💾 Archived View for vath.click › elitemarks › arr.gmi captured on 2024-05-10 at 11:10:47. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
⬅️ Previous capture (2023-01-29)
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White Joker. So called because of many innocents fatally charmed by this squirrel’s distinct white coat.
Thanks to predation by other rodents, only the fittest and most vicious of squirrels survive to adulthood.
Forneus. While long been believed to be naught but the stuff of fear-babes, sightings of the creature in these parts have been many though apocryphal, including those at the notorious Haukke Manor.
Well, it turned out that particular sighting was real enough. That dark demon has been making leaves red in the forest for a while. Beware Forneus, adventurer.
Laideronnette, the red serpent of the glade. One of many monstrosities to manifest themselves following the Calamity, Laideronnette’s attacks coincide with rainfall, a fact which demonologists deem significant.
Most experts agree that the loathsome serpent is the residuum of Laideronnette the wainwright’s red-haired daughter, who was orphaned in the Calamity and fell into grief both bitter and formless, given to shrieking that all the world should weep with her.
Colorful. All you need know is that a giant red serpent has been feeding on man-flesh in the forests. Best to put it out of its misery, don’t you think?
Monarch Ogrefly, the dread vilekin of the Lost City of Amdapor. The barrier that seals in its infestations is considered sound...
...yet even the Gods’ Quiver could not stop the monstrous Ogreflies from escaping with their deadly taint of mold and burrs.
The first among gremlins in saltiness of speech, Ghede Ti Malice finally lost its place in Amdapor after one too many contumelies.
Ghede Ti Malice wouldn’t be the first to fall out with its gremlin mates. Thin skin and big mouths make for an uneasy combination.
Mindflayers are major voidsents also notable for their dealings with the remnants of the Lambs of Dalamud in the Black Shroud.
Of the twelve tiers of the voidsent hierarchy put forth by scholars, mindflayers fall into the fifth. They have a grisly penchant for sucking out the brains of men, their favored prey.
Most rumors are to be dismissed out of hand, yet this is not one of them. Moonless nights are when their rites grow the foulest. Only death and decay can chisel for them a foothold in this world. Walk with Menphina, adventurer, lest the hunter become the hunted.
Stinging Sophie. Fattened on the honeybees of Fullflower Comb, this giant hornet inspires both disgust and complacency.
Contrary to what its excess of embonpoint suggests, this grotesquerie is agile enough to evade its would-be slayers, and instead give them a deadly stitch with its needle-sharp stinger.
Melt. Unfathomable in its concoction and unspeakable in its coagulation, this voidsent has its origins in a sylph’s jest.
The codex speaks the truth, my young friend. Gaze overlong at its sucking tumescence and something inside you will die... and it’s put me off flummery for good.
Wulgaru, the false tree. Not a few poachers have vanished after being bound overnight to these vampiric man-eaters by unsuspecting Wood Wailers.
Wulgaru is also drawn by noise and commotion, breaking its arboreal disguise to feast on the blood of its favorite prey: man.
In other words, go quietly and fight stealthily, adventurer. If a tree comes alive in the forest, you’re not likely to notice until too late.
A bear of unusual size from the distant heights of Abalathia’s Spine, Phecda’s southward migration has not been a happy one for the Black Shroud.
Its uncouth appetite has emptied whole areas of the forest of edibles and game, and no hunter has returned with evidence of a cull — or returned at all. Phecda may be distinguished from its more peaceable cousins by the constant slick of blood upon its claws.
Girtab, the mightiest among mites that ravage the North Shroud.
Painstaking field observations have revealed that the Girtab prefers its prey fresh, and keeps a living larder of two- and four-legged meals artfully held fast in a web.
Botanists call Thousand-cast Theda as well grown a specimen of ochu as ever has been recorded in the North Shroud, but the foolishness of botanists is a fact well known and oft deplored.
Most species of this carnivorous family of bindweed use scent to lure their insect prey. Theda, however, is a plant notably lacking in patience and has evolved tentacle-like vines to pluck fish from water, and grows outsized on its rich meals.
Along with the fisherfolk of the Shroud, Thousand-cast Theda is the main predator of venomous stingrays. Theda’s other favored prey is, coincidentally, the fisherfolk of the Shroud. Hunters suspect a connection, but the foolishness of hunters is a fact well-known.
The ravening queen of ladybugs, Skogs Fru’s natural voracity for pests has taken an unnatural turn. Not content with emptying the fields of pollen carriers and soil tillers, the adamantine-shelled Skogs Fru has adopted a new diet consisting of chocobos and their riders.
