Manticore

"Do you hear the roar from the king of the Savannah? See the bloodshot irises of a beast like a lion. It is a clear sign that death has come and all there is left to do is pray for mercy. This beast knows on pain, knows no fear, knows no loss or tragedy. All it craves is chaos, blood and warfare. The more piles of corpses the better, to sooth the eternal craving of flesh that is the great Beasts. The manticore is his icon, his idol in this world. Going up against such a majestic yet blasphemous creature is naught but a foolish way to throw away your life."
-Arzawakian man of wisdom

The Manticore. A horned beast with the head shaped like a mixture of lion and demon, with a great beautiful mane and a somewhat humanoid yet gargantuan morphology with a massive pair of claws for arms and lion legs at its hind. This beast is known as the king, or simply ruler of the Savannah due to being of a size that it can cleave an elephant in two with one fel swing, as well as take a rhino horn clean to the chest and still regenerate what little part of it pierces through in mere seconds. From its shoulders, this demi-beast can through impossible means take flight into the air and will hunt and kill almost anything that crosses it's path.
At it's tail end, the great carapace carries a scorpid looking stinger which the beast uses both for balance as well as a weapon. Though being stung by the vast size of it alone would be like being shot from point blank range by a harpoon gun, the poison within is lethal enough to wipe out an entire brood of dragons, as long as it can enter their blood flow in liquid state.
This demi-beast is known to make its natural habitat the Savannah and generally lives in hollows they carve out from the mountains. There they live in prides between two or five, as the manticore values few children with secure futures rather than many, seeing as their great need to feed is their greatest setback. Though also what makes them so deadly as they'll gladly prey on humanoid creatures.
The two great threats Manticores face though are that of Gryphons and the intelligent Dragonkin. Terrorbirds are also known to handle manticores one on one, though generally keep out of their way. Gryphons feed on these creatures though and will utilise teamwork strategies to take them down, if they come across a lone or recently wounded manticore.
They do this by attacking in groups as the pride will first pin down the tail and clip off the wings of the creature. When it hits the ground, unable to regenerate dismembered limbs, they'll pin down the arms and tail again while throwing rocks at the manticore to daze it, while flinging sands into its wounds to prevent regeneration. Once it's tired down, the gryphons will rip out the tail and proceed to eat the creature alive. The dragons are not much different, except that they more often kill out of revenge or hatred than for food.
Because they are vastly outnumbered by their only two natural predators, the manticores which exist in the wild are rare, but still far from threatened to go extinct. Mainly as the beastkin tribes tame and breed these beasts for war, where they eliminate all their weaknesses with skilled riders and armour. So symbolic is the manticore to these beastkin, that their demonic god known simply as the Beast, is depicted as a titanic yet more humanoid but also terrible version of this demi-beast.

Creature Type

Species: Manticore
Family: Beastkin
Class: Felidae
Domain: Terrestrial, Avian, Underground

Biology

Size: 4.8m - 5.4m
Weight: ~3000-4500kg
Diet: Carnivore
Intelligence: Cunning
Lifespan: 33-37 years

Habitat

Preferred biomes: Desert, Jungle and Savannah.
Native regions: Golden Dunes, Arzawak, Zarawakania

Hunting knowledge

Strengths: Lethal claws and bite, incredibly thick skin, resilent to attacks both physical and near immune to magic with regenerating blood, not to mention flight ability
Weaknesses: Flamable, silver bullets, harpoons and crossbow bolts dipped in holy water
Special Abilities: Has a scorpion stinger with a potent venom that will kill in 5 - 15 minutes without antidote or magical cure