Crawler. The creature spends most of its time using its hardened fingertips to climb the pillars of the island, digging into the solid gold cylinders to cling to their surfaces. Despite its fearsome appearance, and the fact that it has a mouth, the Spire Crawler does not seem to eat anything, not even sand like the ape-like creatures who worship it. As far as I can tell, the creature is able to absorb energy through its claws from the gold of the spires themselves, and it only uses its sharp teeth in combat. The Spire Crawler spends all of its time not roaming the spires in its home, an ancient fort filled with apes from the desert on the other side of the island. These apes seem to worship the Spire Crawler, working to give it comfort in exchange for small amounts of pure gold scraped from the massive cylinders the Spire Crawler feeds on. Apparently, the apes that worship it are able to eat and digest the gold, as well as other metals and minerals, and they seem to get a lot of energy out of the gold they get from their master.

    Aside from absorbing some kind of sustenance from gold, the Spire Crawler's claws are also powerful weapons. Each claw is also able to suck the life force out of living things, something the Spire Crawler is not often able to do in its dry, barren habitat. Each claw, upon close inspection, is actually hollow, like a venomous snake's fangs, and this shape, along with some quality of the claws themselves, removes energy from whatever is impaled on the end of the claws. The one and only thing that seems to really prevent this fate from befalling those who encounter the Spire Crawler is wool. Feeling wool on its claws is very distasteful to the Spire Crawler, to the point that it will even run away if it accidentally pierces some with its claws. 

    Within the Beast's lair, one can obtain obscene amounts of pure gold by simply joining the ranks of the worshipers and doing a good job. Finding the lair is difficult and dangerous due to its remoteness and harsh climate, but anyone who wants gold without needing to dig it out of the spires themselves will be in the perfect place. As far as I can tell, the Spire Crawler wants to be fanned and have the sand moved around into comfortable shapes to lie on, and it will give each of its helpful followers about three pounds of gold to eat every day. If you do not eat gold, you can hid this from the gold-eating apes and put away three pounds of gold every day. I am sure the Spire Crawler also has a large pile of gold dust in a room of the fort somewhere, but I was unable to find it during my stay.

The Old Gritville Mine: Introduction

I have decided that I am going to take a whack at doing the Dungeon 23 Challenge once the new year rolls around, so consider this the introduction and explanation for my entry.

I will try to post updates (here is the first one) with some regularity, but we will see how that mixes with writing other things for the blog. The description I am going with for the dungeon itself is as follows:

    Known as the Old Gritville Mine or the Haunted Mine, this ancient mine is the original reason why Gritville exists, and also the cause of the worst tragedy in the town's history. About 100 years ago, the miners are said to have uncovered something terrible, warping the space inside the mine into a series of ever-shifting reality bubbles taken from all over the prime material plane. Ever since that haunting day, the entrance to the mine brings people to an unstable world of pocket dimensions which shift and move around inside of the mountain without disturbing the surface. Each bubble of reality seems to consist of 7 rooms at most, which can be of pretty much any size and contain pretty much anything. Because of their motion, these pockets of reality maintain only ephemeral connections to each other. While passages and rooms inside the same pocket reality stay consistent, the hallways that leave and connect to another reality bubble will have new, random locations at the end every couple of hours. Some of these bubbles seem fairly similar to what one would expect from a series of mineshafts and excavated ore pockets, some seem to take people to other planets entirely, many appear to be taken from a much more mundane location, and yet more seem to be the awkward fusion of 2 or more unrelated bubbles.
    Roaming the rooms, hallways, and various pocket dimensions of the Old Gritville Mine are all sorts of creatures. Although it is possible to run into survivors of the original accident, most of them are long dead, usually killed by one of the many horrible creatures from the more exotic reality pockets. Aside from alien horrors, many normal, regular people were also sucked into the mine and a few survived long enough to establish small camps, farms, and even towns in the midst of the broiling chaos of reality bubbles. While rare, these safe havens represent the only thing keeping most who get lost in the Haunted Mine from a painful death at the hands of a terrifying beast.
    Although returning to the entrance of the Old Gritville Mine is nearly impossible because the pocket dimensions are always shifting around, the few who have returned have come back with riches, magic, and powerful objects beyond imagination. While these brave adventurers come back wealthy beyond compare, they also speak of dangers and horrors that they never wish to see again. It is up to each adventurer who hears of the Old Gritville Mine to decide for themselves if they will challenge it. Many have come back with great success, but most have never been seen again.