Vogaal Ja, a Mamool Ja sellsword of particularly ill repute. Known to be as cruel as he is suspicious, and as suspicious as he is displeasing to the eye.
A real prince among men, this one. Can’t get work on account of seein’ every order as a way to get him killed, but claims it’s because he’s ugly-like. That part at least makes sense, but how that gives him the right to hack folks to bits, he’s a mite fuzzy on.
While gardening has long been a craft rich in obsession and madness, the goobbue Croque-mitaine has taken the legacy to new extremes... From the river whose water irrigates the artful plantings upon his head to the pastures rich in worm castings, the creature keeps a jealous eye on the many wild places that supply his cephalic paradise. Many an unwary orchid hunter, vermicomposter, and moss monger seeking rich loam have met their end at Croque-mitaine’s hands, and his green thumb is well stained with their life’s blood.
The vampire bat Barbastelle has many epithets, the only remotely flattering one being ’the laird of Blind Iron Mines.’ While cattle mutilations are hardly any one creature’s domain, experts are united in the view that the infamous mass draining of the herd at the Red Rooster Stead — the so-called ’Big Gulp’ — is the work of Barbastelle.
Long have the superstitious coasters along Moraby Bay corrected their children with tales of Unktehi, the sea-dwelling eater of man-flesh.
What was once considered a mere fancy of the ignorant sea-folk has proven disagreeably real, and Unktehi’s excursions onto land have left the population fearful — and fewer.
Frogs of inconvenient size are a legion, but surprisingly few of them seek fodder commensurate with their size. The Croakadile is one such unwelcome surprise. The first known victim during the present manifestation is reported to be a franklin who felt his ring slip off during a nightly walk with his lady. He turned back down the path, and his lady saw him reach down just as the moon took cover behind a cloud. When the moonlight returned, he had vanished.
A hermit crab of less eremitic bent, Dark Helmet began its love affair with armor when it traded in its snail shell for some nameless Lalafell’s helm. Its salvaging ways abandoned on the sands alongside outgrown and rusted headgear, Dark Helmet lives to acquire larger and finer heaumes — often still occupied by their former owners’ grey matter.
A native of the Indigo Deep, Nahn is a gargantuan man-eating crustacean. Its actual name is unpronounceable except under the crushing press of water.
The Sahagin of the Sapsa Spawning Grounds are responsible for bringing Nahn to shore to serve as a living weapon against the Maelstrom and others inimical to the beastmen.
Once known as a mild and even affectionate beast, Bonnacon is afflicted with a fit that comes upon him like a caul of fire. Tossing his great head in torment and rage, this bull gores to death his unfortunate victims, many of them greengrocers. Phrontists have implicated a rare variety of cabbage in triggering the violent attack. The Maelstrom should worry a mite less about fish and a mite more about these other creatures, if you ask me — the kind that’s killing folk right now in western La Noscea, for example.
Bloody Mary is oft cited as the example of an unstoppable force — Qiqirn gluttony — meeting an immovable object — maternal love. Such characterization would not pass muster beyond the confines of a winesink, however, and is known to provoke dissent even in those establishments. While Bloody Mary is indeed an apkallu whose eggs suffered Qiqirn predation, nesting hens as a rule do not spear a failed egg thief a score and half times with their beaks, then proceed to bathe in their victim’s blood.
Hellsclaw. So erratic yet bloody a swath has this piece of magitek cut across the region that it is suspected of being sadly afflicted in some way.
So much for the infallibility of Garlean technology, eh? Hard to be afraid of a wheel that needs truing, I know, but be careful all the same.
A monster long said to dwell in the eternal twilight of a cavern, Garlok was but an idle tale for generations of Bloodshore’s children.
However, one child was ill content to be idle, and his name was Gegeruju, the Master of Costa del Sol. At his command, a party entered the cavern in search of Garlok...
Well, you get the idea. They found the beast and woke the damn thing up. Now it’s well rested and still a mite annoyed at being roused with torches and arrows.
The nectar-eaters of Eorzea are partial to blooms of different hues. Red flowers such as Oschon roselles and raincatchers are the preferred feed of colibri. Being one such bird, Myradrosh became so fixated on that hue that it now sups from the reddest flower of them all — the still-warm flesh of other birds, beasts, and men.
Of the scores of thaumaturges lost questing for the Wanderer’s Palace, Maruta Noruta was perhaps the least remarkable. Aside from the Lalafellin adventurer’s singular yet unflattering hat, little of him is remembered.
