(This is an original creation dated 22 Jan 2022)
Note: Zhrr'zhsh rhymes with the word "whir", as in "the whirring to machinery". The initial consonant sounds like "Zh" as in the Russian surname "Zhukov". So, the name can be simply pronounced as "zhirr". If you can however, enunciate it with a "sh" sound at the end, so that you say "Zhirr-sh".
Average Size: 1 metre tall, and up to 1 .5 metre in diameter
Average Mass: 200 kg
Average Lifespan: 2 centuries
Reproduction: Unknown, Multiple fission
Body Temperature: Extremophilic
Rendering by Copilot AI
PHYSICAL APPEARANCE AND STRUCTURE
The zhrr'zhsh are a form of silicon-based life that can be found burrowing in the earth. They resemble huge cone-shaped rocks that can float a meter off the ground. What allows the zhrr'zhsh to do so is not exactly known, but scientists believe they float through magnetic levitation.
Touching the "skin" of a zhrr'zhsh is like feeling a piece of carbonaceous rock. However, this "skin" can be felt to ripple and is exothermically warm to touch. Touching at the right places, you might even feel the "pulse" of a zhrr'zhsh, especially in the two concentric seams that run around its body.
Arrayed around the body of a zhrr'zhsh are five white ocular organs with glowing orange pupils that appear to float like in a "lava" lamp. Smooth rock (resembling eyebrows in humans) can be found above each alien "eye". In between and above each eye are five appendages with three crude slightly deformable fingers.
Atop the cone is the zhrr'zhsh's mouth, a circular opening with sharp teeth for gnashing gemstones, minerals, and rocks. They use their appendages to feed themselves such "food" to feel sated. Being silicon-based, zhrr'zhsh do not breathe.
Conversely, at the bottom of the cone-shaped body are thin and colorful ribbon-like filaments made of fine sand-like grains stuck together. These filaments pick up vibrations in the air, and this is how they hear. Another purpose of these filaments is that they are decorative and a way for the zhrr'zhsh to recognize each other.
As explained by Zhrr'zhshs themselves: they reproduce by "starring" at a mate and holding three appendages to each other. Apparently, there is more going on here as the reproductive cycle of silicon-based life is very much different than that of carbon-based life. Scientists believe the connection of appendages results in an exchange of bodily material through the "skin" of the zhrr'zhshs.
After hours of holding each other, both zhrr'zhshs part and about a week later, both parents will produce live younglings (1 to 5) through a process akin to "multiple fissioning". It takes about five decades before the younglings become adults.
SENSES
The eyesight of zhrr'zhshs is quite poor, about half that of humans, however they can never be surprisec unless attacks come from above or below.
They do not have olfactory senses (as they are not carbon-based lifeforms) and they rely on vibration of their bodily filaments to "hear". Zhrr'zhshs are however able to sense gemstones, minerals, and rocks, with the former two valued as luxury "foods"; the lithofactory senses of the zhrr'zhsh (sensing of stones) are located on their "lips", arrayed around their mouth.
SPEECH
Zhrr'zhsh do not speak per se as they have no larynx. Internally within their body however, is an organ that creates vibrations which can then be translated to speech. Their speech is however twice as slow as that of humans. Zhrr'zhshs must therefore wear a special translator that helps them speak to all the other races.
SOCIETY AND CUSTOMS
Zhrr'zhsh live a rather slow and placid life on a rocky Earth-like planet in the Palalyrn Cluster. They dig tunnels underground and excavate huge caverns in their search for food. Their food comes in the form of precious gemstones and minerals such as calcite, feldspar, fluorite, quartz, and talc.
The zhrr'zhsh became sentient early on in their evolution, something rather uncommon among alien races, and a rarity among silicon-based life. They learned to build crude tools at first, and these grew more sophisticated as the race grappled with making full use their five appendages and three fingers. Naturally, the zhrr'zhsh became mathematically brilliant, relying on a pentadecimal system (which truly stymies humans who are advocates of their hexadecimal system).
Encountering huge mushroom fungal-like growths in deeper caverns, the zhrr'zhsh farmed them for their soft fungi flesh. Many products were made with it, but of note is fungicrete, a resource the zhrr'zhsh use to build domiciles and later on, factories, and industrial buildings to process gems and minerals.
My initial drawing of a zhrr'zhsh
The zhrr'zhsh are pretty intelligent beings and their civilization, known as the Lithocracy of Zhrr'zhsh, is atheistic. This means there are absolutely no temples or monuments erected whatsoever to gods. The zhrr'zhsh scoff at the idea of almighty beings and respectfully remain silent whenever religious missions come forward to proselytise their ideas.
Being catapulted to spacefaring status is always a tricky affair, but the zhrr'zhsh have learned to adapt quickly. Discovered only about 50 years ago by an exploratory mission to their star system, the zhrr'zhsh have officially joined the UPF and are clamoring to absorb as much knowledge as they can.
Economic dealings with zhrr'zhshs always have to do with the trade of gemstones and minerals; and these tough rock beings are readily proud to deal with other races on what they consider to be premium "food".
ATTITUDES
As "ominous as the Zhrr'zhsh" is what parents might tell their children when they spot one floating down the street. Frankly, though, the zhrr'zhsh are curious about everything and will come forward hoping to experience something new.
Zhrr'zhsh events are ploddingly slow affairs. They recognize birthdays, which they call "occurances of being", while deaths are known as "quiescences of being". They do not express sadness or happiness during these affairs and see them as "trials of existence".
When it comes to racial coexistence, he zhrr'zhsh get along very well with humans, and dralasites. They find vrusk to be rather alien in nature ("the alignment of their appendages appear disgusting"), and yazirians to be very rude versions of humans.
SPECIAL ABILITIES
Silicon-based Lifeforms
Zhrr'zhshs are extremophilic, that is, they are able to withstand extreme cold and hot temperatures: as cold as -80°C and as hot as 80°C. Anything beyond these temperatures will be treated as normal damage.
Zhrr'zhshs also do not need water to survive; they find it perplexing that carbon-based life must require liquids to survive. They must however, require gemstones or minerals daily, amounting to 100cr daily for sustenance. They eat only once a day.
Echo Vision
As other races have not had the chance to dissect a zhrr'zhsh, no one is certain how they move in the complete darkness of caves. Zhrr'zhshs navigate by sending out and receiving barely audible low frequency echoes.
Sense Food
Zhhr'zhsh can sense gemstones and minerals with 1d10 km of them. They will have to excavate to reach their prized food, however.
Vacuum Survival
Zhrr'zhsh do not breathe oxygen like carbon-based lifeforms. However, they must be reside in similar atmospheric conditions as their home planet or risk entering into a cryptobiotic state (comatose).
SPECIAL PENALTIES
Magnetic Levitation
Zhrr'zhshs cannot venture into areas that bear a nonexistent magnetic field. They will gradually lose their floating ability (in a matter of minutes) and crash to the ground like a huge chunk of rock.
Fear of Liquids
Zhrr'zhshs do not need water to survive, in fact they find all forms of liquids repugnant and fearful. For example, submerging a zhrr'zhsh will cause it to enter cryptobiosis (comatose). They shudder whenever they see another race have a drink.
