Ironjaws
"The lough gives, the lough takes, but it always gives the Ironjaw back." -Proverb among sailors of the Battlement Cliffs
A monstrous wraith of Everwealth’s drowned heartlands, the Ironjaw is a relic of older waters and older wars, a siege weapon grown gills, forged from scales and scars. Towering over all other freshwater predators, this seabound leviathan bears the broad, bladed mass of a sturgeon, wrapped in scale-plate armor knotted like rusted chainmail. Its movements, however, speak of a darker inheritance, the unpredictable speed of a bull shark, sudden and crushing, driven by violence more than hunger. Despite its mass, it glides through the water like a pulled thread, precise, silent, irreversible. Some claim no creature escapes an Ironjaw’s pursuit, and no sailor forgets the scream of splintered hull as it breaches below. Found in the trench-pits of Lough Shears, Lough Lord, and Lough Icewind, it is feared, bargained with, even worshipped, a beast made myth not by absence, but return. Fishermen mark their boats with its likeness to keep it away; priests offer rites to the drowned in hopes their spirits appease its rage. The Ironjaw is more than a predator. It is a legacy of valor drowned, judgment deep-slung, and hunger that waits beneath.Basic Information
Anatomy
The Ironjaw Sturgeon is a creature sculpted by pressure, violence, and time, a war beast of the lough, grown not from peaceable nature, but from the savage memory of flood and Fall. Reaching lengths of up to 25 feet, its body is built like a siege ram: thick and low-slung with iron-gray scale plates, each sharp-edged and ridged like buried armor, forged along its spine in harsh, broken rows. These scales are so hardened and jagged they’ve been known to slice fishing nets clean in half, even without a strike, just from the pressure of passing through. Unlike its ancient sturgeon kin, the Ironjaw bears a broad, shovel-shaped head, but one sharpened and reinforced with dense bone crests and helm-like ridges, shaped not for rooting in riverbeds but for ramming hulls and cracking bone. Its underbite juts like a barbed hook, loaded with rows of jagged, rust-colored teeth, not the filter plates of mundane sturgeon, but something twisted by ancestry, closer to a bull shark’s ripper’s maw, built to tear, not sift. Despite weighing over 4,000 pounds, the Ironjaw is no lumbering brute. It possesses an extraordinary skeletal-muscular structure, honed over centuries of trench-hunting, enabling it to perform sudden, bone-snapping twists and full-body rotations mid-strike. Lakefolk call this phenomenon the "spiral kill," where the Ironjaw will whip around to seize prey diving behind it or smash through the water in a curving breach, leaving blood-churned whirlpools in its wake. It is this maneuver that earned them the grim moniker: “aquatic acrobats.” Yet its most haunting weapon may be its patience. When hunger grows acute, the Ironjaw excretes a murky, alchemically tainted secretion from specialized glands beneath its jaw. This viscous bait mimics the scent and chemical signature of bleeding prey, drawing in fish, eels, crabs, even rival predators, from miles around, all believing they’re closing in on a fresh kill. Instead, they’re swimming into the jaws of a killer whose trap is already set. Sailors say this “lure-blood” clouds the water with memory, a scent that smells like hunger, fear, and the moment before dying.
Genetics and Reproduction
Ironjaws are long-lived and slow to breed. Mating occurs in the deepest, coldest trenches of Everwealth’s lakes once every 25-30 years. Courtship rituals involve violent duels between males, who slam armored heads until one retreats. Females release thousands of viscous eggs along jagged cavern walls, coating them in a bitter slime that poisons most scavengers. Fertilization occurs externally. Hatchlings are immediately left to fend for themselves, ensuring only the strongest survive, a cycle that has kept the species near-mythical in rarity.
Growth Rate & Stages
- Hatchling (0-2 years): Roughly 1–2 feet long, prey for almost everything in the lake.
- Juvenile (2-15 years): Growth accelerates, with armor beginning to harden.
- Mature (15-75 years): Reaches hunting size (15-30 ft), apex status confirmed.
- Ancient (75+ years): Rare and revered, these giants are considered sentient by some
Ecology and Habitats
Ironjaws are exclusively aquatic deepbound creatures They haunt the trench-like pits of Everwealth’s largest loughs, including Lough Shears, Lough Icewind, and Lough Lord, particularly near shipwreck zones and fault-line crevices. They prefer silt-heavy water with low visibility, using vibration-sensitive lateral lines to detect prey rather than sight.
Dietary Needs and Habits
Ironjaws are obligate carnivores with staggering metabolisms. They consume everything from fish and eels to drowned livestock, and, on occasion, unfortunate sailors. Their favored tactic is to stun prey with a sudden breach or tail strike, then swallow whole in a flash of white teeth and gray water. Their stomachs can digest bone, scale, and even metal scraps, though many lake divers report finding half-dissolved armor near sunken nests.
Biological Cycle
These creatures follow a unique seasonal rhythm:
- Spring: Breeding readiness begins; Ironjaws grow increasingly aggressive.
- Summer: Prime hunting season; frequently spotted near river mouths and ship lanes.
- Autumn: Slower movements; deeper dives and trenchward migrations.
- Winter: Partial torpor in the deepest lake pits; feeding slows but doesn’t cease.
Behaviour
Ironjaws are solitary but territorial, rarely tolerating even other's outside of breeding season. They patrol underwater territory methodically, often using precise ambush points they've visited for decades. Though not intelligent in the academic sense, their uncanny memory and targeted behavior against boats suggest something more than instinct. Fishermen claim Ironjaws remember nets. They avoid patterns. Some even say they “test” hulls with nudges before striking. When agitated or wounded, they will ram boats until they split or capsize, dragging prey below in a whirl of bubbles and churned blood. Not entirely a burdensome species though, they are among the few natural predators of the Tiderazors, violet insectoid crocodiles capable of surviving in both fresh and saltwater with an acute taste for flesh, culling their numbers when any find themselves expanding far enough into the mainland past the riverbeds they usually dwell; The same though can be said for the Ironjaws about the Tiderazor, a sort of silent war beneath the waters waged everyday, better them than us.
Additional Information
Perception and Sensory Capabilities
Ironjaws see poorly but are unmatched in aquatic perception. Their lateral lines can detect vibrations from over a mile away, and their electroreceptive pits can sense the heartbeat of prey even through dense silt. Some cultures claim they can “hear” fear beneath the waves and are drawn to it, prompting sailors to undergo ritual chants of bravery before setting sail.
Scientific Name
Acipenser tyrannus.
Origin/Ancestry
Descended from ancient sturgeons warped by post-Schism magicks, likely tied to the first underwater rifts formed in the chaos of the Fall. Unlike their mundane cousins, Ironjaws exhibit impossible agility, traits possibly drawn from fey ancestry.
Conservation Status
Not Endangered, but Widely Feared. Due to their reproductive rarity, they are seldom killed. Yet their dominance ensures that waters housing even one Ironjaw cannot be exploited freely. Most fishermen avoid the known haunts. Those who don’t… don’t return.
Geographic Distribution
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