S1- "Balls of Fluff"

## DESCRIPTION

**These balls, although without anything to replicate speech, *can* speak, in whatever language you speak in, easily communicating between both it's own kind and human kind.**

**If, at any point, you decide to kill one, you will not be able to enter another clump, they will not let you in, and if you force yourself in will be devoured by them. It's better to help them out than to purposely harm them.**

S1, "Balls of fluff" is a peaceful and helpful entity that resides in every dangerous or mildly dangerous level, and will almost always be in clumps of themselves. Smaller clumps range from 10-20 balls, while bigger clumps can hold up to or greater than 50 clumps, spanning a decent portion of walls and other geometry. **If, at any point, you find any while being chased, walk into the balls of fluff. Doing so, they will, depending on the circumstance, move their long strands of fur to grab you and pull you in, enveloping you and protecting you, chirping and chiming and eventually beeping to let the wanderer know it's safe to exit. Once inside, the fur strands will let go and let the wanderer move around.**

Some have said that being inside a clump is like "touching the fluffiest pet in the world, made of soft, silky fur and a soft and smooth skin underneath. the only muscles are used to pilot itself."

The Balls of Fluff range in value, from a deep black to a bright white, two feet in diameter, and are always in a ball shape, regardless of where they might be situated.Their fur is also extremely fluffy, hence the name. A single fur strand, originally coiling and curling into itself, is almost a foot long when stretched out. Even with the long fur size, when within a clump for a longer period of time, you won't get hot, but instead at a moderate temperature of 15.5o C (60o F). Due to the safety of these balls, it's recommended to find all of the clumps within a level if you can when you might need them.

For further detail on these fluff balls, we have studied and looked at them and have made several discoveries:

1. The balls of fluff can easily lose their hair, but instantly grow it back, along with other parts of its body. For instance, if some skin and fur have been torn off, it will grow back pretty quickly. depending on the wound, it could take up to 2 hours, with the simplest wound (deep scratches or scrapes) taking mere minutes to heal.
2. The balls have a complex system within itself that is made up of: Outer layer consisting of soft, stretchy skin and long strands of fur > Secondary layer consisting of muscle along the skin, connected and wrapped around itself > Inner layer consisting of respiratory, digestive, and nervous system, and a gelatinous mass holding it all together.
3. There is actually a mouth, but it's barely the size of a fist. It is capable of attacking and quickly devouring dangerous entities, whilst not harming wanderers.
4. Due to the massive clumps that can gather, they have tiny, harmless, spikes and suction to stick to walls for a long period of time. There can be up to 5,000 of these suction spikes on a single ball. Creating suction within the spikes is possible due to the valve they have within their respiratory system. When a ball breathes in, it can open the valve, letting some air go through there instead. if it has a spot to suction to, the spike will unfold onto that surface, with a membrane keeping the pieces together, and once clamped onto a surface can easily stay there for up to 5 hours, or until prey is nearby to attack. The same way they stick, they can also unstick, so by opening the valve, the pressure will release, letting the ball jump from the surface.
5. Although they do need to breathe, due to their small size they only need to breathe in and out every 5 minutes. They also have a pressure valve, as stated before, that can open and close, letting them both breathe with it active, and also breathe out while it's active, as well. For instance, A ball sticks to a wall for 20 minutes, so it will breathe out about 4 times during, and while it's doing so, if the valve is still closed, will stay suctioned to that surface. afterward, when it breathes out, it can open the valve to release the pressure within the spikes on the wall, and be propelled away.
6. There are points where, when it undergoes mitosis, stated below, and attacked by an entity midway through, can lead to a partial successful mitosis, where only a half of it will be completed, leaving a husk of an unfinished ball behind that will attempt to complete mitosis, doing so and creating dead variants for up to 100 times. This has been classified as S1-1"Clumps Held Together".
7. The Clumps are also used in luring entities to them. If any entity, including hard entities like fossils, is near the clump, a foot to be exact, the fur strands that pulled in a wanderer to protect it will pull the entity in, tearing it apart and leaving barely anything, which they will disconnect from the group and shake off if one of the balls needs to. All entities, excluding invisible entities, can be prey to these balls, but only wanderers will be kept safely without being eaten unless you have killed their own kind, in which case, they will take you as an entity and will proceed to kill you.

After rigorous testing, we have also found out how the balls move and replicate:

They can pull and stretch their body, more than able to extend to double their body length, suctioning onto the next surface, and compress again, slowly moving like a snail. In times of danger, they can use their individual strands of fluff to create a wave, mesmerizing and confusing the predator, while it pulls itself away. We have only witnessed this once, when a skin dog went up to one when it was migrating to form a new clump, it first moved like normal until the skin dog had gotten close, where it then started to move it's strands of fur, causing the dog to freeze and watch it, while it propelled itself up a wall. Once it was high enough, it stopped, and the dog proceeded to try and attack the fluff, couldn't reach, and instead walked toward the researcher, where he quickly went into the clump the fluff originally disconnected from.

The balls also seem to be able to undergo mitosis. Once it reaches a certain size from ingesting entities, it will begin to create a separate ball off of itself, and it will slowly pull away to reveal two identical balls of fluff, both in color and in size. We suspect there is where the large clumps come from: Going from 1 > 2 > 4 > 8 > 16 > 32 > etc. until it reaches a certain point and starts splitting off to find other areas to do the process again.