Subject: “Eurayle”

Source Lineage: THS201 bonded to base JOU128

Thesis: The Hydra genus is known for the phenomenal capacity of rapid cell replication with seemingly little telomere degradation, with some speculation being that it is nigh immortal to the ravages of time. However, it is the adaptability of the genome that bears the most interest in this experiment. Few other species in the wild have adopted as many secondary, seemingly incompatible characteristics as a Hydra is capable of. Hypothetically, if the bonded genetics can align even partially, the cell division will result in a viable hybrid.

What is, perhaps more fascinating and outright peculiar, is the capacity for not only the bonding of probable clade lineages, but the ability to transcend the Kingdom of organism altogether.

See Also: C20058, NEC118, KTK136, and ELD215

Given this proclivity, introduction of a gene sample from the Gorgon species might create the first humanoid hybrid. Using an egg from JOU128, procedure will introduce gene markers to bond in ovum, and be further reinforced by enchantment until gestation completes.

Day 25: Growth of subject in ovum has been confirmed and preliminary examinations of fetus indicate a successful gene graft. Experiment is being moved to Time Vault for accelerated growth and conditions are being kept at optimal levels in the controlled environment.

Day 59: As hatching approaches, a possible conundrum presents itself. On the one hand, most hydra behavior after hatching involves the young imprinting upon a parent. On the other, very little is known about Gorgon mating behaviors, including hatching. Given the possibility of a young gorgon having little control over their gaze… Well… it is better to concoct some form of control in case the worst combination of traits ends up being the case.

Day 64: Subject has hatched. A clone effigy of myself oversaw the process, which took several hours. Luckily, the excess of precaution seemed unwarranted as a young gorgon’s vision is apparently initially too weak to do much. Initial physical examination appears subject is in good health, no prominent mutations or anatomical anomalies present that would hamper full development.

What is surprising is synthesis of the subject’s anatomy. The forelimbs are longer than expected given the proportions while the hind limbs are digitigrade. Initial tests indicate the healing capacity has translated, at least in part, with the sample being one of the cranial tendrils, effectively doubling the tendril in question as one might expect. Healing is otherwise highly accelerated, but does not display any further indication of such effects. I am reluctant to test further on the subject, in case decapitation does not, in fact, yield similar results. Scaling pattern appears to follow Gorgon root, though hide is seemingly thicker in those areas.

The basically humanoid shape was in line with expectations of Figure A., as opposed to the hypothesis of Figure B. The Gorgon’s head did not, in fact, graft onto the body portion where the neck would sprout from the secondary cranium.

Day 300: Subject continues to grow at phenomenal rate. Basic motor skills and development of extranatural abilities were relatively simple, further confirming an instinctual component to such as a Gorgon’s gaze. Her speech development is also well above what might be expected, already understanding basic concepts and demonstrating complexity in simple thought.

Day 410: I believe the Hydra influence has led to a far accelerated growth rate, both in maturation as well as physical size. Child is already nearly as tall as I am, and displaying equivalent behaviors of an 8 year old human. Enclosed are a number of drawings she has made for me.

Day 2088: Eurayle’s growth has slowed substantially, standing roughly twice my size. I believe she is nearing full growth, and the start of secondary maturation appears to have started according to her hormone levels. Sadly, her full capacity for complex thought has also stalled, though she is by no means primitive, but perhaps I am merely expecting too much.

Day 3504: Eurayle has reached full maturity as near as I can observe and has begun to understand the nature of her existence. I believe that in absence of others compatible with her, she may undergo parthenogenesis, which has long been speculated as one of the primary gorgon reproduction methods. If so, I will continue to update with further notes, but I do not think she will want for company. She wishes to venture out onto the island to attain her own space, but promises to visit. I am sure she will be capable of taking care of herself, but nevertheless, I will continue my observation. Discreetly, if possible.

... those are two of the most generic creature types out there.

I have to agree, I didn't have a solid visual for it unfortunately.

Alternatively:

Delirium Beckoner
Creature - Nightmare Siren
At the beginning of each opponent's upkeep, they mill X, where X is the number of cards in their hand.
Whenever ~ becomes the target of a spell or ability, discard a card or sacrifice it.
She calls for you to join her in madness.
1/3

Nightmare might be a harder entry. I have a solid thought process, but nightmare as a type is more Ephemeral... Mostly. Initial, specifically, has it as a primary creature your, but the definition is about as vague as horror.

