Asralan

A large species native to the Beta Targos System gas giant Jyora.

The asralan are most well known for their very unique body feature, where both the stomach and lung are integrated into a single system. They feed on microbes that exist within the gas giant atmosphere while simultaneously breathing. This way, there is little need to actively hunt outside of moving to some various locations, where the microbe density can vary. They are comparable in size to a Harkas, specifically the very small subspecies that appear on Jyora, and are animalistic in nature, they are not purposed organisms. However, they were initially hunted by harkas groups for a food source, until they developed more advanced purposed organisms to use as livestock instead. Currently, both the harkas and asralan species see the other as largely irrelevant though they might become curious about the other to investigate similar to how some humans may be interested in animals. Sometimes they have been made into pets, and other times they were made into purposed organisms. Some asralan body parts might have uses for poachers, though this job is much harder to perform and get away with.

After being inhaled, both air and microbes are fused into the blood. Microbes are transported to a specialized digestion organ not dissimilar from a liver where they are taken out of the blood and digested. However this means the immune system of an asralan must be very effective in order to prevent the risk of infection via allowing pathogens to exist in its bloodstream. The creature also has a regular liver as well.

Making use of a dedicated swim  bladder, they can control the altitude at which they reside. This means that after dying they might sink to an extent as the swim bladder is likely to depressurise. This is taken into account normally as groups of harkas hunt them.

The asralan reproduce in a not dissimilar way as mammals. The baby is born live, in order to prevent them getting lost in the intense gas giant winds. The parents normally take care of 2 children at a time until they reach a certain age and become capable of defending themselves. In this way, the resources of the parents are not distributed over a massive number of children and as such can easily care for them. This also means they have a longer lifespan.

Due to their peaceful nature, they will retreat from any predators they find. They mostly detect movement and microbe clusters with a number of antennae over their body. This ensures that they can find predators from any direction and from fairly long distances. They are notably not very smart however, and as such will likely fall to a sufficiently smart predator.