Chimera

Chimera (mythology)

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For other uses of the term "Chimera", see Chimera (disambiguation).

The Chimera on a red-figure Apulian plate, ca 350–340 BC (Musée du Louvre)

The Chimera (also Chimaera or Chimæra) (pron.: /kɨˈmɪərə/ or /kaɪˈmɪərə/; Greek: Χίμαιρα, Khimaira, from χίμαρος, khimaros, "she-goat") was, according to Greek mythology, a monstrous fire-breathing female creature of Lycia in Asia Minor, composed of the parts of three animals: a lion, a serpent and a goat. Usually depicted as a lion, with the head of a goat arising from its back, and a tail that ended in a snake's head,^[1] the Chimera was one of the offspring of Typhon and Echidna and a sibling of such monsters as Cerberus and the Lernaean Hydra. The term chimera has come to describe any mythical or fictional animal with parts taken from various animals.

Contents 1 Description 2 Classical sources 3 Hypothesis about origin 4 Use for Chinese mythological creatures 5 See also 6 Notes 7 References

Description

Homer's brief description in the Iliad^[2] is the earliest surviving literary reference: "a thing of immortal make, not human, lion-fronted and snake behind, a goat in the middle,^[3] and snorting out the breath of the terrible flame of bright fire".^[4] Elsewhere in the Iliad, Homer attributes the rearing of Chimera to Amisodorus.^[5] Hesiod's Theogony follows the Homeric description: he makes the Chimera the issue of Echidna: "She was the mother of Chimaera who breathed raging fire, a creature fearful, great, swift-footed and strong, who had three heads, one of a grim-eyed lion; in her hinderpart, a dragon; and in her middle, a goat, breathing forth a fearful blast of blazing fire. Her did Pegasus and noble Bellerophon slay"^[6] The author of the Bibliotheca concurs:^[7] descriptions agree that she breathed fire. The Chimera is generally considered to have been female (see the quotation from Hesiod above) despite the mane adorning its lion's head, the inclusion of a close mane often was depicted on lionesses, but the ears always were visible (that does not occur with depictions of male lions). Sighting the Chimera was an omen of storms, shipwrecks, and natural disasters (particularly volcanoes).

"Chimera of Arezzo": an Etruscan bronze

While there are different genealogies, in one version the Chimera mated with her brother Orthrus and mothered the Sphinx and the Nemean lion (others have Orthrus and their mother, Echidna, mating; most attribute all to Typhon and Echidna).
The Chimera finally was defeated by Bellerophon, with the help of Pegasus, at the command of King Iobates of Lycia. Since Pegasus could fly, Bellerophon shot the Chimera from the air, safe from her heads and breath.^[8] A scholiast to Homer adds that he finished her off by equipping his spear with a lump of lead that melted when exposed to the Chimera's fiery breath and consequently killed her, an image drawn from metalworking.^[9]

Gold reel, possibly an ear-stud, with winged Pegasus (outer band) and the Chimera (inner band), Magna Graecia or Etruria, fourth century BC (Louvre)

The Chimera was situated in foreign Lycia,^[10] but her representation in the arts was wholly Greek.^[11] An autonomous tradition, one that did not rely on the written word, was represented in the visual repertory of the Greek vase-painters. The Chimera first appears at an early stage in the proto-Corinthian pottery-painters' repertory, providing some of the earliest identifiable mythological scenes that can be recognized in Greek art. The Corinthian type is fixed, after some early hesitation, in the 670s BC; the variations in the pictorial representations suggest to Marilyn Low Schmitt^[12] a multiple origin. The fascination with the monstrous devolved by the end of the seventh century into a decorative Chimera-motif in Corinth,^[13] while the motif of Bellerophon on Pegasus took on a separate existence alone. A separate Attic tradition, where the goats breathe fire and the animal's rear is serpent-like, begins with such confidence that Marilyn Low Schmitt^[14] is convinced there must be unrecognized earlier local prototypes. Two vase-painters employed the motif so consistently they are given the pseudonyms the Bellerophon Painter and the Chimaera Painter. A fire-breathing lioness was one of the earliest of solar and war deities in Ancient Egypt (representations from 3000 years prior to the Greek) and influences are feasible.
In Etruscan civilization, the Chimera appears in the "Orientalizing" period that precedes Etruscan Archaic art; that is to say, very early indeed. The Chimera appears in Etruscan wall-paintings of the fourth century BC.

