Anuran

'Important note: This species was created with vore in mind so there will be references to it throughout this (both fatal and non-fatal). If you don’t like vore this species doesn’t have to be used for it but please keep this in mind when reading, thank you!'

Anurans are a short, amphibious and highly social species found across most continents in Faria. They are most commonly found in the continents of Malina and Nowe, though small pockets of them are found in the few wet regions of Sphraga. Although their species name is anuran, they’re commonly referred to as sightless on account of them having no eyes at all. One might think this would make them harmless, but they are in fact one of the more dangerous sapient species in Faria if encountered in a swarm.

Anurans favour living in caves, ideally with access to a secure water source. The damp, enclosed environment is the most ideal habitat for them though they also live in dark forests, rainforests and swamps. They also prefer to live close to a source of freshwater. Being an amphibious species they are reliant on water to live and reproduce.

Biology
Aside from lacking eyes, anurans are also identifiable by several other traits making them easy to recognize.

Their other most obvious trait is their short stature, they range between 2’6”-3’3” as adults, males typically being on the taller end. They are among the shortest of sapient species in Faria, with only the murin being significantly shorter than they are.

Lacking physical eyes entirely, anurans rely on smell and hearing as their primary sensory organs. Their ears and nose are so sensitive that they ironically tend to dislike rain, they’re highly sensitive to the smell and sound of it which can throw off their bearings. Anurans are sensitive to touch, especially in the tips of their fingers and toes. All of their keenest senses combined are enough to give them a good idea of their territory and they are excellent at committing a map of their territory to memory from these alone.

Anurans have long snouts containing powerful jaws, full of short, strong teeth capable of producing enough bite force to break small rocks they can fit in their mouth, make tooth marks in bigger ones or break off small chunks, so you definitely don't want to be bitten by an anuran or they would easily break an arm. Their mouth and innards are all a fleshy black colour. Anurans lack the stretchy, sticky tongue of their amphibian relatives but it’s quite long and surprisingly prehensile. Some remnant of this ancestry to frogs and toads remain as their tongues are a bit stretchy and surprisingly flexible. Anuran tongues can stretch just further than 9 inches but it serves little function beyond showing off what party tricks they can do with them. Their skinny, lightweight bodies are ideal for getting about quickly both in water and on land. Limbs end in small, webbed feet and hands with very sharp claws on them which are used for territory marking, latching onto large prey and fighting. They usually walk on two legs but run on all fours and can manage a top running speed of 50 – 60 km/h for a few minutes. Their swimming speed is even better, able to hit 70 – 80 km/h. Anurans swim through water in a manner akin to frogs.

The skin of anurans widely varies in colours of all sorts of hues and patterns, though they are unable to tell for themselves. More notably their skin is quite damp and can absorb water through it, meaning they don’t need to drink with their mouths to get the water they need. They can even drink from murky or dirty water as their skin will keep most impurities from getting into their systems. Equally as variable is the length of their ears, ranging from very short and triangular to being about as long as an anurans snout, able to reach the tips of their snouts with them at such a length.

Anuran stomachs are small but highly stretchy, capable of holding much larger loads than most would think, though because of their size they still have their limits. If they bite off more than they can chew then they would be rendered immobile. This can leave both them and others vulnerable as their strong bonds are instinctively rooted so they will not leave a member behind easily, so they save gorging themselves on live prey for when they’re close to home, or for intruders who stumble into their territory.

Behaviour
Anurans are a social species, an unusual trait for an amphibian as many amphibians tend to lead largely solitary lives. Instead, anurans prefer to live in large groups of their own kind called ‘swarms’. As a whole, anurans are quite impulsive and very much live life by their immediate whims and desires in the moment. There's almost no such thing as putting off something they want to do until later, if they decide to do something fun they act on it immediately regardless of what others may want.

They thrive on companionship and teamwork, it helps them feel secure and safe with others looking out for them, especially in a world where their sensory feedback is more limited. Very few anurans like left alone or being alone as it can make them very paranoid and fearful without others around to provide environmental feedback. Hearing various sounds when alone can make this much worse as well, especially with their sensitive hearing, new smells they don't recognize frighten them as well.

Anurans are nocturnal, preferring to become active during the evening, hunting all through the night and spending the daytime asleep. It's not unheard of for them to sometimes venture out into the daytime in need of supplies or a bit of work that needs done on their territory like marking or gathering firewood, though sometimes they may be desperate for food if the past few night time hunts have gone poorly and will go hunting in broad daylight.