As far as methodology goes, the first room I make on January 1st will be the dungeon entrance and the only way to enter the dungeon from the rest of the game world. From there, each new pocket dimension will get a theme based on a random adjective and a random location type that I have found generators for. These themes will act as guides for what types of rooms and encounters end up in that particular reality bubble since I will be taking up to a full week for each one.

adjective generator

location generator

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: Shpingus

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

    Shpingus is the legendary terror of the Lilac Valley, spoken of in fearful terms even by those who don't believe in her. Legends speak of a voracious hunter who can see in the dark, kill with a single blow from her claws, and disappear into the shadows. While this ostrich-sized beast is certainly dangerous, and she can in fact become a shadow, I would describe her as a scavenger over a hunter. Eating pretty much any food in sight, Shpingus uses her abilities to sneak into settlements and eat as much food as she can get her paws on. If Shpingus is discovered, she will use her fangs and claws in a flurry of death to scare off her attackers, and then melt into a shadow to make her getaway. While she certainly poses a risk to anyone who discovers her, I do not think she has any goal beyond eating as much food as she can find.

    The ability to turn into a shadow is both integral to Shpingus' escape strategy and the result of eating enchanted food a long time ago. Legends say that Shpingus stole a pie left out for the first kobold of Lilac City, meant to give him the power to become an untouchable shadow and travel as swiftly as the wind while in that form. Clearly, the creature still has this power and uses it to great effect. The one thing Shpingus seems to dislike is citrus fruit, avoiding anything that even smells like lemons or limes. While the smell does not bother her, eating even a bite of any citrus will send Shpingus into fits of hiccups for days.

    If one can manage to follow Shpingus back to her burrow under a tree, they will discover a very cozy home. Shpingus seems to take more than just food when she ventures into towns and cities, as her burrow is furnished with every color imaginable of fine cloth, pillows, and rugs. Shpingus seems to like them for their softness, ammassing a massive collection over the years. When I inspected the burrow, I discovered that Shpingus' collection constitutes a huge amount of textile wealth. While most of it is a little worn, some of the fabrics are still the softest I have ever had the pleasure to touch. I made off with a few choice pieces to have made into clothing, and I recommend anyone who is able to find Shpingus' burrow do the same.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Shovel Tusker

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

    While wandering the Bronze Woods of the Lonely Island, it is common to find large trenches dug into the dirt. Locals, while not believed by the world at large, say that these trenches are dug by a creature the size of an elephant known as the Shovel Tusker. By following the trail of the freshest trenches, I was able to find the beast. The Shovel Tusker spends its time digging in the dirt for the edible roots of the otherwise inedible bronzeleaf trees, leaving long trenches in the ground. While usually too focused on feeding to bother others, anything red will immediately gain the Shovel Tusker's attention and be the subject of a vicious attack. The Shovel Tusker's tusks can be used to deadly effect in this rage, so it is best not to bring any red objects to the Bronze Woods.

    Another strange thing about this already strange beast is that the fur on the end of its tail has the magical ability to repel insects, mice, and other pests from areas where the hairs have been scattered. This ability seems to keep parasites and biting flies off of the Shovel Tusker, but it is inherent to the hairs. Oddly enough, the Shovel Tusker seems to shy away from anything that is blue, an opposite reaction to when it sees something red. I cannot say what the cause for this is, but it may be a learned reaction based on something in the beast's past. Regardless, I have found this information to be quite useful in my time studying the Shovel Tusker.

    Every night, the Shovel Tusker returns to the same meadow and goes to sleep in the same spot. The creature has carved several notches into the trees surrounding its home, causing the bronzeleaf trees to ooze sap. This sap has dried and has a unique, metallic scent that makes it worth a lot of money as an ingredient in perfumes and incenses. Such a large supply of dried sap would be worth quite a bit. Additionally, the fur on the tip of the Shovel Tusker's tail regrows relatively quickly, allowing one to collect and use it. The only issue is, of course, shaving the tail without gaining the attention of the Shovel Tusker. I have had some idle thoughts about making a regular trip to collect the dried bronzeleaf sap around the creature's home and to shave its tail in its sleep, but I generally feel like I have better things to do so I don't.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Shindegoost

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

    There is one resident of the Planar Peninsula who I have always struggled to understand. Possessing razor-sharp fangs and powerful tentacles is the Shindegoost, which runs through the Northern Plains at breakneck speeds looking for its preferred prey, teleporting hares. In order to actually catch and eat such prey, the Shindegoost is able to dispatch creatures with shocking speed. The Shindegoost does its killing with its fangs and tentacles, able to easily grab onto anything and slice open its neck in the blink of an eye. This man-sized creature seems to spend most of its time hiding in large bushes and bunches of grass, waiting for its prey to wander by. This behavior likely explains why so few people have ever seen the Shindegoost, in addition to the fact that it will frequently attack any people who happen to discover its hiding spot. By watching a band of teleporting hares for several months, I was able to spot the Shindegoost when one of the hares I was observing seemed to be pulled into a bush one day. Upon closer inspection, I saw the bush shaking a bit, and chose to observe from afar. Soon, the Shindegoost emerged, looking quite satisfied, and began sprinting away faster than any other creature in the Northern Plains.