Pebble mosaic depicting Bellerophon killing the Chimera, from Rhodes archaeological museum

Robert Graves suggests,^[15] "The Chimera was, apparently, a calendar-symbol of the tripartite year, of which the seasonal emblems were lion, goat, and serpent."
In Medieval art, though the Chimera of Antiquity was forgotten, chimerical figures appear as embodiments of the deceptive, even Satanic forces of raw nature. Provided with a human face and a scaly tail, as in Dante's vision of Geryon in Inferno xvii.7–17, 25–27, hybrid monsters, more akin to the Manticore of Pliny's Natural History (viii.90), provided iconic representations of hypocrisy and fraud well into the seventeenth century, through an emblemmatic representation in Cesare Ripa's Iconologia.^[16]

Classical sources

The myths of the Chimera can be found in Pseudo-Apollodorus' Bibliotheca (book 1), Homer's Iliad (book 6); Hyginus' Fabulae 57 and 151; Ovid's Metamorphoses (book VI 339; IX 648); and Hesiod's Theogony 319ff.
Virgil, in the Aeneid (book 5) employs Chimaera for the name of Gyas' gigantic ship in the ship-race, with possible allegorical significance in contemporary Roman politics.^[17]

Hypothesis about origin

The eternal fires of Chimera in Lycia where the myth takes place

Main article: Mount Chimaera

Pliny the Elder cited Ctesias and quoted Photius identifying the Chimera with an area of permanent gas vents which still can be found today by hikers on the Lycian Way in southwest Turkey. Called in Turkish Yanartaş (flaming rock), it consists of some two dozen vents in the ground, grouped in two patches on the hillside above the Temple of Hephaestus about 3 km north of Çıralı, near ancient Olympos, in Lycia. The vents emit burning methane thought to be of metamorphic origin, which in ancient times were landmarks by which sailors could navigate.
The Neo-Hittite Chimera from Carchemish, dated to 850–750 BC, which is now housed in the Museum of Anatolian Civilizations^[18] no doubt served as a basis for the Greek legend. It differs from the Greek version in that while there are three heads, none of them is that of a goat, only a main human head, a lion's head facing forward and placed on the chest of the lion's body, and a snake's head placed at the end of the tail.

Use for Chinese mythological creatures

Some western scholars of Chinese art, starting with Victor Segalen, use the word "chimera" generically to refer to winged quadrupeds, such as bixie, tianlu, and even qilin.^[19]

See also

Look up chimera in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Chimera in popular culture
• Griffin
• Hybrid (mythology)
• Nue
• Pixiu
• Simurgh
• Ziz
• Zu (mythology)

