Volcanic worm

The **volcanic worm** is a unique species of huge worms native to the Volvanic Mountains range in the northern part of Pentoy. They play a large part in the culture of Myshuik, a country controlling some of the mountain range. Myshuikian people see them as a symbol of the perpetual cycle of life and death and as messengers from their pantheon. They disallow harming the worms to any extent for any reason.

### Life cycle

The alpha specimen lives in the lava inside the Kroata volcano. The specimen reproduces with itself, appearing to have all of the required male and female organs. Each three months it leaves the crater and lays one huge blue egg on the volcano's slope, hard as a rock and covered in pores. After 28 to 31 days, anywhere between 10 to 35 small pink worms hatch from the egg. The few tiniest ones from each set pretty often end up crushed accidentally by their siblings. The young worms move at around 5 to 7 kph and climb up the slope. When they reach the crater, they begin drinking lava from it. After 1 to 4 days, roughly half of the specimens change their color to purple and the other to white. The reason why is unknown. Upon reaching 5 days of age, they descend Kroata to the Volcanic Rings. They circulate in them for about 2 months. Many of them die to attacks from senior worm sets. After the 2 months pass, the surviving worms of the set divide themselves into groups containing between 2 and 7 of them and travel the Volcanic Mountains.

Each such a group always contains at least one purple and white member. When living in groups, they don't tolerate any other groups and fight to the death if they ever meet another one - even members of their set. After a few years, the worms come back to the Volcanic Rings and the base of Kroata, losing their aggression and again forming larger groups. They gradually lose their sight and hearing and die. The only exception to the rule is if one of them challenges the alpha specimen when outside to lay the egg and kills it to take over its place inside the volcano. Naturally the worms live about 4 to 5 years with some of the purple specimens noted to have reached 6 or 7. They appear to thrive when engulfed in lava, with the alpha specimens reaching up to 30 years of age before dying of natural causes, though most often they are killed by their successor before that happens.

### Physiology

The volcanic worms appear to breathe through their skin, able to extract oxygen from air and lava alike. They don't seem to have a heart or an internal blood system of any kind. They have the ability to regenerate any torn-off part of their body and continue to function normally, including the head. Contrary to most worms, their skin is not oily and slippery, but in fact warm and soft almost like petting a mammal with fur.

### Size

Upon hatching, the worms are about 50 to 60 centimeters in length. They reach about 2 meters in length at 2 months and stop growing. If one becomes the alpha specimen by killing the previous ones, a sudden burst of hormones causes that individual to quickly increase its length permanently to anywhere between 5 and 7 meters.

### Mitosis

Individuals aged between 6 days and 2 months can create their clone through spontaneous mitosis. Each individual can only clone itself once and only 20% of the white individuals and 60% of the purple are observed to ever do it in the first place. Immediately after the mitosis, the clone and the original specimen rapidly extend themselves back to the original length.

### Other

Any form of water is potentially lethal to the volcanic worms. While droplets of rain merely cause pain, the worms become instantly paralyzed if dropped into a body of water and die within 5 to 15 minutes.