Glimmercap Myrch

Threading the fern-green waterways of Greenvale crawls the Glimmercap Myrch – a dog-sized river-turtle whose domed shell bristles with living mushrooms. The shell itself is ridged and moss-flecked, the scutes pitted by tiny pores where pale hyphae anchor the glowcaps. Each cap rises on a finger-thick stalk, its dome glowing lilac by day and flaring silver at dusk. Viscous sap beads along the gills, then trickles down sculpted runnels in the shell where the Myrch can lap it with a long, rasping, pink tongue. When danger looms those caps snap shut and the turtle locks into its shell, the bioluminescence dimming to a ghostly ember under the leaf-litter.  

“You’ll smell sweet resin before you glimpse the shell. Follow the glow – tread softly, and the caps will stay open.” — Old Murdo, rabbitfolk reed-weaver

  Almost two millenia ago a shard-shower from Amalthea dusted Greenvale’s waterways with Aeum-tainted spores. A clan of river-turtles browsing the shallows nibbled the glowing fungi; most fell ill, yet a single clutch survived when the spores rooted harmlessly in gaps between their shell plates. Over generations the fungus learned to photosynthesise moonlight and draw Aeum resonance, secreting excess sugars as sweet nectar. The turtles, finding the drip more nourishing than scarce river-crayfish, gradually lost their sharper beaks and much of their hunting instinct. Today the Myrch lives chiefly on fungal sap, while the glowcaps rely on their slow-footed host to spread spores and fertilise new colonies with mineral-rich droppings.