The research I had originally gathered about the migratory and mating habits of the dragon turtles has been lost to the sea. Even if any of the documents had survived, without the full context, they are as good as nothing. It will be another decade, at least, before an opportunity such as that will present itself, and even then, years of research would be necessary to regain what has been so callously destroyed.

Nevertheless, I am not one to balk at adversity, so… an impromptu experiment with the cause of that malfeasance will have to suffice in its stead. Subject is an uncatalogued Siren, samples acquired but not yet archived.

First procedure was to permanently silence the creature, harvesting the responsible organs and sealing the void, removing the appropriate secondary aspects. This was, for full disclosure, done in anger.

With subject then so prepared, an alternative method of feeding became necessary. Given the possibilities, I settled for nourishment through psychic means, as other methods were too inconvenient to proceed with. I had to be somewhat creative, but use of symbiont implantation seemed the best possible method. With subject’s cranium exposed, I removed neural tissue from the mid brain and sampled replacement flesh at the core of M19221. The symbiont’s true body already mimics brain tissue, so the graft went smoothly after it bored into place, almost indistinguishable from the hosts own organ.

Now, I will allow the subject recovery, though I am fairly certain the procedure no doubt shattered her psyche, and release it back into the wild where it will either adapt or die. I am not particularly about which, the resultant data will be consolation prize enough.

Subject: DIS090 Hosting

Source Lineage: MMQ253, FRF013, DIS086, IKO167, M11188, ALA161, ALA209

Thesis: Following what I can only describe as the Ulvenwald incident, my frustrations over the broad and sweeping taxonomic family of the “beasts” have finally fomented into a will to trace back the atavistic ancestry of the entire clade. While previously a degree of curiosity drove me to attempt the experiment, it was halfhearted at best and ended with failure, such that I ignored the subject for some time.

However, I think now that I possess a wider array of specimen samples, I have a higher chance of success. Paired as well with a procedure utilizing a creature that was rumored capable of swift and diverse cloning, I have a better baseline from which to begin my distilment of shared traits.

The creature, colloquially known as a Protean Hulk, is ideal for the myriad injections and gene sequencing, capable of birthing the results from the nodules that bubble up from its back. That it, itself, traces to the same clade is fortuitous, but it holds that it will be useful in future projects as well.

Samples including Wumpus, Krushok, Indrik, Goriak, Baloth, Cerodon, and Thoctar have been sequenced for common gene markers and extracted. Missing sequences should be filled in by the host beast during nodule fertilization given DIS090’s diverse and protean genetics.



Results: Day 120: Failure

Fetal development and harvest showed myriad mutations and unviable offspring. Of remaining offspring, commonalities and central traits showed excellent promise for first generation subjects. Next step would have been natural breeding for homogenization of traits.

However, plans were ultimately fruitless given one failed subject that made it through the screening as viable. Behavior was purely aggression and, for lack of better term, maniacal. Creature slaughtered the entire litter of offspring, possibly out of territorial instinct, but I suspect more for actual pleasure. What’s more, as subject grew, unforeseen and… anomalous features appeared. Their uniformity across its body tells me that this was not a random mutation, but some bizarre interaction of atavistic recessive traits that manifested in this… horror.

Not terribly, much to my chagrin, unlike the Ulvenwald incident.

Origin Tide

Creature - Ooze
: Exile target creature card from a graveyard. Create a token that's a copy of the exiled card, except it has no abilities and is an ooze in addition to its other types. Put a +1/+1 counter on Origin Tide
Origin Tide has all activated and triggered abilities of cards exiled with it.
1/1

It is, no doubt, unsurprising when an experiment is unsuccessful. The vast majority of experiments will yield, at best, inconclusive results. It is the mark of character what one does with such failures, to continue on undeterred, to buckle under the circumstance, or to adapt as best one can to the unexpected.

It is such a failure that has led to what I can only describe as the vast lake of goop that now resides in one of the chambers below my complex.

Originally an experiment whose exact nature I can no longer remember (my notes having been less stringently recorded before I created the Fetches) I have vague memories of trying to recreate a primordial soup from which life may be rapidly engineered.

In that regards, it is, in some fashion successful. Insomuch as it isn’t life so much as a simulacrum of such.

But, perhaps I am getting ahead of myself.

The exact nature of the hypothesis is murky to me, but what collections of my notes survived the procedure that crafted the slime allows me to piece together what I must have done, knowing myself as well as I do, after all.