    While the Shindegoost is quite fast, it seems like that is not the most incredible thing about the creature. The Shindegoost secretes a musk from the tips of its tentacles that is able to prevent the hares it catches from teleporting. The musk seems to be derived from whatever part of the teleporting hares allows their own teleportation, however, so the effect relies on a steady diet of hares and little else. Despite its sharp teeth and strong bite, however, the beast is unable to bite through metal, making one immune to its dangers by wearing conventional armor. With its powerful tentacles, the Shindegoost will be able to remove the armor, but it will give its victim time to react as well.

    Having this time to react is important, as well, because I believe the musk on the creature's tentacles is effective against all forms of teleportation. Such a substance would be of incredible value, one just has to collect it off of the tentacles of a deadly beast. The Shindegoost does not seem to keep a nest or lair of any sort, preferring to sleep up in a tree where other creatures on the ground cannot easily see or reach it. I am not brave enough, but I suppose someone could track the beast down and collect the musk while it is sleeping. Whoever performs such a task has a lot of money to make from those who want to detain teleporting criminals and rivals, so good luck to them.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: Shepherd Jim

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

    Shepherd Jim is the semi-aquatic protector of the cold water manatees that call Big Bay home. Stretching out to thirty feet from his nose to the tip of his tail, the people of Farport know Jim as a fairly gentle creature who will keep manatees out of the way of ships in the bay. Not only is this good for the manatees, but it saves the crews of the ships a lot of work scraping bits of manatee off the hull in port. Manatee herding is not something Shepherd Jim does out of altruism, however, as he will periodically lead one of his herd off to eat it out of sight of the others. To ensure that none of the other manatees find out about his treachery, Jim will pull his victim onto land to eat, usually caching the manatee in a nearby tree and coming back over several days. With his herd as his primary source of food, Jim is quite protective of them. Those who harm a manatee from Jim's herd are rarely heard from again, so it is probably for the best that he tends to keep the manatees away from people.

    Keeping the manatees in check is something that Shepherd Jim is able to do through magic. Jim's saliva has a hypnotic property which makes the manatees docile and easy to direct. In the state, the manatees do little more than sit in place and eat until they are pushed somewhere else by an outside force. To ensure they stay in this state as much as possible, Jim will spend hours of each day grooming his herd of manatees, as well as himself. Beyond the necessity of this behavior for maintaining his food supply, the creature seems to be a bit of a neat freak. He tends to avoid seafoam in particular, seeming to find it particularly offensive, although for what reason I do not know.

    Most people in Farport seem to be aware of Jim, but pay him no mind since he tends to stay out of the way. This is their loss, as most people do not realize that Shepherd Jim eats the manatees he herds, and therefore do not realize that his food caches represent the only way to harvest cold water manatee blubber without incurring his wrath. This blubber, unknown to most, can be dried into one of the hottest burning fuels that can be naturally attained. This blubber, so dense in calories, burns hot enough to melt iron and can be lit with a single spark. While certainly dangerous, this blubber can also be a powerful tool. The creature does not eat the blubber, preferring the meat and organs, so harvesting blubber does not impact Jim's food supply. As a side note, Jim's saliva acts as a powerful narcotic drug when applied to the foreheads of people, and is one of the most relaxing experiences I have ever had.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: Scondalius Firebringer

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

    It has always been considered common knowledge that the tales from the Ashmount Range of Scondalius Firebringer are mere explanations for the random nature of volcanic events in the area. As it turns out, there really is a bright red lizard the size of a hippopotamus that is able to eat rock and regurgitate it as a gout of lava. Scondalius Firebringer seems to eat rocks only to produce lava, however, and needs to maintain a diverse, omnivorous diet to fuel his body. Acting as a bit of a scavenger, Scondalius is able to fit just about anything in his massive jaws and crush it up, a fact he is able to use should his lava spitting fail to ward off an opponent.

    Despite being mostly mouth, the most impressive thing about Scondalius Firebringer is his stomach, which can not only digest just about any organic material, but melt rock into lava. This magical process of melting rock seems to also be why Scondalius is able to eat anything, a convenient side effect. Scondalius Firebringer also seems to be entirely immune to the effects of heat. The creature is able to wade through lava and walk through blazing fires without issue, paying the hazards no mind. As a result of this heat resistance, however, Scondalius cannot handle any temperature cold enough to freeze water. To avoid the cold of winter, Scondalius Firebringer will spend months at a time wallowing in lava pools, apparently unharmed by this behavior.

