Marilith

Mariliths are a species of semi-humanoid serpentine demons that live in many places worldwide.
==Info==
Excerpt from A Slayer's Field Guide To Demon Identification by the Watchers' Guide Press, 1988 edition.
MARILITHS
Mariliths have a lifespan of around five hundred years.
They are a repto-monotrematic species--an egg-laying species with features of both reptiles and mammals: Mariliths are exothermic ("cold-blooded"), with a body shape that resembles a human/snake hybrid with six arms. They nurse their young.
Mariliths are a single-gender species--they appear and identify as female, and reproduce through a very strange form of cross-hybridization with males of other species. They are able to conceive with both endothermic ("warm-blooded") and exothermic males. This is because the process is not strictly conception. Rather than producing zygotes through the joining of ovum and spermatozoa, mariliths absorb the sperm and retain it within their own bodies, where it is metamorphosed into a fertilizing component they can use to impregnate themselves at will at any point in their lifetimes; because their bodies retain the sample permanently, they can repeat this as often as they desire. The resulting offspring are mostly the children of the mother--only approximately 20% of their DNA comes from the father.
Often, mariliths only choose to engage in sexual activity once in their lifetimes; repeated times are not unheard of, but are usually only done if it is believed that the offspring of their last joining was in some way flawed.
A marilith goes into estrus four times a year, to make another joining possible if needed. Besides their bizarre fertilization techniques, mariliths also are capable of embryonic diapause--that is, the ability to put their unlaid eggs into stasis until the conditions will be favorable for laid eggs to hatch in.
Mariliths produce up to a dozen eggs in a clutch, and often allow them all to hatch. However, unable to care for them all, they will eat the superfluous young until the clutch reaches a manageable number.
Most mariliths choose to live alone, either deep underground or in isolated caves in mountainous regions; it is uncommon to find mariliths in groups, and where such can be found, the groups will always be mother/daughters, or sisters, and they will not be in numbers larger than four. It is rare to the point of near-impossibility for a marilith to be found outside a desert-like climate.
A marilith's decision to live alone is not, by any means, entirely intellectual. A recent study of a preserved marilith brain shows that they possess two glands, one above the nasal cavity and one at the rear base of the skull, which play a key role in this. The gland at the nasal cavity acts as a receptor, detecting the hormones and pheromones of other beings. It then relays these signals to the gland located at the skull base, which produces an adrenaline-like chemical that causes the marilith severe distress, a sort of "bloodlust" that will cause her to lash out violently. Neither gland is ever truly inactive, but further study shows that during the quarterly five-day estrus cycle, the receptor will not relay the hormones and pheromones of males to the "rage center," allowing possible mates relative safety in the marilith's presence.
Mariliths are hunter-scavengers. They hunt prey up to the size of a deer, but can happily and easily survive on carrion. Mariliths in a family group may hunt prey as large as other species of demon or even human beings, but this is unusual and discouraged by the tenets of their society.
Their society, such as it may be called, is a loose alliance of knowing vaguely where the rest of the species is. Mariliths being solitary by nature, they teach their daughters that secrecy is the most valuable asset they can have. They do not interact or interfere with other species and their societies. A marilith that is bothered--either by another marilith or an outsider--can become extremely volatile and highly dangerous.
Mariliths possess enormous strength and coordination, the result of having to harmonize the movements of six limbs and a prehensile tail. They are also very large creatures, commonly ranging in size from fifteen to twenty-five feet from the top of the head to the tip of the tail, though able to grow up to thirty-five feet in length with consistent, proper nutrition and a large enough living space. (Many mariliths have been shown to experience stunted growth if their development is in a cave or den too small to accommodate a larger height.)
A typical marilith stops growing around the age of one hundred to one hundred and twenty-five years old. Because of their lifespan, mariliths do not, on average, reach full physical or sexual maturity until they are around two hundred to two hundred and fifty years old.
Mariliths are commonly very intelligent, but highly territorial and materialistic. Besides being scavengers, they are also often thieves--they build tremendous hoards of objects they find to be attractive, which can range from the fabulous (many African mariliths are known to raid diamond mines) to the mundane (American mariliths often have large collections of metallic litter, such as broken hubcaps and empty soda cans).
One curious quirk of the species, especially considering their hermit-like lifestyles, is that they have neither a spoken nor written language of their own. Mariliths learn instead the spoken and written languages common to their localities. They are extremely adept at this; a marilith that chooses to adopt a nomadic or migratory pattern can absorb hundreds of languages--human, demonic and even animal.
Mariliths are naturally diurnal, but often train themselves to be nocturnal to accommodate their desire for secrecy and isolation.
Category:Species
Category:Mariliths