It is likely he would have been entirely forgot were it not for the fact that his hat resurfaced soon after, upon the head of a tonberry painting the shores of Bronze Lake with the blood of adventurers.
Called the Critic by cowering locals, Nandi uses its petrifying gaze to turn passing creatures into works of art for its perverse pleasure alone.
Ever has this catoblepas haunted the mountains of Vylbrand, yoked by the weight of its gross head, prodding the stone paths conjured by its downcast eyes.
Nothin’ so dangerous as a stillborn artist, they say. Don’t you go temptin’ the wretch with good material, if you know what I’m sayin’.
A bird feral is a deadly thing, and none more so than the condor Vuokho. Witnesses place him at the Nym Massacre, which consigned some of the finest naturalists of the day to a mean and early grave. What was not consumed on the spot, the murderous bird seized whole and took to its eyrie, even as the staunchest among the Maelstrom looked on helplessly, their eyes leaking at the horror.
Of the zu much is known, for their migration between Eorzea and the Near East provides many opportunities for observation.
The vilest among these birds of prey is the Cornu, who has made himself maddeningly scarce to learned eyes that would pry from it the secrets of its savage heart.
In death does Chernobog find its purpose, and so the scent of corse-flower is sweet to this creature.
A stele unearthed at Nym records that Chernobog was summoned during the War of the Magi in the Fifth Astral Era, for the conquest of the Floating City.
The ploy failed and Chernobog was bound at great cost, by the efforts of some two score phrontists of Nym. What broke the tethers is not known, though there are theories ranging from the Calamity to the humble weevil.
Ovjang. A mammet of some antiquity, last in possession of a wealthy collector who suffered from a particularly virulent case of buyer’s remorse.
He ordered the mammet disassembled and sold off for parts. However, once under the chisel, the mammet came to and attacked the smith, wounding her badly before making its escape.
Sabotender Bailarina blooms but once every two score years. The flower is remarkable less for its appearance, which are pedestrian enough, and more for its fragrance.
The scent has been described by naturalists as an olfactory equivalent of fingernails on slate, and sends sabotenders into violent frenzy. Whether the effect arises from discomfort or lust is unknown.
One of a pair of cyclops captured several years ago on Vylbrand by the Adventurers’ Guild and subsequently separated.
Brontes was sold to an Ul’dahn circus, where he proved a prize draw, and never more so than on his last day, when he slew two of his keepers over a haunch of venison barded in flare fat before escaping.
Having learned the joys of enlightened cuisine during his captivity, the cyclops is drawn by the aroma of fine comestibles, much to the terror of culinarians.
Born in the full foulness of the effluent passed by Amajina & Sons’ Copperbell Mines, the voidsent Sewer Syrup was so named by the less imaginative among even the fume-addled unfortunates that work the recently expanded mine.
Containment attempts by the Stone Torches were foiled by the voidsent’s acrid stink. So powerful was the stench that it laid low many of the militiamen, and others still weep blood-tinged tears.
It is known that ziz hunt in pairs: the driver maneuvers the prey toward the ambusher, and both eat well that day.
The elders say Alectryon never knew his place, and correct they were proven when his ambusher was found dead. The latter had starved while the self-styled lone hunter took the game by and for himself, leaving nary a gristle for the other ziz.
Few have seen Zona Seeker, such is the altitude it keeps in its deadly flight.
Its elusiveness would trouble none but the most ardent scholars of airborne monstrosities, were it not for the many airships of Highwind Skyways lost to Zona Seeker’s attacks.
The beast near landed on me once. That was a bit of a scare, let me tell you! Flashes of light draw it — must’ve been the brushed bronze pauldrons I was wearin’.
Gatling. A hedgemole of exceptionally bad temper who makes free of the lichyard of the Church of Saint Adama Landama.
He has been thus dubbed for taking up residence in the tomb of Gatling the Alchemical Smith. If the creature has a true name, it remains unknown and of no great interest to local folk.
While Halatali is a cultural institution of note, it has also been less than perfect in keeping track of the fighting beasts it starves into greater savagery.
Maahes is an object lesson. The blood meant for spilling on stadium sands has instead grown richer, feeding on the flesh of caravaneers.
Lampalagua. A dragon of many heads, cage-born and stadium-bred. His escape en route to the Coliseum was a major embarrassment for his handlers, or more precisely, to their heirs.
Each head having been blooded as a hatchling, Lampalagua is exceptionally barbarous and exquisitely attuned to the bloodlust of the crowd.
