#enthused cryptotaxonomist moments

[enthusedbambi-jjba-au]

Monster AU - Risotto Nero research notes

You weirdos really wanted me to try and study this guy. It’s… been interesting! Here’s what I have:

[

[A paper of notes about Risotto Nero. The paper has tape in various places.]

[On the left side:]

Risotto Nero

he/him (I think)

At least 6'5" by my estimate (I'm VERY short so hard to tell)

Leader of "La Squadra" (bunch of assassins. Every time I've tried to infiltrate, catboy catches (:3) on to me.) Human jaw strength is about 7.5 times a cat's. hospital.

Species : Sanguisuge ('vampire') - species unknown

has fangs (yes)

drinks blood (yes)

Non-undead (bleeds normal blood, so he must have been born like this).

Not P.C.S (Pop Culture Standard)—no weakness to garlic, can be in direct sunlight (though he seems to prefer not to be) and no weakness to religious affects despite being Catholic aligned—can tell he's Italian-born.

I know he drinks blood because I’ve seen him do it. seems to have keen senses. I’m sure this isn’t surprising but I can’t get close enough to tell if he’s warm- or cold-bodied. he could be a half-vampire. They’re usually more likely to be warm-bodied despite still having poor circulation. They often don’t have to drink blood, but the craving is stronger, especially if they don’t give in often. They also tend to drink more at one time than full vampires since they tend not to satiate themselves as regularly… he drinks a lot of blood when he does drink it.

[There's an illustration depicting one of Risotto's eyes. The 'whites' are black, and the irises are bright red, and the pupils—also black—appear slit, like a cat's.]

Eyes are black sclerae and pupils with very bright red irises—glowing, I think.

Stand: "Metallica"

ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?! A SANGUISUGE WITH A BLOOD-BASED STAND ABILITY??! ARE YOU FUCKING JOKING!? HOW DO I KNOW WHAT'S STAND AND WHAT'S SPECIES RELATED!?!?

Update: its not blood based so much as its iron based but he uses blood as a source of iron which still makes things complicated for me to figure out. range seems to be a 5-10m radiu [The writing trails off at the end. There's a lot of blood on the corner of the page.]

[On the right side:]

Maybe in his 20s? Short of directly asking, I don't think there's a way I can pinpoint for sure.*

[There's an unfinished rushed illustration of Risotto Nero.]

My memory isn't the best and he uses invisibility a lot so I can rarely see him long enough to draw him from observation...

Will he show up in a photo? I don't think cameras use silver anymore!!

[There’s a partially-ripped photo of Risotto Nero, in dark lighting, presumably in the process of using his Stand, taped to the page. There's blood splattered over the photo. Frantic writing at the bottom of the photo reads "I PICKEDA A BAD SPOT TO STAND IN"]

he does show up in photos!! thank god for camera zoom haha...

*Vampires are known for looking fairly young, due to abnormal physical aging tendencies. Turned vampires usually stop aging once Turned, since they’re undead. Born sanguisuges like this guy can vary—some hit a certain point where they just stop “getting older”, and some age very slowly once they hit puberty. I heard someone say that the slow aging owes to vampires’ typical poor circulation—what?? Do you know what aging is? Yes, vampires tend to have poor circulation if they have any circulation at all, but the poor circulation contributes mostly to cold skin (and infertility, I think) like it does in humans. And for the record, they don’t drink blood to compensate for a lack of blood in their own bodies because, in case you’ve forgotten, that’s not how bodies work. Blood consumption does not affect the consumer’s own blood in any significantly direct way. ]

Guess it must be lucky to be a sanguisuge whose job is offing people… he’s hard to get close to because I usually catch him when he’s uh. You know. Doing his job.

He still hasn’t realised I’ve been tailing him though! I… I think. Like with his age, short of asking him directly, I can’t really be sure, and as I’m sure is obvious, that’s not really a good idea.

if anyone has any questions or insight… go ahead?

I could use any info.

~Bambi

[ambyandony]

Monster AU - Monster Taxonomy [P1]

[P1: what the fuck is taxonomy and why does it matter in a monster AU]

short answer it doesn't. you dont have to care butgod i fucking love classifying things an d making up names. and also there are some intricacies that taxonomy can help elaborate on when it comes to species.

Taxonomy is the scientific practise of ascribing names, categories and classifications to living things based on characteristics both individual and shared between different creatures. There is a taxonomical hierarchy that goes as follows, from least to most specific: domain, kingdom, phylum (sometimes division in botany), class, order, family, genus, and species (plus subspecies).

Most things you think of as living fall under the domain Eukaryota, so you can assume everything I talk about belongs to Eukaryota unless otherwise stated. A major part of taxonomy is binomial nomenclature, by which species are given a scientific name consisting of two parts, the genus and the species. These scientific names typically have Latin roots or are named after a proper noun, but other languages are also in my repertoire.

Vulpes vulpes, the red fox, is the species vulpes in the genus Vulpes, and Tyto multipunctata, the lesser sooty owl, is the species multipunctata in the genus Tyto.

Any normal person will call these 'the red fox' and the 'lesser sooty owl' or just 'the fox' and 'the owl', but taxonomically, they both have a very specific classification.

From kingdom to species, the red fox is: Animalia > Chordata > Mammalia > Carnivora > Canidae > Vulpes > Vulpes vulpes the lesser sooty owl is: Animalia > Chordata > Aves > Strigiformes > Tytonidae > Tyto > Tyto multipunctata.

See, they share a kingdom and phylum, Animalia and Chordata, more or less because they are both animals with spines. But then they diverge as their characteristics differ; in this case, the difference between mammals (Mammalia) and birds (Aves) is their morphology and reproduction; mammals have mammaries (breasts) and give live birth, and birds have no mammaries and lay eggs. Each further specification on the taxonomical hierarchy indicates a more specific list of shared traits between creatures in that classification.

Taxonomy helps to identify species that are related or have common traits. And why does it matter? Simply because monsters aren't human (Okay, well, on that front it can be a little complicated) and there are many different kinds of monsters that fall under a single umbrella label; for example, maricrypts or "seafolk", which may not even fall within the same genus. Maricrypts are commonly widely miscategorised as 'mermaids' no matter what they actually are, but there are countless actual 'kinds' of 'mermaids'. Squalo, a merrow, is fundamentally different from a siren or a selkie. Lycanthropy is a bit of a special confusing case, but I'll get into that later.

In other words, monsters aren't Homo sapiens and the term "monsters" is a catch-all term for a category of beings who shall be known henceforth in scientific contexts as cryptians (yes, I know, "monsters" is the common term, "monsters" is more recognised, I'm using "monster" for the titling of my notes, but "monsters" is also a lot more derogatory and weird when you consider that angels and gods can also fall in the category).

Cryptians or 'monsters' are not an actual class or genus, as the creatures under the umbrella of the term are far too varied; some cryptians are human-adjacent, but not all of them are, and even those who look human-adjacent might belong to entirely different classes. (hint, theres a nonzero entirely likely chance that polymorphs don't belong to the chordata phylum!!!)

And I'm a sucker for coming up with words (and being silly).

See, officially, cryptians don't have any taxonomical classifications (and 'cryptian' is a protologism) because most people don't believe in them and those who do believe in them want them fuckin dead(/double dead in the case of the undead) a pretty good amount of the time. Nobody is like actually studying cryptians at least not in an organised way. kind of like how monster medicine cant be standardised because all the monster-friendly doctors keep getting fucking killed / incarcerated for malpractice and fraud

But we're talking biology here! Perhaps a scientist with an interest in cryptobiology would want to classify cryptians and perhaps that scientist is hypothetically me (not a scientist) and I'm going to come up with scientific names and figure out some classifications for my monster research notes thing. field research woooo!!!! (update: starting to reconsider the whole enthusiastic "field research wooo" thing) (update 2: ow)

Monster Taxonomy Page 1 Subsection A:

[WIP]

Monster Taxonomy Page 2:

[WIP]

(( Stick around if you're interested and leave if you dont give a fuck . i dont care i fucking love rambling about my monster au. please ask me (and/or my sona who 'wrote' this) about it

ill update this post with more related posts and you can check the monster taxonomy/monster au lore tags.

note: this is a revised version of a post id already made a while ago. wanted to reword some stuff. Also wanted to establish these notes are written quasi-in-character 'by' Bambi, the jjba monster au variant of my sona . "enthused cryptotaxonomist moments" means Bambi (the enthused cryptotaxonomist) has dubious authorship of the lore contained .

