New Critter: Korriks

Korriks: 

These are creatures that have, so far, been seen in The Trochiabite Boy in Sarkoshia, which is why I want to outline them here.  Mostly, because I've had some ideas about them and want to get them on meta-paper before I forget them.  

Korriks look like giant, reptilian slugs.  They are named for the sound they make during their mating season.  They have a large, toad-like head, complete with the toad/frog waddle, with which they can call.  In most ways, however, they appear like a very fat, proportionally short, serpent, and they move in much the same way: by undulating muscles moving a series of overlapping ventral plates or scales that propel them forward along the ground.  These plates are made of a chitinous substance almost as strong and as durable as plastic, and like a series of fingernails on their lower side, they are replaced constantly.  

Korriks are very fast, very strong, and relatively quiet.  They are a preferred beast of burden in many cities, but particularly one of humans and kinto-shah (even though they have been known to eat young kinto-shah).  They are, for the most part, omnivores, fed most like a pig.  However, they can be predatory.  They will eat animals of size up to the size of their own head.  Korriks usually only require one or two meals a week, and do not require pasture or, really, a great deal of space for stables.  When not moving and not compelled to work, they will rest in one position, so they can be stowed and stabled in smaller spaces.  They also lack the capability to buck, stomp, etc.  However, they can do something called 'bulging' or 'swelling' which can be just as dangerous: they intake a large quantity of air, such that their body swells to a nearly 50% increase in size.  This can cause a rider to become off-balance and fall off, strain or pop straps around them, and break forms of carriage hitches or saddles attached to them.  It is usually a defense mechanism when they are unhappy about someone being on top of them.  Usually, it is an anger reaction more than a fear reaction, because very little makes these creatures afraid.  Furthermore, having one of these animals run over someone is a dangerous, if not deadly, experience.  Their plates dig into the ground to propel them forward, therefore, they will dig into flesh just as readily, cutting and breaking what's underneath, and since an adult korrik weighs hundreds of pounds, this can be fatal.  

Korriks are not necessarily the easiest creatures to train, and have, relative to the japal or horses, been domesticated for labor relatively recently (within maybe the last several hundred to a thousand years).  They are not as intelligent or as ready to learn as horses or japals, but smart enough to understand where food comes from and how they might attain more of it (therefore, trainable).  They are never really broken, but are just taught to cooperate and given food such that they have no need to eat anything else.  They slowly grow accustomed to particular people, which makes them readier for use with wagoners and transporters than with people who just need a mount for a while, or who need to buy a horse. Lastly, they will not go across some terrain (particularly, scorching desert terrain, excessively sandy soil, or frozen terrain. However, they can, and readily will, travel over water, which is how the kinto-shah have come to adapt them to their use (in the Swamps of Ish-Berea).  

One of the greatest disadvantages to Korriks is their mating habits.  The male leaves a large area of slime in a particular place and calls to the female.  When the female finds a call she likes, she moves over the slime and absorbs it into her body.  Effectively, she shuts down and hibernates for about six months (usually the winter months) for her offspring to gestate within her.  Therefore, breeding korriks becomes a difficult and expensive process, one that must be agreed upon by both owners of a breeding pair (usually, one takes the offspring, and another takes money).  The male korrik stays near her to protect her during this process (so, two korriks are effectively incapacitated for almost a season).  Thankfully, there is no nursing or weening that must be accomplished.  The newborn korrik, which already weighs over two hundred pounds, is on its own and the parents separate.  Fortunately, a female korrik will breed once a year, if given the opportunity, even if she cannot choose the best male.  

Korriks have to be trained to pull and obey commands.  This can be a very tedious and difficult process, but so can training a horse.

 

Anyway, that's korriks for now.  I may have some other ideas soon about them.  Don't know.