Antarctic fish monster

The antarctic fish monster is an aquatic cryptid said to have an armoured head and to have jaws that make an unholy scraping sound. It is said to have a particular taste for human heads. From the scraping sound the mouth makes, it is believed by many to be a Dunkleosteus, though it could be much anything from placoderma, though it is known to have a strong bite, strong enough to bite through the neck of a man or penguin.

## Sightings

The antarctic fish monster was first sighted by Ui-te-Rangiora in the 7th century. Ui-te-Rangiora claimed it ate one of his crew members. He described it as a lipped fish with a bony head.

Later, Gonzalo Pizarro claimed to have, when fleeing from the King of Spain, to have sailed south to a mysterious island where he saw the monster. He claimed to have heard "un sonido como el sonido del alfilado de una espada", or a sound like the sharpening of a sword, which continued as blood filled the water and a penguin was devoured. Pizarro claimed to have seen a dorsal fin unlike that of a shark or dolphin.

After that, another conquistador, Diego Romo de Vivar, in an expadition to Elizabeth Island, where he believed Sir Francis Drake to have set up a military base, claimed to hear "el sonido más horroroso", like the most ear piercing sharpening of a sword, after which point the captain of his ship, after, out of fear, Diego Romo made him land first, got spooked and tried to swim to the ship, but was eaten by a great fish leviathan with a head unlike any seen before, and that the fish monster bit the man's head clean off, and as it opened its jaws it made an unholy scraping sound. Acording to de Vivar, but not to his crew, he tried to shoot the monster, but the bullet bounced off.

In 1841, a member of ross's crew claimed to see a fish with jaws the size of a man and an armoured head, as well as to hear a scraping sound as he saw it devour a penguin. He claimed it to have swam out from under the Ross Ice Shelf. He claims that the sea monster looked at him menacingly.

## Other evidence

Some bodies from shipwrecks have been found with heads removed from the body, such as the San Telmo, this is the only indirect evidence that this creature exists, and fossils have not been found due to the fact that the ice which covers most of antarctica makes such finds impossible for the moment.

## Explanations

1. A late surviving placoderm, this is supported due to the fact that the "sonido más horroroso" was described to be like the sharpening of a sword, and due to the self sharpening nature of some placoderm teeth, such as Dunkleosteus. Gaps in the fossil record are likely due to the fact that it prefers the coasts of antarctica may simply mean that it is hidden under the ice sheets
2. Of late surviving placoderms, dunkleosteus seems to be the most common claim, however, it is more likely another kind of placoderm due to the absence of any fossils of dunkleosteus in formations near the land which eventually became Antarctica.
3. A descendant of Groenlandaspis which specialised for the niche of aquatic apex predator.
4. An unrelated fish that converegently evolved the same jaw structure as the placoderms.
5. Two surviving Placoderms, to account for only Pizarro having seen the dorsal fin. Under this theory, the one seen by Gonzalo Pizarro was a descendent of a acanthothorac which had evolved to fill a niche similar to that of sharks and dolphins.