I say dubious authorship because you can kind of tell that some of the lore is written with a lot more omniscience and knowledge of things Bambi couldnt really know about ))

[enthusedbambi-jjba-au]

Okay! I think it's finally time to get this started!

WELCOME TO THE JJBA "MONSTER AU"

WHATEVER THAT MEANS!

Hi, I'm Bambi, and I'm in Naples right now, which seems to be a Stand User-magnet zone. I'm doing extensive research on "monsters" (as they're colloquially called) and writing my observations down with some interjections brought by some weird flashes of omnipresence. Let's not talk about it. Here's me!

I am the project runner and also work alone, mostly. I'm open to any questions (including ones about myself) except ones about how I got here. I'm also open to interaction because I don't have any friends here.

If you see anything weird, you can send your observation in, and maybe I can help explain it.

Before anyone asks I have no affiliation with the Speedwagon Foundation. And if a cop is reading this I also have no affiliation with organised crime.

Let's get started!!!!

Asks Open!

[enthusedbambi-jjba-au]

Monster AU - Monster Hunters [P1]

[The Guild, silver weaponry and can we please talk about how these bullets break the fucking Geneva Conventions]

Monster Hunting!

I am sure that the term is self explanatory. You probably know already.

But if you don’t, here’s a quick rundown:

Monster hunting, also known as “Field Exorcism”, “Damnation”, “Befliction”, and fucking “murder”, among other things, is the practice of tracking and killing non-humans - that is, “monsters” (or pretty much anyone they believe to be non-human), usually with the overall goal of completely eradicating all “dangerous” cryptian species. It’d be a hate crime if only cryptians were a protected class. In case you haven’t guessed, they’re not (though some of them look human enough that murdering them is still generally frowned upon in most jurisdictions, like most vampires and lycanthropes that shift back upon death).

”Cacciatori”, in Italian, means hunters, and is the word used for monster hunters here as well. Not to be confused with a dish prepared alla Cacciatora, or the surname Cacciatore (we are not here for nominative determinism!!!). They’re majority ‘Catholic’ by which I mean most hunters in Italy seem to be semi-religiously-motivated “Italian Catholics” (they’re Christian at least, I don’t know; the religion scene here is wild). I assume this is primarily due to proximity to the Vatican and general historical contexts. I thought they were all Catholics but apparently most of them just self-describe themselves as Catholics, and I don’t know much about Christianity in the first place. (I had a Bible when I was younger and naturally I drew all over it because I was a child. I do not know what they expected. I also went to a Christian summer camp but I only retained the fun parts of that.)

Okay, back to monster hunters before I get off topic any more.

Most of them hunt:

to ‘protect’ their communities

for religious reasons, usually also an extension of the above

for money, obviously

for money but the other kind

It's hard to say which motivation is the majority, like, I can't exactly do a survey or anything; in Italy, as far as I've seen (I haven't really seen that far, admittedly, mostly just near Naples), it seems to be a somewhat even split, between the general public's subconscious fear of being out at night (as well as the influence of religious institutions) and the financial prospects of mark-hitting and marketing. To be clear, monster bounty hunting (as a casual term. monster-mercenarism might be a closer fit, but... much harder to say) isn't quite the same as regular bounty hunting; monster-mercs actually rarely go after an individual who has a bounty on them—though some do take shady jobs to 'find out' if someone is a monster—they mostly just hunt monsters and then get paid based on their kills.

You probably assume all hunters are human, of course, right? Yeah. I fucking wish. I fucking wish there weren't monsters out there willing to off other cryptians for money. There are even werewolves out there hunting werewolves. Etc. I think sometimes it's like internalised hatred, but sometimes monsters are also out of their fucking minds just like human beings.

I always wondered if they fully grasp just how fucking quickly their fellow hunters would take a gun to their head the second they found out.

But yeah, most of them are human.

Anyways, you might be wondering who the fuck is paying them. Monster hunting isn’t exactly legal since normal non-believers and the government generally will see a dead humanoid cryptian and go “ah, murder”, so I have to assume most of the payment for the mercs (as opposed to the shadowmarket suppliers and shadowmarketers who obviously get paid for merchandise) is funded by the Guild.

now on the subject of the guild: I’m sure a lot of you are curious what in the fuck that is, which is fair, since you probably hadn’t heard of it before i started saying words.

La Gilda dei Cacciatori Mostri

La Gilda dei Cacciatori Mostri d'Italia (GCM), the Italian Monster Hunter's Guild, is precisely what it sounds like: a guild of monster hunters. In Italy. Surprise. I just call them the Guild, mostly. Hunting seems to be sort of culturally hereditary, and Guild membership is somewhat exclusive; for "safety reasons" allegedly (though I personally think at least half the time they're just a bunch of fucking self-righteous elitist bitches), as they need to 'make sure they can trust their members' or something like that. They signal membership of the Guild with these little silver pins with insignias that they wear. They're silver because you have to be able to wear the pin to be in the Guild, I think. I guess they assume that anyone who can touch silver must be a human. I'll get to silver's importance later. I think the bottom of the pin is a tiny out-the-front knife for, like, the most dire of emergencies or something? I've seen some where the bottom comes out more or less, so there's probably a switch on the back that extends the blade, but I can't really say for sure because I just can't seem to get my hands on one. Whatever.

Bunch of smug bastards; they have one of those fancy Latin mottos. Translates to 'Sanctity and Safety; Keeping The Faith'. Or something. No fucking idea what that means, but sure. Anyways, the Guild spans across all of Italy (I don't know if San Marino or the Vatican or Sicily or Sardinia are included; I'm assuming Sicily and Sardinia are, but I can't say for sure). They keep in contact with each other through this Guild… meetings, and stuff. I know there's a Northern Division and a Southern Division, and then a bunch of local chapters in each division. It's sort of hard to find out the specifics since they have to be careful with what they talk about, but it seems like the whole Guild isn't super closely knit because it's just not practical to have everyone at every meeting and such. The divisions are closer amongst themselves than one another, but they all support each other, at least for the most part. I understand them as having a representative system where reps from each chapter are assigned to meet up instead of having everyone meet together to stay connected. They probably keep in touch with everyone so they can alibi each other if police come poking around.

I dunno what the deal with Sicily and Sardinia is, but the distribution seems to split right above Lazio; anything above Lazio is Northern Division, and Lazio plus Abruzzi and anything south of those two regions is Southern. They have Guild ‘capitals’: the Southern one is definitely Rome, though Naples apparently has one of the most ‘powerful’ hunter families in the country (and just a lot of families in the area? From what I’ve seen?); I’m not sure what the Northern capital is but based on population I’d have to guess probably Milan? I don’t really know if the chapters are region- or city-based; I think it might depend on size and population. I’m just gonna call them based on the most notable nearby town/city.

The Guild actually isn’t all that big; most of the smaller chapters are actually just a single family, if that—like I said, hunting seems to be culturally hereditary, so people seem to be passing it on to their kids, which actually means their numbers are starting to dwindle slightly as kids are denouncing or declining the occupation, or people die before their kids get old enough to carry the tradition on or something such. Many known monster hunter families have actually retired semi-recently due to various circumstances. In areas where the primary family or group of hunters have stopped hunting and whatnot, it seems that leaves room for foreigners to step in or hunters already patrolling another location nearby to absorb the unsupervised region into their territory. It’s also when the shadowmarketers swoop in and start ‘poaching’. Shadowmarket suppliers and Guildists seem to have issues with each other, too, even though they’re hunting the same thing. I assume it’s primarily due to greed. Or desperation. Or both.