Language is a tricky business for anurans and others trying to communicate with them. They tend to pick up on and copy whatever the local language in their area is, this can get confusing if there is more than one language used in an area as they will use the words of different languages simultaneously. Other species are their best source of learning new words for their language, but because other species often get eaten by anurans or want nothing to do with them, anurans learn to speak in a broken tongue, some swarms or individuals more than others. Anurans are intelligent enough to learn to fully grasp language, the opportunity for this is rare but one or two individual anurans known to have managed to learn to better grasp a fuller extent of a single language. The most commonly mixed up languages for anurans is English and Lyran. Other languages from Earth can also find their way into their confusingly varied lexicon, how is a mystery.Anurans have a strong love for accessorizing and dressing up, though because they can’t see and usually have a poor knowledge of how clothes are worn, they wear garments in ill-fitting or bizarre combinations, even wearing things that aren’t clothes at all. The more they dress up, the more popular among their peers they will be. For this reason, alphas dress up the most but shed most of their clothing when leading the swarm on hunts for convenience.

Anurans have been known to be surprisingly capable merchants. The largest swarm in Malina, the Chomp Swarm, make a living in the middle of the dry and deadly Oskeli Badlands by trading with passing merchants and the scattered local settlements. Their business has spread far beyond their home, found almost all over Faria conducting trade in towns and cities. The effort in making the Chomp Swarm a trusted name across the globe was almost singlehandedly headed by Rose Chomp, alpha female of the swarm and a scarily well spoken, persuasive mistress, her mate Needle Chomp takes care of more local business.

Anurans as Predators
Hunting is the primary means of getting food for anurans, they do this with a rotated hunting team to keep everyone doing an equal portion of work for the swarm. This hunting team is lead by the/an alpha of the swarm. In a group, anurans are extremely coordinated and organized hunters. Their tight bonds with their swarm members means they always look out for one another on a hunt as well as always wanting to make sure everyone has a good meal.

When possible, anurans eat their prey alive and whole for the sake of pleasure and also to get a meal to keep to themselves, which they like due to their possessive nature. Often for the sake of being able to make it back home safely, they settle for smaller prey species to eat whole such as lyres, lacris, murin as a smaller stomach is easier to carry home. When they do eat larger people, they usually only prey on those who have gotten too close to their territory, but it’s not unusual for people to fall victim to their voracious appetites if they unfortunately crossed paths with them while anurans are out on a hunt, or if an anuran was just particularly hungry.

Anurans as Prey
While it usually doesn’t happen since anurans stick together and work in groups to keep threats away, on occasion they are preyed on by larger predators. This most commonly happens when a member gets separated from their swarm and a large predator they can’t fend off alone finds them before their swarm does. This sadly most commonly happens to the youngest members of a swarm due to their lack of experience, but it can happen to any anuran easily. This is also the reason many anurans don’t live to old age.

The most common predators of anurans are nagas, aghrahns, other large flying predators able to carry them off and large predators they would need to be in a group to fend off. Lyres have claimed to have eaten lone anurans before when they cross paths due to being hungry. An anuran would sooner die than admit to losing members of their swarm to "blue-bloods".

Diet
Anurans are a carnivorous species, they rely on meat for their essential nutrients. They will readily eat any kind of meat and will hunt on both land and in water for their food. An individual anuran will happily eat smaller mammals, birds, reptiles, fish and bugs of any sort, but the ideal means of getting food is hunting for large prey as a pack.

With large prey they’ll dog pile the prey once subdued and tear into them with tooth and claw until they bring it down and eat them until there’s nothing but bones left, though they often take bones home to use for other purposes. Anurans also hunt in water, usually by flushing schools of fish in strategic manner so the swarm can eat them in mouthfuls. Dogpiling large prey also can occur underwater since they can chase them down prey much faster in water than on land. Land and water hunting can  be brought together, as some swarms have worked out strategies of tricking their prey into entering the water in an escape attempt, only to pile on them even more quickly.

Swarms also may sneak into towns to steal food and supplies, taking whatever they can find that's edible, of potential use or just cool to them. Anurans like to eat other kinds of food, they adore trying anything edible as they enjoy new tastes and different textures to the point where they tend to gorge themselves if the chance comes along.

