Skugs

Gigantic (~2 - 3ft tall) springtails who have grown to have skin/eyelids, all that other good stuff. Think of them like halflings, they are generally uninclined to fight and like living in cozy holes. Similar to the scaly foot snail, the minerals they eat are incorporated into their tusks and teeth.

Fun Facts!

• They prefer to dig down instead of building up, making towns and even cities appear very tiny and quaint... Until you look underground.
  
• Their diet consists of tubers, bones, rocks, and small animals such as birds, rodents, and lizards.
  • They domesticated rodents to eat/keep as pets, but even in the modern day they spend a lot of time foraging for minerals and bones as a family tradition thing. There's some controversy around it, though.
• Some languages have up to five genders, all of them have at least three, it just depends on how they classify in-between stages of male and female.
  • Skugs are all hermaphroditic technically but depending on hormone changes they can be male, female, neither, or in an in between state, hence the various terms.
• Skug genetics can change depending on their environment. A skug could have parents with no hair and end up with a full body of it if they're raised in a cold enough climate.
• They have a desire to eat rocks and minerals, because it will get transferred into their bones, teeth, and claws. It can pose a problem during surgeries, as you have to break the bone to get at any organs, fix teeth, etc., so it's important for a skug to catch any issues early in case a mineral-fast is needed.
  • If it's urgent, however, there are tools to get through tough bones... they're just not preferred or available all the time.
• Their tentacle-limbs can hold roughly 15 - 30 pounds (so, a micro or small dog). They are used for precise manipulation.
• Speaking through your lower lips is generally considered rude or threatening because that's where all your bite force/dangerous teeth are.
  • Skug bite force is strong enough to break rock and bone, with the highest bite forces recorded being able to break minerals at 7 - 8 on the Mohs scale (quartz and topaz).
• A skug can safely cut their entire tusk down with no issue as long as they don't damage the root. They will regrow back in about a year, but the speed depends on diet and age.
• Those lovely antennae are their nostrils and taste-buds. Their real "tongues" are mostly for maneuvering food to the back of the mouth.