Silverbore

The typical silverbore can grow up to two inches in length. An individual silverbore has a teardrop-shaped body equipped with a radulated, lamprey-like maw on the rostral end and a body-spanning fin that comes to a point at the other. A silverbore may be mistaken for a glistening tadpole at first glance, but the transition between its body and tail is more subtle like that of an eel or sea snake. Fine, backward-raking scales coat the body of the silverbore and allow it to anchor itself into the flesh of a host but may be laid flat by muscular contractions should the creature decide to extract itself. Four small 'whiskers' at the rostral extent of the body are dappled with chemoreceptive cells and cilia sensitive to water movements which grant the silverbore the ability to pursue its prey; the parasite has no exterior eyes or nostrils, though it does have gill slits.

Unlike leeches, silverbore eggs are laid in clutches stuck to the underside of beshadowing rocks or plants in the shallows where the creatures spend most of their time. Male silverbores exude gametes into the surrounding water when they sense they are close to a cluch, fertilizing any eggs there indirectly. Silverbores are already an inch long and ready to eat as soon as they leave the egg.

Silverbores evoke disgust in many sentient peoples because of the way in which they feed. Like leeches, silverbores feast on the blood or other somatic body fluids of other creatures, but they go a step further than other endoparasites by actually burrowing up to half a body length into the flesh of the parasitized creature. Silverbores detatch when they have fed enough to support reproduction.   One unusual feature of silverbores is that they exhibit some preference towards certain types of prey over others. If a silverbore detects a more agreeable victim, it will detach from its current host and pursue the new target host. Distal polyps are one such host, and it has been observed that some species with particular resilience against the bodily damage caused by silverbores (i.e. Distal razorbacks) may intentionally wade into silverbore-infested waters to counter the threat of polyps in the area or, in rare cases, to help treat their own pre-existing parasitosis. In this way, while they are often regarded as parasites only, they do have some conditional symbiotic relationships in the wild.