Notes

1. ^ Peck, "Chimaera".
2. ^ Homer, Iliad 6.179–182
3. ^ "The creature was a goat; a young goat that had seen but one winter was called chimaira in Greek". (Kerenyi 1959:82).
4. ^ In Richmond Lattimore's translation.
5. ^ Homer, Iliad, 16.328–329
6. ^ Hesiod Theogony 319–325 in Hugh Evelyn-White's translation.
7. ^ Pseudo-Apollodorus, Bibliotheca 2.3.1: "it had the fore part of a lion, the tail of a dragon, and its third head, the middle one, was rough which it belched fire. And it devastated the country and harried the cattle; for it was a single creature with the power of three beasts. It is said, too, that this Chimera was bred by Amisodarus, as Homer also affirms,3 and that it was begotten by Typhon on Echidna, as Hesiod relates".
8. ^ Pindar: Olympian Odes, 13.84–90; Pseudo-Apollodorus, Bibliotheca 2.3.2; Hesiod, Theogony 319 ff.
9. ^ Graves, section 75, note
10. ^ Homer, Iliad 16.328–329, links her breeding to the Trojan ally Amisodarus of Lycia, as a plague for men.
11. ^ Anne Roes "The Representation of the Chimaera" The Journal of Hellenic Studies 54.1 (1934), pp. 21–25, adduces Ancient Near Eastern conventions of winged animals who wings end in animal heads.
12. ^ This outline of Chimera motifs follows Marilyn Low Schmitt, "Bellerophon and the Chimaera in Archaic Greek Art" American Journal of Archaeology 70.4 (October 1966), pp. 341–347.
13. ^ Later coins struck at Sicyon, near Corinth, bear the chimera-motif. (Schmitt 1966:344 note.
14. ^ Schmitt 1966.
15. ^ Graves 1960:sect.34.2.
16. ^ John F. Moffitt, "An Exemplary Humanist Hybrid: Vasari's 'Fraude' with Reference to Bronzino's 'Sphinx'" Renaissance Quarterly 49.2 (Summer 1996), pp. 303–333, traces the chimeric image of Fraud backwards from Bronzino.
17. ^ W.S.M. Nicoll, "Chasing Chimaeras" The Classical Quarterly New Series, 35.1 (1985), pp. 134–139.
18. ^ fr:Fichier:Museum of Anatolian Civilizations080.jpg
19. ^ Barry Till (1980), "Some Observations on Stone Winged Chimeras at Ancient Chinese Tomb Sites", Artibus Asiae 42 (4): 261–281, JSTOR 3250032

References

• Graves, Robert, (1955) 1960. The Greek Myths (Baltimore: Penguin), section 75.b, pp 252–56
• Kerenyi, Karl, 1959. The Heroes of the Greeks. (London and New York:Thames and Hudson)
• Peck, Harry Thurston, 1898. Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities: "Chimaera"

Research Reference for Monstropedia Everna
Source:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chimera_%28mythology%29

A Wendigo, tentative image from http://www.wowwiki.com/Wendigo
In Everna, Wendigo can be found in cold places like Val'shka, Fjorn and Bjordan

Wendigo

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Jump to: navigation, search

"Windigo" redirects here. For other uses, see Windigo (disambiguation).

For other uses, see Wendigo (disambiguation).

The Wendigo (also known as Windigo, Weendigo, Windago, Waindigo, Windiga, Witiko, Wihtikow, and numerous other variants)^[1] is a mythical creature appearing in the mythology of the Algonquian people. It is a malevolent cannibalistic spirit into which humans could transform, or which could possess humans. Those who indulged in cannibalism were at particular risk,^[2] and the legend appears to have reinforced this practice as a taboo.

Wendigo psychosis is the name conventionally given to a culture-bound disorder which involved an intense craving for human flesh and the fear that the sufferer would turn into a cannibal. This once occurred frequently among Algonquian Native cultures, but has declined due to the Native American urbanization.^[3]

Recently the Wendigo has also become a horror entity of contemporary literature and film, much like the vampire, werewolf, or zombie, although these fictional depictions often bear little resemblance to the original entity.

