Cha'thrang

Travelers usually mistake a cha'thrang for a clump of broken, sun-dried bamboo until it moves. Beneath the disguise is a squat, dull-brown beast shaped like a tortoise, its shell bristling with short, hollow bone tubes that pass for dead reeds. It builds that shell from an alkaline lime secreted along its back, adding to it as it grows, and a tough, stringy fiber binds its body to the shell's underside. Hooked front claws let it burrow and grip the ground.

A cha'thrang hunts the sky. It lies still for hours with a pocket of air trapped beneath its shell, and when a low flyer passes within 50 yards it drives that air up through its spines in one explosive burst, launching a spray of lime-coated darts trailing fibrous cords. Only one dart can strike, for 1d6 damage. The lime on the tether is type A poison: a failed save vs. poison costs 15 points of damage, a successful one none, but the toxin needs 10-30 rounds to act.

Meanwhile the flyer is caught in a tug-of-war, and the cha'thrang digs in so it cannot be dragged off. A character snaps the cord only with a bend bars/lift gates roll. Huge and gargantuan flyers break it automatically, man-sized ones with a save vs. paralyzation, and smaller ones never.

Then it simply waits. When the tired victim lands, the cha'thrang crawls along its own line toward it, shortening the slack for any second escape, and finally rips the prey apart with its jaws (1d12). It can fire 1d4 volleys per day, discarding the spent cord each time. Its spines aim only upward, so against ground attackers it has just its foreclaws (1d3), its bite (1d12) and its shell, one reason these creatures almost never travel alone.

Cha'thrang move in threes called trines, usually two females and a male. Trines belong to loose clans that adopt any stray they meet and later bud off new trines. Mating is so hard on them that many die of it. Each female lays one clutch a year of 1-6 eggs, and small predators eat most of the young. They can live for centuries, though few escape hungry enemies that long.

The discarded cords make superb rope fiber: one dry strand easily holds 50 pounds, and a few braided together produce a slim, very strong line. Spent strands measure 20-50 yards (1d4+1 x 10), and some desert traders make rounds between several trines collecting them.

The flesh is edible with care. Coating it in lime from the shell's underside keeps it fresh for weeks, but every trace of the toxic lime must be scrubbed off before eating.