Stoneback Phant
| Stoneback Phant | |
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| Fauna | |
| Official Name | Stoneback Phant |
| Common Nicknames | Mountainbacks, Phantom Dunes, Sand Titans |
| Classification | Reptile |
| Habitat | Farahdeen |
| Domesticated | No |
| Current Status | Rare |
Named for their immense size and partial rocky coating, the Stoneback Phant is both a remarkable and feared titan from the deserts of Farahdeen. Easily mistaken for the dunes even when in motion, these immense blends of reptilian and mammalian traits are also known for purposefully letting themselves be buried in sand in order to lay upon their eggs, only to burst up from the earth as their laylings begin to emerge. The ultimate survival animal, built to withstand the harsh climate they live in, Stoneback Phants are perhaps on the brink of extinction due to the lingering effects of the Great Storm. If they will die out is not yet known, but for now, they remain a rare and awe inspiring site to the peoples who call Farahdeen home.
History
The origins of the Stoneback Phant are mysterious, and likely dates back many millennia beyond what is known by Aloria’s many peoples. There are suggestions they might even be as old as the Seraph, but this remains unclear. All that is clear is that the Stoneback Phants roamed the continent known today as Farahdeen for millennia prior to the Great Storm. The habitats of these creatures were often far away from the local Ailor populations, but they were still encountered by the Allorn Empire when they established their outposts in the region. Some were also supposedly captured and returned to Allorn land for study and display, but this is less certain. However, with the expansion of the regional Ailor, now known as the Qadir, and the expulsion of the Allorn, the animal became much better known to the locals. It is believed that, for a brief period, these large creatures were ridden and used as regional transportation, though the rapid rise of technology meant these interactions were soon abandoned. From this point forward, the creature faded into the background of Sariyd society, a motif in their designs, decoration and artwork, but disconnected from the increasingly machine-focused people. When the Great Storm eventually came, these creatures suffered the most of any. Able to live over a century, and the Gargant members of their species suddenly deprived access to large oases, rivers and more that had once existed in Farahdeen, their deaths were a slow one. They have become incredibly rare today, with many suspecting they could be on the fringe of extinction. Despite this, they are still seen from time to time, and the local peoples respect them as a resilient element of the natural environment.
Physical Appearance
The Stoneback Phant is an immense creature, weighing many dozens of tons, and standing up to twenty feet tall, and sometimes thirty feet long. However, many are smaller than this size, as such a vast appearance is reserved for the Gargant members of the species, which will be explored later. As for their bodies, Stonebacks have an appearance similar to that of Aloria’s pachyderm population, though also including some truly strange features. Their heads are huge and low-set, with a pair of large ears, though they are not as large and flat as those of proper elephants. Instead, the top of the ear is a thick ridge with a stretch of skin underneath, and points backward. While able to flex and move forward, they can also curl in, and lay flat against the animal’s body, protecting their ears from sandstorms. Stoneback Phants also have a large prehensile trunk, with two tusks on either side of this appendage emerging from their relatively small mouths. However, these often yellowed tusks are shorter and thicker than the sort of structure seen on elephants. Their eyes though, are massive, and possess the dual protection of internal eye lenses, as well as long eyelashes, meshing traits seen in reptilians and Jamals. The rest of a Stoneback Phant’s body stands on six legs, each a thick, short limb that supports their immense weight well, before ending on a short tail. Their body is covered in a mix of incredibly-dense stone-like scaly growths focused on their backs, but which also plate their faces and the beginning of their trunks. These scales then mesh into rough skin that covers the legs and animal’s underbelly. The species often has gray hues along its entire body, though tan hues for its rocky backside are not unheard of, and neither are more dark-purple colorations for their leathery skin.
Diversity
Stoneback Phants are incredibly hard to distinguish from each other at a ground level, and so gender has been difficult to track within their limited numbers. While Gargant Stonebacks are all assumed to be female, some believe that there are males in this subset of the population. Additionally, aerial or high-up views of Stoneback Phants have allowed people to determine individual specimens since while plates shed and regrow, their arrangement and pattern down the spine remains intact.
Life Span and Development
Despite being so mammalian in many ways, Stoneback Phants also possess reptilian traits, and one of the most obvious appears in their method of reproduction: egg laying. Stoneback Phants are capable of laying two to four large, pale gray eggs, which they bury in the sand, before settling themselves down upon them as a sort of incubation. While it was one said they died to give birth to their new young, this is not the case, as they are able to detect the emergence of their young from the eggs, and will burst from the sands, helping to clear a divot in the dunes for their young to emerge in. When they first hatch, Stoneback Phant laylings are fairly pale, and have a thin coating of pale hair over a body also dominated by scales. Their trunks are also long, and are not immediately prehensile, dragging in the sand for a few hours before the layling is able to pull it up, and curl it, thus learning the first key skill in their new lives.
The new family will often immediately make for a source of water, the pace unusually fast as, unencumbered by size, the laylings will usually rush ahead of their pondering mother, which is also when predators of the desert tend to strike. However, upon reaching water, the Phant laylings will drink, being weaned quite quickly from their mother’s milk in exchange for this other substance. They then begin to grow, and by the age of five, will have reached an adolescent stage where their hair has all fallen out, their leathery skin is more pronounced, and their tusks are just beginning to come in. Another ten years sees them reach a young adult stage, and they are then considered adults, moving away from their mother to live out on their own. Stoneback Phants are capable of living as old as 200 years apparently, but some believe it may even be longer. Few make it to such an age however, often dying of natural causes around the 100 year mark.
Mental Overview
Stoneback Phants are an enigma, living away from sentient life for much of their existence, and difficult to observe because, while not aggressive, they dislike interaction with external groups. This may be due to a conditioning of suspicion and extra care when crossing the deserts of Farahdeen in their ceaseless marches, as there are many hostile species that lurk across its vast expanses. Despite this, it is clear they care for other members of their species. While deaths of natural causes are more common than those by predators upon a Phant reaching their adult years, other Phants will take, and purposefully gather bone remains in graveyards of their kind, which some seek to expire in when they can seemingly sense their natural ends coming. These boneyards are difficult to plunder, as Stoneback bones are incredibly dense, but also because younger members of the species tend to gather near them and keep a sort of watch over the remains, perhaps even over the remains of their parents.
Territory and Groupings
Stoneback Phants are solitary and nomadic, with no truly defined territories. Instead, there are general areas that they frequent, such as certain oases and areas containing boneyards where they are best observed. However, there is one type of Stoneback Phant that commands the ultimate respect, and these are the Gargant Stonebacks. Huge members of the species, considered by some to be a Genos mutation, or some magical effect produced by an unknown location in the sands, these massive titans will often develop a small herd in their wake as they move across the desert. These Gargant Runs are devastating, as the huge creature does not go around obstacles, it goes through them, which has caused significant damage to minor settlements in both Qadir and Songaskian territory in the past two centuries. Gargants will lead their herd until the day they die, at which point the herd disperses.
Trivia
- Stoneback Phants are said by some to have a connection to the Dragons, but if there is any truth to this, is unknown.
- Stoneback Phant tusks are perhaps the easiest part of their body to acquire, as young members of the species shed them three times during their growth into adulthood, and the Songaskia collect them eagerly.
- There are rumors of Qadir war machine designers starting to turn away from humanoid forms of construction, instead examining the trundling form of the Stoneback Phant.
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