World: Alfheim
Diet: Nutrients of other plants
Height: 1’1″
Lifespan: 5 years
Habitat: Forests
Activity Cycle: Nocturnal
Deep in the darkest of forests, especially places like the Nightglade where the sun never rises, mandrakes lurk. During the day, they are entirely buried in the earth but for their flower. Only at night do they emerge, scurrying about in the dark to launch an assault on giants. They use their floral mouths to bite into the bodies of large plants like trees and suck at their internal fluids. Each mandrake has a favored tree, and up to a dozen may share one, although this load often leads to the death of that tree. They latch on for hours each night, slurping down sap and all the while keeping their large ears swiveling, listening for enemies.
Mandrakes are skittish creatures, and rightfully so. Every portion of their body is both edible and delicious, packed with nutrients. They are the basis of many diets in their natural environments. Their massive ears are fine-tuned machines, picking up the faintest noises even a mile away. When attacked, a mandrake’s first resort is to bury itself, but if it does not have the time, it instead screams. The scream of a mandrake is a lethal thing, not by the mere sonic force of it, but by a psychic assault that wipes the mind of anything attacked by it. Anything exposed to the full blast of the scream collapses, incapable of the mental activity needed to even move. The effect wears off over a few hours, but few creatures survive that long. Completely helpless, they are devoured by other predators drawn by the distant scream of the mandrake.
