#next post will probably be about the biology of their species

[evesetchings]

WARNING! THIS MISSION IS NOT RECOMMENDED FOR RIDERS WITH ANXIETY, SELF ESTEEM OR IDENTITY ISSUES! PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK!

Name: Dream Eater

Age: Unknown (at least above 50, speculated to be higher)

Species: Unknown specimen of the Somnivora genus

Ability: Invasive habitation of other organisms and physical control when unconscious

Affiliation: The Prototype cult

Rank: Knight

Threat level: 9/10

Additional information: Dream Eater is a cowardly being whose most prominent role is as a covert manipulator of opposition and taskmaster to lower ranks. As such, they are most likely not to be first apparent in a situation. Keep an eye out for unusual behavior of those around you and if you suspect that a person is being infested, stay calm and do not alert the creature of your position. Trust your judgement and make a reasonable decision on how to handle the situation. Your skills will be valued and your life be cherished. This will be no problem at all for someone as great and strong and smart as you. You don’t need to hide, because we are here and willing to listen. Our guidance will lead you to the best outcomes for you and your loved ones, and there is nothing for you to worry about when dealing with them, as our leadership will allow you to achieve the greatest of things and become the best version of you.

give yourself to us

au by @onyxonline

[alithographica]

As promised, welcome to

Fun biology in TOTK’s designs

I'll keep this post updated as I go through the game. I'm going to skip the more general identifiable things like apples (they're based on apples!) because there are tons of more unusual species to talk about.

Overall, the really interesting thing I've noticed is that many of the more unique Earth-based lifeforms in TOTK are super ancient, like predating dinosaurs ancient, which is a really cool tie-in to the overall time-hopping plotline of TOTK. Specifically, they're found in the new areas (caves, depths) while the surface remains a bit more normal.

(There will be no plot spoilers in this post, and also I've barely gotten into the plot because I'm spending all my time wandering, so shhh no spoilers in the tags for like a month please.)

Most recent additions: More lilies, irises, wild ginger, spiny bones, pigeon extravaganza, plus added some more real photo comparisons to old stuff.

PLANTS

Bryophytes my beloved. Bryophytes are among the earliest land plants, waaaay predating flowers and even seeds. In our world, they’re small by necessity—they lack vascular systems to help move water around like other plants, so they have to stay small and moist (hence their frequency in caves in TOTK—though they do need some light in real life.)

In TOTK they’re quite large and I think that’s very sexy and art directors should give us big bryophytes more often

Anyway, there are three types of bryophytes: mosses, liverworts, and hornworts. First image pair is a moss, second is a liverwort. Those red-brown and palm-tree-like structures, respectively, are their reproductive structures.

Real liverwort photo © Graham Calow, NatureSpotUK

Not yet spotted: Hornworts! Did they forget the third bryophyte sister :(

I think these next guys are probably lycopods (specifically club moss, which is not a true bryophyte moss, thanks science.) Very old, but vascular, so they're a bit more evolutionarily recent than bryophytes.

Real photo © Gloria Hanley Schoenholtz, virginiawildflowers

All the enormous curly-topped trees in the depths: Ferns! They curl like that until they unfurl. Another very old plant, though younger than bryophytes and lycopods.

Real photo via The Cosmonaut, Wikipedia

Brightblooms and some of the other giant plants in the depths: Possibly based on a cycad? Again, a very ancient plant lineage. At this point, evolutionarily, they've developed seeds—that giant cone in the center is called a strobilus, and that's the seed structure.

These next few plants are angiosperms, meaning they produce flowers. Angiosperms are a more recent evolutionary lineage—still many millions of years old, but it took a while to develop flowers as a reproductive tactic.

Sundelions (left) are a fun recolor of a lily. There are also some scenery lilies (right) in various places—there are yellow ones that spring up when you turn on a lightroot (which gives them literal and thematic connection to the surface) and several other varieties, including tiger lilies, throughout Hyrule. Fun note, the sundelions appear to only have 5 stamen, while other lilies in the game (correctly) have 6. Seems to be an intentional decision to make it a more distinct fantasy species.

These next ones are Peruvian lilies/Alstroemeria, just used as a scenery plant but a very fun inclusion. Fun fact, not true lilies, so they're not deadly to cats like true lilies are.

Real photo © Dick Culbert, Wikipedia

Plum trees: These are also called out as plum trees in game! There's a journal in Kakariko that refers to the plum orchards.

Okay I'm a little proud of figuring this one out. Bomb flowers blend a few botanical references. Superficially, the fruit resembles a type of seed pod called a capsule—specifically it's very similar to a poppy capsule. The little red thing in the center is a nice addition to resemble both a flower stigma (reproductive part that leads to the ovary) and a bomb fuse. Now, poppy capsules disperse their seeds via wind, but there are other plants who do explode their seeds outwards as a dispersal tactic! This is called explosive dehiscence.

There is one tree in particular called the sandbox tree, AKA monkey-no-climb or dynamite tree (yes, really.) Their capsules look more like little pumpkins, but are known for violently exploding when ripe—they can launch seeds at 150 miles per hour (250 km/h) and spread them roughly 200 feet (60 m) away. The photo comparison is a poppy capsule but you should def go look up dynamite tree videos.

Real photo © PommeGrenade, pixabay

Fire fruits (and the other elemental fruits) grow on the same generic plant that looks kind of like it has grape leaves. Fire fruits resemble a specific botanical thing too though—the black netting is a papery calyx (part of the flower) seen in a nightshade genus, Physalis (golden berries, tomatillos, etc.)

Real photo © Helene Rogers, Alamy

I think this stuff is an Asarum, AKA wild ginger. I was actually puzzling over it until I walked past some today and went HEY

Not sure of the exact species but they're very green and heart-shaped and love being dense and low to the ground.

Real photo via David Stang, Wikipedia

Irises: Love irises, one of my favorite flowers and words, very happy to see them in game.

MISCELLANEA

Cup lichen! Lichen is not a plant, but a symbiotic structure of an algae + a fungi. Cup lichen is just a type of lichen formation that has a kind of vertical cup-like structure.

Real photo via Bernard Spragg

Geology crossover! Go look carefully at some of the whiter walls in the depths—they look like they have fossils of coral and other undersea hard-structured animals in them.

ANIMALS

Sticky lizards: Based on Diplocaulus, a very early (now extinct) amphibian! Their skulls are wacky. We're not sure whether the long sides stood out separately or were smoothly connected to the body by skin flaps, but the separate arrow-like shape is the most popular rendition.

Deep firefly: Might be a stretch because it could just be a multi-winged fantasy critter, but I think the "wings" and antennae are very reminiscent of Anomalocaris, an ancient aquatic arthropod.

Update: Other folks in the notes/tags have pointed out that they're probably based on a cryptid that's especially popular in Japan: skyfish AKA rods! They show up in photos and people think they're an alien lifeform. In reality, they're an optical blur created when a lower quality video captures intermittent flaps of an insect's wings, leaving sort of a many-winged smear in the photo. Thanks to all who left info!

Little frox: Another stretch because it totally could just be a Hinox-like frog, but every time I see the little ones I can't help but think of like...Ichthyostega, Mastodonsaurus, Eryops, and other early amphibians. They were pretty hefty—little frox size or bigger—and had with little waddling legs. This is less "I think it's definitely this" and more "it makes me happy when I picture frox as primitive amphibians."

I haven't detailed many of the scenery animals around Hyrule because most are identifiable with the camera function—it'll tell you that a certain animal is a heron or porgy, for example, and those groups are real, even though the exact species is made up. But I think the pigeons are fun because they're all crested pigeons. Pink-necked green pigeons may have also been the inspiration for the color palettes on the wood and rainbow pigeons.

Both pigeon photos via JJ Harrison, Wikipedia

Spiny bones: Not a specific critter, but those spiny bones that you can find lying around Eldin Canyon are vertebrae—possibly from the same thing that left those big rib cages around? The top spike is the spinous process where muscles attach, the littler spikes on the side are the transverse and articular processes. The dark O in the center is the spinal cord.

Also I made a friend who finally recognizes my purpose in Hyrule.

That's all I've got for now! Will add more as I keep playing.

[theres-a-body-here]

Scumtober- Day 10 (Knotting)

Legoshi x Male!reader

If someone had told you at the beginning of your relationship with Legoshi that he would be the one to initiate sex, you probably would have laughed in their face.

So imagine your surprise when, after a particularly amazing date, Legoshi proposed that the two of you have sex the next night.

You didn't know what to expect. You're a virgin and as far as you know, he was too. To be honest, you were scared. You took enough biology to know that wolf knot plus a human ass would definitely mean pain. That's not even taking into consideration that Legoshi was way taller than wolves of his own species.

But you had time to prepare, so you did.

You followed every tutorial on Furrchan and Beastube, especially that one gay dude who Nair'd his ass on video and posted it onto the site. He seemed like the expert to go to. You went out shopping and frantically bought everything you might need for such a challenge. Lube, condoms, douche, and information pamphlets went into your cart.

You currently sat on Legoshi's bed bunk, waiting for him to arrive. You had showered, cleaned yourself out, and even used the shampoo that Legoshi liked. Everything had to go perfectly. You even had some soft music playing through a small speaker.

As you waited anxiously, the atmosphere in the room seemed to thicken with anticipation. Every sound that echoed down the hallway amplified your heartbeat just a little more, making each moment feel like an eternity.

Finally, after what felt like hours, there was a gentle knock on the door followed by its slow creak open. In walked Legosi, looking quite flustered as nervously walked over and sat on the bed with you.

"So…uhh," You muttered, not sure how to initiate sex. You were in the dark about these kinds of things.

At your hesitation, Legoshi's eyes darted around nervously before returning to meet yours halfway. He swallowed hard, taking a deep breath as he tried to find the words within him. His cheeks flushed under his fur even deeper at his own embarrassment.