Here are some notable hunter names and families I’ve heard about (for some reason, there seems to be a lot of them in or around Naples? Or, you know, I’ve only noticed more of those because I’m here):

Mista - Napoli Chapter - wolfhunters, long-standing lineage, Campania representatives (presumably)

So, the Mista family is arguably the most well-known and respected hunter family in the Southern Division. Maybe even in the whole Guild. They specialise in hunting lycanthropes and other zooanthropic creatures (mostly the lycans, though). They’re incredibly successful at killing monsters, and they—as a family—are known for this… ‘faith override’ ability they have. See, faith and belief are super powerful, so religious implements are ineffective against a creature whose theological alignment doesn’t jive with it. A Christian cross isn’t going to do much to an individual of a different religion, because the symbol doesn’t mean anything to them. But the Mista family’s ‘override’ is something about their belief outweighing a general lack of belief, thus making their religious iconography effective against enemies whether they should be affected by it or not. I guess magic is fine if YOU get to use it, huh? Bit self-righteous if you ask me.

The Mista family has been in the Guild for a good while now, allegedly from the beginning, and the youngest member—Guido—seems keen to keep up the family tradition even though he’s not living with his family anymore.

So I think it’s safe to assume he has no clue what’s going on in the group he’s currently part of.

James - bayside Napoli - not actually in the guild

A foreign family, and by family, I mean a guy named Damien James came to Naples from London and was seen for a while with a woman he claimed was his wife, encroached on the Mista family’s territory, and then went missing. He was known but not well-liked and wasn’t allowed in the Guild due to a refusal to respect regulations, adhere to territory rules and cooperate with the Mistas. Nobody knows where the fuck he is. His supposed “wife” is still spotted around the bay occasionally, though. She’s really scary, and apparently, when she got approached by someone asking about Damien, she seemed to get super mad about it. Stupid games, stupid prizes. Don’t fuck with widows. Especially not strange widows who spend a lot of time by the water. That’s how you become sea-food. Dumbass.

Fugo - Napoli Chapter - vampire hunters, long-reaching lineage, seemingly recently retired

I’m not sure how true the stories I’ve heard about are, but I’m under the impression that the Fugo family, a bunch of high-class wealthy rich people, came from a lineage of vampire hunters. But they apparently retired a generation or so ago because they were satisfied with being a bunch of rich assholes. Feel bad for their son but that’s none of MY business!!! Hahaaaaaaa that might also just be a load of bullshit. I don’t really know. I’m telling you what I’ve heard alright. Like I don’t want to hear people bitching because my specialty is researching cryptians not humans!

Verga/Ventura - Roman Chapter - variety hunt

Presumably, they are the descendants of the Guild founders, but half of them—the Venturas—have stepped away from hunting, while the other half—the Vergas—continue to hunt whatever they come across. Despite the surname difference, all currently surviving members of the Verga and Ventura families are actually siblings. I think. The little one in the Ventura family might be one of their kids but I dunno I’m pretty sure one of ‘em called her their sister. I think the Venturas changed their surname to distance themselves from the family history, but I’m not really sure. They also seem to have some connection to Passione, but I can’t elaborate on that for reasons.

There’s, uh…. Nine—NINE?! NINE OF THESE LITTLE BITCHES that is so many. Um, even though they’re all attached to the Roman chapter, only three of them are actually, like, Roman. Or even southern, for that matter. The other six are from, uhh… if I can remember… Venice or Verona (though four of them are twins (or quadruplets?) two claim to be from Verona, and the other two claim they’re from Venice, so I don’t know who to believe). The two eldest and the youngest (the kid) are the Roman ones. Fuck I regret meeting these bitches because now I have to explain shit!

To clarify, while the Verga family seems to have been the founders of the Guild ages ago, the current Verga family don’t seem to be leading it (I don’t know who is) but are just carrying on the tradition. I hear that a lot of them have political or governmental positions which might also have some relation to their connections with Passione. Dunno. They were in Naples a while ago, which was when I met them, but they didn’t stay super long, so most of what I know is also from rumours and poking around.

Cacciatore - Venice Chapter - therianoid hunt - retired

Yeah I know I said with the nominative determinism and whatnot. It's not nominative determinism. Just think about it logically. They're not hunters because they're Cacciatores; they're called the Cacciatores because they were hunters. It's called an occupational surname! (It's pretty much the same as the English surname Hunter; same principle as Baker or Cooper or Smith or Miller).

From what I can gather, along with the Vergas and Mistas, and possibly a couple others, they are the oldest known hunter family, hunting mostly animal-like monsters like werewolves and animal demons; they split from the Guild and eventually from the profession as a whole, citing that the Guild’s recent modern innovations on their weaponry—the Crackling Silver in particular, I’m to believe—are fucked up and incredibly unethical even against monsters. I would have to fucking agree with them! Who in the fuck comes up with a thing like crackling silver?! Ugh. More on that later. It’s bad.

Zatta - Chapter and hunt unknown - allegedly silversmiths, or at least close with the Guild’s

I don’t know if they’re the ones making weapons or just coming up with ideas, but based on my ‘research’, I’m of the understanding that they have something to do with the production of the more advanced and fucked up weapons the Guild has taken to using, like the aforementioned Crackling Silver, as well as burst bolts and Stoppers. I don’t know what their main hunt is, if they have one, though I have heard that they’re kind of on thin ice for not getting along with other hunters. Something about how silver is for monsters and not humans. They’re close with another hunter family that also has ties with weapon production, but I don’t know what the other family is called.

Apparently, the youngest daughter severed ties and outright denounced monster hunters as a whole—something about hunters being way fucking worse than the monsters they go after, and she can’t take being around them anymore because they’ve done more than enough damage to her life. You go, girl! There is definitely a LOT of issues and trauma going on there that we are NOT going to unpack! I’ve heard rumours that her brother also split from the family but has been seen in various towns and cities, allegedly “appearing to be hunting”. No clue what that fucking means.

-

Okay. That’s about all I’ve picked up from trying to sneak around and infiltrate hunter circles.

Which means now it’s time to talk about the super fucked up part. The weaponry.

Silver

so I was going to wait till a future post to really delve into Silver and related topics, but it’s important for this topic to give you the groundwork:

Silver is the single most widely effective and secular monster deterrent and defence. ‘Course, a lot of the Christians think it’s a holy metal. That’s not why it works; it’s not religiously aligned, and that’s why it’s so widely effective. For a lot of monsters—or at least the most commonly known ones, like vampires, werewolves, demons and their ilk—silver will burn. And bad. It hurts and does physical damage. Humans are actually super lucky to be incredibly resistant to silver, but humans also love to push that envelope and give themselves argyria by excessive use of silver as an alternative medicine which by the way, totally do not recommend; please be fucking responsible and don’t turn your skin blue by fucking about with colloidal silver and the such. I can’t believe I have to go out of my way to say this. Anyways, yeah, humans can get silver poisoning too, but monsters are very magically-infused, which is why silver is so much more hazardous to them. I’ll explain that fully at a later date.

Just know—silver? Great against the common monsters. So of course, when hunters (who’d have their crosses and holy water sometimes fail) found that silver worked on nearly everything, they immediately turned to it as their weapon material of choice. Started out with swords, though silver isn’t exactly super cheap or super easy to get, so most silver swords were actually made chiefly from more affordable, more available materials, like steel, and then the blades were tempered with a thin layer of silver, which seemed to work alright.

Blades were traditional for hunters, they’re the oldest silver weapons used by the Guild. First swords, until swords turned out to be unwieldy as fuck. And impractical in the modern day. And expensive. And heavy. And just fucking ridiculous. Swords were replaced by silver hunting knives since they were more subtle, quieter and cheaper.

Are they good?

…no? absolutely not

Come ON! Does close-quarters combat with a transmissive werewolf sound like a great fucking idea to you?! Lycanthropy is transmitted through saliva-blood contact, LIKE GETTING FUCKING BITTEN. Traditional doesn’t mean fucking GOOD. I imagine shit would be fucking awkward if these guys were trying to kill monsters with KNIVES. Swords could be fine, at least at the time when it was all they had, since they had longer reach than knives, but they were superseded by ranged weapons pretty sharpish.

Still, every monster hunter (at least in the Guild) has a hunting knife, probably for emergencies. Only the blade is really silver, not the back of it, to my knowledge, and they’re made to be practical. If the dagger is super fancy, it’s probably fake silver, for religious purposes, or the owner is just a massive fucking bitch. A real hunting knife is simple. Practical against humans, too, kinda, but mostly good as a utility knife. You can throw them if you’re out of your fucking mind (or that one gayboy in La Squadra who is obviously already out of his fucking mind).