Contents [hide] 1 In Algonquian mythology 2 Human Wendigos 3 Wendigo ceremony 4 Wendigo psychosis 5 References in popular culture 6 See also 7 Citations 8 References 9 External links

[edit] In Algonquian mythology

The Wendigo is part of the traditional belief systems of various Algonquian-speaking tribes in the northern United States and Canada, most notably the Ojibwe and Saulteaux, the Cree, the Naskapi and the Innu people.^[4] Though descriptions varied somewhat, common to all these cultures was the conception of Wendigos as malevolent, cannibalistic, supernatural beings (manitous) of great spiritual power.^[5] They were strongly associated with the Winter, the North, and coldness, as well as with famine and starvation.^[6] Basil Johnston, an Ojibwe teacher and scholar from Ontario, gives one description of how Wendigos were viewed:^[7]

“

The Weendigo was gaunt to the point of emaciation, its desiccated skin pulled tautly over its bones. With its bones pushing out against its skin, its complexion the ash gray of death, and its eyes pushed back deep into their sockets, the Weendigo looked like a gaunt skeleton recently disinterred from the grave. What lips it had were tattered and bloody [....] Unclean and suffering from suppurations of the flesh, the Weendigo gave off a strange and eerie odor of decay and decomposition, of death and corruption.

”

At the same time, Wendigos were embodiments of gluttony, greed, and excess: never satisfied after killing and consuming one person, they were constantly searching for new victims. In some traditions, humans who became overpowered by greed could turn into Wendigos; the Wendigo myth thus served as a method of encouraging cooperation and moderation.^[8]

Among the Ojibwe, Eastern Cree, Westmain Swampy Cree, Naskapi, and Innu, Wendigos were said to be giants, many times larger than human beings (a characteristic absent from the Wendigo myth in the other Algonquian cultures).^[9] Whenever a Wendigo ate another person, it would grow in proportion to the meal it had just eaten, so that it could never be full.^[10] Wendigos were therefore simultaneously constantly gorging themselves and emaciated from starvation.

[edit] Human Wendigos

All cultures in which the Wendigo myth appeared shared the belief that human beings could turn into Wendigos if they ever resorted to cannibalism^[2] or, alternatively, become possessed by the demonic spirit of a Wendigo, often in a dream. Once transformed, a person would become violent and obsessed with eating human flesh. The most frequent cause of transformation into a Wendigo was if a person had resorted to cannibalism, consuming the body of another human in order to keep from starving to death during a time of extreme hardship or famine.^[11]

Among northern Algonquian cultures, cannibalism, even to save one's own life, was viewed as a serious taboo; the proper response to famine was suicide or resignation to death.^[12] On one level, the Wendigo myth thus worked as a deterrent and a warning against resorting to cannibalism; those who did would become Wendigo monsters themselves.

[edit] Wendigo ceremony

Among the Assiniboine, the Cree and the Ojibwe, a satirical ceremonial dance was originally performed during times of famine to reinforce the seriousness of the Wendigo taboo. The ceremonial dance, known as a wiindigookaanzhimowin in Ojibwe and today performed as part of the last day activities of the Sun Dance, involves wearing a mask and dancing about the drum backwards.^[13] The last known Wendigo Ceremony conducted in the United States was at Lake Windigo of Star Island of Cass Lake, located within the Leech Lake Indian Reservation in northern Minnesota.^[14]

[edit] Wendigo psychosis

The term "Wendigo psychosis" (also spelled many other ways, including "Windigo psychosis" and "Witiko psychosis") refers to a condition in which sufferers developed an insatiable desire to eat human flesh even when other food sources were readily available,^[15] often as a result of prior famine cannibalism.^[16] Wendigo psychosis has traditionally been identified by Western psychologists as a culture-bound syndrome, though there is a debate over the existence of phenomenon as a genuine disorder. The theory was popular primarily among psychologists in the early 1900s, and may have resulted from a misinterpretation of northern Algonquian myths and culture.^[17]

In accounts of Wendigo psychosis, members of the aboriginal communities in which it existed believed that cases literally involved individuals turning into Wendigos. Such individuals generally recognized these symptoms as meaning that they were turning into Wendigos, and often requested to be executed before they could harm others.^[18] The most common response when someone began suffering from Wendigo psychosis was curing attempts by traditional native healers or Western doctors. In the unusual cases where these attempts failed, and the Wendigo began either to threaten those around them or to act violently or anti-socially, they were then generally executed.^[19] Cases of Wendigo psychosis, though evidently real, were relatively rare, and it was even rarer for them to actually culminate in the execution of the sufferer.^[19]