In order to support this habit of eating for the fun of it, anurans consume and store rocks called gastroliths in a gizzard located just before their stomach in the lower chest cavity. The rocks they eat help break down unfamiliar foods/heavy meals, the rocks they eat are rich in minerals which are also essential to their diet. The rocks in their stomach can provide extra weight to dive deeper underwater if needed. Rocks are good for their teeth when breaking them down to size to keep them strong and sharp, bones make a good substitute for this purpose as well.Anurans love eating gemstones, to the extent that they will go out of their way to get even just a tiny bite of a precious gemstone to eat. Their obsession with them is comparable to humans obsession with sugar. More sociable swarms who get along better with other species have been known to strike up trade with merchants for gemstones, even low grade gemstones are seen as a treat to anurans, though higher grade ones are strongly desired. Less trustworthy merchants often try to take advantage of anurans lack of knowledge to trick them into trading fake gemstones, though anurans often can tell the difference from just the feel of the material and dislike anyone trying to trick them. Anurans might not always be bright, but they’re not as dumb as one might think them to be, especially when it comes to gemstones.

Weaknesses
While anurans have evolved to not have it be a hindrance to them, their lack of eyesight can still become a weakness if you prevented them from using their other senses. Several methods of disabling their major sensory organs have been passed around as advice; one of the most widespread is keeping a whistle on hand since they are cheap and easy to come by, though any object that you can use to produce a loud, high frequency noise will send a swarm running as it causes them pain. This has made dog whistles especially popular as a tool to fend off anuran swarms, and valuable too so they sell for high prices among merchants since they can scare off anurans without attracting other predators. Another common trick passed on by travelers is to use smelling salts on them. These are very cheap and widespread across the Outer Lands of Faria since they use as a quick and effective cure for someone who has been put to sleep by predators or knocked unconscious. Smelling salts are great at keeping anurans away since they hate the smell. Many similar tricks to keeping an anuran off of your trail also are passed around with other smelly substances, including some brands of aerosols from The Warren which are especially effective but are much harder to come by.

It’s also surprisingly simple to just talk your way out of being their food if you are in a position to do so. If you can quickly manage to find a hook of interest in a swarms alpha and win them over, you’ll win over the whole swarm as well and get a pass from being food. Existing animosity between species can make this harder to do but tactics like offering goods the swarm are interested in, telling stories and even music have been used to sway them. Beware though, backstabbing or scamming them often means you will end up their food anyway for all your effort put into winning them over.

Spirituality
The closest most anurans get to being close to any sort of religion is robbing shrine offerings from lyre shrines, or just vandalizing the shrines for fun to watch the lyres get mad, something they never get tired of finding hilarious. The shrines are a useful resource of supplies like new and interesting foods to eat, blankets for warmth and interesting objects that feel nice or make nice sounds that were intended as presents for the gods, which just sweetens stealing them for anurans.

Anurans who have adapted themselves to wider society may find themselves drawn to the worship of Riyujiin, the demon god of wind and storms in the lyre pantheon. What draws anurans to worshipping him is mainly Riyujiin popping up in the societal underbelly anurans frequent, his ties to trickery and mischief (something anurans love) and getting to spite lyres with knowledge of their own faith by worshipping the one god they forbid worship of.

One or two swarms have been said to more seriously adopt the worship of Riyujiin and even think Riyujiin may be an anuran like themselves. The territories of these swarms may be dotted with very rough carvings of their best attempts at capturing the likeness of Riyujiin. Ironically many anurans can't actually pronounce Riyujiin's name correctly, often calling him Roojin/Rijiin/Region or just nicknaming him Zappy God, Angry God and other such titles, which is more care put into respecting a god than they give to any other deity where they don't care to learn their names in the first place.

Overall
Anurans are thought of by most other species as sneaky, conniving, vicious beasts with no manners or respect for anyone. They aren’t far from the truth when they say that, but that’s only because anurans treat most other species with the same respect they usually receive. Other species often call the anurans ‘sightless’ as an alternative name for them. Some anurans don’t mind this but others find it offensive as they may be used to the term being used towards them as a slur but it’s down to individual basis (but often it’s better to play it safe to not end up food to them). They are neutral but strongly wary of most other species, this can differ based on experiences quite widely, but there are of course species anurans get along better with, or especially poorly with. Anurans living in mixed settlements are more capable of decent relationships with other species than those living with their birth swarms, even with the species that hate their guts.