Finally, he managed to squeak out softly, "Um... do you want me to undress first?" It was clear from his voice that this was foreign territory for him too; there was an uncertainty lacing every syllable.

You pause for a moment, trying to remember the pamphlet about healthy sexual relationships. "What if.....what if we help remove each other's clothes?" You finally manage to recite meekly as you fiddled with your thumbs.

At your suggestion, Legosi's eyes lit up slightly as he nodded eagerly. "Yeah," he murmured softly, "that sounds good."

With a snail's pace, he began reaching out to gently grab hold of your shirt hem. With a hesitant look in his eyes, he began to tug lightly, urging you to move closer so he could pull it off properly without letting go entirely. As he did so, he took note of your reaction—whether you were uncomfortable or enjoying the contact between them. You nod timidly and lift your arms up.

As soon as Legosi felt your permission through your lifted arms, he quickly grasped onto the idea and began pulling your shirt upwards with newfound confidence. His fingers brushing against your skin sent shivers down your spine. Once fully off, Legoshi started at your bare torso. He shifted closer as if wanting to take in the sight.

As Legoshi moved closer, his hot breath danced along your neck sending shivers down your spine. He couldn't resist taking in your scent, trying to commit it to memory forever. The way his nose grazed against your skin ignited a spark inside him, awakening primal desires that he didn't know existed until now. His heart raced faster as adrenaline coursed through his veins—this was intoxicating!

This set the pattern.

One of you would take off the other's article of clothing, then stare at their body. As the two of you progressively shed layers of clothing, the air between you became charged with electricity. Every brush of fingers against skin sent ripples of pleasure through your bodies. Even though you were both nervous and unsure, something about this exchange felt right.

Finally sitting face to face in nothing but their underwear, Legoshi couldn't tear his gaze away from you. He traced delicate patterns over your chest with his fingertips, marveling at how soft your skin felt beneath them. Meanwhile, you reached out to feel his soft fur.

Both of you blushed deeply as you realized where this was heading. Neither of you wanted to make the first move, fearful of crossing boundaries or being rejected. But despite your hesitations, neither could bring themselves to break eye contact either.

Slowly, almost reluctantly, Legoshi reached out towards your boxers, his fingers trembling slightly as they hovered just above the fabric. With bated breath, he slowly pulled down the waistband of your boxers, revealing your erect cock beneath. Your member twitched slightly at the sensation of cool air bathing it. After a few minutes of Legoshi staring in awe at your dick, You decide to return the favor and pull his briefs off.

As you pulled Legoshi's underwear off, exposing his hardened cock tentatively, he let out a soft moan of relief. Feeling increasingly bold, he reached out to touch your cock once again, stroking it slowly with his palm while looking into your eyes for any sign of discomfort.

Taking courage from his touch, you leaned in close, wrapping one arm around him to pull him close for a kiss. Your lips met in a tender kiss as your bodies pressed flush together. Your tongues tentatively explored each other's mouths as you began grinding your hips together in sync, rubbing your cocks against each other.

You shifted to lay in the bed. Legoshi didn't stop kissing you as he followed your movements. Fortunately, you had prepared for the next part since you didn't want to waste precious time. You had already lubed your hole prior. But it was still worrying to think about Legoshi's knotted cock fitting into your ass.

As you lay back on the bed, Legoshi couldn't help but stare at your ass, his heart pounding with desire. He knew that this was going to happen eventually, but seeing it right here in front of him made it all the more real.

His brow furrowed in concern when he saw the expression on your face, worry written all over it. "I don't want to hurt you," he murmured softly, his voice full of regret.

You shook your head reassuringly, trying to calm him down. "It's okay," you whispered back, placing a hand on his chest to steady him. "We can take things slow."

With a deep breath, Legoshi nodded slowly, still uncertain but willing to trust in your words. Together, you guided him closer, positioning his tip at your entrance. He had a strong grip on your hips and you placed your hands over his.

"Are you ready?" you asked quietly, meeting his eyes for reassurance. He nodded again, biting his lip as he prepared for the inevitable penetration. Slowly, carefully, he eased himself inside you, groaning softly at the tightness surrounding him.

As Legoshi pushed further into you, a sharp stab of pain shot through your body. You winced and let out a small cry, causing him to freeze midway. "Did I hurt you?" he asked worriedly, pulling back slightly. Closing your eyes tightly to block out the pain, you forced yourself to relax and breathe steadily. When you opened your eyes again, you saw the genuine concern reflected in Legosi's gaze. He looked truly frightened at the prospect of hurting you.

Reaching up, you cupped his cheek gently and smiled reassuringly. "No," you said softly, "just a bit of discomfort. Keep going..." Your voice trailed off as he resumed his thrusts, slowly pushing further into you. Despite the pain, you couldn't deny the intense pleasure mixed with it. The sensation of being filled by your boyfriend was overwhelming. As Legoshi picked up speed, his hands entwined with yours.

As Legoshi's pace quickened, sweat dripping down his fur, his movements became erratic yet powerful. Drool slipped past his parted lips, trailing down his chin as he lost himself in the motions. His eyes were glazed over, focused solely on you and the rhythmic movement of their bodies. His muscles tensed with each thrust, the sounds of fur slapping against skin filling the room.

Every time you cried out in pleasure or arched your back, it drove him even harder, his cock throbbing with need inside you. He lost track of time and place, consumed by the primal desire pulsing through him. All he could see was you and all he wanted was more.

Legoshi's voice cracked as he tried to speak, the heat building up inside him making it difficult to form coherent sentences. "Mmm... God, you feel so good," he moaned, his tongue tangled in his attempts to express himself.

As he continued to pound into you, his hips slapping against your ass, he managed to gather enough strength to whisper, "Please... tell me how much you love this... Tell me it's amazing!"

Despite his plea, he doubted anything could have prepared him for the wave of emotion that crashed over him when you finally answered, your voice hoarse with passion, "Yes... yes, it's incredible. Don't stop."

Legoshi's hand slid down between your legs, his rough fingers curling around your cock as he began to stroke it in time with his thrusts. Your moans of pleasure echoed off the walls, driving him wild with lust. Unable to contain himself any longer, he threw his head back and roared, the sound reverberating throughout the room.

Legoshi's moans grew more intense as his pace increased, his body trembling with the effort of holding back his climax. "I love you," he chanted between ragged breaths, his voice breaking with emotion. "God, I love you so much."

"I love you too," you replied between heavy pants as you felt your world spinning. Your body quivered with each thrust, the sensations overloading your senses. You clung to Legoshi and wrapped your legs around his waist for dear life as he stirred your guts with his cock. Before you knew it, your entire body tensed up as you came with a loud moan.

As you came, your body convulsing in pleasure as you spilled seed onto your stomach, Legoshi growled low in his throat. The sound vibrated against your skin. Seeing your release only fueled his desire further, and he continued to pound into you, determined to claim his own release.

Legoshi's entire body tensed up as he felt his orgasm approaching, his movements becoming more frantic as he neared the edge. Just as he felt like he couldn't hold back anymore, he let out a loud, primal yell. In one thrust, he slammed his knot into you, locking into place with a wet popping sound. He released himself inside you, filling you up with his warm cum as his knot kept you in place. You whimper as you feel it coat your insides. His body shuddered violently as he let out a long, drawn-out moan.

Legoshi stayed buried deep inside you, his body still trembling with excitement. He nuzzled against your face affectionately, soft kisses scattered across your neck and shoulders. "I'm so sorry if it hurts," he whispered softly.

You ran your fingers through his fur gently, offering reassurance as you spoke, "It's okay." You paused for a moment before adding, "Besides, maybe it won't be so bad having us stuck together like this for a while." You gave him a playful smirk which only served to make him flustered even more.

You both spent the rest of the night cuddling closely together, occasionally shifting positions to ease the discomfort caused by his knot. As sleep claimed you both, you drifted off happily knowing Legoshi was connected to you, physically and emotionally.

Scumtober 2023 Masterlist

[bigtimefreq]

going over this because oh my fucking god

charlottes middle name is whitney????? weirdly fitting

parker jay robins

WE GOT CONFIRMED AGEs HELLO??? charlotte is 28 and parker is 30 🥹

charlotte's weight is just. 30. 30 pounds? ounces? i assume objects would have a different way to measure weight than humans would

parker reported her missing the very next morning instead of right away...i assume he didn't do it right away because of the circumstances of her disappearance (i mean she just disappeared in front of him)

the cell phone number?? area code omitted, i assume this is because cheesy doesnt want people trying to dial up an actual number but it's still curious to me and i think an in-universe explanation would be fun too!

charlotte has an instagram (awesomegram) apparently

the spaces for limb and eye colors caught my eye too. i think it implies that objects of the same species can have different limb/eye colors, so it's more than a stylistic choice on cheesys part im probably reading too much into it but idc give me some slack

space for glasses/contacts

parker marking unknown for the report type 🥲

PARKER'S HANDWRITING!!!! this is a small detail but i really love when we get to see a character's handwriting it's just a cute touch

unknown as a marker for sex, i'm guessing this is for if the missing person in question is a doe but it would be funny if it were more widespread

OBJECT CLASSIFICATION GROUPS!!! i posted this on my biology blog but i found this especially exciting. really really good foundation for the taxonomical classifications of objects if that's your thing (i dont think anyone except for me cares about this but oh well)

that's it, i really like this, i'm hoping we get more of these for the other characters???