Anyway, swords were short-lived for monster hunters. The primary weapon for hunters was crossbows with silver bolts for a while, and then guns became a thing. A few hunters still use crossbows, but most carry guns now and silver bullets. Innovation is mainly made with long-distance hunting weapons since they’re safer to use. I’ve seen a hunter use a fucking slingshot. Didn’t stick around, obviously. I ain’t out here triflin with David. I’m under 4’, and I still want NO part of that

So anyways, yeah, maybe I'm a bleeding heart that doesn't agree with monster hunting, but it's normal-ass guns and silver bullets. Those aren't the worst shit; maybe you don't think it's that inhumane to kill with that (hunters don't see monsters as human anyway), so what's the big deal.

The big fucking deal is the fucking mods they started putting on the bullets and whatnot.

The primary purpose of ALL silver ammo innovations is to prevent the monsters—generally the zooanthropes, I think; surely they don't use this type of shit on vamps and stuff, at least I fucking hope, 'cus if they do, they're more fucked up empathetically than I thought—from being able to recover from their wounds, thus dooming or at least weakening them with unending afterpain.

Which is fucked up. AND AGAINST THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS BY THE WAY. JUST SO WE’RE CLEAR.

I am especially talking about what I’ve mentioned earlier:

Crackling Silver

The “crackling silver” bullet (named for the crackling noise they make as they exit the chamber) is designed with looser shards of silver that loosen with the heat of the gun upon firing, then break off and embed in the wound upon impact, which prevents the wound from healing itself as the silver shards never stop burning the flesh until removed. It’s not just designed to hurt like all fuck; it’s also designed to keep the wound open since the shards mostly embed into the front of the wound where they break off. By keeping the wound open, the monsters are not unlikely to slowly bleed out unless they’re able to find someone who can help them dig the shards out.

Stopper Bullets

The good news is that since silver burns most of these common monsters, the bullets—even crackling silver—will pass right through their body, so only the shards are left inside the wound, so the bleeding out is more of a concern that they can focus on, since the pain isn’t so bad! Apparently, that was a problem! So, someone came up with Stopper Bullets. Stoppers are silver bullets that (don’t ask me how they work, I don’t know) somehow jam themselves halfway through the monster’s body, never coming out the other side, meaning they just sit inside the body and BURN. Stopper bullets are more of an auxiliary weapon, I think; they’re more meant to slow down the monster because they focus on the pain.

there is a special place in hell for whoever the fuck thought to make the crackling stopper. You can infer what that does based on the above.

Silverdust

It’s silver dust. I’ve heard hunters with more silver to waste like to throw silverdust in lycanthropes’ faces to blind them. I feel that some of these hunters are only hunting to go on a power trip.

Burst Bolts

Kinda like the crossbow version of Crackling Silver, except I'm not super sure how they work because I know next to nothing about crossbows?

-

Like, just, do you get why this shit drives me up the fucking wall?? It’s not even that they just casually use this crazy shit; it’s the fact they don’t seem to care! Like, even giving them the leniency that they don’t think monsters are free-thinking creatures, did NOBODY but the Cacciatores see this and think it was fucking sadistic?? Even if monsters were like animals with no complex awareness or comprehension, even IN the case of frenzied lycanthropes, why go out of your way to make them suffer unless you enjoy the suffering of other living creatures? Would you go to the same lengths if you hunted deer, or rabbits, or birds?

It was never necessary! That’s why it’s so fucked up! A normal-ass silver bullet will kill with a shot to any mortal creature’s vitals, so these mods exclusively serve to inflict a painful and needlessly prolonged death upon a creature and would only be useful for people who can’t fucking aim and need to slow their target down, right?!

The worst part, the way I see it, is that a lot of them—take Guido Mista, for example, the youngest of the Mista family—have more-or-less noble intentions, like wanting to keep the streets safe, and they genuinely believe they are by hunting monsters. I’m sure that if a lot of these people knew that they were close to monsters, or even just that monsters aren’t necessarily evil, they probably would realise that the monsters aren’t always the aggressors.

I’m sure if a lot of them knew that some of their close friends weren’t human, those hunters wouldn’t have it in them to hold true to their convictions and turn on the people they love and trust.

I don’t think it’s impossible that some of the hunter families that have retired might have done so because this happened to them in some way. Monster hunters make me angry, but they also make me pretty sad sometimes, especially knowing that a lot of them just had the monster-hunting thing pushed on them by their families.

And hey, even if you're one of the people who actually hates monsters and support the Guild in eradicating them all, you do realise a lot of regular ass humans can and do get hurt by this shit, too, right? like, sure, silver doesn't burn humans, but that doesn't mean it's not going to fucking hurt to have silver shards jammed in your fucking body. Nobody is perfect, no matter how experienced, and mistakes are bound to happen while hunting every so often.

That's assuming it's a mistake, anyway. if you'll recall what I said about the Zatta family being on thin ice. I doubt they're the only ones.

oh well whatever

That’s all I got for now. Stay safe.

[enthusedbambi-jjba-au]

I FINALLY MANAGED TO INFILTRATE LA SQUADRA LONG ENOUGH TO STUDY THEM

HOPEFULLY I don’t get got by catboy this time. This hasn’t helped me make much progress on studying risotto though…

~ bambi the dubious infiltrator

[enthusedbambi-jjba-au]

DO PEOPLE REALISE THAT SHAPESHIFTERS AREN'T INHERENTLY MAGICAL???

like sometimes, yes. Magic can be used to change forms or create the illusion of doing so. But for the most part for an actual polymorph/tochnopolymorph, formshifting capabilities derive from a biological factor which means they aren't limitless. like, people do realise that without using magic, additional mass doesn't just come out of nowhere, right? thus a shapeshifter can't make themselves super massive?

"oh but i saw a shapeshifter turn into a huge creature" yeah you probably saw a shapeshifter turn themself inside out to make a flimsy imitation of a huge creature most likely in a dire situation and that shapeshifter might be dead now because they put their organs back in wrong

just, like, realise that there's a certain threshold where redistributing mass becomes unhealthy. i know some polymorphs dont even know about this so consider this a PSA

hyperaugation (n. unc.) / ˈhaɪpə(ɹ)ˈɒgeɪʃʌn / - [HI-per-aw-GAY-shun] hyperaugate; hyperaugated; hyperaugates; hyperaugating; hyperaugatory

An act whereupon a polymorph expands their physical form's size beyond their body's capability, involving externalising and compressing the organs, leading to health complications, severe pain, and, in many cases, death. It is considered a form of self-harm or self-destruction, as the body naturally attempts to prevent hyperaugation past a certain point. It is almost impossible for a hyperaugation death to occur accidentally. also: oversizing

Shapeshift responsibly!

~ Bambi

[enthusedbambi-jjba-au]

Monster AU - Discrimination Among Monsters

[Prevalance of victim-blaming, ableism and other discrimination in cryptian societies]

Not-so-fun monster fact: there are monster-specific slurs and because humans generally don’t know about monsters’ existence, they are usually used by other monsters. Monsters of the same kind, generally.

A lot of them seem to be lifestyle or disability-related, and aimed towards others in their same community or species; even among each other monsters in communities are fairly secretive, so more 'racist' monster slurs aren’t as common ( you may find some ghosts (Illuso) using some rather nasty words ('hell-dodger', 'soul-dropper', 'fucking coward', etc.) in reference to liches (Prosciutto), but having said that, being a lich is by-and-large a choice, so it's not really a race thing, and if you ask me, is deserved in this case (if I were dead I’d be pretty pissed about being teamed with a guy who cheated death)).

A notable example is the term “singleskin” / “single-skin” used in polymorph communities in reference to a polymorph who suffers from hadrodermis (or ‘stereodermis’, a creature-specific disability where a shapeshifter is rendered unable to shapeshift due to having ‘solid’ skin that cannot flex) or a similar condition. It is also ascribed to polymorphs who do not shapeshift by choice; this both ascribes simple choice as incapability, and further alienates the incapable. As minor as it may seem, the pressure to prove their capability stifles the autonomy of voluntarily amutative polymorphs (the guys who just don’t want to shapeshift) and can lead hadrodermic or other dysmutative individuals to overtax themselves, leading to suffering, transmogrification, mutilation, and in some cases, death.