The samples I had been using were not ones I collected directly, but had, instead came into my possession after two very different encounters. One had been passed to me by a fellow planeswalker that had harrowing tales of a newly discovered, or rediscovered, plane that had been thought a myth. I dubbed the sample DIS110 and observed it for some time. It was a fascinating sample that seemed to adapt strongly to the proximity of other organisms. From what I gather, it was the remains of a cytoplastic creature that rampantly sampled gene sequence from hundreds of beings and promptly went on a rampage. The ensuing calamity did not apparently go as planned and the subsequent clean up took months. It is in that time that the still living sample was recovered and shortly after came into my possession.

The other sample, dubbed CMD210, is one I traded for during one of my trips to the bazar in Aretopolis. I am not sure how it actually came to be in the proprietor’s tent when I found it, only knowing that it was clearly non-native to Kephalai. Somehow, while he was loathe to discuss its procurement, he had quite the tale of its origin. It would seem that the creature it came from was well known among its peoples, revered and reviled in equal measure. While DIS110 displayed rapidly evolution through acquisition of living tissues, CMD210 would reorder itself using dead tissue.

Some time passed between as I experimented to see the capabilities of each individual sample. So much so that I admit feeling somewhat foolish that the obvious combination didn’t occur to me for what might possibly be years (time has become difficult to track outside of these notes. One reason I have increased my diligence in outlining them.)

The only problem, initially, was that each sample came loaded with immense genetic potential already absorbed, along with the dozens of experiments I’d conducted already. So, rather reluctantly I deciphered some scheme to purge the samples so that there would be fewer variables in the execution of the experiment. The full folly of that procedure was not clear for some time, though it became immediately apparent. With each ooze reduced to its base state, I introduced the samples to one another. The reaction was… unforeseen.

While I thought the base structures would be similar enough that assimilation would be seamless, I did not factor in the behavioral differences present, or more aptly, their similarity. Instead of achieving a peaceful synthesis, the samples immediately tried to absorb each other. Competitively.

As a result of the struggle, they grew rapidly, absorbing basically any organic matter possible and quickly dwarfed the experiment’s parameters. Eventually, it seems, that neither won, or perhaps they both did, as immediately it ceased struggling (only after having destroyed the containment lab) and… promptly stopped moving altogether.

What I had not anticipated, even beyond the instinctual response that prompted the catastrophe, is that having purged the pre-gested sequences, I had also removed the sentient aspects to the creatures. They no longer displayed any agency, and were, for all intents and purposes, a giant sludge that indolently occupied the ruins of my workspace.

The resultant mass, at least, has proven useful to study behaviors of creatures prior to their full manifestation, as it is capable of profound complex and independent mimicry. Further, when certain inversions are performed, it grants an excellent blank slate to work from, especially in the development of clones.

I am, however, growing pensive about its continued use, as, and I might be mistaken in my observations, but it seems to be displaying a vague personality, for want of a better term. It might simply be my imagination, but I can say for certain that it has grown since the initial skirmish.

I get the uneasy feeling that it is watching me, as I observe it.

I'll give this a shot. I probably didn't get the voice right, and I threw in all kinds of details that Barinellos might not want, so feel free to consider this off-canon. Still, I had fun writing it.

Enjoy!

Hypothesis: Within my talents, I am not unskilled at the praxis of sorcery and enchantment. I understand the fundamentals of execution and am capable of quite powerful feats. That said, there are aspects of this world and the functions there in that elude my understanding, things that exceed the physical world and the ordered laws which govern it, such as those as we understand biology. Even my existence as a planeswalker is more metaphysical than physical, and sadly my capacity to translate my understanding of one to the other is, at best, limited.

I do not begin to understand how my will interacts with aether to form a body. While I can construct any form I so wish, it is an intrinsic process. I am not cognizant of the intricacies necessary to assume the shape of a dragon, I cannot even speculate if the form is accurate other than by feel. (While theoretically I could vivisect myself, I find the process likely too involved and inevitably messy for accurate data gathering.)

This preamble may seem frivolous, but it necessary to establish the limits of my knowledge as it pertains to manifestations, pure mana beings, and embodied concepts. While they exist in the physical world, they are not born by any biological process. Their forms mimic biology in every discernible way, but so much of that is in service to no biological function. They are creatures that transcend the merely physical, and as a result, the observations one can make and the data collected is an incomplete picture.