[blueper-saiyan]

I’m overanalyzing something that’s canonically not meant to be thought about, for fun, so here’s a speculative Saiyan biology question: how often do they actually need to eat? I’ve sort of joked about the possibility that it’s like large predators irl where they gorge themselves occasionally and then wait until the next big kill. This would balance out the amount they’re eating to closer to a normal human, just a surprising amount in one sitting, and dodge the thing I’m about to go off the deep end about. But I think they’re probably supposed to need that amount frequently? Which is like, rodent levels of frequency and portions, but unlike a small mammal, a huge amount of actual food consumed. It’s fine if there’s only a handful of Saiyans on a whole planet but how did that work when there was a lot of them? That’s a massive amount of food, where is it coming from? Are they mostly feeding their army by taking food from conquered planets? They’d still need to be producing enough for their homeworld. Is it being farmed automatically and that’s how they can have the majority of their whole species be soldiers? But like, Gine has a job processing meat, so it’s clearly not entirely automated. Stuck thinking about Saiyan agricultural production and supply logistics help.

Unfortunately, I can also say that almost immediately after finding out the amount that Saiyans eat, the back of my mind did jump to “how fast do they starve?” Like, is that a much bigger threat for them than a human or do they have about the same amount of reserves, even if they’re eating more? If it is way faster, how does that affect how they view food/hunger? As a fun irl example, hummingbirds have such an insane metabolism that they would potentially starve to death if they slept at night. So they don’t sleep like normal, they enter a state that’s more like hibernation to slow their metabolism down enough to survive. Many hummingbird species are fiercely territorial because they need access to their food source or they starve. I imagine a theoretical hummingbird society would be thinking about food differently. And because this is my indulgent post where I get to talk about animals, I’m also going to bring up vampire bats, which could also potentially starve if they can’t feed within two days or so (I did not go deep into scientific literature to find original numbers and sources for this estimate I’m sorry true bat fans. Actually same goes for the hummingbird estimate but I know more about birds.). Unlike the more territorial hummingbirds though, vampire bats roost together during the day in colonies, with the same other bats repeatedly. And their food source can’t be guarded like a flower patch can, so there’s less purpose to territoriality. So they can form long term friendships with each other by interacting in ways like grooming each other. Within these friendships, when one bat gets a meal during their few-hour-a-night feeding window, but the other one doesn’t, the one who got enough food will often share with their friend to keep them from going hungry. Then their friend returns the favor when their roles are reversed, keeping them both alive, along with the rest of their friend network.

So those are some very different responses to needing food nearly constantly. If I were deeper in ecology mode I could probably try and come up with explanations based on the types of food source and territory and other factors for why, but I’m here to apply this to Saiyans lol. Honestly, a cooperative strategy would make more sense given that they’re pretty human-like, but that’s certainly not the sense we get given of their society. Were they always super individualistic or is that a recent development? Are they even actually individualistic or is that fully a societal role thing (elites are different from lower class warriors)? Or is the idea that they don’t cooperate partly a lie made up after their deaths anyway? Speculative biology for intelligent species get the extra layer of culture just to make things more messy and fun. We also know pretty much nothing about their original home planet and the actual context that shaped them, so I don’t get to apply other factors, like how easy it is to defend food sources or how important it is to stick together. We probably won’t ever get to know anything more about their original homeworld/Sadala, which is disappointing given that we got hints about it, but it does leave more room for speculation.

[cccc-aus]

The CCCC x Pokemon Mystery Dungeon AU

(also I haven’t decided if I want to open up asks again yet, so don’t even bother)

So I was thinking about that one post I made a while back about a PMD AU. The result was this convoluted list of random compiled headcanons. Enjoy.

In General / Set-up

Takes place in a timeline where Soul did commit suicide after The Bidding just like he said he would, resulting in the events of Light never happening and the time loop ending prematurely

Basically, the Headspace was destroyed and the three died, but instead of the timeline resetting like normal they just showed up in the Pokemon world

This is an interesting case, because their memories are still intact, but they have absolutely zero idea what the hell a Pokemon is, so basically the opposite of typical PMD protagonists

In this universe, Pokemon are typically divided into sapients and non-sapients (or ‘ferals’)

As well as that, humans that show up in this world- since they’re, whilst very rare, still a known phenomenon- do so in forms that look distinct from the species they’re supposed to be, and more often than not as a completely different type as well!

When they wake up, they’re separated so it takes about a day for them to actually find each other, but they reunite rather easily. And so began the tale of the land’s latest and greatest rescue tea…

…sorry, did I say rescue team? Uh, no, no they’re not. They’re just a bunch of assholes who deeply despise their current situation, are absolutely certain that there’s a way back home despite what everyone tells them, and think the Mystery Dungeons are key to that.

They ain’t no heroes in this place, and that’s a fact. Just selfish jackasses who just happen to do lots of heroic stuff by coincidence while pursuing their own goals.

Heart

Heart is a Poison-type Sobble (that gains the Dark type upon evolving into Inteleon). He is also, unfortunately, still blind

It’s not like his biology actually matters since he’s the only member of this subspecies, but I’m going to include it anyways for context:

They’re supposed to live near caves (and urban areas, but only if it took place in a modern human world, which it doesn’t), navigating the world mostly through scent

Like many Poison-types, they get by by intentionally eating potentially harmful things in order to fuel their abilities

Poison Sobble specifically harness these powers as defence mechanisms, never attacking anything unless they think it intends to harm them (though they do feel threatened very easily…)

They’re also nocturnal, and spend most daylight hours in the aforementioned caves, as well as self-dug holes (ha) if there aren’t any safe hiding spots nearby

Anyways, back to Heart himself… well, he’s blind, and has no idea where he is besides the fact that he basically just died, so he probably just thought this was some weird purgatory for a while

He didn’t know why he was some kind of lizard thing all of a sudden, or why his sense of smell was so strong, and the only thing he still had with him was his blindfold, which he got understandably attached to as it was the only thing he had left

Though, by the time he was just starting to process the idea of being a gross lizard thing for the rest of his life, Mind found him, and god he had never been happier to hear that asshole’s voice in his life.

They stayed close together for the next few hours (though Mind was still tempted to wash his hands afterwards, even before he found out the lizard he was holding hands with the whole time was actually poisonous), until eventually they found Soul

Once he gets used to it, though that takes a while, he gets pretty content with the idea of staying for the rest of their lives, though he still prefers the Headspace

He does have a lot of sleepless nights there, though: partly because he’s nocturnal, and partly because there’s no way he didn’t get nightmares at some point about the fact that he literally died a few days ago

Oh, and once he evolves into Inteleon, his blindfold comes off, and his eyes inexplicably grow back! So he’s very happy about that

Mind

Mind is an Electric-type Snivy (that gains the Steel type upon evolving into Serperior)

They shed their skins once every year, and the shed skin comes off in a form resembling a leather jacket that they carry around with them (see art of Snivy!Mind that I reblogged from my main blog awhile back)

They mainly eat feral Water-type Pokemon, since I figure eating things that are weak to electricity is a good way to fuel that power

Though, just because they can generate their own electricity, that still doesn’t mean they won’t go to rather bizarre lengths to store as much as possible…

…”rather bizarre lengths” totally not meaning “climbing up to the top of metal poles during thunderstorms trying to get struck by lightning, and then getting all giddy and cackling like madmen with euphoria on the off chance it actually works”.

Anyways, when he first woke up in that world, he… dealt with it. He liked being able to eat and sleep again after so long of being a robot. He didn’t like… anything else.

For hours on end, he could hardly walk with Snivy’s tiny-ass twig legs. He had to crane his head around like a bird’s just to get a good look at anything with eyes like that. As well as far more hateable things about his new body and new home.

He was still concerned for Soul even after he basically killed them all, but he would deny being worried about Heart until his dying breath. Either way, he still tried to go look for them as soon as he got a hang of moving around in his new form.

He’s easily the one who hates it there the most. Too illogical, with all the superpowered animals that can talk sometimes and can’t the rest of the time.

He’s basically the driving force keeping the other two focused on getting back home like they all promised

He finds it easy to get caught up in the whimsy of the Pokemon world… but less in the “wow this place is so cool!” way and more in the “WHY IS IT CALLED THAT. EVOLUTION MY ASS THAT IS CLEARLY METAMORPHOSIS.” way.

Like Heart, he probably also has nightmares about dying in the Headspace, but tries his best to just suck it up and deal with the trauma

Soul

Soul is a Psychic-type Torchic (that gains the Dragon type once it evolves into Blaziken)

I haven’t decided how its biology would work, so I’ll have to skip that part but

Once he shows up there, he decides he pretty much loves the idea of being a psychic chicken for the rest of what’s basically his afterlife… until he realises Heart and Mind are there too.

Mind slaps him the first time they reunite, resulting in yet another petty sibling fight, and eventually Soul reluctantly agrees to help them all get home. (Though of course, he did subconsciously miss Heart and Mind quite a bit, even if he didn’t realise it.)

Even after that agreement he still doesn’t hide the fact that he greatly prefers being a psychic chicken to the shit he used to go through in the Headspace.

Once he evolves into Combusken, he probably makes many a joke about the fact that he is a cock that’s also shaped like a cock.

He would also have frequent nightmares at some point, but not about his death. It’s about the fact that he could potentially be stuck as one third of a whole for the rest of his existence.

He feels like he can’t escape Heart and Mind, and what they made him into. Of course, it’s not actually their fault, but he still blames them for it, because it’s convinient.

For now, though, he’ll just enjoy spending the rest of the foreseeable future as a psychic, draconic rooster.

[microraptorreactor]

Hello! It's time, I'm making my (somewhat rabid) speculation on eliksli biology while waiting for the next act of Revenant. This speculation is wholly mundane, but good fun for me. Long post, so it's below the cut!

Now, my first note that informed much of this post:

Riis was fucking DANGEROUS.

Or dangerous for pre-Traveler Eliksni, anyways. I have a pretty simple reason for this, and that's because Eliksni have a lot of kids. Seriously.

