01. Name - Rock Tortoise Size - Large Temperament - Passive Design notes and permitted colors - A gigantic tortoise with a boulder serving as a shell. These animals look like large rocks when they retract their legs and heads and have scaly skin that can come in any colors that could appear on a mountain. The ridges on their heads and spikes scattered across their body are any shade of grey, and the eyes can be any shade of amber, gold, green, brown or grey. Physical features - Rock Tortoises have a set of about 4-7 ridges of tall rocks on top of their heads, which are unique to each specimen. They use them as horns to fight for dominance like mountain goats, and they as serve as an identification for each individual. They have extremely long claws that can retract most of the way to make it easier to walk/get around; they never stop growing like rodent teeth, so many of them will shave down their claws by digging. They claws are strong enough to cut through stone; in the mountains, they use them dig their homes and help create passages or small networks of tunnels if they live in a group. Habitat - They can survive in any environment due to easy temperature regulation, but their natural habitat is the mountains. They are able to travel long distances without getting tired but prefer to have a stable home and live in the same place for their whole lives. Life notes - Unlike most eggs, theirs are extremely hard and seem3 exactly normal rocks. A baby Rock Tortoise develops inside the egg-rock, but they don't hatch like normal; their legs and eventually the head break through the "eggshell", and the rest of it serves as their normal shell that they use for the rest of their lives, discounting a thin, pearly membrane for extra insulation, which falls off after a few days. Small cracks or patches on this membrane will appear right before they hatch, and after the head emerges the fissures will widen and it will fall off a few pieces at a time. Soft parts of egg-rock at a slight indent make it easy for the feet to escape, but the head is really hard, so they may spend a few days appearing not to have a head O)-(O How to get - Your cat goes on an exploration to the mountains and must locate an egg-rock*, which are hard to find because they look pretty much just like ordinary rocks. Your cat must sacrifice 5 exp in order to tame, they are loyal and generally nonviolent creatures but it's hard to get them to understand what you need them to do. *For more on these egg-rocks see "Life notes". Benefits of this companion - > They have the ability to lay huge clutches of eggs, so if you have a full-grown female you can hide in the spot where they carry their eggs before laying. It is designed to keep the eggs warm before they are ready to be moved to a nest, so it feels like crawling into a dry, warm cave. (fully grown females ONLY) > Having this companion makes your character immune to weather disaster events. > Your tortoise will have a 20% chance of injury or "weathering" if you do this, but it can come to battle with you lower your death chance by 15%. . .. . .. . 02. Name - Shadowbeast Size - Can be Small or Medium Temperament - Nonviolent but hard to control Design notes and permitted colors - All shadowbeasts are solid black and relatively small, and change size and shape to some extent (never larger than the average apprentice). Their fur appears short and silky without many tufts or sticking-up fur, and a long, plumy tail. in reality they have no fur since their physical form is usually smoky unless they are sitting inside your shadow. Physical features - Shadowbeasts generally do not have a physical form, so there isn't really much to put here. They can "harden" for short periods of time. While doing this they can interact with the world and other entities like a regular animal. Touching them while they have this form feels like dipping a paw in ice-cold water. Habitat - Shadowbeasts can live in nearly terrain with heavy shade and a good amount of vegetation; they do not eat but can bite things when hardened and love to chew on thick roots. Though very small, given enough time they could chew an adult tree's entire root system! Life notes - Despite commonly taking forms very similar to cats, shadowbeasts hatch out of eggs. These animals are born about the size of a billiard ball and must be born in either complete darkness or a flaming nest called a "fireden". Adult females have the ability to set tiny purple flames if they have enough energy; they create nests out of mud for their young and set them ablaze, since they are extremely cold and need their offspring to stay warm. They generally do not stay with their young, instead watching from afar until the babies hatch. As they grow up, the shadowbeast-kits can start shapeshifting, but cannot change into anything bigger than them until they reach adulthood. cont. below