    Despite getting no nutrition from it, Scondalius Firebringer seems to be able to pass the rocks he eats but does not spit out as lava through his digestive system. This does not appear to be a pleasant experience for the beast, but the one time I saw it happen, the rocks he ate left his body as a massive ruby the size of my head. Something about the magic that melts rock in his stomach seems to also convert rocks into gems when fully passed through. While I certainly collected the massive ruby, I believe the experience was quite uncomfortable for Scondalius and I doubt it would be humane to try to force this result.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Rotten Creeper

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

    Lizard folk of the Mangey Seagull Tribe tell legends of a terrible creature known as the Rotten Creeper, a mass of putrid, decomposing goo that roams the island they call home looking for food. Able to alter its body into any shape, the only warning its victims get is the smell of rotting flesh that permeates the air around the creature. On the new moon, the Rotten Creeper leaves its lair to go find prey, looking to find the largest thing it can catch. The beast will alter its shape to sneak up on its victim, remaining silent until the moment it grabs its prey, at which point it uses its great strength to pull in the poor creature and drown it in its gooey body. By the next new moon, the creature will be digested, bones and all. After a successful hunt, the Rotten Creeper will often kill several more unlucky creatures, taking them back to its nest to become bedding rather than eat them.

    Being able to maintain a solid form with a body that is apparently made entirely of liquid is the result of a magical spell, something I was able to figure out by examining the creature's magical aura. Whoever cast this spell is long gone, but their work remains to terrorize the lizard folk of the Opal. The reason why this mass of decomposed goo is still around so long after its creator seems to be that it is able to suck the energy out of its victims, using this energy to sustain the spell that keeps it alive. To avoid this fate, it is important to always have a source of light around. Any light, but sunlight in particular, seems to dry out and injure the Rotten Creeper, causing it to move away from the source of the pain. In order to avoid being touched by any light, the beast maintains a large pile of decaying animals which it can hide under for the month of light between new moons.

    Taking advantage of this time spent hiding from the light, I was able to get into the Rotten Creeper's lair and collect some samples of the creature's goo. Although it would not stay usable if exposed to sunlight, it turns out that the goo is incredibly caustic, being able to dissolve flesh instantly. These samples have come in handy many times since then, allowing me to dispose of any organic material with ease. To keep the goo safe from drying out, I keep it all in a leather-wrapped vial in my bag which has been quite effective. I assume this goo would have similar utility to others, but no one has ever asked me where I got mine, so I take that as an overall lack of interest in the stuff.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Rooftop Clicker

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

    While it is normal to hear many different sounds at night in a large city, some parents enjoy telling stories to their children about the strange creatures that produce these otherwise mundane sounds. One of these sounds is a distinct, rapid-fire clicking, which stories attribute to a creature known as the Rooftop Clicker. While stories and descriptions vary wildly, there is in fact a real Rooftop Clicker. He stands about three feet tall, is an excellent climber, and he uses his large beak to make his clicking sound. Preferring to run away if anything happens to see him, the Rooftop Clicker seems to prefer to perform in solitude. Should one catch the quick little creature, his beak is actually quite sharp and capable of leaving a nasty gash. As far as food goes, the Rooftop Clicker is able to feed off of the mental anguish of those trying and failing to get to sleep.

    The Rooftop Clicker, when undisturbed, is able to detect the person having the most difficult time getting to sleep in the entire city. He uses this magical sense and climbing skills to make his way to that person's roof, where the Rooftop Clicker will click his beak in irregular, rapid bursts to keep his victim from falling asleep for as long as possible. By standing near his target, the beast is able to absorb the psychic energy produced by the victim's frustration, consuming this psychic energy instead of conventional food. Warding off the Rooftop Clicker is as simple as getting onto the roof and shooing him away, but at that point I would hardly call that a win.

    With great difficulty, I was able to track down the Rooftop Clicker to his nest. Situated inside the attic of an old tavern, the entire nest is coated in a strange, smooth, purple substance. This substance, as it turns out, is regurgitated by the Rooftop Clicker after he feeds, probably a by-product of digesting psychic energy. After it dries, this substance becomes incredibly hard and dense and has been used to create rudimentary furniture in the Rooftop Clicker's nest. This dried substance is harder than diamonds and can be fashioned into incredibly durable and sharp tools with enough work. If the substance is broken, it can be mended by wetting the pieces with water and holding them together for a few moments, making the tools easy to fix as well as durable and sharp.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Quiffleromper

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

    Chickens, and more importantly, roosters, are not really found in the bog lands of Squee, making the sound of a rooster exotic to the area. Bog people, however, seem to have legends of a terrible creature from well before their knowledge of roosters which makes an identical sound. This creature is the Quiffleromper, the legendary protector beast of all quiffle bushes. According to legend, this flightless bird stands about ten feet tall, has a whip-like tail which can shatter bones, and a razor-sharp beak which can sever limbs. The Quiffleromper, as its title suggests, will attack anyone who attempts to pick the fruit of a quiffle bush, preceding the attack with its rooster-like call. In reality, the Quiffleromper only attacks those it sees picking quiffle fruit, which is very few people. Regardless, bog people have a cultural taboo against picking the fruits, which is probably for the best. Quiffle fruits, while not being particularly nutritious, have an addictive quality that its consumers attribute to its unique flavor. 