A common habit of many anurans is nicknames for other species if they are not familiar with them or don’t know the proper name, and even if they do. Examples below include:


 * Blue blood - lyre (doubles as an insult)
 * Tall-bald - human (doubles as an insult)
 * Tall-not-bald - beastkin
 * Tall-baldish - halfkin
 * Danger-scaly - nagas/aghrahns
 * Danger-squishy - deceivers



Lyres
Anurans and lyres have hated each other for as long as they can remember, members of both species would scoff at the notion of a time when they once did get along. Anurans are despised by most lyres for their aggressive, rude, possessive and greedy natures which strongly contradict lyres own perception of the right way to live life, as well as believing that anurans embody the evil forces of the dark that want to take back the world from their gods, calling anurans night terrors as a derogatory term in reference to this and their nocturnal nature. In turn, anurans dislike lyres back because lyres push for them to be driven out of mixed settlements, as well as seeing lyres as stuck-up snobs, often calling them blue-bloods in a derogatory manner in reference to the cold attitude towards them, but also as a general nickname for lyres as they're so used to calling them that, as much as lyres dislike it. Some anurans think that lyres literally have blue blood, this of course isn't true and is just confusion caused by anurans misunderstanding the term.

Anurans will eat lyres given the chance, as well as stealing food and tools from them. Incidents of huge swarms overrunning and devouring almost all of the lyres in villages, driving out the rest and taking over the village for themselves have occurred in the past as well. Anurans take lots of pride in these successful raids, living like kings in secure housing and partying like animals for weeks, either until they get bored, decide to expand it into their own territory or until the Lyre Guard comes by to chase them away. Whether they keep the new territory or not, swarms that manage such raids on lyres successfully will likely have word spread to other settlements that can potentially reach other swarms, helping bolster their reputation as a fearsome and/or cool swarm.

Deceivers/Nagas/Chimeras
Anurans are terrified of deceivers and will not even go near one if they can help it, their shape shifting ability and even just the scent of them frightens them greatly. To an anuran a shapeshifted deceiver always smells and especially feels wrong to them, so they can detect their disguises even without sight. A troubled group of anurans called the Swipe Swarm are said to live alongside the deceivers in Turnaway Forest, though no one who has come back from there has ever met them.

Nagas are as terrifying a predator to anurans as they are to lyres, but it would be argued by anurans that it's even more dangerous for anuran swarms to bump into them, as lyres have an ever so slight advantage in being just too tall for a naga to eat a whole villages worth of lyres, while a naga could potentially wipe out an entire swarm before they're full, so anurans need the entire swarm to have a chance to take one down and protect their territory. Dromos smell off in the same way, but dromos are perfectly welcoming of anurans, and the Chomp Swarm has a close relationship with the dromos, so they're used to the smell of them by now and happily trade supplies with them.

Chimeras are not as capable of ingesting as many anurans, but have many tricks up their sleeve that can still cut an anurans life short like poison, as well as being strong predators in their own ways with plenty of teeth, claws and hooves to spare. Much like deceivers, they also find nagas and chimera smell off to them.

Humans
Humans tend to fear anurans due to their frighteningly efficient and coordinated pack hunting as well as the anurans tendency of seeing humans as food. Humans simply see anurans as mindless savages, in spite of being aware they're clever hunters, and will chase them from settlements on sight with the aid of weaponry. Anurans call humans tall-bald as an insult, but also as a means of referring to them.

Gargoyles
Gargoyles in the towns and cities are especially terrified of anurans, even if they've never met one because of warnings about them. Because of the anurans ability to bite into rock, they can easily penetrate the stone layer gargoyles use to protect themselves. Amongst anurans, gargoyles and their stone encasing is seen as a delicacy of high caliber equal to gemstones. This is actually a large part of the reason gargoyles started moving into towns and cities since anurans aren’t usually welcome in them, giving them protection from them. Slabs of old gargoyle casing will sell highly or trade for valuable goods within anuran swarms just so they can get a taste.

Halfkin
Anurans have an unexpectedly good relationship with halfkin. Halfkin are very quirky, open-minded and usually more interested in other species than their own. Halfkin thrive on being the sole member of their kind in a group of other species, making the two species a perfect fit together. Anurans rarely welcome other species into their territory anyway, and halfkin can relish in all the attention and affections from the anurans for themselves. They often become a secondary/tertiary alpha alongside the group's current alpha male/female/pair, a famous example being the Chomp Swarm lead by Needle Chomp and cat halfkin Dr Aurora Borealis. Stories of swarms lead solely by a halfkin have been told but nothing has confirmed these to be true.