Irl, often the more babies an animal has per pregnancy is linked to how likely any individual is to survive to adulthood. I'm going to drastically oversimplify things here, but the more likely any individual offspring is to die, the more offspring the animal has. Any individual juvenile insect is very, VERY likely to die, so most insect species have hundreds. Tiger cubs have a 40% chance to make it to adulthood, so tigers have 2-4 cubs in a litter. Only animals with very high infant survival rates (humans, elephants, whales, etc.) can afford to put all their resources into one offspring.

Eliksni have about four offspring per gestation. Probably. We'll get into the nitty-gritty later. To my knowledge, there aren't any crustations that have clutch sizes that small, so to figure out approximate survival rates, I'm looking to mammals. For lions, another large social apex species that also has between 1-4 offspring per gestation, the survival rate for offspring is about 20%. This lines up perfectly with Eliksni. To me, that says it was tough being an Eliksni and shit was killing them all the time. Pre-Traveler contact, those adorable hatchlings were dying all the time.

"But Spire, why did you say probably an average of four?" You may cry, shaking your screen. Or not, I don't know. That's because of the exitance of Eggcloth! While, to my knowledge, the exact way eggcloth is created is unknown, one thing we do know is that it's made of the shells of eliksni eggs. And the only time this is mentioned it is in reference to crushing an egg. The specific line I'm getting this from I'm going to dig into, so I'll put the full thing here.

I should have crushed his egg and woven it into cloth; a regret I will always carry. "

Inaaks' great life regrets aside (no wonder Misraaks has mommy issues), she mentions destroying an egg and turning it into cloth. While it could be argued that this IS drastic, and she's just desperate, why would she turn it into cloth if it was? And eggcloth is a relatively common material made of broken eggs, as can be gathered elsewhere[1][2]. While in Achilles Weaves A Cocoon those broken eggs may have been broken on accident, with the other mention of crushing eggs in The Long Dark, I'm really not sure that's the case.

So, my theory is it's possible Eliksni clutches are larger then 4. It's just that more then four hatchlings need more recourses then most Eliksni can give, and the excess eggs are crushed and turned to eggcloth. One could argue eggcloth is usually made from the discarded shells of hatched eggs, but the fibrous material inside Eliksni eggs [1] may be ruined when the egg hatches, since it's only ever referenced to be made from broken eggs.

And now, let's talk about Eliksni teeth! It's confusing. I'll start by breaking it down.

I've divided Eliksni jaws into three sections (yes, I did figure out Blender just for this post lmao). It appears there might be a fourth section of teeth behind 3, but I can't get a good enough shot to figure out what those teeth would be used for.

This is the outermost section of teeth that are definetly for eating. They appear long and thin, with the exception of two cusped-like teeth on the front of the upper jaw. Thanks to this being an old model, the teeth are INCREADIBLY low-poly. What I can tell is that this layer of teeth is long, thin, sharp, and close together.

This is a pair of sharp and large teeth. While similar in appearence to rodent teeth, there is no corrisponding teeth on the upper jaw. I'll dig into this one soon.

This is the inner section of teeth. I have problems with how this inner section was handled. I will get to those problems in time.

I'll start with what's clear to me. Section 1, the outer teeth, are most likely for eating fish. Long, thin teeth like that are usually seen in aquatic animals that eat fish, as those thin teeth pierce fish like a spear and keep them in place, or hold fish within the animal's mouth depending on the size.

Section 2 is strange. The main option that appeals to me is that these teeth are for cracking open fruits or nuts. These teeth also could be used for separating fruit from rinds, as Achilles uses his section 2 teeth for separating egg materials. The top of the mouth's corresponding structure doesn't quite line up for this. There isn't quite as much of a structure on the upper jaw to press against as one would expect for that purpose. Section 2 might also be for display.

Section 3.... how I dislike section 3. This is plain old lazy modeling. A second set of thin sharp teeth, point blank, does not make sense. With the current tooth setup, it would appear that Eliksni are purely piscivores. They are not. While the full diet of Eliksni is never mentioned, they are treated as if they are omnivorous. Most omnivores possess grinding teeth. The reasonable location for grinding teeth would be behind the piercing teeth, but these are not grinding teeth, so that caught fish wouldn't have to go far through the mouth to be chewed. The reason for this is because in 2014 Bungie wanted to design a monster. Not a creature that lived in an alien ecosystem, but another thing to mow down en-mass. It makes sense from a monster design standpoint, but ugh.

Anyways, notes I have for now! As I get The Garden-Way I may have more thoughts. Or this may be completely disproven! Who knows!

[plantify]

TOONTOWN HEADCANON LORE POST THINGY NUMBER 2

(Like last time, this is also cantered around TTCC, and is mostly just me rambling like a lunatic about my headcanons.)

Topic: Toons

(This is sorta like the Toon counterpart of the Cog post I made earlier)

Basic Details

Toons are generally very silly beings, and are a very social species by nature. They come in a variety of sizes, shapes, etc.

They can be a singular species, or they can be a mishmash of different parts, there is not much limit to what a Toon can look like.

Variation in "animation style"

Their mannerisms and motion is usually akin to that of the kind of cartoons Toontown was inspired by (rubberhosey, vibrant and colorful) but there is also much variation in this as well. One Toon may move around/look like they're "animated" differently than another.

Toons are spread out far and wide, but when I say spread out, I mean it. Compared to how much of the world is inhabited by Suits, there aren't as many Toons, to the point where many Suits don't even know of their existence.

(This is largely because Toon culture/Toon subjects aren't really taught or talked about in Suit societies, both due to lack of knowledge on them, and the deliberate desire to stamp them out of public knowledge)

Regardless, there are notably other significant populations out there (think stuff like where Ducktales takes place and whatnot).

The Toons at Toontown aren't the only ones who have had to deal with the whims of Suits and their expansion, desire to take land, etc.

More Biology Stuff

There isn't really much that is concrete to the biology of Toons. Like stated earlier, they're extremely diverse and have many differences across each other.

Some might have skeletons or bones and whatnot, but whether they do or not probably wouldn't make too much of a difference.

Probably something like cartoon logic, where whatever is funniest at that moment will be true. That's probably the answer to a lot of things about Toons now that I think of it

Sillyness

Just about every Toon by nature needs to be happy to be healthy. The Laff meter is an invention that helps track a Toon's sillyness/happiness at a certain time. This is measured/quantifiable with the Laff formula. (I'm literally just making that up cause I thought it sounded funny so make of it what you will)

Laff increasing is essentially a sign of increased resistance to negativity, in a way. Not that high Laff Toons will never get sad, angry, or otherwise never feel negative emotions, but a Toon with high Laff may have a better time faring against deliberate attacks to one's happiness. Laff is generally increased by having fun, and is often boosted when experiencing that fun with someone else.

Sad or otherwise unhappy Toons often have very low Laff, whether it be that they have less than others, or that they have lost a lot of their Laff.

Some Toons are more serious than others, and may not show happiness/joy in the same way, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're a scrooge. Like us humans, (which don't exist in this world) they have wide ranges of emotions and may experience them/show them differently.

Despite this, some Toons might be edgy........... and reject happiness or something IDK why you'd willingly want to be miserable

Culture

It varies a lot. There's quite a lotta Toons of all shapes and sizes out there. Lots of communities. They all got different cultures! But they all most often share the same general traits (happiness, sillyness, helping each other out, etc. How nice.) i really dont know what else to write here.

Fin (i dont know how to end this)

:3

Previous

Next

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Frederick R. Prete

Published: Feb 11, 2024

About the Author

Frederick Prete is a biopsychologist in the Dept. of Biology at Northeastern Illinois University. He teaches courses in neurobiology, and human and animal physiology. He has also served as an associate editor for the International Journal of Comparative Psychology. Prete writes about how people use and misuse biology to support their social and political points of view. 

Other essays by Prete can be found on his Substack Everything Is Biology.

--

The contemporary “debate” (if one can call it that) surrounding the biology of sex suffers from a lack of intellectual seriousness on one side. The arguments forwarded by those insisting on the non-binary nature of sex often demonstrate a rudimentary understanding of basic biology, or are so comically nonsensical that one wonders whether they’re even worth responding to. Academic biologists engaging with gender activists’ arguments for the so-called “sex spectrum” are like mathematicians engaging with numerologists (individuals who believe in a mystical relationship between numbers and coinciding events) or geologists debating Flat Earthers. However, given that sex pseudoscience has somehow taken over academia, serious scholars now find themselves compelled to engage with the absurd.

One such example is the bizarre suggestion that because some fish can literally change sex during their lifetime, then perhaps humans can too. This idea, while absurd on its face, is far from fringe. It has been given credence by popular science outlets like Scientific American, which highlighted the sex-changing abilities of clown fish “to emphasize the diversity of ways in which sexual beings move through the world.” Even the United Kingdom’s national library posted (and later deleted) a thread on X during Pride Month last year about the sex-changing abilities of the Māori wrasse, and Greenpeace made a similar move in 2021.

What relevance does LGBTQ+ Pride Month have to sex-changing fish unless there’s an intention to suggest that these examples illuminate the potential for sex changes in humans? But if activists insist on making such far-fetched comparisons, they should be challenged to follow their logic to its ultimate conclusion.

Let’s be honest, animals do a lot of weird things. They enslave other animals, eat their offspring, cannibalize their lovers, kill their newborn twin sisters, and devour their siblings in the womb. Do any of these activists want to justify slavery or embryonic cannibalism because animals do it? Probably not. But it’s equally silly to claim that we can derive grand lessons about human biology and sexual behavior from animals. Male octopuses, for instance, grab a packet of their own sperm with one of their tentacles, shove inside a female’s mantle cavity, and drop it next to her oviduct. This hardly seems like a behavior humans should try to emulate. Are there any objections? Why, then, would we think that fish sexual biology is a better model for us humans than that of octopuses?