Lacking a conventional audience in the wilds of eastern Thanalan, Lampalagua has instead taken to appearing wherever violent business is afoot.
When the Hyuran tribe came to Thanalan some eight hundred years ago, Albin the Ashen was at the head of one of the columns.
Then-native Belah’dians rose against the invaders and prevailed, as history records. Albin was but one of many slain in the abortive conquest, yet his mortal coil still roams the land in search of vengeance.
Zanig’oh. A drake altered by an Amalj’aa alchemist for no less a purpose than the conquest of Ul’dah.
In addition to magic powers conferred by runes graven into its very flesh, the drake has a taste for melee combat, ably provoked into violence by inwardly spiked bangles affixed to all four limbs.
The large population of golems in southern Thanalan is ascribed by mainstream historians to the mages of Belah’dia, who made the sturdy guardians for the protection of the Temple of Qarn.
Among these sad remnants of a civilization lost to time, Nunyunuwi stands out for his exceptional size and stealth.
At rest, he vanishes into the landscape of tors and boulders. Only an outbreak of sizable chaos and bloodshed will rouse the stone soldier to his ancient duty: to fight to the death.
Flame Sergeant Dalvag was among the thousands of defenders who met the Garlean invasion force in northern Thanalan soon after the Calamity. His company was ill placed to hold their position, yet given strict orders not to retreat.
Many fell, and suffered much in the falling. Multiple witnesses attest that Dalvag was the last of the company and fought as a man possessed till the end, the names of the dead tumbling in hoarse barks through cracked lips. Scholars theorize that his mortal remains are animated by a thirst for vengeance alone.
Much is told of the corpse-soldier, Flame Sergeant Dalvag, yet mainstream scholarship has lagged woefully on the matter of what became of the rest of him.
Efforts by hunter-scholars with intimate knowledge of northern Thanalan have resulted in persuasive identification of a malevolent local demon as the late sergeant’s spirit.
Ah, yes, the sandworm. Large concerns like Amajina & Sons don’t give a toss about the commonfolk being ambushed and eaten. But a sandworm attacking their convoy — we can’t have that!
...Sightings of Minhocao have long been reported near deposits and mines, particularly those that hold quantities of ceruleum. Alchemically similar to the sandworms’ foremilk, the catalyst is a food source for the great worms.
However, any attempt to lure Minhocao to the surface with the use of edible bait would necessitate very large quantities of food.
Ah, yes. You know how Ishgard is about dragons. The Holy See managed to get Naul and a few other dragons on to the elite mark list. A favor to be repaid in kind, I’m sure.
The dragons Naul and Svara are best known for their attack on the Steel Vigil, which left the fortress a smoking ruin. Notable casualties include the third son of House Haillenarte...
Every High House of Ishgard has its own dragon in a bonnet, don’t they? An enemy without keeps order within. The dragon Marraco is to be hunted for the crime of mistaking almost a dozen of House Durendaire’s knights for kindling.
An impressive physical specimen by all accounts, the dragon Marraco can easily withstand a direct hit from dragonslayer cannons, thus requiring enterprising hunters to exercise some forethought in their choice of arms.
A winning combination of size and agility, the dragon Safat spends much of its time winging its way through the Sea of Clouds.
A scream or two, however, never fails to bring the Safat streaking down to its prey, attuned as the beast is to human terror and misery.
Some hunters have been known to subject themselves to hair-raising experiences in order to bait the dragon. Results have been mixed.
Leech King of Silvertear Falls, so dubbed by the Sons of Saint Coinach for its enormous size rather than any perceived system of sovereignty.
Those who make mock of its grossness soon repent, for the Leech King is nimble where a meal of blood is concerned.
A particularly savage specimen of the unnatural creatures that inhabit both water and land, Kurrea was once a mere nuisance known for purloining game brought down by hunters.
Amphibious beasts having an ingrained tendency to have ideas above their station, Kurrea soon took to attacking and feeding on the hunters. The flaccid, nerveless quality of their skin makes them proof against all but the most powerful thrusts of the blade.
Agrippa. This magitek colossus is the newest of its kind and appears to have been designed as an anti-adventurer countermeasure.
While the name is believed to be a tribute to an actual Garlean, no record of a likely honoree has been found.
Ye’ll want to be on yer toes in Mor Dhona. There was an adventurer huntin’ for treasures an’ the colossus mauled her somethin’ fierce. Hard to kill a woman, though, hah! We die hard, ye know!