Codex: Ganrael (Silly Mode)

Name (Singular & Plural): Ganrael

Sexes: Monogendered

Height: 5 to 6 feet. Some exceptional specimens can reach up to eight feet of height, though their dietary requirements to maintain such mass makes such individuals exceedingly rare.

Senses: As goo-type creatures, the Ganrael have very limited perceptive organs. They are capable of 360 degree sight and have acute senses of smell and hearing. Most ganrael, will affect humanoid eyes and ears as part of their limited shapeshifting, in order to appear more familiar and appealing to their mates.

Skin: Ganrael come in a variety of colors, ranging from green (the most common), through red, pink, purple, and dark blues. Rarely, some specimens of yellow or orange coloration have been seen, though they appear to be vastly in the minority.

Combat

Unlike many goo creatures, the ganrael are not stealth predators, but prefer to openly challenge their opponents. This shift in tactics compared to similar species is likely based in the ganrael’s unique evolutionary adaptation: armor. Species like the rahn and galotians are completely soft-bodied, constantly keeping their gooey extremities saturated with liquid to maintain their easy range of motion and shape-shifting abilities, with varying levels of penetrable dermises. Ganrael instead have adapted to slowly dry out and harden their outermost layers of goo, which eventually crystallizes into a nearly diamond-hard armor plating around the subject.

This hardened outer armor protects the otherwise vulnerable ganrael inside, allowing it to engage in direct combat against even armed foes, such as the myrmedion who live in the upper caverns above the ganraels’ natural habitat. Crystal armor regenerates quickly with focus and food consumption on the part of the ganrael, and can even be adapted to grow semi-biological weapons for use: many ganrael hunt with crystal daggers, axes, or spears.

Environs Typically Inhabited

Ganrael are natives of Myrellion, specifically the deepest caverns on the planet. Most live their entire lives without seeing the surface, though thanks to the abundance of bioluminescent cave fungus and creatures within the deep caves the ganrael retain their ability to see in light. Ganrael prefer wet, humid areas in the caves, particularly those near underground lakes, rivers, and thermal vents.

Reproduction

Ganrael, like most goo creatures, have distinctly non-mammalian reproduction patterns. Though some ganrael will adapt the appearance of one gender or the other, they are fundamentally a mono-gendered race, with any individual capable of bearing children. When a ganrael is ready to mate and bear children, it need only acquire the genetic material of another compatible creature - male or female, semen or other form of genetic carrier. The genetic material can then be absorbed through the skin (or, more commonly, inserted into the bearer through penetrative sex). Ganrael have several erogenous zones in their natural form, and usually shift these to more traditional areas when mimicking humanoid shape so that both the ganrael and its mate can enjoy the proceedings.

Once proper genetic material has been absorbed, the ganrael’s reproductive cycle begins. Over the course of the next 24 hours, the ganrael will begin to divide its cells, with half of the resultant cells carrying the new genetic material mixed with the parent’s. The parent ganrael will shed its crystal armor and effectively split in two, resulting in a smaller (some say younger) copy of the parent along with a fully-formed child. Both parent and child are fairly weak for the next few days, requiring some time to gather their energy and eat enough to begin restoring their full size and armor plating. Between “insemination” and the resultant ganrael being fit to hunt again, perhaps a full week has passed.

Culture & Society

Most ganrael are nomadic, moving through the caverns in pursuit of game and mates. There are relatively few ganrael settlements and little in the way of organized civilization. At best, a family unit of a mated pair of their children may stay together until the children are old enough to hunt on their own, at which point the family usually disintegrates. Ganrael are, as a rule, individualists who struggle to work together with other creatures (of their own race or others), which has made organized ganrael societies rare, and keeps them relatively small and insignificant.