What’s more, it frustrates me that those who continuously discuss sex changes in fish don’t get the fish-sex story straight in the first place. In reality, sex changes among the roughly 20 families and seven orders of teleost fish are driven by physiological and hormonal events that are triggered—depending on the species—by factors such as body size, perceived social status, or (in the monogamous clown fish Amphiprioninae) the disappearance of the large, breeding female. It’s also the case that those big, newly minted, dominant female clown fish are viciously aggressive to any fish they do not recognize as part of their group. So, if we’re taking our cues from clown fish, let’s not be hypocritical—let’s go all the way and demand that only extremely large, dominant, hyper-monogamous people who are particularly xenophobic should consider a sex change, and only after all the other females in the neighborhood have vanished. Does that sound reasonable? (I trust you realize I am being facetious here)

It should go without saying, but it appears that some still need a reminder: people are not fish. Fish live in the water. People live on land. When it comes to sex and reproduction, this makes all the difference in the world. In aquatic environments, you can simply release your gametes (eggs and sperm) into the water and let them drift around until they hook up. That’s because, in water, they won’t dry out and die. And neither will your embryos because they’ll be in the water, too. This is why so many fish can produce eggs or sperm at different times in their lives. It doesn’t take any specialized external organs to squirt gametes into the water, just a gonad for gamete production and an orifice for release.

However, the whole situation changes if you live on dry land. As mammals evolved for terrestrial life, they had to acquire adaptations—both structural and behavioral—to prevent their gametes and embryos from drying out. You can’t simply drop your sperms and eggs on the ground and hope for the best. So, male terrestrial animals evolved specialized external body parts for transferring sperm directly into females, who, in turn, have evolved body parts designed for receiving sperm and a chamber for nurturing the developing embryo until it is ready for life on dry land. Additionally—and equally important—both males and females evolved complementary neuromuscular behavioral patterns that allow them to court and mate successfully.

That’s why terrestrial mammals can’t change sex like some fish do. Such a transformation would require females to spontaneously sprout some kind of tube for internal sperm delivery, and males would need to somehow develop a complementary orifice. Moreover—and more importantly—both males and females would need to develop all the necessary internal parts and “plumbing” to make these external structures functional. It’s insufficient to merely alter the appearance of external structures, which can be done surgically (even on pets). A terrestrial animal transitioning from a female to a male would also require developing a complex duct system linking the gonads to the external tube, along with glands to secrete a carrying fluid and nutrients for the sperm (i.e., the Wolffian duct system, prostate, and bulbourethral glands). Going from male to female would involve developing some kind of organ to catch the eggs when they get released into the abdominal cavity, retain them until they encounter sperm, and then house the resulting embryo while it develops (these are derivatives of the Müllerian duct system).

Obviously, none of this could happen. When it comes to mammals, the die is cast prenatally. So, whatever fish do is their business and has absolutely nothing to do with terrestrial mammals. So, let’s drop the clown fish and Asian sheepshead wrasse analogies. Anybody who brings them up simply doesn’t understand evolutionary biology. It is futile to engage in discussions based on such analogies unless, of course, you’re one of those people who think that because some animals reproduce parthenogenically, humans should simply stop having sex altogether and hope for the best.

I want to make it clear that I have a deep understanding and empathy for those of us, including myself, who do not fit the popular stereotypes of any category or group. Throughout my life, I have received what seems to be an unrelenting stream of criticism for the fact that I was never (and still am not) perceived as representative of the norm (whatever that is). Consequently, I grew up defending those who were similarly targeted, and I believe that each of us should be continually mindful and accepting of the rich diversity of the human condition. Each of us should actively and consciously strive to be as compassionate, accepting, supportive, and inclusive as possible.

However, doing so does not require us to abandon reason, turn our backs on biology, or unhinge ourselves from reality.

[bethanythebogwitch]

I like Pokémon and as my post history can tell you, I like fish. So why not combine the two and talk about fish Pokémon? I’m going to go over the real life inspirations for every fish Pokémon, discussing their biology and cool facts about the real inspirations. I’ll do this in parts so it doesn’t get too long. Today let’s do generation I and II.

The first fish we get in national dex order is the Horsea line and these aren’t too hard to figure out. They’re seahorses, some of the weirdest fish out there. Seriously, real seahorses are way weirder than Pokémon. We’re talking about fish that can barely swim, have prehensile tails, mate for life, the males get pregnant, and they have no stomachs but have the highest hunting success rate of all fish. Horsea has nothing on that. Horsea can also shoot water and ink from its mouth. This seems to be a reference to squid ink and water guns, though Horsea’s RB dex entry says they use precision shots to shoot down flying bugs. This was likely inspired by the archerfish, which does exactly that. This won’t be the only time that archerfish come up in this series. Their category as the dragon pokemon and Kingdra’s dragon typing references the Japanese word for seahorse, tatsu-no-otoshigo, which means “dragon’s child” based off of a myth that a seahorse who lives long enough will become a dragon. Kingdra also seems to have some weedy sea dragon influence, but there’s a better example of a Pokémon based on that much later in the series.

(image description, a seahorse)

So many recurring archetypes in the series can be traced back to gen I. Archetypes like the early game bird, the early game bug, the early game rodent, the mushroom, the three-stage rock, and more came from RBY. Another, probably less intentional archetype is the incredibly forgettable fish. Meet Goldeen and Seaking. They’re based on goldfish and koi and the only thing that makes them stand out from real fish is the horns. There are a truly absurd number of goldfish breeds but the one that looks closest to Goldeen is the tosakin, which has a curly tail like Goldeen and is popular in Japan while Seaking looks most like an azuma nishiki.

(image description: a tosakin Goldfish)

Since goldfish and koi are both members of the carp family, I wonder if there’s a close ancentral relationship to Magikarp. They are also said to swim upriver to spawn and Seaking gets redder during mating season, which seems to be a clear reference to salmon. In addition, male Seaking uses its horn to make a hole in a rock for the female to lay her eggs in. many male fish will make nests or other structures to woo females and provide a a safe spot to lay eggs. The horn is interesting. At first I thought I was just there to make them look less like normal fish, but there might be more to it than that. There are fish with horns, the cowfish, but they look nothing like these two (and barely look like fish for that matter) so I don’t think that was an inspiration. The unicornfish has a horn-like protrusion on its head that could have been an inspiration. I also found refences to Hinduism with Matsya, an avatar of Vishnu that looked like a horned fish in some depictions which could also be a reference in the line’s design (sidenote, a India-based region would be really cool).

(mage description: an artistic depiction of Matsya as a horned fish)

These fish are found in a ton of regions despite not being all that interesting. In real life goldfish have become invasive or introduced species in many areas due to irresponsible pet owners releasing them into the wild. As these two are sometimes kept as pets, I wonder if their wide distribution in the Pokémon world is due to the same thing. Also, why is fresh water fish named Seaking?

Next we move on to the mon, the myth, the legend: Magikarp. I’m only going over Magikarp as I see Gyarados as a sea serpent/eastern dragon rather than a fish. Magikarp is, as you might guess, an Asian carp, though it also seems to have some koi features.

(image description: a common carp)

The common carp is somewhat golden in color, which could explain Magikarp’s shiny color, and mirror carp and koi have been specially bred for appearance, which might be why Magikarp is red. Magikarp is famous for its splashing and jumping, something Asian carp are also known for. Silver carp in particular can jump clear out of the water, which makes them a hazard for boaters.

(gif description: a silver carp jumping out of the water and hitting a boater in the head)

Most pokedex entries focus on the splashing and how weak Magikarp is, but some go on to say their survival in the Pokémon world is due to them being able to live in very poor water quality and reproducing like crazy. This is very true of real Asian carp, who can thrive in terrible conditions and produce millions of eggs per spawning. This has contributed to them becoming invasive species in many parts of the world. Considering Magikarp can be found in every region, the same is probably true of the Pokemon world. Magikarp evolving into the draconic Gyarados is a reference to the legend of the dragon bridge: a waterfall that, if a carp jumped over it, would turn the carp into a dragon.

Chinchou and Lanturn are weird little fish. The glowing lures and their described deep-sea habitat make them deep-sea anglerfish, specifically football fish, but they also look very different than their inspirations.

(image description, a footballfish that washed up on the shore)

Some deep-sea anglerfish have multiple glowing lures like these two, but I couldn’t find any with Chinchou’s orientation. I think Chinchou may be a reference to alien bug-eyed monsters, with its body looking like the head and the antennae you sometimes see on said BEMs. Chinchou being able to walk on its fins may be a reference to shallow water anglerfish, who are often bottom dwellers who have modified their pectoral and/or pelvic fins into legs.

(Image description, a frogfish. note the fins that have been modified for use as legs)

Chinchou’s name is the giveaway to it identity. It seems to come from chōchin (lantern) and the related chōchin-ankō (deep-sea anglerfish). Lanturn looks more like a fish, but it still doesn’t look much like an anglerfish as it’s cute and they’re usually ugly as hell. A lot of people say it has dolphin influence. I don’t really get dolphin from its design, but if it is a dolphin, it may draw from the Greek god Apollo, who was associated with light and whose sacred animal was a dolphin. Chinchou having fin legs but Lanturn lacking them seems to indicate that as they mature, they go from bottom-dwellers to free-swimming fish. Since real anglerfish use symbiotic, bioluminescent bacteria in their lures, the Chinchou line may be one of the few cases of a mutualistic relationship in Pokemon and maybe the only one with a non-Pokémon lifeform that isn’t a plant. Interestingly, Slowbro, Slowking, Remoraid, Mantine, Tatsugiri, and Dondozo also have mutualistic relationships and they’re all water type. That’s a weird coincidence. 

