The Nature of Animals

Written by Namlyn Runlaked, Natural Historian, Chemyl Academy   To start with, I will define animals in this instance as any non-sentient creature with an internal skeleton. What that means is that it includes all furred creatures, all feathered creatures, and all fish creatures, but does not include either Zaanri or Yanryl.   All animal species may be subdivided into two types: common and archetypal. As an example, we will take the common forest rabbit. These creatures weigh about 5 pounds (2.25kg), have soft fur in earth tones (browns and greys), long ears, live in burrows, and run from predators. The archetypal forest rabbit is nearly twice that size at about 9 pounds (4kg). Its fur, while soft, shimmers almost as if it were made of a metal in tones of brown, red, grey, or green. The long ears, living in burrows, and running from predators is the same. However, something about the way the light reflects from its fur confuses the eye of a predator, causing the creature's body to not quite be where the predator calculates, enabling it to more easily escape into the safety of its burrow.   Archetypal creatures occur rarely, depending on the species. The most frequent occur at a rate of one archetype out of every 50 animals born and tend to be prey animals. Larger, carnivorous archetypal animals appear occur less frequently, though it is difficult to calculate. Estimates judge that they occur somewhere between the rate of one in every 100 births to one in every 500 births. Archetypal creatures may be either male or female.   As illustrated in the forest rabbit example, archetypes tend to be larger than the common version of the animal. Another similarity between archetypal animals across species is an extended lifespan. They tend to live about half again as long as other animals of their species. To elucidate using our rabbit example, the average lifespan for a common forest rabbit is about 4 years, however, the average lifespan of an archetype forest rabbit is about 6 years.   There is usually a difference in body coloring and marking between the archetype and the common version of the animal. Often the archetype creature of a species has a more vibrant appearance. This generally means that the monetary value placed on the remains of the archeytpal creature his higher than that of a common creature of the same variety, however, please read the end of this article where I deal with a practices and taboos relating to archetypal creatures.   Size, lifespan and appearance are not the only differences these archetypes possess, however. Each has a native ability which enhances its chance to thrive. The archetypal forest rabbit's coat confuses the eye of the predator. Other prey animals have other means to escape capture ranging from special perceptions to unique abilities. Predatory animals also display senses and capabilities not seen on their common counterparts.