One of the more famous cases of Wendigo psychosis involved a Plains Cree trapper from Alberta, named Swift Runner.^[20][21] During the winter of 1878, Swift Runner and his family were starving, and his eldest son died. Twenty-five miles away from emergency food supplies at a Hudson's Bay Company post, Swift Runner butchered and ate his wife and five remaining children.^[22] Given that he resorted to cannibalism so near to food supplies, and that he killed and consumed the remains of all those present, it was revealed that Swift Runner's was not a case of pure cannibalism as a last resort to avoid starvation, but rather of a man suffering from Wendigo psychosis.^[22] He eventually confessed and was executed by authorities at Fort Saskatchewan.^[23] Another well-known case involving Wendigo psychosis was that of Jack Fiddler, an Oji-Cree chief and shaman known for his powers at defeating Wendigos. In some cases this entailed euthanizing people suffering from Wendigo psychosis; as a result, in 1907, Fiddler and his brother Joseph were arrested by the Canadian authorities for murder. Jack committed suicide, but Joseph was tried and sentenced to life in prison. He was ultimately granted a pardon, but died three days later in jail before receiving the news of this pardon.^[24]

Fascination with Wendigo psychosis among Western ethnographers, psychologists, and anthropologists led to a hotly debated controversy in the 1980s over the historicity of this phenomenon. Some researchers argued that Wendigo psychosis was essentially a fabrication, the result of naïve anthropologists taking stories related to them at face value.^[25][17] Others have pointed to a number of credible eyewitness accounts, both by Algonquians and by Westerners, as evidence that Wendigo psychosis was a factual historical phenomenon.^[26]

The frequency of Wendigo psychosis cases decreased sharply in the 20th century as Boreal Algonquian people came in to greater and greater contact with Western ideologies and more sedentary, less rural lifestyles.^[3] While there is some substantive evidence to suggest that Wendigo psychosis did exist, a number of questions concerning the condition remain unanswered, and there is continuing debate over its nature, significance, and prevalence.

[edit] References in popular culture

While Wendigos have been referred to in literature for many decades (most notably in Algernon Blackwood's 1910 story "The Wendigo," which introduced the legend to horror fiction,^[27] and in Stephen King's novel Pet Sematary^[28]), recently they have become something of a stock character in horror and fantasy films and television, along the lines of werewolves and vampires, usually bearing very little resemblance to the Algonquian spirit. Appearances include the movies Wendigo^[29] and Ravenous, and in episodes of the television series Blood Ties^[30], Charmed^[31], Supernatural^[32], Haven^[33] and others.

They also appear as characters in a number of computer and video games, including Final Fantasy,^[34] The Legend of Dragoon,^[35] and the Warcraft Universe,^[36] as well as role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons.^[37] Additionally, there is a Marvel Comics character known as "Wendigo".

They are referenced in music as well: the Cree singer-songwriter Buffy Sainte-Marie's song "The Priests Of The Golden Bull" asserts that the "money junkies" of the world are Wendigos.^[38]

[edit] See also

• Ithaqua
• Jack Fiddler
• Jikininki
• Ogre
• Skin-walker
• Wendigo (comics)

Gnoll

Gnoll - Dungeon & Dragons Version

Gnoll - World of Warcraft Version

Gnolls are similar to the were-hyenas of African bushman folklore, and the tall dog men (Cynocephales) of early European travellers' logs and bestiaries. Hyenas were associated with death because they dug up and ate human corpses.

