World: Any
Diet: Dragons
Length: Varies
Lifespan: 5 years
Habitat: Any
Activity Cycle: Always active
Dragons are inherently creatures who deny nature, and very often, they reject the very cycle of life and death. A dragon’s body must be thoroughly disassembled, lest its chaos live on, animating its bones to continue its existence. This is a unique state of undeath. No soul remains that may be dissuaded or banished, just raw chaos seeking more of itself. Some say this is the true mind of the waters above, but even dragons know little of the world they trickle down from. Whatever drives this hellish beast, it targets other dragons, seeking to prolong its life with their own bones.
Much like any skeletal undead, the life of a petricarn is bound up in the flesh binding its bones together. A multi-colored membrane clings to the bones, paper-thin and rough like shark skin. This protects the bones from decay and forms a living surface that grows like a fungus over captured bones. However, the core of the being’s life is the black ooze that slithers within. Toxic, corrosive, and corruptive to whatever it touches, this ooze blinds the bones together and can even slither on its own much like the slimes of the White Void. Whatever the dragon’s original breath weapon was, it now vomits a torrent of this slime. Those who survive its attempts to dissolve their flesh are often left partially draconic, limbs coated in scales or jaws half-twisted into a permanent toothy snarl.
Despite their attempts to extend their own lives, petricarn are universally short-lived. Those who fail to feed upon other dragons will slowly starve, their gooey bodies drying up and flaking away. Those who are successful instead become titans, adding more bones and more chaotic flesh as they grow to terrifying sizes. This growth is always unsustainable, with the mass of the slimy body becoming too much for the bones to support and move. The end result is total collapse, leaving behind a lake of chaos. The horror will be immobile, but by no means contained; the lake remains hungry and malicious as it dwindles, and dragons will regularly emerge from the depths to terrorize the land.
An end-stage petricarn, descended into a lake of chaos.