Qwilfish is certainly an underdog (underfish?) story. From being a completely forgettable single-stager for multiple generations until a regional form and evolution pulled it from obscurity. Both it and its Hisuan form are pufferfish or porcupinefish. Both are closely related and have the ability to gulp in water or air (though gulping air is bad for them) to inflate their spiny bodies as a defense.

(image description: an inflated porcupinefish)

Unlike their counterparts, Qwilfish is always inflated, but can grow even bigger where in the real fish, inflation is stressful and only done when in danger. The line’s poison typing comes from real pufferfish having some incredibly potent poison. It’s called tetradotoxin and it’s an extremely dangerous neurotoxin. Fugu fish famously has to be prepared by a well-trained chef who knows what parts to cut away to avoid poisoning whoever eats it. Pnlike real puffers, Qwilfish can inject the poison into others through its spines, making it venomous as opposed to the real ones, who are poisonous. Overqwil also seems to have some sea urchin elements with how huge its spines are. Some urchins are also venomous and can inject poison through their quills. Finally, the whole line seems to be based off of naval mines what with their roundness and ability to explode.

Remoraid is a fish of many talents and has a lot of origins. First things first, it’s a pistol. This is more easily seen in its unused older design, but you can still see it. This is also why it evolves into an octopus. Octillery is an artillery cannon. Also the animals they’re based on both use suction and squirt water. Remoraid also has major inspiration from the archerfish (remember them?) in that it is a master at spitting water with precision and the pokedex says it can shoot targets out of the air just like an archerfish.

(imager description: a spitting archerfish)

The archerfish inspiration and pistol design are why it learns so many shooting moves. Finally, Remoraid is a remora,  even though they really look nothing alike. Like the remora, it has a modified dorsal fin shaped like a suction cup that it uses to suction onto larger animals. Both remoras and Remoraid will get carried along by the larger animal and will eat scraps of the larger animal’s meal. The remora benefits by getting a free ride, water over the gills, and food while the larger animal may also get some benefits from the remora eating ectoparasites and dead skin. A remora attaching to an animal would either be a commensal (one party benefits, the other receives neither benefit nor harm) or mutualistic relationship. In Pokémon, the only animal we see Remoraid attaching to is Mantine and they have an explicitly mutualistic relationship as Remoraid fights alongside Mantine and its presence allows Mantyke to evolve. Speaking of which…

image description: a mana ray with two remoras attached to it

Mantyke and Mantine are stingrays, specifically manta rays, one of my favorite animals. They truly are gentle giants and these Pokémon are too, being primarily special walls. Like mantas, Mantyke and Mantine are intelligent, social, and playful creatures. Mantas are one of if not the smartest fish, smart enough to pass the mirror test by recognizing their own reflections. There is a correlation between animal intelligence and playfulness. The smarter an animal is, the more likely it is to play for fun rather than for hunting practice and other purposes. This can be seen in primates, corvids, canines, and yes, rays. Those antennae on Mantyke and Mantine are based on the cephalic flaps of the manta, modified fins that help direct plankton into its mouth. Of course these two have the flying type and unlike Gyarados, there’s a good reason for it. Mantas are part of the genus Mobula and all 9 species of the genus are known to leap out of the water before splashing back down.

(image description: a Mobula ray jumping)

Nobody really knows why they do this, but there could be several reasons: cleaning parasites, herding prey, finding lost members of the school, or maybe just for fun. Mantine’s flying abilities are highly exaggerated and it also has some airplane design features, with the Remoraid on its wing looking like a plane engine or wing-mounted gun. As mentioned above, Remoraid and the Mantyke line have a mutualistic relationship. Not really relevant but still a fun fact: mantas give live birth and the babies come out folded up like burritos.

That’s it for part one. Come back next time for generations III and IV

[lwamonstergirls]

A Complete Change to the AU

Okay, I've thought about it, and I've decided that I wanna do a change up of the Monster AU in some ways.

First off, I'm gonna be changing the origins of the Monster AU completely! No longer will this all be because of a spell that Akko screwed up, but instead this will be how things were always like. Luna Nova would have always been a school for monster girls, and all the characters, aside from Akko, would've been born monsters. Akko on the other hand, would be a girl who got turned into a werecat after being bitten by one a few years before she got into Luna Nova. And in this world, no school would except her since she was no longer human, so her parents had to look up and down to find Luna Nova, since it was the only school for monsters, that was also about studying witchcraft! So yeah, the monster stuff would've always been the case. It would also allow me to go full spec evo on this AU, possibly add some hybrid monsters to spice things up, and make some kinds of views and kinds of societal norms to monster society~!

Second thing is, a few students will have their species changed, either due to me not finding those previous choices interesting enough to have them stay that way anymore, or due to me not liking how rushed some choices seemed! Plus, over the years I've grown fond of some more background witches, so I figured giving them better, more cool monster choices, would be more respectful~! Plus, I wanna have the background witches to be able to have more spotlight on them, like just as much as the main cast in this AU, so this would help for sure.

Also, due to a few characters sharing the same species as the fae folk custodians, and since they're obviously still sharing the same magical resources, that means that the school would probably need a larger magical resource than just the Sorcerer's Stone. Which means, that strike episode with the fae's would never happen in this AU. Which is good since I abhor that episode. Literally the only episode of the anime that I cannot stand. Then again, it's probably best for the fae's that that never happens. Because if they did start attacking the students, the dragons like Sarah would vaporize them. So yeah, that episode never happens.

In fact that's another thing I should bring up! Since the background characters are no longer background characters, and since everyone is a monster of a different species with certain abilities, the series will obviously take some different turns, have some relationships established that weren't there in the original, have plot points that weren't in the original series, and just have it overall be much more distinct from the original series, so that it doesn't feel like I'm just mimicking it but with monster girls.

One final thing, I might redo my previous bios, since the plot is different and obviously some new rules should be established for this world. Don't worry though, none of the girls I talked about already will have their species changed (except maybe Mary's), and I'll keep the stuff about their biology that I've already talked about in the post, just with some changes to the world building and maybe add some stuff if I feel like it. Because the zoology part of my brain really loves talking about the biology, spec evo, and world building of this AU~!It makes me genuinely happy that I'm reviving it and being able to actually do something with it~!

Okay, I think that's everything! I hope you all enjoyed this news and be sure to stick around because the next post is coming soon! Bye~!

[cloudyswritings]

Scug biology

These are just some of my thoughts on how exactly scugs function.

They’re a social species, living in colonies of up to 70 or so individuals.

Their language relies more heavily on movement and context than actual noises. In that vein noises, especially sounds from the mouth, signal strong emotions about topics

Theyre slimy/sticky. We know these fellas evolved from some pipe cleaning purposes organisms and I can’t imagine them as being fluffy. Their ability to squeeze through small spaces supports them having slimy skin too.

Their skin is probably pretty thick though? Also very loose. Kinda like a honey badgers, it’d explain how they can sometimes survive lizard bites and escape.

Scugs have a surprisingly large range of natural colors, going all the way from earth tones to reds and blues. The purple that spearmaster has however, isn’t natural. Nor is the rivulets particularl shade of blue.

Scugs sleep a lot, this is primarily due to having evolved in tandem with the cycles. Even without them however they’d still have a similar sleep schedule

I feel like they’re probably the next species in line to achieve technology and society? Like there’s an argument to be made for scavs, but as artificer proved slugcat are really the more dangerous of the two.

They naturally prefer diets high in protein, and shellfish and other mollusks are preferred prey.

I’ll absolutely be doing a part two of this, and a couple posts about saint and spearmaster.

[suffarustuffaru]

I'd love to hear more about Otto and Natsumi Schwartz if you have anymore thoughts on them

hah once again ty for all the cool asks its been fun answering them :o !! and arghhhhh otto and natsumi......................................... i have many thoughts.

ive been planning on making a comprehensive otto queer analysis post for a while - just bc i think my thoughts on reading otto as queer are kinda spread across different posts of mine HAH and i dont normally write very formally with proper grammar in most of my analysis posts, even (...i normally save that for my school essays...... </3) but id love to make an actual formal analysis just for the topic of queer otto bc i have been Gathering Evidence!! making theories!! otto's whole judging attitude towards natsumi is definitely part of it.

and also i do have fic wips in the works abt these sorts of topics!! i am publishing one sometime this month or early next month!!

anyway i went over like my theory on otto being a little fixated on normalcy in asks like this one.... which is yknow due to being an outcast his entire life so then he ends up overcorrecting a little (see: him insisting on wearing green bc he thinks itll help him look approachable) but then he never fits in anywhere Except for the emilia camp anyway so :,))

that, and. you would Think that otto wouldnt give a shit bc of his dp. like animal biology is soo widely different between different animals, biological sex can be a little complicated at times (like. snails. for example) and of course animals all work Really differently, but also sometimes animals will have sex with other members of their species with the same sex (like bats. or giraffes.) so its like. Yes, human sex and gender and sexuality and human concepts of these things are Not comparable to animals but its still like - these are natural things, you know? and ottos talked with lots of animals and probably seen a bit of shit, so you would expect him not to be homophobic or transphobic or anything right?

and i think on one level he would recognize human sex, gender, and sexuality as natural things, bc they are, but i also think otto still has internalized shit going on from all the times hes struggled with learning social rules and how human connection works as he was growing up, id say. i remember how in my. um. "how homophobic would rz characters be" tier list i had to move otto UP a tier into the same tier as FERRIS AND SUBARU.... in the DEALING WITH INTERNALIZED SHIT tier..... yes. i have reasons for doing that yep!!

so. in three idiots goddess statue episode, garf otto and subaru of course crossdress to go to this party with roswaal for Reasons!!!! and ottos got a bit of an attitude about the crossdressing ok. just gonna leave some excerpts from there regarding otto's feelings on natsumi and crossdressing:

She is a thin woman with wavy gray hair and beautiful ornaments. She has a neutral face, but the lightly applied makeup enhances her good looks. She looks so good in a dress that exposes her thin white shoulders that it is a shame that she walks with her head down.

