The prickly pear worm.
'We found him in the dessert, the first of his kind, what a barbaric world this is! The patient lay there on white garments, now flecked with blood and puss as he squirmed in pain at the slightest touch. We couldn't bandage his wounds, it was too painful in him. Blood trickled down his lips as he bit down onto his gnashed tongue, the subject of his malevolent inner pain. We could do nothing, but watch him slowly heal. We could've done something, but several had already called it quits, complaining about dreams riddled with holes and screams.
The dwarf was riddled with holes, holes down into his innards, through his intestines and flesh. They squirmed ribs, such a precise weapon, I do not know what had inflicted so. They were seeping with puss and blood, mixing in with faeces and chipped crimson. However, we had no choice but wonder; "What could've been so precise, in drilling these holes? What single weapon could've done this to him?". For now, we could only wait, wait for cleric.'
WIP Lore
Prickly pear worms are named after the 'fruit', which grow on their tail. Covered with sharp needle like pines, they are the image of a cactus, of which they are designed to emulate. Growing to around six to ten feet, of which about half their length are burrowed in sand, they are naturally docile, possessing no sense of sight, hearing or smell. They however, possess a sense of touch, though small. Due to their tough hide, their nerve receptors are hidden about 3 centimetres below their exterior. Due to this small amount of sensitivity, they have evolved to grow spines, running down their side which are attached to their nerve receptors.
Movement:
The Prickly Pear Worm moves by stiffening their spines, then twisting their body through the sand. However, due to how inefficient their movement is, they prefer to dwell on the surface, emulating cactuses and eating anything that goes after it's 'roots'. When touched, or even startled, no matter the case: It would twist in order to discombobulate the attacker with sand, before sifting into the sand where it would dwell. In some cases, it would even leave the 'cactus' part of their body, before sifting it's frontal portion of it's body further into sand.
Eating Habits:
Due to their docile nature, and their way of eating, the Prickly Pear worm are not surface hunters but prefer to hunt underground. Like a spider, it lies in wait for it's prey.
The dried up husk of a Prickly pear worm. [Frontal end]
With half of it's end sticking up while the other half burrows into the ground, it lies in wait for plant eating animals to gnaw at it's roots. Taking advantage of this, the worm has developed quite a surprising hunting method.
Like a plant, it produces sugar, which is secreted into the sand around it's mouth. However, it possess a light toxin which temporarily paralysis the prey, giving the normally slow moving worm a chance to swallow it's prey. Due to it's fleshy interior and it's lack of bone and teeth, it can only swallow animals up to the size of a Rodent.
Reproduction:
Asexual, their method of reproduction is quite fascinating, as well as sickening. Named after the fruit like entities growing on it's backside, or the portion which sticks up in the air, they naturally look like cactuses. The fruit it grows, however are in fact eggs. Segmented 'bundles' of eggs.
A trio of 'bundles', disguised to look like fruit. The lack of spikes makes it ideal for a surface dweller to eat.
Upon 'biting', the bitten portion of the fruit, would be chewed and then digested. Upon digestion, the small egg would hatch into a toothpick sized worm, which it would then latch onto the side of the small intestine. Unlike it's adult counterpart, this 'worm' has small teeth, which allows it to draw blood, and also to chew 'slob' which enters the small intestine. As it grows older and older, it would draw more and more blood before it grows to the size of a finger, where it's teeth would retract and it would eat the majority of the digested food, in-took from the stomach. Eventually, when it grows to the size of a toilet roll tube, it would burrow it's way through the stomach. However, due to it's sensitive nature, it would only do so at night, as it cannot stand the heat of the dessert.
It would only pierce skin at dessert night, or until the adventurer leaves for a more humid place.
The Various segments of the 'prickly pear's egg allows optimal survival of delivery even if the whole 'fruit is not ingested.'
A foot and a half long, slimy but without spines, it erupts from the belly before quickly burrowing to the ground, digging it's way through before squirming away to the nearest water source.
This whole 'growing' cycle would take about 3 days, as the small worm itself takes the majority of the nutritional intake it's host would consume. Because of the vicious nature of the prepubescent worm, it would sometimes, if the host is small enough, even erupt through the digestion tract of the animal before feeding on it's corpse, like a maggot. However, larger animals, like humans, orcs and elves would survive the process, though through extreme pain and weeping. Dwarves however, due to their small stature would find it even more, painful.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICpw9FwYqAs
Similar to botfly infestation.
Ways to distinguish if a cactus is actually a cactus, or a prickly pear worm.
-Cut it, if it gushes blue blood, it's a prickly pear worm.
-Examine it for 24 hours, if it moves, it's a prickly pear worm.
-Touch it lightly, if it moves after 5 minutes, it's a prickly pear worm.
Some treatments would be to:
-Eat a kilograms worth of raw garlic everyday, to rid it through the anti-toxic nature of the plant.
-To eat enough food to boost the growth of the worm, so that it may not starve you over the next 3 days.
A fully grown Prickly Pear Worm.
Tl;dr
Behavioural traits:
-Docile, will not attack even if cut or hit.
-Would burrow through ground to escape, confuses predator by spraying sand into the air
-Burrows into sand after 5 minutes of being touched [when possessing eggs] in order to avoid any suspicion.
-If egg is not eaten after 24 hours, would burrow away to find another spot.
-Feeds by secreting sugary toxin in the ground, slowing prey that goes after it's roots before swallowing it whole.
-It's 'front' is heat sensitive while it's tail, due to possessing a thick hide is more resistant.
Physical traits:
-Looks like a cactus
-Smells like a cactus
-Feels like a cactus
-Ring of mouth is surrounded by 'pores' which secret it's toxin.
-Has blue blood.
-Hide is rough, but not rough enough to be made into armour.
Symptoms of parasitical infection:
During the three days
-Constipation
-Growing signs of nausea and dizziness as the three days go by.
-A sense of fullness which would gradually grow into abdominal pain.
-Discolouration and bruise like marks on abdomen as size of grub increases
-Blisters alongside pits.
-Discolouration of eyes.
-Growing signs of weakness and fever as the three days go on.
-Stretch marks would appear on the lower abdomen, ones similar visually to woman undergoing pregnancy. Small bump.
First Creature Lore, as well as my first piece of proposed lore! Please be kind.
If you have any ideas for a name, other than 'prickly pear worm', please pm me about it.