Similarly, among maricrypt societies, an unfortunately common term that is often seen as derogatory is “dry-gill”, usually insulting an amphibicrypt who is unwilling or unable to return to the water.

"Dry-gill" can rather coldly include selkies and merrows who have been trapped (usually by a 'spouse') on land due to having their morphostrophate (an item that allows them to switch between land and aquatic forms) hidden or locked away (an act known as 'beaching' or 'sealing'). A worse variation when referring to a beached maricrypt is "bait-biter", generally understood as a slur of sorts that shames the beached maricrypt for "getting themselves caught"; in essence, victim-blaming.

Seafolk have a few widely-observed issues with discrimination, though the exact details vary from society to society. As the above suggests, certain seafolk societies often discriminate against amphibicrypts and anyone who associates with landfolk in general. They have a tendency to consider maricrypts going on land as traitors to their own kind. There is a sort of irony; most of the animosity these seafolk have for landfolk and everything to do with them seems to be because human behaviour (beaching maricrypts) has been a repeated issue, but they still discriminate against the victims of this as if they're also responsible for the human behaviour. This isn't the case for all seacieties, and, curiously, in societies that suffer the impacts of overfishing, amphibicrypts become valued for their increased association with sirens and their infiltration of landfolk as saboteurs. Keep in mind that, like on land, societies underwater are variable and diverse, so attitudes are different in different cultures and places; and the seacity’s circumstances often affect their culture and their treatment of and relationship with each other.

'Victim-blaming' of this sort seems to be a common thread in certain monster communities. There have been ages and ages of oppression and destruction forcing cryptians to hide their existence from the humans who, by the way, largely don't really even believe in monsters anymore because of this. It's a possibility that this history of hiding the self and being suppressed has led to a sort of desperation to feel as though they have some level of control, thus discriminating against those who have less control in their situations, which makes the average cryptian feel like they have better control in comparison. This isn't universal, but is common enough to notice as a pattern.

For example, a similar 'blaming' culture can be seen in some lycanthropic pack networks, and is usually directed towards Turned lycanthropes, who were generally attacked by a lycanthrope and became a lycanthrope later in life as a result. The attack may have happened with the turner either in or out of lupomorph, because a lycanthrope can still transmit lycanthropy when in "person" form; the criteria for transmission of lycanthropy is generally saliva-to-blood contact, which is why biting is the most common turning method.

Because transmission can also happen in person form, a perhaps-surprising lot of turned lycanthropes resulted from abuse situations or assaults, so turned lycanthropes are known to have more (and more severe) trauma regarding their lycanthropy. Because of this, they usually don't pack (with other lycanthropes) unless forced to and often fear other lycanthropes due to the circumstances of their turning. Due to these traits, traumaborn Turned lycanthropes are often called 'chewtoys', and those who avoid packing due to fear are called 'lone wolves' which, in lycanthropic societies, is not usually a good thing. Not all lycanthropes are cruel towards the traumaturned, but the prevalence of discrimination is observable.

It is a point of debate whether derogatory language used by lycans and werewolves to refer to the other type (lycan use of derogatory language against werewolves and vice versa) is considered inter-race discrimination or species racism. Oftentimes, if there is an area with one prominent werewolf pack and one prominent lycan pack, you will find that they both believe themselves the superior kind of lycanthrope. It's more of a Capulet-Montague thing, though; most of the time neither lycans nor werewolves really have the power to oppress the other, so I guess it would be moreso specieal discrimination rather than species racism. Or like. Ethnocentrism.

That’s… everything I can think of for now, I’ll update later if I think of anything else.

[enthusedbambi-jjba-au]

I’m not putting risotto studying as an option this time you guys were crazy for that.

[enthusedbambi-jjba-au]

Okay, let's see...

1 vote each for lycanthropy and human-passing

2 votes each for Monster Inter-Discrimination, Illusory Magic, and Hybridisation Fundamentals...

4 votes for Bayfolk of Napoli c. 1990

6 votes for seaciety and maricrypt...

...

And 8 votes for 'try to study risotto nero again'.

Other than the fact I'm fucking notorious for being unable to make my own decisions, I don't know why I fucking asked.

You guys know this is gonna take a while, right?

For the record, it's not because I'm completely failing to secretly observe Risotto or anything! Like, he doesn't know I fucking exist! I've stayed totally under his radar or at least mostly! And I STILL end up getting my ass kicked somehow! Like, Risotto is just a majorly dangerous guy to be following around! I still don't have any clear identification on what the fuck he is beyond 'sanguisuge' and considering his Stand is blood-based (from my best understanding based on observation), I don't know how the fuck I'm gonna figure it out.

Also, he can turn invisible, just, for the fucking record, I can't always keep an eye on where he's at because I can't always SEE HIM!! and i dont know if that's a Vampire trait or a Risotto trait. See the problem? (CUZ I FUCKIN DON'T, THATS THE PROBLEM)

My first post about him probably isn't gonna have close to everything, it's just gonna be, like, what I do know, and maybe I'll show you my stupid little conspiracy wall. I've been trying to compare his mannerisms to another vampire I've had an eye on. There might be more than one in the 'La Squadra' group but I can't really tell what gayboy 1 and gayboy 2 (the really obvious ones) are yet because I've been preoccupied.

So, so far, there's only two vampires/sanguisuges I've found in Naples. If anyone knows of others please let me know

[enthusedbambi-jjba-au]

Monster AU - Hybridisation Fundamentals

This might be a relatively short one. There are few hybrids confirmed to speak of.

Generally, most hybrids would be what you'd expect—offspring of a monster (a.k.a. cryptian) and a human. Hybrids of this sort are typically referred to as 'half-(X)', with the human half being implied, since humans are more-or-less the dominant (or at least most prevalent) species in most places. Hybrid is the general term referring to any kind, but as a whole, hybrids are also sometimes called things like 'middies', 'halfies', 'combos', and, often more derogatorily, 'half-breeds', and 'amalgams'.

When there's a hybrid of more than two creatures, they can be referred to as 'part-(X)'.

In some cases, when only one parent's species is known / identified, I've used the suffix '-ling' to indicate being the offspring of something—e.g., the child of a demon with an unspecified other parent may be a Demonling or Dämonling. In theory, this could also be used for other similar situations, but I've only thus far used it for the aforementioned Dämonling. It's almost a synonym for 'cambion', but dämonling basically just means 'demon-spawn' in general; whereas a 'cambion' is defined as being a hybrid of specifically a demon and a human and no it's not specifically a(n) suc/incubus, it's just any human-demon offspring. This INCLUDES, but is not LIMITED to, individuals who are half concubus. and also can people PLEASE stop treating cambions like it's somehow their fault they were born ? yes even the concubi cambion. sure there are a lot of cases in which the circumstances of their existence are reprehensible but it's literally not their fault. like. they didn't fucking ask to be born??? and theyre not inherently dangerous so stop jumping to conclusions??

Anyway, hybrids between a human and cryptian (sometimes called 'humons', 'halfmen' (gender neutral), or 'the consequences of monsterfuckery') will typically inherit many traits and capabilities of their inhuman parent (in essence, human characteristics are much more likely to be 'recessive'). However, any powers they may attain are generally only about half as powerful, with their weaknesses also often being about halfway diminished. The way hybridisation manifests can vary on a case-by-case basis, but you are likely to find human-monster hybrids being more humanoid than their cryptian parent but still with many of the inhuman traits. Hybrids between two cryptians are much more varied, generally pretty rare between less humanoid monsters and can't be generalised; for the most part, though, they conceptually fall somewhere along the same lines as human-cryptian hybrids.

Genetics isn't my area of expertise, so explaining the relationship between human genes and monster genes in terms of dominance/recessiveness is pretty hard. Plus, it's foolish to generalise genetics through all cryptianity!

Hybrids also typically have a combined feel to their aura, integrating the metaphysical texture of both parents' auras. A cryptian's aura is usually significantly more potent than a human's, and a hybrid is usually somewhere in the middle. Being a Stand User will also affect one's aura.

There are, however, some hybrids that are irregular. or Giorno Giovanna.

The main irregularity is overruling or dual species, which cannot technically be just 'part' or 'half'. In particular, there aren't really any 'half-werewolves' or 'half-lycans' and so forth.