Natsumi: “So, how long are you going to keep your mouth shut? Don't you think it's time to make up your mind?” Audrey: “I'm more curious as to why you're so adamant about this!” Natsumi: “Oh-ho-ho-ho” Audrey blushed and yelled at Natsumi, who put her hand over her mouth and laughed loudly. However, in no time at all. Audrey immediately covered her face with her hands, as if ashamed of herself. Audrey: “How could this happen? If I knew there had been two other people besides me, I wouldn't have had to resort to such emergency measures! I've been tricked!"

Needless to say, it was Garfiel who was dressed as the blonde woman, and Otto as the gray-haired woman. And the last one, Natsumi Schwartz, was the one who… Subaru: “So she's the temporary form of Natsuki Subaru, as you know.” Otto: “Um, how come you're so smooth and perfect? Even your voice has changed, hasn't it?” Subaru: “Actually, I failed once before because I couldn't change my voice. Ever since then, I've been practicing for a chance at revenge.”

Subaru: “Did you actually have a secret desire to dress as a woman? So you took this opportunity to......?” Otto: “don’t look at me like you've just found out the terrible truth!” Otto spat and screamed at Subaru's shocked face. Then, while he was breathing hard. Otto: “Your crazy prediction is way off! I really only did what Ram asked me to do. I thought I was doing the camp a favor, and this is how they treat me!” Subaru: “Wow, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, calm down. Look, you're ruining your pretty face....…” Otto: “Shut up”

With the men calling out to her one after another, Audrey left the crowd and took a breath. She wanted to sit on the balcony and enjoy the cool breeze to cool down the heat of the party. To be honest, since we entered the venue, the men have been constantly coming at us with no time to rest. Audrey had heard that this was a place to meet people, but the hunt of a hungry wolf is insatiable. They are so hungry that they are even blinded by the gender of the person in front of them. If they don't develop a better eye for women, even if they do meet someone, they will probably end up unhappy. Or is it that "good"?  Audrey: “Hmm, makeup is scary. I can see how men can turn into....…”

Audrey glanced toward the center of the hall. There, as usual, Natsumi was having a good time chatting with many of the participants. She was so excited that she could be heard shouting over and over again. Garnet: “Captain...... No, not so much as a lady” Audrey: “I really wonder what's going on with that guy....... I'm worried that he won't respond to me calling him Natsuki-San anymore.”

Gwain: “No, no, no, enough is enough. You ladies are beautiful, especially that dark-haired girl, Natsumi Schwartz. She's got the youngsters by the balls. She's a bad girl.” Audrey: “Ha-ha-ha.” Audrey couldn't help but let out a hearty laugh and failed to look feminine.

Then, smiling with her hand over her mouth, is a woman with distinctive mean looking eyes. With her unusual black hair and jet-black dress, she exudes elegance in her demeanor. Perhaps it's because she's a good talker and a good listener, but she seems to be able to swim through the social scene with ease, laughing and creating a friendly atmosphere even when surrounded by several men.  I couldn't decide whether I should be impressed or dismayed by her versatility. A short distance away, a sharp-looking blonde woman silently waved away the men who approached her, creating a stark contrast between the light and dark of the people involved. And to those of us on the sidelines, watching the scene…

anyway so. thats a whole lot of excerpts and theres probably at least a little bit more in that ss that i didnt put in this post hah.... and i know that you could definitely interpret these scenes in a few different ways, and also that when youre writing about gender, your feelings on it are likely to bleed into the text a bit and so some of stuff like otto being a Bit of an Asshole in this ss might just be tappei's tappei-isms also (which is most likely the case for stuff like this entire ss tbh :,)) ) but. but i do think theres Something here to be analyzed in regards to otto!!

bc like. lbr. i really doubt that otto is Straight. i really really doubt that hes straight, and i feel like theres just so so much possible gay subtext behind whatever the hell ottos feelings for subaru are thatre scattered across side content and the main story HAH...... this isnt even my ottosuba bias talking, its genuinely what i think could be happening here. and lbr if otto was female everyone and their mother would be shipping ottosuba more i think haha.

but yeah anyway otto shows up being a little...... wack..... about crossdressing??? HM. hmmmmmmmmmmmmm. but also the rezero fantasy world seems to be rather Judgmental about these sorts of things anyway so. :,)))

but i am squinting HARD at "I'm worried that he won't respond to me calling him 'Natsuki-san' anymore".............. and the hungry wolf part......... im squinting at it for multiple reasons (tappei being tappei) (.....but also WHAT is going on in otto's head...)..... "I couldn't decide whether I should be impressed or dismayed by her versatility."............

anyway. i think this could be several possiblities....

otto is once again focused on what's considered "normal" and is focused on trying to at least Attempt to fit into societal ideas of normalcy so when he sees subaru whos this absolutely chaotic and bold person whos also like Queer In Every Direction, otto's brain basically shortcircuits. hes like "wtf how are you doing that. you cant do that. thats not allowed. youre so confident about this too. wtf" (ie: ............otto is transphobic.) (this is 1ooo% the most likely option)

otto is gay for subaru and subaru dressing as a woman gives otto a little bit of a bi crisis. natsumis a bad girl thats got youngsters by the balls, you see. also bc subaru called otto pretty and otto was immediately like "SHUT UP" like T^TT

otto is gay for subaru and subaru dressing as a woman gives otto a tiny itty bitty crisis bc if subaru's sex was female and if subaru was 100% a woman then liking subaru romantically would be a million times easier bc then its societally acceptable

otto, being a bit of a manipulative asshole, goes "hm. subaru-as-natsumi effortlessly charming the room? interesting. i approve of the political maneuvering."

otto is being an asshole, once again, to complain, once again, about all the work he Willingly Does for his friends

................................................gender envy???????

or feeling off bc hes uncomfortable crossdressing just bc of that mismatch between his gender presentation and his gender yknow

otto is feminine/androgynous, so could he have been made fun of for this in the past?????????????????? does he ever get uncomfy about that?????????????????????? not being traditionally masculine??????? bc otto easily passes as a woman when hes crossdressing?????????

a mix of a few of the above options!!!!!

but yeah like. ottos clearly ashamed and embarrassed to be crossdressing. he's also been mistaken for a woman in the past (in subaru's pov) bc yknow hes very androgynous. and also otto gets Really Fucking Defensive when subaru insinuates that otto couldve wanted to dress as a woman also this entire time. the "youre ruining your pretty face..." "shut up." exchange is SOOOO.... T^TT

(and also quick side note but i think ottos stance on queerness is "i dont think its personally wrong. except that i think its wrong Societally bc society will be a bitch about it!! too much Trouble and Work For Me!!!! " :,)))) fucking bitch. thanks otto </333)

and im sure the "I'm worried that he won't respond to me calling him 'Natsuki-san' anymore" line is a dig at subaru passing so so strongly as natsumi that ottos like "urgh hes more of a Woman now" or smth :,))))) however!! its also interesting just bc "natsuki-san" is like. otto turned it into a pet name. basically. like at this point. even though he and subaru have grown closer during and after arc 4 otto Still uses "natsuki-san" - its kind of special, yknow? dude turned that into a fond nickname. so its like..................... if you squint.... why is otto basically saying "will subaru being natsumi drive him away from me..." like im gonna slap otto across the face i swear HAHA. but also otto Does use "natsumi-san" towards natsumi as well but im still. squinting hard at that. "natsuki-san" is The original pet name, after all.

and also the hungry wolf lines... like i know the intent of that is like. otto as audrey keeps getting hit on by guys at this party bc shes attractive, right, with her dress and makeup and styled hair and all that. insert tappei's tappei-isms here. but ottos musing on this like "mm.... men can be so hungry in their romantic pursuits that they'd be blind to the true gender of the person theyre hitting on...... makeup can really do such a thing huh... turns men into Animals..." and its like. hm. otto. you know. i Wonder. i really wonder my guy after hearing about you be obsessive over subaru for like three arcs!!!!!!!!!!

as for ottos gender like. dude is cisgender in canon im sure. though i definitely think its fun to explore genderqueer interpretations of him - and even then, i think even if he isnt genderqueer, i think there might be a bit of shock or even envy, if you squint, at otto seeing subaru so flamboyant and way more confident about crossdressing while ottos over here ducking his head and red with embarrassment while natsumi is absolutely OWNING it. despite the judgment otto and other people are giving!!! otto could Never. it completely blows ottos mind a little, from the looks of it. "how come youre so smooth and perfect?", the defensiveness at subaru saying otto couldve secretly wanted to dress as a woman, "i couldnt decide whether to be impressed or dismayed", and of course it all goes back to subaru being in the spotlight and otto watching from the sidelines. in the Darkness, you could say. hahahaahahahah................. subaru who gets easily into trouble and seems so so shameless about things while ottos so distressed about it.... about every little thing................

but also i do have another running theory that subaru's masculinity issues and otto's androgyny do clash a little just bc. well subarus judged ferris a bit before - "what part of you is like a man?" iirc is the line from arc 4 wn that subaru said to ferris. and subaru can feel more confident bc hey.... im more masculine than a guy like otto, right? otto, who can easily be mistaken for a girl? but im sure subaru would be a little jealous, even. maybe. bc woah. i want to pass as a girl when i decide to dress as one. and then yknow ottos being a dick abt it. maybe its a "im a man and Not a woman" (cisgender man who is uncomfortable dressing as a woman and knows this is not for him) thing too or maybe its a "im a man and Not a woman, so doing this is stupid and beneath me" (internalized/not internalized transphobia????????????) thing???????

yeah so idk i feel like theres different ways to read this fr especially when. haah..................... otto is Not Straight for subaru. thats for sure.

so why are you being an asshole about your crush crossdressing????????? why does it kind of threaten you a bit???????????????????????? why are you behaving this way????????????????????

but if you think about it i do think that maybe. at the heart of all of this. otto is just upset at the Impossibility of him and subaru being together (in any sense of that word) bc theyre so similar but so so different and it makes them clash in every way. :,))))

[trifectum]

“LIAVOSSO’S GALACTIC JOURNAL! - entry one: the Mantisi.”