Gnolls in the Discworld series are small, matted and dirty enough to sprout fungi and grasses on their hides (and seem to relate to soil as trolls relate to rock), and act as street-cleaners in cities like Ankh-Morpork; as Captain Carrot Ironfoundersson puts it, they "pick up this, pick up that, maybe bang it against the wall until it stops struggling..." In the case of at least Stoolie, if not every gnoll on the Discworld, there seems to be a tendency to drop the vowels in words, reflecting a croaking sort of voice.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnoll

Dungeon & Dragons Version

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/eo/20030823a

World of Warcraft version:

http://www.wowwiki.com/Gnoll

Monstropedia Eternia - vol. 02

MONSTROPEDIA ETERNIA
List of Monsters and Magical Beasts
Described in FireHeart Novels
Part 02

Orc
Level A (Humanoid Race)
Element: All, mostly Earth and Fire
Alignment: Neutral – Chaotic – Warlike
Usually found in: Gremion (Realm of Orcs), Sylvania and throughout Aurelia
Description:
Orcs are a humanoid variation race with greenish, brownish or grayish skin. Their intelligence is slightly inferior to humans but they cover it with superior strength. Their faces are like boars with tusks protruding from their overlarge mouths, and short-boar-snout-like noses. Some orcs do have superior intelligence, and they mostly serve or lead as shamans and army officers. They organize their people as tribes, and sometimes several or many tribes unite as a nation ruled by a Khan. Chieftains are known with a title Bragl, and the superior orcs (in intelligence and/or strength) are usually called ‘Uruk-hai’.
Orcs are usually well-versed with Aurelian Common Speech as well as their own harsh language that mostly sounds like grunts and growls, but they always speak in harsh slangs and sarcasms, and only believe that they can only control or lead others by power and out of fear. Female orcs only choose those who are fearsome and strong (because no orc is fair – as a matter of fact). No wonder male orcs sometimes kill each other to get the female and to show who’s the strongest.

Kobold
Level D (Humanoid Mutant)
Element: Physical, Beastly
Alignment: Neutral
Usually found in: Lore, Regia, Escudia-Corazon, Arcadia, Wardstone, Borgia
Description:
A humanoid monster with a dog’s head and tail along with human limbs and torso. It has low intelligence and has instincts like most common dogs. They attack with fierce strength and speed.

Giant Mantis
Level C (Giant Insect)
Element: Physical, Beastly
Alignment: Neutral
Usually found in: Anywhere throughout Aurelia, an uncommon mutant species.
Description: (as in the novel)
As he turns his head, suddenly he is greatly shocked at the sight of a gigantic moving form with big, round eyes like a fly’s; and the snappers on its two front legs look like overlarge scythes. The man is horrified, and starts to shiver. The monster looms closer to him and the faint moonlight from outside the cave shows its original form – a giant mantis. The giant mantis swipes its left snapper at the man; it misses his head about an inch.

Troll
Level C (Humanoid Giant)
Element: Physical, Earth or Nature
Alignment: Neutral
Usually found in: Western parts of Aurelia, an uncommon humanoid species.
Description: (as in the novel)
Trolls are giants with large ears and noses. They exist in three types: Forest Trolls (who live in the forests with greenish skins), Mountain Trolls (common trolls) and Rock Trolls (with all-stone tough skin).
Trolls like fish the most, although some of them eat men. Proceed with caution. These creatures are dim-witted, but they’re very brutal. And Forest Trolls can regenerate and heal their wounds. But they can only heal one wound at a time, so attack quickly and inflict fatal wound as soon as possible.
Attack the trolls in broad daylight, because they are the strongest at night. But they’re never weak, only dumb. If you’re not strong enough to confront them frontally, use your wit and speed.

Flobber (Jelly Monster)
Level E
Element: Water (Solid Jelly)
Alignment: Neutral
Usually found in: Western parts of Aurelia, a common species.
Description: (as in the novel)
Flobber is another name for Jelly Monster. A term widely used by hunters because of the jelly-ish substance they found in it – The Flob or Jelly Core. Flobber is a low level monster.