Treating Each Other
Amongst themselves, anurans treat each other much more respectfully, or at least by their own standards of "respectful". Their idea of treating other well comes in the form of everyday play-fighting, teasing, eating/eating each other (non-fatally) and having sex with each other for pleasure to keep tensions low and group bonds high.

Anurans have a strong tendency of being playfully insulting to each other as they’re so used to being mean to everyone else they can’t really help it. They see it as harmless banter, even the most foul of insults can be meant well amongst them. This can make conversations with other species a challenge if they aren’t familiar with the anuran way with words.

It's also considered a normal part of everyday life to just decide out of the blue to have big cuddle sessions as a group to just have a bit of quiet(er) leisure time. Unrelated adults will also just casually invite others for an orgy in a more private part of the cave as if it were an invitation to have a tea party. The sexual appetite of an anuran is said to be nigh unmatched by any other species.

Swarm Life
Swarms can average about 20-40 members though they can easily be smaller or larger depending on how long the group has been around for. An anurans dedication to their swarm is so strong that every individual in a swarm carries their swarms name as a surname like one giant family. Swarm names are picked on the basis of ‘I thought it sounded cool.’

An alpha or a pair of alphas lead the swarm. The alphas can be male or female, same sex alphas are deemed completely normal. The alphas don't hoard breeding rights to themselves, instead their responsibilities include securing and maintaining territory for their swarms, ensuring safe spawning pools are available and kept clean, keeping the swarms morale and teamwork skills high and leading hunting groups. Alphas also just love being the boss and getting to brag about it and assert themselves day in and out, but the better they carry it the more respected they'll be as a leader.

The rest of the swarm largely does what their alpha/s tell them to do, but they have plenty of freedom to occupy their time how they please. Hobbies amongst anurans are simple, mostly their days are spent playing with hoarded items of interest, modelling clothes, bone and rock carving and generally having fun together. They also do like to groom one another’s hair with their hands and claws as they find it relaxing and fun.

Anurans are allowed to leave to start their own swarms if they desire but they are not allowed to take eggs laid from their swarms spawn (even if it’s theirs) and they cannot come back once they leave unless they’re exchanging members. Many new swarms don’t last as numbers are needed to survive, some survive by agreeing to merge with other swarms or lasting long enough to build up numbers on their own.

Alphas can be challenged for their position, decided on by a much more serious fight than their usual tussles. Anurans won’t try to kill each other but because of the strength of their jaws they are capable of leaving serious injuries on each other that have proven fatal. Challengers who earn the title will become the new alpha, though the partner of the last alpha is not obligated to pair up with them, especially if their partner was killed by the challenger. Normally anurans killing one another is seen as a grave sin but this is the one lone exception and a possibility new and current alphas alike have to be mentally prepared for.

Fallen alphas are sent out on the nearest rivers available on a small raft adorned with nice objects their alpha liked best, if there is no body (due to an alpha being eaten typically) this little service is still done anyway. Overcoming the loss of an alpha can be tough for a swarm, especially if no other took up their place prior as not having a leader leaves them disorganized and distressed until a new alpha establishes themselves. Other members of their swarm do get a send off as well in the same fashion ,though in order to conserve limited supplies they are not put on a raft. Instead, they just float their loved one downstream with their favourite belongings tied to them, or just their belongings if there isn’t a body.

The Exchange
Another job the alphas must do is an odd occurrence that happens every few months to a year often called The Exchange. This is when alphas visit other swarms to meet with their alphas and arrange to swap swarm members. If the other alpha agrees both alphas will choose members of theirs to join the new swarm and meet at an agreed meeting site and swap their members around. This can be a tense time for swarms who aren’t familiar with or are on poor terms with each other.

This is beneficial to the swarms as it can cut down on scuffles over territory invasions or food with swarms, improve relations with other swarms and most importantly it introduces new genetics into a swarm and prevents inbreeding. The new members of a swarm will typically take on the surname of their new swarm and use their birth swarms name as a middle name. Some alphas even let new members keep their surnames but this is rather rare.