This is one of the first of perhaps quite a few entries into what is basically just an easy way to summarise the nature of the various species in this universe. No music this time - but do read on! The remainder of this post is basically what the writer (Liavosso) has written in unity with it - on a separate piece of paper.

“Well - this hasn’t been a great start for what I was hoping would be a fun and easy way to recall my encounters with people… first they fight me on sight - then I discover their blood is WAY too good at staining! Like, I’m trying to shake off the ‘evil probably-cannibal Demon-monster descended from a famous murderous bounty-hunter with a Void-thing for a limb’ narrative, and here I go getting alien blood on so much paper that I might as well paint with it!… and I did - but dammit I had nothing to colour with!

But anyway! Anyway… the first entry of my journal is dedicated to the Mantisi - or more accurately - the White Herald. What I aim to do in each addition is have a model of a certain species pose so I can sketch them in all their glory and write about what I’ve learned about them - as well as my opinions and experiences with them. While I couldn’t do that here, I hope next time they are a little more… non-weird. Now, anyone who knows the White-Herald probably thinks I’m a bit mental for picking them first, but I have a good reason: my daughter (adopted) is a descendant of a White-Herald royal - which does incentivise me to get them out of the way early… She doesn’t mind me killing them - if you’re wondering - they aren’t exactly her favourite people.

So - first thing to mention: biology and history! The Mantisi are unusual, in the sense that they are one of the first milky-way residents (in this iteration of the universe) to gain the knowledge of genetic editing. Now, most Mantisi just got two legged variants and removed wings - and left it there. But the White-Herald… they went mad with it. They edited their features, their minds, even their natural defences, to look more like my subspecies - the Vyrocepters (not very well - but they have a ‘plan’ for that). To save time - and skip hours of lore about who did who and what that meant for whoever else - my Mum boinked one of their albino ones a long while back, and a big cult developed to preserve and advance that particular variation of Mantisi in order to somehow create viable offspring with anyone of my species. So, all White-Herald royals are albino, and have the more… ‘bug-like’ lower bodies, while their soldiers are two-legged, and are a dark shade of green. You won’t get too many who look more like other heralds - but there are some weird mutations for… obvious reasons. Things like four arms, multiples pairs of wings, and durable shells. Ok - so not much of that was biology than it was history, but again, this is a hectic start.

I’ll put this in too, because everyone asks - yeah they do have the same ‘fun-time’ organs. It’s a common thing with Mantisi that people think what goes on downstairs does much more than sit on a different bit of the undercarriage depending on which one you come across, but no - all of them tend to be compatible. At worst the top half of a royal has the soldier placement of the appropriate parts.

Ok! Next bit, next bit… what was the next bit… oh! My opinion! It’s not great. To me, the White-Herald are a stain on the race as a whole, and the universe they inhabit. I personally couldn’t see myself liking any one of them, even with my daughter in mind, and I doubt they would really ‘like’ me, despite their obsession with trying to make a bug and a mammal (I think we’re mammals - GenoDemons I meet won’t specify) work. So I’d say avoid them. That… might also be a good summary. Ok - next time I’ll have this sorted - with the Lybadora. In the meantime I’m gonna figure out how to phrase all this. Blade’s been a help, but in the end it isn’t my dominant hand and it can’t explain things well unless it’s in a pickle. Until next time!”

[writernopal]

Hi Nopal! And happy WBW to you☺️

You've been probably asked this before, but I'd like to know: why lizard folk?

Could you elaborate on how you created them? Did you decide which features they share with humans and which they don't? Or was it more of discovery? Were there any concrete inspirations?

Any other interesting behind-the-scenes facts about them?

Happy late WBW, Sam! It's been a super busy couple of days, so I'm sorry I couldn't answer this on time! Also this is going to be a long one, sorry for that too!

Why Lizardfolk?

Why indeed?! When I started developing the world of AASOAF I took a lot of inspiration from Skyrim, Divinity Original Sin II, and D&D-style TTRPG worlds because I knew I wanted a big world where I could do whatever I wanted. However, when I was picking the different races/species I wanted to include, they originally didn't make the cut. It wasn't until I started writing that I added them in because I thought, why not? Why shouldn't I have Lizardfolk? So in they went! I should say I never counted on getting obsessed with them. That was a complete accident!

Could you elaborate on how you created them? Did you decide which features they share with humans and which they don't? Or was it more of discovery? Were there any concrete inspirations?

The short answer, I created my first problem child: Wilkes.

There was this whole concept of an organization similar to the Nine Pirate Lords of Pirates of the Caribbean in the original telling of AASOAF, and in an effort to make things simple, I thoughtlessly picked a few names and assigned them to characters with some kind of identifiable appearance. Wilkes was one of these characters and was mostly meant as a set piece, just like the others, for Fay to interact with. She was the only main character at the time, and the idea was she would have run-ins with these pirates to form part of an arc in her story. I wrote a few of them (all human up to that point), and they were great fun, but then I got around to Wilkes and I got STUCK.

Remember when I thought I was making things easy for myself? (She didn't) I offhandedly created him as an albino Lizardfolk and when I tried to write him, I quickly realized 2 things:

1. It wouldn't make ANY sense to write him the way I would with a human. I got so stunlocked when I realized that he probably wouldn't have ears LOL.

2. I didn't know how he related to other Lizardfolk because I knew next to nothing about how I wanted Lizardfolk to be or how they as a people connected with the world around them.

So as I started to develop his character, I also started asking myself a lot of questions that forced me to research beyond my initial inspirations. I started looking at nature and biology. I did TONS of research on socioeconomic and political systems, languages, ecosystems, and how all of these are represented in my initial inspirations for AASOAF's Lizardfolk (Argonians of Skyrim, Lizards of DOSII, and Lizardfolk and Dragonborn of TTRPGs).

Eventually, I arrived at Version 1, which was enough for me to continue writing and have a more 3D version of Wilkes. The dynamic he and Fay developed was SO cool to me despite him still being a bit of a prop that, eventually, the story centered around the two of them instead of just Fay. And as I wrote him more, I discovered new things about Lizardfolk, which eventually turned it into the lore behemoth that it is today. So by the time I started canon AASOAF with Mariel and Axtapor, the world of Lizardfolk and the race themselves were already quite built up and I ran with it!

Any other interesting behind-the-scenes facts about them?

I actually have a whole info dump post here that covers most facts about them!

[masterofrecords]

Larger Pacific Striped Octopus (LPSO)

Sooo I know Weil made a post with the wikipedia link, but those guys are so cool and I know not everyone has the time to go through the wikipedia sources for more info. So.

Wikipedia says they are "a relatively new scientific observation", and thus not properly described, and what that really means is that in the 70s one dude observed LPSO, tried to write a proper article on their behavior, and that behavior was so different from what was expected from octopuses, that the publication never passed peer review. It's wild.

Most of the information below will come from this 2015 article in PLOS ONE, as far as I know it's one of the few publicly available scientific articles on LPSO.

Putting the rest under read more because it's getting long... but look at these beauties:

So, if you've read anything about octopuses, you probably know a few things about them.

Octopuses are solitary creatures. There are exceptions, of course (see here), but even in cases of abundant food and advantageous terrain there would be maybe 14 or so octopuses in the same area, and most times keeping two octopuses in the same tank results in one of them getting killed.

LPSO have been observed to live in colonies of as many as 40 individuals, and were kept in the same tanks in captivity without any incidents.

Next is mating behavior. For one, the mating in most octopuses typically results in cannibalism or other mutilations - which also leads to males of some species mating from afar to be able to escape should the female become aggressive, or even breaking off their mating arm to leave it to do its thing while the male himself flees. Other species mate in a closer mounting position.

Even if the male survives the mating, he doesn't have long to live - the mating triggers the process called senescence, and they stop eating. The females live a bit longer - just enough to protect the eggs until they hatch. However, they still stop eating and also die soon.

Literally none of those behaviors is observed in LPSO. The pairs can live together for a while before mating, and were even observed sharing food in a position similar to their mating position - beak to beak, suckers aligned.

And yes, they mate beak to beak, which is closer to how, say, squids do it. That's not to say LPSO matings are gentle, per se - the females can still display some degree of aggression and grapple and almost completely envelop the (usually much smaller) male in their web, which is similar to aggressive contest behavior in octopuses. The embrace will leave sucker marks on their arms. (All of thisthis may or may not be where some of Azul's kinks in Aquarium originally came from.) Still, absolutely no cannibalism or related behaviors was observed (no violently strangling the male, no pulling arms).

And they survive the mating and can actually procreate multiple times over their lives! They still don't live long (I believe current estimate is about 2 years), but it looks like their senescence isn't tied to mating, and females continued to hunt and feed while brooding.

And I almost forgot about the hunting! Here's a quote:

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” said marine biologist Roy Caldwell, a University of California, Berkeley, professor of integrative biology. “Octopuses typically pounce on their prey or poke around in holes until they find something. When this octopus sees a shrimp at a distance, it compresses itself and creeps up, extends an arm up and over the shrimp, touches it on the far side and either catches it or scares it into its other arms.”

There is still a lot unknown about this species, I'm afraid, but they really are a fascinating example of the variety in octopus behaviors. Hope this was interesting. (Also tell me if you want me to talk about the moray teeth. Please let me talk about the moray teeth, I'm doing way too much marine biology research for this stupid fic.)