Racial Physiology: The Dreugh

Racial Physiology: The Dreugh

By Hlara Beroth, Senior Anatomist of the Council of Healers of the Imperial University

With assistance from Indoril Senil Beroth, Master Dreugh-Rigger of Gorne Chapel, and the Shrine of The Rotting-Dreugh in Dawnstar.

In cooperation with my contacts in Morrowind, the Abecean Sea, and northern Skyrim, here in this tome lies the consolidation of as much as can be gathered about the aquatic, troglophilic hominid known as the 'Dreugh'.

As these oceanic beastmen are seldom able to be communicated with, either by inability or refusal on their part, much of what we in the enlightened Empire can acquiesce comes from observation, first-hand account, and dissection.

The dreugh is a race that possesses humanoid, crustacean, and cephalopodic qualities. It inhabits the northern and western oceans of our great empire (excepting the shore-waters of Skyrim).

Much of its flesh is suffused by a tough, waxy substance which is easily extracted. Ingesting in the wax imbues one's own muscles with revitalization, at the risk of sapping one's mental strength.

Its carapace is highly sought after by the Dark Elven dreugh-riggers of Morrowind, who break them apart to fashion into armor and weaponry.

In my observations of Senil Beroth at work, the organs within are only somewhat analogous to humanity -- with many more being chimeric and paradoxical fusions of aquatic flesh that are not currently identifiable with our most advanced chirurgery.

Notably, there is an absence of any recognizable reproductive organs.

Dreugh are first seen as adolescents in oceanic waterways. While egg sacs have been observed, their hatching and infant dreugh have not.

The water-dwelling dreugh possesses a face with a haunting similarity to men and mer, three arms ending in claws, and one arm ending in a humanoid hand. They are troglophilic, and prefer to reside in grottos or in grotesque hives for shelter.

Once they reach a certain age (of which is unknown), they undergo a transformation known as karvinasim (a word which I could find no translation or origin for), a process in which their carapace-like hides begin to envelop them. Their carapace reforms into a coffin-like shape, buoyant enough to be washed out of their grottos and onto shore

For what has been observed to be approximately a year, they reenter the world from these coffins as 'land dreugh'. The land dreugh possesses a monstrous, toothed face, and lacks the former form's cephalopodic anatomy, becoming entirely a tetrapodal crustacean.

Land dreugh are hyper-aggressive and voracious, scuttling along beaches to glut themselves on any living thing.

If they have not starved to death or been slain, they undergo what's known as 'meff'. When a land dreugh 'meffs', they consume their own hide and limbs, turning themselves inside out into a mess of muscle and organs.

In a sequence of events difficult to describe, what was once the land dreugh congeals back into its aquatic form, now larger and mature. Before they once again return to the sea, they violently expel 'grom', an alchemically inert vomit.

Occasionally a dreugh that has assumedly consumed enough food in their year-long jaunt on land transforms them into what's known as a dreugh 'man o'war', although nobody has ever observed this process.

As the name implies, these dreugh specimens are the apex killers of their race, possessing a much larger stature, tentacles, set of claws, and even two fully formed humanoid hands with which they can utilize weapons, most commonly observed to be spears.

The presumed progenitors of the dreugh race is the queen. From the rare sightings and tales of survival from their fleshy palaces, dreugh queens are monstrously large conglomerations of limbs, and are spellcasters unparalleled.

They possess massive crested heads, and large, flat abdomens. Local superstitions from Morrowind tell that they are immortal, and possess the ability to manifest one of their demons, 'The Ruddy Man', in their own flesh.

As implied by their name, they are the monarchs of their kind, ruling from palaces of their own construct. While recovered pieces of dreugh structure resemble that of coral growth, it uncannily also has the structure of muscle and blood vessels when peering within.

From survivors of dreugh hives, they speak of the very walls digesting prey both aquatic and humanoid, with furniture and 'art' that breathe and twitch like they are part of one massive, living organism.

Lastly are the enigmatic, rumored 'dreugh-kings'. It is of the opinion of this author that the queens self-fertilize, but other scholars whom I respect propose the existence of these kings is for the function of healthy reproduction.

Myths from the Nordic wars on the Dreugh and the invasion of Akavir in Morrowind speak of their existence, so it would not be proper of me to entirely deny their existence, but there is so little information to be gathered I am to consider them irrelevant for this treatise.

While obviously intelligent, and capable of displays of an aberrant form of civilization, any attempts at communication with the dreugh have been futile. Their responses are eclectic, from haunting silence to vicious slaughter.

Unless one day the dreugh wish to integrate into the great Empire of Tamriel, we must be vigilant and supportive of our brave sailors of the West, East, and North Navies that keep our sea-going folk safe from these strange legions slumbering beneath.