    Aside from being protective of the bushes, the Quiffleromper also has the ability to instantly travel between quiffle bushes by stepping into one and magically stepping out of a different bush elsewhere. This ability seems to come from a lifelong diet of nothing but quiffle fruit, a feat that would be difficult for any other creature to accomplish. Bog person legends speak of one way to ward off the beast, however. If one wishes to safely pick quiffle fruits, all they have to do is coat themselves in a paste of mint, onion, garlic, and ginger. The strong scents are distasteful to the Quiffleromper and will keep the creature at bay for as long as the paste remains potent. 

    Oddly enough, the Quiffleromper maintains a nest, deep in a massive thicket of quiffle bushes. I was able to get to it by sneaking up on the Quiffleromper itself and walking under it while it transported through a quifflebush, repeating the process as a way to observe the creature until it happened to take me to its nest to sleep. Here, I discovered that the creature passes the large pits of the quiffle fruits without breaking them, and it actually alters the pits in the process. After having been swallowed and excreted by the Quiffleromper, quiffle seeds become explosive. When broken, these altered seeds erupt into a massive ball of flames, a discovery that took me by surprise. Of course, once I learned this I grabbed several of these altered quiffle seeds for self defense, which I recommend anyone else with the opportunity do as well.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Notorious Beast

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

    The Notorious Beast is one of the few creatures I've encountered who is not only known worldwide, but also largely believed to be a hoax. This massive creature, nearly thirty feet tall at the shoulder, is seen regularly by those who visit the remote Peninsular Range. Reports uniformly describe a creature which looms over the treetops, leaving a path of trampled and toppled plants that anyone can follow. Pulsating Plums are the creature's favorite food, although it will eat any fruits it can find in the cloud forests it calls home. Should anything try to challenge the Notorious Beast, it can use its tail like a massive whip, capable of snapping large trees in half. Despite this formidable weapon, the Notorious Beast is so large that very few things are able to gain its attention. Conversely, its size makes it difficult for people not to notice it.

    The fact that the Notorious Beast is so large makes it hard to miss, but the remoteness of its home means that very few people actually have the opportunity to see it in person. This is where the notoriety of the beast comes in. For some strange reason, anyone who sees the Notorious Beast is magically compelled to tell everyone they meet about it for up to a year after seeing the creature. A secondary part of this magical effect seems to be that anyone who hears about the Notorious Beast but hasn't seen it will assume that they are being lied to. Due to the low number of people who have actually seen the creature, this has led to global derision at the idea of such a creature, and even resulted in the rather sarcastic name bestowed upon it. The magical effect seems to be some kind of defense mechanism to keep attention away from the Notorious Beast, and it seems to be working quite well. As far as curing this effect goes, I found that eating a pulsating plum, the beast's favorite food, does the trick, and will also work as effective bait for the creature itself.

    Related to the effects of viewing the Notorious Beast is the effect gained from covering oneself in a powder made from the creature's shed scales. After several months of following it around, I had amassed quite the collection of shed scales, so I chose to experiment a little. As it turns out, the powdered scales have a strange effect. While they do not turn things invisible or muffle sounds, the powdered scales made it so that other living things simply do not notice whatever is covered in scale powder. In essence, with the scale powder one does not need to become invisible because no one will notice or care that they are there. Of course, it did take me a long time to collect enough scales to grant this effect to myself, but considering my line of work, I actually followed the Notorious Beast for much longer than I had planned to collect a decent supply of scales. The Notorious Beast seems to shed the most during drier parts of the year, but not by much.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Mud Guzzler

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

    When wandering parts of the bog lands of Squee at night, one may hear a strange sound. This sound is something like that of a howling wind in the distance, although I have personally only ever heard the sound when the air is calm. Local folklore suggests that this sound is produced by some kind of massive, deadly creature that one ought to move away from, but having followed the sound, I can tell you that it is produced by the harmless Mud Guzzler. Standing about ten feet tall at the shoulder, the Mud Guzzler is a nocturnal creature that feeds by sucking mud up through its trunk and filtering out all of the insects, rodents, and bits of organic matter to be digested while the inedible parts are expelled immediately. This feeding method is what produces the terrifying sound that most know the Mud Guzzler by. Although it is generally peaceful, the creature is able to defend itself by blasting mud out of its trunk at assailants. 

