Gray renders were dangerous predators found in swampy or forested wilderness areas. Renders had dense muscles and thick bones, similar to bears, but much more vicious. They walked on two feet, but they were hunched over, and their extra long arms dragged along the ground. Even with such a posture, they reached about nine feet tall. Their broad shoulders were four feet across.
A gray render's body was hairless. They had sharp claws on their hands and powerful jaws full of black teeth. Perhaps most unique was a render's eyes; it had six of them. They were small and yellow-colored and were in two rows along its sloped forehead.
Abilities[]
Some rangers reported that they could rip three-foot-diameter trees out of the ground with their mouths and claw them apart in minutes.
Gray renders had a keen sense of smell and their eyes were especially perceptive, being able also to see in the dark.
Ecology[]
When hunting, gray renders sometimes waiting to spring a trap. Once they engaged in combat, they attacked to kill, working themselves into a thoughtless rampage of fearless destruction.
Gray renders were never found in groups of their kind. However, they often accompanied other creatures, both animals and more intelligent races, in a protective role. Scholars could not explain this strange behavior from an otherwise aggressive monster, but gray renders seemed to "adopt" these other creatures whether desired or not. Such a protecting render would even bring freshly killed meat to its charges. Even if those being protected attacked the render, it would simply retreat and come back later; it would never cause harm to such creatures willfully.
Larval gray renders are completely harmless. In this stage, it is easiest to bond with one.
Sometimes, other predators or scavengers would follow behind gray renders to take the scraps left behind by its path of destruction.
Render reproduction was bizarre even by the standards of other magical creatures. Gray renders were asexual, but still required a second render to reproduce. After a lengthy mating ceremony, the flesh around a renders neck swells with cyst-like growths. At this stage, called "popping", the render becomes even more aggressive than usual. Once the mature, the cysts pop and a tiny gray larvae falls to the forest floor and burrows into the earth for several months before emerging as a juvenile render.
Culinary Use[]
The cyst-like growths that form on a grey render are called popplers. Each one containing a developing larvae as well as a buttery yolk that is highly prized for culinary uses. Either removed by a bonded humanoid, or removed from a slain render, the popplers remain usable for up to seven days before spoiling or forming a larvae.
History[]
Some scholars came to believe that the origin of gray renders could be traced back to the chaos of the elemental planes, because of how chaotically they fought. Others believed that they were an arcane perversion of mundane animals like bears effected by the energies of the world-cavern or far realm.