Forest Imp
Level D
Element: Physical, Beastly
Alignment: Neutral
Usually found in: Yggdrasil’s Forest and the Black Forest of Terranova
Description:
Forest Imps are monkey-like monsters with odd-shaped faces and ears, large mouth, sharp fangs, and abnormally long tails and tongues. Their tails are extremely useful to hang on trees, catch their preys and strangle them to death, and move from a tree to another. They’re carnivorous and very savage. They prey on anything or anyone as long as it’s fleshy, and tend to be cannibals when food is very scarce.

Gnoll
Level C (Humanoid Mutant)
Element: Physical
Alignment: Neutral
Usually found in: Western parts of Aurelia, an uncommon humanoid species.
Description:
Gnolls are brutal half-human monsters with heads like horses. They are superior to kobolds because they can somehow use simple techniques in their attacks.

Monstropedia Eternia Vol. 01

MONSTROPEDIA ETERNIA

For FireHeart Project – A Study

By Andry Chang

List of Monsters and Magical Beasts

Described in FireHeart Novels

Part 01

Harpy

Level B (Magical Monster - Physical)

Element: Dark

Alignment: Evil

Usually found in: Sylvania, Regia, Terranova, Gremion

Description:

A harpy is a beastly woman with enormous wings as hands. Its lower body is covered with fur and comprises of a pair of bird talons and feet and a bird tail. Its face is beautiful or birdlike – downright hag-like – and its skin is colored, either in red, green, black or brown. Its hair can be short or long, and most commonly very untidy like thorns or spikes. A harpy, though human-sized, can fly very fast, and its common attack is scratching and stabbing using its talons.

Legendary: Gyaeghir the Black Wings

Marsh Folk

Level D (Freak of Nature – Physical)

Element: Water + Earth = Mud

Alignment: Neutral

Usually found in: Bresconnor and some vast marshes in Aurelia

Description:

Half-man, half-frog. The ‘froggish’ parts: Head, face, hands and feet.

Partially intelligent, this monster can use weapons, mostly tridents and sais (trident-daggers). And it is also amphibious: it can breathe in the open and in the muddy, murky waters. Beware of its surprise attacks when you cross the swamplands!

Gavial

Level C (Freak of Nature – Physical, Intelligent)

Element: Water

Alignment: Neutral

Usually found in: Bresconnor and some vast marshes in Aurelia

Description:

Half-man, half-crocodile. With a crocodile head and tail, a gavial poses greater danger and somewhat superior to marsh folk in term of intelligence, physical prowess and culture. It can talk like humans do (although in growls and simple language), have names for each other and can form tribes and build simple buildings. Maybe it still has traces of human intelligence when a legendary thaumaturgist created it and called it ‘her masterpiece’.

Legendary: Schkumann, the Gavial King

Uthul Frog (or Dragon Frog)

Level D (Freak of Nature – Physical, Poisonous) – Rare

Element : Water, Poison

Alignment: Neutral

Usually found in: Bresconnor, Jigdha’uthul swamp

Description:

Uthul frog has fangs, thorns on its body and a lizard-like tail. Its saliva alone is corrosive venom that can dissolve its victim’s skin, flesh and bones in an instant, let alone its fangs and claws. Uthul frog’s gall is one of the most valuable ingredients in alchemy – it can serve as a very powerful poison, and can also be the antidote of that poison.

Tatra

Level C (Magical Beast)

Element: Lightning

Alignment: Neutral

Usually found in: Regia, especially Mount Hvalgarr

Description:

Cute monsters with four antennae that can function as hands, feet and weapons at the same time. They can produce lethal electric shocks generated with their antennae.

Arachmen

Level B (Magical Humanoid, Moderately Intelligent)

Element: Poison, Nature

Alignment: Neutral

Usually found in: Regia, especially Mount Hvalgarr, Borgia, Bresconnor, Arcadia

Description:

Man-spiders, combination of human head, hands and torso and spider torso and legs just like centaurs (man-horses).