    Something about the Mud Guzzler's mud filtering must be magical. This is because the filtered mud that it excretes is lacking in any organic material at all and has the ability reverse the aging process in other animals. I do not know why the beast would grant this effect to mud, but any creature who finds themselves submerged in the filtered mud will rejuvenate at a rate of one year for every hour submerged. In order to produce this magic mud, the Mud Guzzler seems to prefer mud with very few rocks in it. After noticing this, I did a few experiments and found that the creature will generally avoid rocky areas, allowing me to start influencing its direction of travel by putting rocks in areas I did not want the Mud Guzzler to go. Given no choice in the matter, the creature will cease feeding to go find a less rocky area, but only after it has exhausted its nearest supplies of non-rocky mud.

    Even after a few weeks of observing, I never saw the Mud Guzzler return to any one spot to sleep. Rather than maintain a nest, the creature seems perfectly happy to burrow into the mud and sleep wherever it is when the sun comes up in the morning. While this can make finding the creature somewhat difficult until you get close enough to hear it, the magical filtered mud it produces is probably worth more than gold. Unless one provokes the Mud Guzzler, collecting its magical mud should be as easy as following it around and waiting. I think the only reason this resource isn't being exploited is that most people choose to believe local legends when they hear the horrible noise produced by the Mud Guzzler and run away. Simply put, everyone is too scared to go look and find out the truth, which I suppose is a good thing if you're the Mud Guzzler.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: Martha the Giant Snake

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

    Measuring nearly two hundred feet long is one of the largest residents of the Damp Plains, Martha the Giant Snake. Martha, like many snakes, is a predator who swallows her prey whole after subduing it. Unfortunately for the people of the Damp Plains, Martha's preferred food is them. The beast's preferred hunting method is to wait until nightfall, sneak into a village, and pick off anyone walking around by themselves. Despite her size, Martha only really needs to eat a few times a month, and she spreads her hunting out between villages, meaning very few people have any idea what the true reason for the disappearances is. While certain legends do describe giant horned snakes such as Martha, almost no one in the Damp Plains suspects the legends to have any real truth to them. Despite this, Martha was actually quite easy to track down. During the day, Martha has a particularly large rocky outcrop she likes to sun herself on, and I happened upon her while looking for a place to eat my lunch about a day after I began my search. The outcrop in question gives a great view of the surrounding plains and villages, which is why I had picked the spot, and evidently Martha appreciates a good view too.

    The few times I witnessed another creature attack Martha, she showed herself to be much faster than one would expect, and she preferred to use her horns as weapons. Without fail, every time she was able to get both horns in contact with her assailant, the unsuspecting creature would be electrocuted to death. This effective use of a magical ability seems to be purely for defense, however, as all of Martha's victims die from a potent venom in her fangs before being consumed. To avoid either fate, it seems like one needs to keep lots of wind chimes and bells around. Martha has sensitive hearing, which she uses to make sure nothing is sneaking up on her, and that also means she dislikes loud, high-pitched noises.

    Once, a group of drunks with bells happened to walk down a village street that Martha was hunting on. I do not know what these people were celebrating, but their activities caused Martha to leave the area with such haste that she actually knocked one of her horns against a building with enough force to gouge the building and chip her horn. After inspecting the piece of horn material, I found that it is able to convert other forms of energy into electricity, and I was even able to have a device made that uses the horn to launch lightning bolts at targets on command. I'm not really sure how one would go about getting a chip of Martha's horns on purpose, but it would be worth it.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: Marteus Goldhide

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

    The people who live near the mouth of the Mustard River say that if you ever get lost out in the salt marsh, simply call out for Marteus Goldhide and he will appear to lead you home in exchange for nothing more than a bit of food when you get there. While most brush this off as a fairy tale after a few attempts, it turns out that Marteus Goldhide is real, his hearing is just very bad so he needs to be quite close to hear the calls for help. Despite being hard of hearing, Marteus Goldhide, or Marty, as he likes to be called, is quite affable and makes for a very good travelling companion. The beast knows the salt marsh better than anyone else alive and is able to avoid treacherous areas, or places where dangerous animals tend to be, and he claims to feel an obligation to use his knowledge to help others. When I asked how a gold-scaled lizard the size of a bear like Marty came to be, he explained to me that he has been cursed with his appearance, among other details. 

    Long ago, nearly 1,000 years ago by Marty's reckoning, he insulted a witch and now he is cursed with the appearance of a giant golden lizard, an unnaturally long life, and the inability to leave the salt marsh he now calls home. Marteus Goldhide has chosen to use his curse for good and has become a master of his environment, knowing the properties of all of the plants and animals that call the salt marshes home as well as all of the safe routes through them. In the sunlight, he is able to use his gleaming scales to blind anything that tries to attack and he is capable of using his claws if that fails. Marty is a very gentle soul and is unlikely to attack unless provoked.