While lycanthropy (and other forms of zooanthropy) can be genetically inherited and lycanthropes can have children with non-humans as well as humans, lycanthropy is very complicated. A traditional lycanthrope (werewolf) is a human who turns into a wolf under the full moon, but that means that they are, technically, still a human (most of the time). In this sense, lycanthropy is moreso akin to a genetic mutation like albinism.

What I mean to say is, whilst 'lycanthrope' is technically its own classification of species (I need to establish the difference between different kinds, lest people keep calling them all werewolves—they're not all werewolves and werewolf logic does not apply to all lycanthropes), to be defined as a lycanthrope, the individual in question must be something else that transforms into a lycanthropic/lupomorphic form. All lycanthropes are also something else (same goes for other zooanthropes for their respective animals).

Lycanthropy is not exclusive to humans, though human lycanthropes are the most commonly known. The child of two human lycanthropes will also be human - and, bizarrely (though rarely, perhaps), might not inherit the lycanthropy, resulting in a normal human child. (I keep thinking about one dominant allele and one recessive allele but it just doesn't track).

Meanwhile, the child of a human (or any other) lycanthrope and an inhuman (whether another lycanthrope or not) will follow the same rules as a typical hybrid of their sort, and their species would be classified accordingly, but if they inherit the lycanthropy, they will be a lycanthrope as well no matter what. They will either be called a lycanthrope, or their other species can be used as a modifier before it, resulting in classifications such as 'demonic lycanthrope' or 'half-vampiric lycanthrope' (yes, contrary to some beliefs, it's not impossible for vampires to also be werewolves. The world just isn't ready for that talk I guess. There are so many kinds of sanguisuges and lycanthropes they are not all incompatible with each other).

And then there's Giorno. Giorno Giovanna. Infamously a triple hybrid (at least!) (come to think of it, it might not be the best idea to reveal his whole name) whose aura is - as a result - 'a terror' and 'atrocious'. Giorno is presumably part-human (with an infusion of ethereal Entity), but he's also unquestionably part sanguisuge (vampire) and, apparently, somehow... part... Gentry? I want to refer to this hybridisation, despite the human part, as a Faepyre, because it sounds cool however there is a chance i may get got for doing so. His aura is very intense and imposing due to the chaos. Being a hybrid of a vampire (you'd have to assume Sanguinarius saxeus, based on his parentage, but a lot of his traits seem 'traditional', whatever he is) and Gentry, he's quite incredibly powerful, but not as powerful as a being wholly of either kind would be. However, as aforementioned, he's blessed (figuratively, FIGURATIVELY) thusly with heavily diminished weaknesses, which is very lucky because a lot of traditional non-Italian-born vampire weaknesses seem to be just, like, being in Italy.

Being part-vampire comes with the desperate craving to drink blood but typically the lack of necessity to do so. He doesn't appear in silver-backed mirrors. Being part-Gentry comes with potential nearly beyond human comprehension, magic of influence, and Glamour... as well as a slight iron allergy... He has also claimed he is unable to be baptised due to 'medical reasons' and gets very offended if anyone asks him to clarify.

There are also 'pseudo-hybrids' as well, beings whose species are themselves a 'hybrid'. These are called 'chimera' or 'chimeric species'. For one example: Sphinxes (Tiziano Vecellio (will i get my ass kicked for putting his actual name here?) is a Sphinx & the only one I happen to have 'encountered' thus far).

Sphinxes are, mythologically, hybrid creatures with the bodies of lions, wings of raptors (most often eagles) and heads of humans, meaning the species as a whole is 'hybrid', but the individuals are not necessarily hybrid. Actually, when it comes to chimeras, there generally are no partial-chimeras. Especially when it comes to chimera with a human component. You don't really get 'half' of something when that something is already 'half'. In particular, the offspring of a human and a sphinx would be considered a full sphinx. There's a bit of a grey area on satyrs or fauns, and minotaurs have a complicated hybridisation, but if we're talking centaurs or some shit, you can't really go halfway with that. I guess it's sort of because the shape defines the species, or something like that.

(Also worth noting is that the term Sphinx may be more suited to indicate a family or genus than an actual species (this also applies to some other species, but taxonomy is a story for a different time); there are different (though not many) kinds of Sphinx species or subspecies with differing traits; without getting too far off track, Sphinxes as a collective over time seemed to trend towards being bipedal and more humanoid (hence Tiziano being more humanoid than leonine)).

Aquatic hybrids are actually surprisingly common, probably because it's remarkably easy for half-maricrypts to not know that they aren't fully human. Many seafolk hybrids are amphibicrypts—they have a land form and an aquatic / swim form. As they are typically born outside of the water (and unions between humans and seafolk are famously not very happy), they may live their entire lives in their land form. Unless fully submerged in water, there's generally nothing that would blatantly bring them to realise that they're amphibious, especially if their supernatural parentage is hidden from them (selkies and merrow have been known to fall victim to these behaviours as they are relatively easy to 'trap' on land). They often feel a pull towards the sea or the ocean, but in a lot of cases, they don't transform noticeably simply from being exposed to water; in these cases, it's often being submerged fully to where breathing oxygen is not an option—the body instinctively breathes through the gills (all fish-based seafolk have them!) and that generally pushes the body to transform. But how often does that happen? Fairly infrequently. Because it's easy for them to not know they're amphibicrypts, and, thus, they live their entire lives terrestrially, they're also more likely to have offspring with humans and pass the trait on to their offspring, so a lot of people could have genetically buried, watered-down (hah!) seafolk genes and not even know.

[enthusedbambi-jjba-au]

bambi's field work INJURY LOG

ive had an eventful couple of days.

Days since last incident: 0

RECORD:

x Landed in bay of naples (swam to shore) and got a splinter on my way out

x Stand Attack (lost)

x Stand Attack (lost)

x Tried to study Risotto Nero

x Stand Attack (lost)

x Punched in face by ghiaccio upon attempting to infiltrate la squadra hideout

x Attacked by vampires (sanguisuges)

x Fell off a roof

x Tried to study Risotto Nero

x Tried to study Risotto Nero

x boat-related mishap

x Stand Attack (lost)

x Stand Attack (draw) (revision: lost)

x Tried to study Risotto Nero

[ambyandony]

context: https://www.tumblr.com/ambyandony/748131009138245632/bothering-you-bothering-you?source=share

context 2: https://www.tumblr.com/ambyandony/748131497495625728?source=share

[ambyandony]

Monster AU - Monster Taxonomy [P2]

[P2: Human-Adjacent Species]

oh and please dont get me started on hybrids like . theyre like a whole different thing. ill get into it later its so complicated

First up, I want to try to tackle species that are adjacent to humans; not just species that look very human, but species that more or less actually theoretically exist near humans taxonomically.

So this includes mostly just (some) turned "vampires" and "ghosts" (I'll get to lycanthropy later), and I know that sounds fucking ridiculous because I have just listed what most consider The Undead, Like, People Who Have Died and yeah. That's kinda the idea of them being human-adjacent because they... kind of are humans. Or they were human, once. Also, like lycanthropy, being fucking undead isn't necessarily a human-only thing. This is only really for human ghosts and vampires.

It's a bit complicated; it's hard to say if, cryptoscientifically, they're actually 'species' of their own, due to the aforementioned factors; again, I know it sounds ridiculous to classify fucking GHOSTS as a different species, but the problem is that there are different kinds of ghosts and that's even just the human ones. And those need to be classified, at least to an extent. I'd say from an informal standpoint, to most people, these are theoretically just 'kinds' of 'humans', but that's because cryptosciences are insanely different than what orthoscientific[1] fields really cover and they don't have procedures in place for this shit. But documentation of this 'pseudoscience' has to start somewhere.

Taxonomically speaking, I'm gonna say my options to classify (turned human) vampires and (formerly-human) ghosts are as subspecies of humans, as a subgenus of the Homo genus, or as species in the Homo genus. Either way, we can assume this means they're in the genus Homo, and due to the need to further classify them, I'd possibly call them... "species"... but imagine I'm saying that through gritted teeth and squinting eyes to convey dubious legitimacy of my scientific study as expressed by my peers in the greater scientific community

We are also going to ignore the subspecies 'too different to just be the same species but not different enough that they can't reproduce so we can't consider them a separate species' stipulation. Again. I'll get into hybrids later. but they are great proof that when it comes to cryptians, 'similar enough to reproduce', does not apply in any meaningful way. plus theyre probably magic.

