Sand Wyrm

Basic Information

Alternative name(s) Threat Varies per size Tactics Stealth ambush at night Subspecies Locations Amol-Kalit

Physical description

Size Distinctive features Elongated serpentine body, 4 legs. a crown of frills, 2 vestigal wings.

Out-of-character information

Image source Nidraak

Sand wyrms are a species of lesser golden dragons with a characteristic, serpentine look to them. They have four legs far apart from each other and their two wings look more like sails or fins rather than limbs capable of flight. They do, however, glide with them if necessary.
Their face is long and crooked, with whiskers and a mantle of iridescent frills akin to that of a frilled agama. they tend to be extremely diverse on an individual to individual basis.

A hatchling sand wyrm is about the size of a wild hare and their eggs are similar to those of ostriches, except blue in colour.

The sand wyrm most commonly lives in the desert and the mountains. While it spends most of its time stalking prey in the sands, it breeds and roosts deep in mountainside caverns.
Most of its prey tends to migrate between the desert-grassland gradient and they occasionally be seen wandering into the Savannah.

Sand wyrms are hypercarnivore ambush predators. they are indiscriminate hunters, but prefer the flesh of herbivores.
While young members of the species tend to race along dunes to capture prey, older members bury themselves in the sand, where they wait in hiding.
Their whiskers, which poke out of the sand attract hungry grazers who mistake them for grass. A single disturbance around that area causes the wyrm to leap out of hiding and grab at the potential prey animal, beast of burden or person.
While they may spend energy pursuing their prey by swiftly racing across the dunes, they are not enduring creatures and thus tire quickly.
Some may sometimes use gliding to their advantage while hunting to preserve energy, but they are easier to evade this way. [1]

Sand wyrms either live solitary or in packs created by a coupled pair. Pairs are more common where prey is abundant.

The sand wyrm juveniles may be about the size of a fox, newborns are as small as hares, with adults reaching to the size of a horse at minimum and elephants at the larger confirmed size, though no maximum size has ever been recorded. Most eyewitness accounts for the largest sand wyrm could be disputed as an exaggeration.

Younger sand wyrms prefer to hunt in packs.
The Sand wyrm can spit poison if threatened.
They are incapable of flight, but my glide.
Their skull behind their eyeball is very thin and easy to pierce.
One of their preferred methods of locomotion is launching themselves out of the sand and gliding long distances across the warm rising air of the desert.
Though they prefer to hide buried in sand, where they use their sensitive whiskers to locate prey.
They are maneaters but prefer prey animals as their main source of sustenance.