    Marty has built up a shelter of sorts over the years by moving whatever large rocks and wood he could find into a ramshackle hut. Inside, he keeps a vast collection of mementos and tokens from those he has helped and befriended in the past. Among his collection are medals from several important people of the past, magical trinkets which are unlike any other in the world, and pieces that hold only sentimental value. Marteus Goldhide's collection is worth a thousand king's ransoms, but I think Marty sees it as even more valuable than that due to the memories associated with each object. If there is anything he would quickly jump to violence to defend, it is his collection of trinkets.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: Ludwig of the Forest

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

    When wandering the woods and forests of the Greatest Fork, it is possible to catch a glimpse of a strange creature known as Ludwig of the Forest. Ludwig stands about six feet tall at the shoulder and spends his time wandering through the woods foraging for food. The creature's diet consists mostly of the soft inner bark of trees, something he is able to get by thrashing tree trunks with the spikes on his flexible trunk. This action knocks off and shreds the outer bark and makes it much easier to get at the soft tissue Ludwig prefers to eat. Ludwig is also quite fast, able to range dozens of miles from his nest and still return home to sleep each night. As a result, Ludwig is pretty much only found in his nest when it is dark out and he is sleeping. In order to survive the harsh winters of his home, Ludwig must hibernate each year, going to sleep around the time the leaves fall and waking up around the time new buds form. None of this is to say that Ludwig is peaceful. The beast is incredibly violent, but only towards those who he witnesses cutting down trees. When he sees someone cutting down a living tree, he flies into a rage, charging the offender and shredding them with his spiked trunk.

    Although it may seem odd that a beast who brutalizes trees like Ludwig would dislike those who cut them down, I believe there is a reason for it. Ludwig, as far as I can tell, has the magical ability to sense which trees are close to death. While this is a bold claim, I believe it has merit because the creature only ever seems to feed on trees that are either sick or quite old. Often, the sickliness of the trees are not evident until after they have been killed. Such an ability indicates that Ludwig must care for the overall health of the forest, speeding up the demise of unhealthy trees to keep the overall population strong. Why Ludwig performs this task is beyond me, but I appreciate his work. Other than not getting on his bad side, the best way to ward off Ludwig is to burn pretty much any kind of incense. Ludwig has a very sensitive sense of smell and does not like the strong scent of burning incense.

    If one can find Ludwig's nest, it is quite safe to look inside because Ludwig is either not there or he is asleep. This is a good thing because Ludwig actually keeps a lot of valuable material in his nest. To keep things soft, he shreds up tree bark with his trunk until it is soft and fluffy. Not only is this material excellent bedding, but it can be spun into thread and woven into incredibly soft fabrics. Or if you don't want fabrics, the unprocessed fluff is highly flammable, which is always great. Whatever you want to do with your pilfered bedding, the stuff is very valuable and can also be sold for large amounts of money while being relatively easy to collect once you know where to get it.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Leopard Gecko

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

    One of the few creatures I've encountered that has been mistaken for a god is the Leopard Gecko, a creature that wanders the Cerebral Desert of the Dragon's Maw. A dangerous ambush predator the size of a regular leopard, this scaled beast is cold-blooded and lizard-like despite its more mammalian features. While it maintains a den in an exposed crag of rock, the Leopard Gecko will sometimes spend weeks at a time wandering the desert in search of food. The Leopard Gecko gets all of the water it needs from its prey, usually an unlucky pygmy camel, and it only needs to eat once every week or so due to its lower metabolism. Sunbathing in the morning is a must, and the Leopard Gecko is unlikely to attack a person while it is sunbathing, or if it has just eaten, but that never means it is safe to get lose.

    One incredible ability of the Leopard Gecko is that it can turn completely invisible on the sand. Something about its scaly skin is able to perfectly mimic the texture and color of sand, helping it to sneak up on its prey. This cat also dislikes water, avoiding it as much as possible, although water does not seem to harm the Leopard Gecko in any way. Following this example, the lizard folk of the Leopard Gecko Tribe spent generations practicing their stealth, painting themselves yellow with black spots, and avoiding water as much as possible. These lizard folk believe that by following the creature's example, it will protect their village and grant them some of its powers. Incredibly, some of the most devoted members of the tribe are actually able to channel the Leopard Gecko's powers and gain a sandy texture that makes them disappear in the desert. Also of note is that not once have I ever seen the Leopard Gecko attack a member of the tribe, despite it preying upon several people during my observation period. Clearly, something the lizard folk are doing works.

