Rotik (ROE-tick)

One of the largest life-forms on the world of Hesper, rotik are impressively-sized aquatic saurians that bring the oldest legends of sea serpents to life. Notable not just for their size, but their unusual third eye, these distinct leviathans feature in many a sailor’s tall tale.

Distribution and Habitat

Rotik can be found world-wide in Aurrus Sais, the Golden Sea. Outside of nesting season, rotik are epipelagic, spending their entire lives in the open ocean. Studies have found that specific groups have specific migration patterns, with different groups utilizing different rutting/nesting grounds. Because of this, most who make their living on the Aurrus Sais either make it a point to know these routes or to hire someone else who does.

Characteristics

Rotik are egg-laying, air-breathing saurians that grow continuously over the course of their lives. They have large heads with powerful jaws, thick necks, and a pair of robust, but short arms. The rest of their body is serpentine in configuration, with no rear legs. They are covered in tough scales and have a long, single dorsal fin that runs the length of their bodies.

Male rotik tend to be slightly larger and heavier than females, with the largest male specimens found to top out at around 174 feet (29 ya/53 meters) and the largest females approaching 114 feet (24 ya/43.8 meters). Rotiks estimated to be over 200 years have been found (dated by embedded spears/harpoons in the animal’s side), with many suspecting they could live a century more. Another unique characteristic of the rotik is their third eye. This eye, believed to be a highly developed parietal eye, is located at the end of a long, extendable stalk. When at rest, the stalk is folded against the top of the creature’s skull, allowing it to rest against the rotik’s forehead. When extended, it can be raised straight up. The length of this stalk is relative to the creature in question, being about twice the length of the rotik’s skull. This eye is often used to look above the surface of the water. Iit has been suggested that this eye perhaps has been adapted specifically to out-of-water sight, but these theories have yet to be proven.

Ecology and Behavior

Rotiks, despite their fearsome appearance and impressive size, primarily eat small crustaceans, such as shrimp and krill. They use specialized notched teeth to filter their food from the water. They do possess grasping front teeth however, including impressive canines, and use these to occasionally feed on deep-sea invertebrates: cephalopods, jellyfish, and the like. Rotik have been seen scavenging larger kills and even dead Kegani, but they are not generally known to actively hunt any large species. Fully-mature Rotiks males are largely solitary, grouping only during the breeding season in large groups to vie for mating rights. Female rotik generally travel in small matriarchal groups, where all assist in the raising of the group’s young. Rotik tend to stay in these groups until their death, with elderly non-reproductive females assuming the more dominant roles. At around ten years or so, young male rotik generally break from these family units, sometimes forming small, flexible “bachelor groups” and sometimes striking off on their own. Eggs are laid near shallow water, often in natural bays or in reef environments. Females haul themselves up onto the shore to bury and lay their eggs, where they keep vigil, only occasionally returning to the sea to hunt or to prevent themselves from drying out. Because groups tend to consistently use the same nesting grounds down generations, most of the larger rotik nesting grounds are known and generally avoided during nesting season. Rotik communicate through very low-frequency, songlike calls that can carry for hundreds of miles. Females are notably more vocal than males, coordinating the movements of their group or “broadcasting” dangers to others. As saurians, rotik breathe air directly. They have very long, efficient lungs that allow them to hold their breath for extended periods, though this ability varies by age. Newly-hatched rotik can hold their breath for about 30 minutes, whereas the average adult rotik can hold its breath for 2 hours, and the oldest and most impressive specimens do so for up to 4 hours. The only known predator of the rotik are Cennas. Though the rotik are not unintelligent, they are not quite as clever as these smaller, deadly pack hunters. Younger solitary males are at the highest risk of predation, though a coordinated group of cennas can, with persistence and patience, bring down even the larger specimens. Because this is almost always accomplished by drowning, though, it is rare to see a truly ancient rotik targeted this way: the time, energy, and danger are seldom worth the resulting meal, and fully-grown, exceptionally large rotik have little to fear.

Hunting and Uses

Rotik are hunted primarily for their meat and their tough, scaly hide. Only specialized leviathan hunting vessels tend to attempt this, as rotik can be very dangerous when engaged, and can easily capsize or otherwise destroy an unprepared vessel. Hunting a rotik is a grueling process that often involves simply exhausting the creature, a process that can last days. Rotik hide can be tanned and used for a variety of large-scale projects, and the meat is edible by all sentient species of Hesper, and can be served in a variety of ways. General practice is that only solitary male rotik are to be hunted, though some success has been had with small bachelor groups. This is both to keep the population stable and for the safety of the hunters themselves: engaging a herd of females is extremely dangerous, as they will not only work in coordination with one another to defend their pod, but have been known to have their alarm calls answered by either other matriarchal groups or even males. As of now, there has been no success in domesticating rotik for any purpose, though some fishing communities are able to peacefully coexist with the groups that pass through their area. It is rumored that the The Hollow King has the ability to command these great serpents of Hesper’s seas, but if there is any truth to these legends, only the King and his counsel know.

Additional Information

The Man-Eater of Suller

(Note: the term "man-eater" is used here as a romanization of a Low Atlantean term that means, more generally, "eater of sapient beings") On rare occasions, though, rotik have been known to predate sentient species. The most famous account of this involved the Man-Eater of Suller. Roughly fifty years ago, an enormous and evidently old rotik male terrorized the settlement of Suller on the eastern end of the The Atlantean Viaduct. The rotik regularly attacked fishing vehicles, capsizing them and hunting down the floundering crew. Those that weren’t devoured were often simply killed, but a few survivors escaped to spread the tale. Many efforts were made by the town to trap, hunt, or otherwise kill the Man-eater, but between his unpredictable habits, immense size, and experience, they were unable to bring the beast down until nearly a year after his reign of terror had begun. At that time, Cherut Das, The Floating City was passing not far from the Viaduct, and the townsfolk were able to raise funds to hire a hunting vessel to assist their plight. The Man-Eater was brought down, albeit at great cost. In the process of the hunt, the vessel was sunk and over half of the crew was either killed or drowned, but at the end of it all, the Man-Eater was dead. The remaining crew and their captain, who had also survived, were given butchering rights to the corpse, though the skull was gifted to the townsfolk. It hangs in the town’s central tavern to this day, and newcomers are often regaled with the tales of the Man-Eater of Suller. Many theories exist as to how this happened. The most commonly-accepted one is that the Man-Eater survived an attempt on his life from a hunting vessel (supported by several old weapons found lodged in the creature’s sides), and either developed an aggression towards all vessels, or developed a “taste” for sentient flesh.