Iron Carrionfish

Iron carrionfish are predatory marine creatures, originating from sharks mutated by exposure to Narzhak's bloodCreation of the first iron carrionfish - https://www.roleplayerguild.com/posts/4888919. Their purpose is to scour the oceans for parts or remains of divine bodies contaminating the water and remove their influence by consuming them.
== Description ==
Despite their transformation, carrionfish still broadly resemble sharks in many aspects. Their bodies have a similar sleek, elongated shape, and are for the most part equal in size to adult great whites, unless bolstered by having fed on divine matter. The most immediately striking difference is their skin, which has been replaced by a smooth metallic sheen, made iridescently colourful by Ashalla's blessing. This metal hide is, though as resilient as could be expected, highly flexible, allowing the carrionfish to propel themselves through the water through serpentine contracting motions. Their fins are atrophied, having been reduced to almost immobile vestigial protrusions. Their other external organs, however, remain fully functional, and are even improved in the case of their eyes, supplemented by a second pair. In spite of their name, iron carrionfish are not susceptible to rust.
The vital cycle of the fish remains mostly unchanged, with natural lifespans not exceeding seventy years. In normal conditions, they subsist on a carnivorous diet, preying on smaller fish and other marine animals. Despite their feeding preferences, they will not attack living deities, though they will fight other creatures, marine or not, for possession of their favoured prey. Being nomadic unless they locate an area with consistent divine residue (such as the waters off the coast of the Charnel Steppes), where small populations will remain for the best part of their lives, carrionfish are not territorial, but usually solitary. Regular exceptions occur during mating and when several individuals converge on a godly trace. Gestation is ovoviviparous, with regular clutches including between three and ten eggs.
== Abilities ==
Iron carrionfish most notably possess the ability to digest and process residual divine matter, such as flesh, blood or other organic equivalents. Specimen that feed on such substances undergo dramatic growth spurts regardless of their age, potentially reaching downright gigantic sizes if consuming an exceptionally large mass. Their lifespan will likewise increase proportionally to the amount eaten, although this is likewise dependent on the individual's current age; young, healthy ones may live as much as two hundred years longer than normal, while for old ones the addition may be imperceptible. Females will additionally experience increased fertility, and may in some cases even become capable of asexual reproduction by self-impregnation. 
To assist them in locating their preferred prey, carrionfish have an extremely keen sense of smell for divine residue, allowing them to track it from vast distances. This does not extend to traces of nondivine beings, or living deities, unless they are bleeding or otherwise shedding parts of their bodies.
== References ==
Category:Life