    Following it to its den, I discovered something strange. Like many lizards, the Leopard Gecko sheds its skin in patches and eats the patches as they fall off. I was able to sneak up on it while it was asleep and remove a shedding patch of skin a little early. After some experimentation, I was able to get this piece of skin to take on the sandy texture the Leopard Gecko uses to hide. By running an electric current through it, I was able to replicate the magical ability. It would be dangerous to get enough materials, and wearing it would probably be rather dangerous, but I can imagine a cloak or something covered in shed Leopard Gecko skin that can be shocked into a sandy appearance would be useful. I could at least get some use out of such a garment.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Land Whale

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

    The lizard folk of the Dragon's Maw live in fear of a creature known only as the Land Whale. While lizard folk accounts are almost never taken seriously by the rest of the world, their tales of this predator the size of an elephant ought to be taken seriously. In order to keep such a large bulk fed, the Land Whale must spend almost all of its waking time hunting the local pygmy camels and giant pelicans. This voracious appetite means that any people who find themselves in the path of the Land Whale are also on the menu. I was able observe through a lot of invisibility potions and leaving out bait. I was then able to follow the creature to its nest, hidden away at the top of a rugged hill and built up from the feathers and fur of all of the beast's recent meals. While the creature will try to sneak up on prey, it is so large that even the trees and bushes of its home cannot hide it for long, forcing the Land Whale to pursue prey over longer distances than it would like.

    How such a creature came to be in the first place is, I believe, the result of a magical experiment. In addition to giving it legs legs, whoever created the Land Whale also made it virtually immortal and highly aggressive to all other living things. The Land Whale's creator, however, seems to be long gone because I have not once witnessed anyone visiting the beast or heard tales of any such thing ever happening. As far as the local lizard folk are concerned, the Land Whale has always been and always will be, leaving the creature's origins a complete mystery. Oddly enough, the beast seems to be fearful of the sound of bells, a fact that I never needed to use, but which some travelers may find useful.

    One thing I can be sure of, however, is that the Land Whale was created with one goal in mind, hypnotic ambergris. Unlike marine whales which rarely produce usable amounts of ambergris, the Land Whale will excrete around five pounds of ambergris every year during the Fall Equinox. Finding and collecting this substance is a dangerous, stinky job given the required proximity to such a violent creature, and one must properly process the substance before it can be used. However, if someone ages the ambergris properly, it can be used to hypnotize others and control their actions. I have not had any opportunities to test the limits of these hypnotic suggestions, but I believe that it is quite powerful. In the wrong hands, such a powerful substance could be quite dangerous.

The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Lake Giraffe

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

    Although it sounds unlikely that a large mammal would inhabit a high altitude lake that freezes over every winter, the kobolds of the Short River Valley would beg to differ. Their legends speak of a creature that appears to be a giraffe with flippers and a finned tail that only those with the purest and most lawful souls are able to see. While that last part certainly isn't true, the Lake Giraffe itself is a real creature that lives in the largest lake in the valley, Long Lake. During the summers, the Lake Giraffe spends its time grazing on lakeside plants and grasses, using its long neck to avoid getting too close to shore. Closer to shore, it is likely to be attacked by one of the many land predators of the valley, so the Land Giraffe spends almost all of its time in the deeper parts of the lake. To survive the winter, the Lake Giraffe has an interesting strategy. Much like the alligators further south which survive short freezes by going dormant under the ice, the Lake Giraffe will sit on the bottom of the lake with only its nose above the surface. The Lake Giraffe will then enter a deep slumber until the surface of the lake thaws again in the spring, apparently unharmed by spending months under the ice.

    The Lake Giraffe's cold resistance is due to its fur, which acts as a near-perfect insulator. Despite being covered in a layer of fur no different than a normal giraffe's, it has the magical property of being able to retain the perfect amount of body heat to keep the Lake Giraffe warm and comfortable. I was able to collect some samples and confirm these observations by finding the beast's nose on the lake ice one winter and waiting for the thaw. While it was still drowsy and disoriented, I was able to shave off some fur and get away before the Lake Giraffe was aware of my presence. Overall, the creature is terrified of other animals and will dive under the water, hiding for hours, as soon as it notices movement on land or the lake surface. Because of this bashfulness, I do not believe the creature poses much of a threat to those who happen upon it.

    If one was able to catch it without harming the Lake Giraffe, the creature's fur could be used to make very high quality winter-wear. That said, I believe that if the Lake Giraffe were missing its fur during the cold parts of the year, it would not be able to maintain enough warmth and it would freeze to death. To avoid the needless death of such a majestic creature, I would ask that anyone looking to collect its fur follow a method similar to mine, ensuring that the Lake Giraffe has time before winter to regrow its fur.