Science abhors such vacuums.

It is with this in mind, that I am going to attempt, with the purely physical means, to form a demon. Demons, as per my observations, are among the only manifestations that can be created with a biological host through means not transubstantive or by obscured occult means. One can “corrupt” a host. I have heard that this is a physical change that reflects an alteration of the “soul” but as the “soul” is not something I can directly gather data on, I will have to presume that my magics are acting as intended.

Subject: INV219

I know that the choice is unorthodox, but I have chosen it after some in depth consideration. As this is a change that exceeds perceivable procedures, I need to limit the number of variables present. Such a choice allows me to dictate 3 key factors in the process for the highest chance of success.

Further, this allows me a secondary aspect of study for which I have a bit of data: the awakening of tree to treefolk. While not conclusive by any stretch of the definition, I do have enough data that forms something of a picture of what to expect in those regards.



Day 1: The tree is technically several weeks old at this point, as it had been growing in my gardens prior to this, in an effort to keep as neutral a baseline to my influence as possible. I have chosen to plant the tree on Innistrad, for a few reasons. The first is that it is well known for the vast swathes of undisturbed wilds, and this gives me a fairly robust buffer against civilization ever actually interacting with the experiment.

The other 2 contributing factors are that Innistrad is well known for its demonic population and manifestation rate. I feel this creates the proper environment, but the other more immediate factor is the well documented leylines that are particularly strongly associated with black mana. It is at a crossroads of two of such leylines that I have chosen to plant the sprout.

As this is a long term project, I am leaving a Fetch to care for the sprout and conduct observations. To further the success of the project, I have also transported a tank of water from the Pentafjord Lake (KHM264) to water the tree with approximately once a month. I will revisit these notes during my next visit, as well to collect whatever observations the Fetch will have made.

Day 4266-4284: The tree is now grown to a size that the next procedure will have enough space to allow me to work. I have scored the bark with runes known to be associated with demonic creatures. While the awakening stage is still far, far away, this should begin the process I am aiming to create. Theoretically, it might already have, though considering the inert nature of trees, we won’t know for some time.

Day 28,522: The runes I had laid on the tree were arranged in such a way that when some form of activity were detected, it would inform me. Rather unexpectedly, that nearly forgotten spell finally bore fruit. It would seem that the process known as The Rising is at hand, and I have suspended my current experiments to relocate for the foreseeable future to observe the next stages of the experiment.

Day 28,567: The procedure, long in the making, has confirmed results. The corruption of a treefolk into a demonic entity proves several aspects to the hypothesis and the data collected will be useful in extrapolating avenues about queries more philosophical than biological, but provable nonetheless.

Day 28,590: Behavioral observations have been fascinating. Beyond relocating to a place more engaged with a population, I’ve observed strange conversations it seems to have with itself. There is a clear sense of identity and a frightening amount of intelligence to it, but I have yet to actively engage with it, for concern it may learn of the origins of its existence. Nonetheless, the seemingly instinctual pursuits it demonstrates speaks to the nature of demonic entities and their driving forces. The need for power over others, the offer of temptations, it seems ingrained into them at a spiritual level, unobserved and untaught, it is simply part of their very core being.

Day 28,626: A brief note, but as a treefolk that bears fruit, that seems a key part to its initial temptations. Fascinating adaptation.

Day 28,651: An earlier mystery has been resolved, and the scope of my experiment seemingly has to be broadened. Not only has the experiment created a demonic treefolk, but the peculiar interactions of the animating forces and primal powers of the two have seemingly given rise to a second creature, possibly more, that I had not foreseen. There is now a diabolic dryad assisting in the temptations of mortals that encounter the tree demon.

She shows all the hallmarks of both her dryad nature, the unmistakable comeliness, as well as the infernal origins, the horns, the color of her skin, and many other traits. I have heard that devils are born from the dreams of a demon, a byproduct of the unfiltered existence of a demon, but the result here is fascinating. The unique circumstances of the treefolk’s influence has seeped into the demonic aspect of the creature. I will continue monitoring to see if this is to be a unique event or if more will spawn, as dryads are usually solitary in how they are bonded to their tree.

Ooo, very cool! Trust Quaint to try and turn a tree into a demon The formatting has a few typos, I'm afraid.

So, for this one, I'd be really interested setting what kind of card someone could dream up. Bonus points for the devil Dryad too.