I may get every single Latin gender-tense word agreement wrong . brother i can barely speak italian in italy. but I'm trying ok. i tried looking it up also and didnt get much clarification

For human-turned-vampires, to put them as an adjacent species in the genus Homo, my instinct would be to call them Homo sanguinarius. What with the blood-drinking being the primary distinguishing factor of vampires and all. Kinda what defines the whole category, which I'd call sanguisuges or haematophages; the word 'vampire' is more common to describe the whole classification, but, like 'werewolf', it's actually probably best suited to describe just one species/subspecies denoting the traditional western Pop Culture Standard (PCS) vampire... those ones just got popular in media, so now all blood-drinkers are 'vampires'. Different kinds of sanguisuges with distinct enough traits from each other (PCS vampires, strigoi, possibly shtriga, lugat, etc.; I need to do more research) would be considered subspecies.

However, I consider even human-turned-vampires to be so different from humans enough so that I would have to consider them a Homo subgenus, Sanguinarius.

Consider a PCS vampire Sanguinarius publicaperceptius, "public perception" vampires; meanwhile, "traditional literary vampires" (Dracula) would be Sanguinarius draculus (I'd say there's a significant enough difference to separate the two in classification). DIO (Brando), Straizo and anyone else turned by the stone mask would be Sanguinarius saxeus, with saxeus referring to the stone mask. Sanguinarius infectiomorsibus, "infection fangs", could refer to a vampire turned by a bite, who can, presumably, turn someone else via a bite of their own. This is not the same as what saxeus vampires (or at least DIO) do, as the victims are less vampiric and more zombified. Pillar Men are not Sanguinarius saxeus. Pillar Men are something else.

As for human ghosts, I initially considered them as moreso a subspecies and called them Homo sapiens morsareliquarium (mors ("dead") and reliquum ("remnant") so "remnants of death") while normal humans would be Homo sapiens sapiens and Danny Phantom would be some third, more mysterious thing

But I changed my mind due to, again, the need to classify further, as well as feeling like it just didn't work right that way. and I only left that last paragraph in for the Danny Phantom joke, because comedy is actually the most important thing to me

Once I'd considered and decided against 'species', I started to tentatively go with subgenus (again).

I classified human ghosts as subgenus Morsareliquarium, and, naturally, all distinct types of ghosts (wraiths, spectres, yurei, onryo, etc.) would be species.

For example, an onryo, originating from Japanese folklore and described as a vengeful spirit who became a ghost because they had, in some way, been wronged in life, could be something like Morsareliquarium vindicta. A likely candidate for the classification Sugimoto Reimi falls under, whereas a more hostile typically-'vengeful' ghost, especially if not vindictive on their own behalf, might be something like Morsareliquarium invideo.

I needed someone to represent each mentioned subgenus of the Homo genus for this post and while I could have just gone with whichever three people came to mind first I remembered that there's one of each in La Squadra! So I put them in the silly little chart and this surely wont result in misfortune for me !

Illuso, Pesci, and Risotto Nero are a ghost, a human and a vampire respectively. Also, Pesci is the only human in the entire group and he's literally just a guy. he's so confused

Illuso is specifically a 'mirror ghost' ((which is popular enough to be a ghost trope but not specific enough to have a Wikipedia page or any specific non-individual examples (sorry Bloody Mary), so I gotta freestyle a little)), a ghost that can generally only manifest in reflections, specifically mirrors, for which I'll go with Morsareliquarium captispecula ('capti' (trapped) and 'speculum' (mirror), so "trapped in a mirror").

As for Risotto Nero... um... I'm not sure. It's really hard to study him on account of him being able to go invisible and also being incredibly dangerous. I know he's a vampire of some kind, but I don't know which kind. I've taken to just using Sanguinarius sanguinarius, to sort of indicate an unspecified sanguisuge. I'm still trying to study him but have been thusly unsuccessful in my attempts to infiltrate the group. oh well!

Look, I think vampire species should probably be its own separate post anyway. Maybe I'll be able to elaborate more on Risotto then!!

Oh and then theres zombies... it's complicated. Since zombies are generally just reanimated corpses, a lot of them don't really display a higher level of sentience, which can generally just be called "zombies" or "shamblers". Cadaverus is the term I'd use were I to apply a sub-genus to the category, although it's dubious. They do not fall under the umbrella of Morsareliquarium as they are, in general, corporeal undead, whilst ghosts are, in general, incorporeal undead.

There are a few kinds of zombies that have enough of a level of sentience and enough differentiation that they would be considered their own species; revenants, in particular, are a particular kind of zombie (Carne is an example) reanimated with the intention of just generally tormenting and/or harming the living, perhaps falling under the name Cadaverus malignitas.

A draugr is another kind of higher-sentience zombie; among the distinct abilities of various kinds of draugr, the main consistency is its contagiousness, as a draugr, much like a PCS zombie, is able to spread its draugrism, such as by biting. The main difference between an infectious shambler and a draugr is typically the presence of active sentience, as draugr tend to have at least some ability to cognitively think, as well as the ability to use a number of various magical abilities. Draugr could perhaps be described with Cadaverus transmissia.

Reanimated skeletons are also undead but are usually a magical construct or the result of possession of sorts. Generally, a walking talking skeleton (ambulossa) either falls under ghost or zombie category, or they are unsentient magical constructs.

Liches are undead as well, but fall moreso under the category of a human subspecies or a zombie; I would tentatively give them the name Cadaverus voluntarium, voluntary zombie.

They are typically a magic user (often but not always a necromancer) who made themself undead in a bid to achieve immortality, typically investing their immortality (their soul) into one or more objects or phylacteries ("anchors") in such that when the body is killed, the soul does not pass on, and thus the lich does not truly die. When a lich's anchor(s) are destroyed, their soul (or the part of the soul locked into the anchor) is returned to their physical body, after which the lich can be killed. A lich typically keeps a pretty close eye on their anchor or else hides it in a very very good hiding spot. An example would be Prosciutto. If he's anything to go by, it seems ghosts tend not to get along with liches. I think I can understand why a dead guy would be pretty spiteful of a guy who's cheating death.

Finally, for the record, mummies are not undead. Let me repeat that: mummies are not undead. They're not even cryptians. They don't move around. They're just dead. They're preserved corpses. Spooky zombie mummies are a complete fabrication of pop culture media. Still wouldn't recommend fucking with ancient tombs even if you don't give a shit about being respectful, because the bodies aren't moving anytime soon, but sphinxes sure are, and if they happen to be the tomb's guardian, as many remaining sphinxes may, you better hope you're real good at trick questions or you're fucked.

[1]: orthoscience is real-life actual science aka the opposite of pseudoscience. This is not a real-life, like, pre-existing, accepted or generally known word because I made it the fuck up for my own purposes and whatnot.

(( You can always ask me and/or my sona about my Monster AU and my/his notes! ))

Monster Taxonomy Page 1

Monster Taxonomy Page 1 Subsection A

[WIP]

Monster Taxonomy Page 3

[WIP]

((I've got a few things to say myself about what happened when trying to develop Monster AU Risotto, whom I labelled as a Dhampyr on something I drew a while before the original post of this. The dhampir originates in Balkan folklore, and from my research (I mostly just looked at Wikipedia for the general outline initially), it seems that it is the offspring of a human and a vampire; however, I was classifying them as a kind of vampire as they're the offspring of vampires with very specific traits, who don't seem to have a name distinct from "vampire", but don't quite fit the description of "traditional" vampires. So while technically a hybrid, this species' nomenclature would refer to the parent.

When I first made this post, Wikipedia... and absolutely no other source I could track down (the literal source listed on Wikipedia didn't mention this anywhere, I can't find any mythological resources that say this, and my Element Encyclopaedia of Magical Creatures doesn't even mention dhampirs, the bastards)...claimed what seems to set Dhampirs aside from normal vampires most prominently is that their blood is acidic to normal vampires and can melt any part of a vampire.