Reproduction
Every 5 years in the middle of winter, all the females in a swarm will begin their oestrus cycle. In this mass breeding frenzy all the males and females will mate together to fertilize the eggs before the females spawn them all at the end of winter. Females only have one large egg on average but when laid they are put together in a group of spawn in the most secure and clean pool of water available. The spawn need warmth to hatch, to do this anurans will crowd together in the pool in turns to use their body heat.

The secret to these anurans keeping their eggs warm when they are cold-blooded is using the remaining month of the female's oestrous cycle after laying their eggs. The anurans keenness on sex for pleasure actually benefits their offspring's development using the warmth produced by such rigorous activity, as well as the close proximity of protective parents. This keeps the spawn warm enough for the tadpoles to develop for one month until they hatch in time for spring. It also means there’s always adults close by to protect the spawn.

Life Cycle
When the spawn all hatch, anuran tadpoles have very underdeveloped limbs closer to resembling fins, white skin, no lungs and a tail to aid swimming. They have sharp little baby teeth and very voracious appetites so they have to be fed very often until they can leave the water and grow big and old enough to hunt, and a little bit of gravel to eat help them control buoyancy better when swimming. As the tadpoles grow up, their fins develop into limbs, they develop lungs and their tails will recede into their body. When they’ve walked on the ground for the first time at a year old they will begin to develop their adult colour as well, though sometimes they remain white.

At this point they will still be too young to participate in hunting but they’ll be taught all the theory behind it since their mental age is equal to that of a 3 year old child at this stage. While they are growing up tadpoles are not given names by their parents or anyone in the swarm, adults often call them crude nicknames like ‘runt’, ‘tyke’, ‘pipsqueak’, and other such names. Similarly the kids have crude nicknames for each other of equally mature demeanor. They’ll only be allowed to choose their own name when they’re adults.

Parents don't raise the tadpoles themselves, instead every adult in the group is now that years parents and all the tadpoles are everyone's kids, at least that’s how anurans see it. As a result tadpoles don’t form bonds with their biological parents over anyone else in the swarm but this aids them learning to rely on everyone in the group equally.

Hunting increases to be much more frequent when the tadpoles are growing up, their bodies grow very quickly but will not do so without substantial food, which is caught for them and brought back by the hunting group. This prey is almost always killed as the tadpoles start off only being 4 inches long, unable to ingest the huge live meals of the adults until they become adults themselves.

Anurans reach their teenage years at about 6-7 years old, until the coveted 10 years old comes around. The maximum lifespan of an anuran is 40-45 years. Anurans die at less than half their potential lifespan from predation and their very rough lifestyles, though they don't consider having a short life to be a bad thing. Anurans consider it more important to have had fun with the time you had than to worry too much about living for so long that you don't have fun while you're at it.

Rite of Adulthood
Once anurans are 10 years old (equivalent to a human turning 18) they will have reached adulthood physically. In order to become an adult socially they must go through what's known as a Rite of Adulthood. This moment in an anurans life is often seen as their most important as they can’t be seen as an adult by their swarm without completing it.

The Rite of Adulthood involves the youngsters who have reached 10 years old (detectable by scent when hormone changes occur) going out on a special group hunt lead by their alpha so they can be a trusted witness to the youngsters change to an adult.

There are actually two phases for them to complete which are either done on the same night or separate nights depending on the circumstances, but the phases are always the same.

The first phase is the most important one: The young anurans must show their alpha that they are strong enough to take down prey. Alphas will have them chase and take down their most common game, both on land and in water if possible but they have to show they are able to do it and more importantly do it together while following their alphas leadership. Once this phase is completed the alpha will reward them their kill without taking any at all except for anything leftover which will be brought home again. The second phase is the riskiest but means that they can display their cunning and decision making skills most effectively to the alpha. They are required to sneak into the nearest settlements homes and steal an object of personal desire to take back to their alpha. It doesn’t matter what they take as long as it isn’t edible, can easily be carried and they are not caught or alert the town to their presence. Individual anurans who pass this phase will go on to become an adult, those who don’t will simply repeat this phase again with the alpha until they succeed. The object the anuran steals becomes their token of adulthood, a prized possession of any anuran even if the object itself is completely worthless.

Completing the Rite of Adulthood means that anurans will now be allowed to take part in hunts and other jobs in the swarm, mate and choose their own name for themselves.

Naming is based on words that an individual knows and enjoys the sound of when it’s said by others even if they don’t know what the word means or is, sometimes they may make nicknames from childhood their own real name.