Gulanga

The gulanga (pronounced /ɡuːˈlɑːŋɡə/) is a six-limbed mammal found in the mountains of Vlastach. It typically walks on its rear pair of legs, while using its other four long limbs for balance and manipulation, as well as to attack foes with its sharp claws; sometimes it may drop to four or even all six legs for extra speed. Atop a shortish neck is a wedge-shaped head with two large, oval eyes and a wide, snaggle-toothed mouth. Its body is covered in fur, usually tan but varying in color from almost white to chocolate brown and coal black.

Habitat

Gulangas are usually found living on forested mountains, though occasionally they are also encountered underground. They prefer temperate climates, though they can survive colder climates if necessary; gulangas are seldom if ever found in tropical areas. They are generally top predators of their areas, lacking perhaps the bulk and strength of some other predators but making up for it with greater speed, agility, and intelligence.

Gulangas are found primarily in the lower reaches of the mountain ranges surrounding the Mirror Sea, though occasional specimens have been sighted in distant locations, perhaps having for some reason either made long journeys from their usual homes or been brought there.

Biology

For the most part, gulangas are ordinary mammals, with few really odd anatomical characteristics. Their six limbs do set them aside from most mammals, of course, and require a second pair of shoulder blades that interrupts the creature's rib cage; the gulanga's heart is in the upper part of the rib cage, between its two pairs of arms, while its stomach is in the lower part, between the second pair of arms and the pelvis.

The gulanga's omnivorous diet is reflected in its dentition and digestive system. Though the gulanga's highly visible front teeth are triangular in shape and sharp and serrated for cutting and rending flesh, they also have blunt molars in the backs of their mouths for grinding harder plant food. They have two stomachs, the better to break down hard-to-digest vegetable matter, but they are not as efficient in digesting plant matter as are ruminants and other dedicated herbivores.

Lifestyle

Gulangas are omnivores, eating a wide variety of different foods. They seem to prefer meat, but have to supplement it with some vegetable food to fill all their dietary needs, and are capable of subsisting for weeks on a purely vegetarian diet if necessary. They are clever and efficient predators that use a wide variety of tactics, sometimes going out alone as solitary hunters, making use of their size, agility, and relative intelligence to take down their quarry by themselves, and sometimes hunt in packs to bring down larger or more formidable prey. Most gulangas live in family units, taking turns doing the hunting and gathering, but a few for whatever reason live on their own.

While most gulangas don't actively seek out human flesh, they're not above attacking (and devouring) humans who venture into their territory; gulanga attacks are a fairly frequent and often fatal hazard of their mountainous territories. However, on some occasions gulangas have seemed peaceful or even helpful to outsiders, and there have even been a few reports of a gulanga saving a traveler's life.

The noesis of gulangas is in dispute. While they don't seem to wear clothing or build any sort of permanent structures, they have often shown signs of remarkable intelligence. Some scholars dismiss these as indicative of complex instincts, or merely coincidental, but others are convinced that gulangas are as intelligent as humans, or nearly so, even if for whatever reason they rarely create artifacts and don't yet seem to have formed any sort of civilization. Rumors exist, in fact, that the gulangas seen on the surface are only throwbacks, that advanced gulanga civilizations do exist deep underground, with marvelous cities full of intricate technology and complex societal organizations. No evidence has ever turned up of the existence of these cities, however, and the few accounts of them are both anecdotal and contradictory, and even those scholars who do hold the gulangas to be a noetic species don't believe in the stories of their hidden civilizations.