But... I was unable to back this detail up because I couldn't find any source that said this (like, not even the D&D sources, just, nothing. Which sucks because I was really hoping I could confirm this because I was thinking it would be so cool with Metallica's whole blood thing), so it appears to have been completely made up by some jackass editing the page. That detail has now been removed from the Wikipedia article since I brought up the lack of a source in the talk section. Remember to check the sources on more obscure Wikipedia articles.

There's also their supposed lack of bones (noodle moment) according to some areas, which apparently contributes to a typically short lifespan and a soft body. Small problem with that. Any being without bones can't be in the genus Homo because it's... an invertebrate. If we're to believe that specific interpretation that dhampirs have no bones... they are not in the Vertabrata subphylum. Even if they have a human parent.

You know where the actual problem lies here?

If he has no bones he doesn't belong on this post because he wouldn't be in the Homo genus. On account of not having bones.))

[enthusedbambi-jjba-au]

i think i need to make a chart im starting to lose track of what is and isn't really a mammal. among other things

~ bambi the confused cryptotaxonomist

[ambyandony]

Monster AU - Colloquialisms [P1 A]

[P1 side note A: why can't I just call a vampire a vampire]

Why not just call a vampire a vampire?

I mean, you can, but that can contribute to a prevalent (if seemingly innocuous) issue that puts you, dear (or not dear) reader, at risk - the unfortunate consequences of generalisation, miscategorisation, and the ever-prominent implications of... colloquialisms.

Now, I already touched upon this in the main post and pretty much explained why it matters, but I want to go a little more in-depth as to how there are potential downsides to the lack of taxonomical classification.

A colloquialism is, as defined by Oxford Languages, "a word or phrase that is not formal or literary, typically one used in ordinary or familiar conversation." In other words, a word is a colloquialism when it is an informal variation of a word that would be used in more formal contexts.

For example, the way that humans refer to all creatures in the genus Vulpes as 'foxes', which are a separate genus from dogs, but the term 'canine' is used for both the subfamily Caninae and as a word simply referring to dogs - which can lead to the confusion that dogs and foxes are, loosely, 'the same thing'.

There's also, similarly, the way humans call Ailurus fulgens 'red panda' and Ailuropoda melanoleuca the 'giant panda' although the two are not evolutionarily close as the giant panda is considered a bear and the red panda is not a bear. Referring to both the giant and red panda as 'panda' is likely to confuse people into thinking that they're both panda bears (as the bear is a bit more familiar on a broader scale) when they're not.

There are issues here that mirror the problems that only using colloquialisms brings (which is why I'm adamant about at least trying to classify and distinguish as pretty much the only cryptotaxonomist I happen to be aware of).

What I'm saying is that when colloquialisms are used to generalise (and then, conversely, generalised terms are applied and associated with one individual of the category), important nuance can be lost. This is especially true and important to acknowledge when it comes to dealing with cryptians (monster is a colloquialism, too, and a pretty derogatory one at that merely because of how it’s negatively used, but it’s the most common way to refer to them), especially because it then concerns a category of powerful creatures not comprehensively understood (as cryptoscience is considered pseudoscience).

If you don't quite understand, allow me to illustrate with an example:

"Vampire" is a colloquialism for a group encompassing sanguisuges, a plethora of distinctly different blood-drinking creatures.

Pop culture has done a real bang-up job of conjuring up an image of what a “vampire” is to people, particularly in the West. Pop culture would have you believe that a cryptian with fangs that drinks blood is a vampire, weak to garlic, sunlight, and crosses.

Now go ahead and try that with Risotto Nero, an Italian, and see how well that works out for you. (Hint: IT WILL NOT WORK OUT WELL!!! (I'D ADVISE USING A COMPASS!! OR BETTER YET MAYBE JUST DONT GET IN A FIGHT WITH THE MAN!! NOT GETTING IN FIGHTS WITH ASSASSINS IS ALSO AN OPTION!!!!!!) Do NOT rely on pop culture to elucidate to you the weaknesses of a species!!!! EVER!!!!)

Vampires are called different things in different places because, by and large, there are so many different kinds of vampires and the different names generally refer to different kinds. They have different abilities, different weaknesses, different existences.

Pop cultural depictions will probably have you colloquialising lycanthropes as 'werewolves', thus making the assumption that all lycanthropes come out in the full moon and revert in the morning, and that the big wolf werewolves are just the same as the humanoid ones. THEY'RE NOT. FOR THE LOVE OF FUCK NOT ALL LYCANTHROPES ARE WEREWOLVES! I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH! "WEREWOLF" AND "LYCAN" ARE NOT INTERCHANGEABLE! They're so fucking different!!!!

It is SO important to make the distinction so that YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DEALING WITH! THAT'S why you don't just call a sanguisuge a vampire!

Just to elaborate on one example of many; because of the generalisation issue, while there are werewolves (and lycans!) who ONLY change by the full moon and revert by daybreak, people (believers, usually ones who are not monster-friendly) apply this logic to all lycanthropes and go out on nights that aren't the full moon like 'i'm not gonna run into a werewolf it's not the full moon' WRONG, SUCKER!!! Some werewolves turn EVERY NIGHT! And a lot of lycans DON'T HAVE EXCLUSIVELY MOON-BASED TRANSFORMATION!!! The Full Moon is just the only night that ALL ZOOANTHROPES, including both lycans and werewolves, WILL ALWAYS TRANSFORM! And it's ALSO when they're more active and aggressive which is why the public perception assumes werewolves turn on the full moon and always become aggressive in lycanthropic form! Because the Full Moon is when most lycanthrope attacks HAPPEN! Because it's the only GUARANTEED SHIFT TRIGGER! AND THE MOST LIKELY CONDITIONS TO INDUCE LUNACY! (more on lunacy and moonsickness later when I divert from the taxonomy and document other stuff too.)

(And please don't EVER think that wolfsbane will keep you safe from lycanthropes!!!! Wolfsbane is fucking poisonous, btw, and you can absorb it through the skin and fucking die, so I would recommend just staying away from it! IT DOESN'T EVEN REPEL LYCANTHROPES. IT'S MORE LIKELY TO SEND THEM INTO A FRENZY. It is SO fucking dangerous!!!!)

Monster Taxonomy Page 1:

Monster Taxonomy Page 2:

You can always ask me questions about my research and notes! <3 Send me an ask <3

[enthusedbambi-jjba-au]

a few notes about wordage for the uninitiated:

'cryptian' is a synonym for 'monster' or 'inhuman'. i use the terms somewhat interchangeably. cryptian is my term and the basis for a lot of my other words

'maricrypt' is a more technical term for seafolk / seadwellers, and it's a shortening of marine cryptian. it refers to 'monsters' that are aquatic, generally

'amphicrypt' or 'amphibicrypt' is a term for 'monsters' who can live both in the water and on land, and often, it refers to cryptians who have both gills and lungs (like merrow) or selkies.

zooanthrope is a wide category, but almost all individuals within it exist with the same principles. when discussing things about lycanthropy, you can often assume the rules similarly apply to ailuranthropy, which is basically the cat version.

there are other kinds of zooanthropes with different animals, but mammals are the most common, and in particular, canines and felines (i've got one for each that i can study!! (un?)fortunately, i haven't found any actual werewolves or werecats. i've just found one lycan and one ailura. But they're both pretty different so at least theres that!)

'lupomorph' pretty much means 'wolf form' i just think it sounds cooler and more scientific, plus 'wolf form' kinda carries the implication that you're actually turning into a wolf and lycans generally take a semi-anthro form. Generally still meant to be on all fours but has some limited extra range of upper body movement. i feel like 'wolf form' doesnt do it justice

sometimes i may refer to lunacy, frenzy, and rampage. eventually ill finish my in-depth post either about lycanthropy or about the moon idk which first, maybe it'll be both at the same time. either way, until i can make that post and put it up, heres the short version: the moon is inherently magical and moonlight, due to being reflected off the moon (unlike sunlight) is magically charged. VERY magically charged. because of that there is such a thing as moon overexposure (for those sensitive to the magic), which, in lycanthropes especially, can lead to lunacy.

In a lunic state, a lycan generally loses their "sanity" and control of themselves, and they will often enter rampage, which essentially is a killing / feeding / attacking spree. Frenzy is a similar state to rampage, but it's generally entered by docile lycans (usually after getting a taste for blood) as opposed to lunic ones, so frenzy can often be reverted or pacified.