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Description

The clutter archipelago is a handful of small islands connected by the southeast of serulia on scylios. The islands themselves are generally flat, with mountain peaks being uncommon, being due to the fact that the clutter archipelago itself is a series of mountain peaks, in a similar situation to the sub-continent of Zealandia found on earth, with the true islands known as New Zealand. The clutter archipelago is a very warm and humid environment, which is still a very common temperature found worldwide.

On land, it is covered by tall bamboo forests and large amounts of plant life in the canopy, with an array of fungi species on the forest floor alongside common forest floor litter, with strange, starfish-like slugs and giant insects ruling here, mostly due to the fact groups like grazer snails not living on the islands, but in the shallow sea all around the archipelago is an abundant environment. As you dive into the ancient waters things seem rather lifeless, sand is everywhere and abundant in wave-like patterns that cover the seafloor, with the only thing visible in the dim watters being a gelatinous mass, almost looking like wriggling intestines that barely move. But these aren't the remains of an unlucky fish, it is truly alive.

The giant false stinger octopus (tabidermata ichthyovenator, meaning corrosive-skinned fish hunter) is a unique species of cnidarian, more specifically a giant group of anemone larvae. They have a ring of several tentacles, giant outreaching tentacles that are used to catch and subdue their prey. Small species of fish are known to weave in, out and between the tentacles to stay safe from predators, though usually stay in open water, only staying a couple meters away from them, only dashing towards their stinging defence at the sight of predators. In turn other, slightly larger fish try to catch the ones that hide within the false stinger octopuses. Having so much prey bob and weave between its tentacles makes it easy to catch any of the individual fish near it. But when it eventually does catch something in its tentacles it releases a lethal amount of neurotoxins into its prey, with its spiral, coiled arms quickly moving towards its body to make escape impossible before digesting it alive, but paralyzed. Like any other anemone they eventually become fully grown and sessile, with its diet of abundant fish making it grow giant until they themselves mate and produce another generation of false stinging octopuses.

After a while of the false stinging octopus seemingly the only creature in an endless aquatic desert a blurry shadow appears, far in the distance is a much larger silhouette of an animal around the size of a man, as it gets closer it becomes clear that this isn't some giant shark but instead a giant bony fish followed by a trio of smaller fish. The bright orange fish following look strange, appearing like they have a tail inside of their tail… and they do.
The flathead sougoby (rotundocephalicthyis spp, meaning rotund-faced fish) is a specific genus of geminacaudidae, (meaning twin tails) which are a specialised group of gobies who already had enlarged posterior dorsal fins and anal fins, eventually growing so large in an evergrowing preferance for giant tails for sexual selection that their true caudal fins grew smaller which became a disadvantage when true apex predators evolved, developing their already giant dorsal and anal fins into secondary “tails.” They grew to be lunate-shaped, specialised for speed as millions of years passed, whilst others grew to live in caves to avoid their newfound predators. Sugoby are a part of the first group, double tailed fish that follow alongside the giant fish seen above, pecking and preening it from parasites but also swimming down toward the seafloor to catch the occasional snail, showing that they have a very generalist diet. They live alongside the bigger fish, similar to how small fish occasionally hide near the false stinger octopuses mere meters away, though these fish live close to the larger fish for protection, after all, why would a shark go for tiny, fast fish when it could be seriously hurt by the larger fish that could thrash and hurt it?

At this point it is clear that this seemingly barren environment is teeming with life, both those with backbones and those without but the largest one found in this shallow ocean is the giant fish that the smaller sougobies follow, a large, yellow form with a brown coat. Although much more antisocial than its pelagic relative it's clear that this is another species of giant anchoveta descendant, small filter feeders that got larger and larger due to the lack of any other filter feeding species.

The sandgrazers (littugnathus veluspinus, meaning sand-jawed sail spine) were a particular group of anchoveta descendants, closely related to the striped sunwallowers found commonly in pelagic environments. With them already having adaptations to sifting and filtering, it just was a matter of time before they’d specialise for a niche of sifting through the sand, developing a flattened face to dig up sand and anything hiding inside it, may it be small crustaceans, snails, annelids or any other small organism in the sand. The developed specialised pouches inside their gills for holding the smallish organisms inside their mouths before pushing the excess sand out of their gills before swallowing the food they had been able to capture. Their way of filter-feeding was very different from the way the pelagic formes did it, with the latter instead filtering microscopic organisms, only having to sift food from water instead of the harder way sandgrazers did it as the sand grains were many, many times larger than the water molecules and so developed to filter in a very different way, with larger cavities and inlets to hold small prey but to also spit out the excess sand that would be in their mouths. With them living in an environment that wasn't as abundant in food as the open oceans, they have developed to live solitary lives, not needing the protection of living in groups anymore as predators were uncommon in the seas covering the archipelago, whilst sunwallowers needed such protection due to pelagic air-breathing sharks, but above the seas the islands above are even more abundant in life…

Description

The clutter archipelago is a handful of small islands connected by the southeast of serulia on scylios. The islands themselves are generally flat, with mountain peaks being uncommon, being due to the fact that the clutter archipelago itself is a series of mountain peaks, in a similar situation to the sub-continent of Zealandia found on earth, with the true islands known as New Zealand. The clutter archipelago is a very warm and humid environment, which is still a very common temperature found worldwide.

On land, it is covered by tall bamboo forests and large amounts of plant life in the canopy, with an array of fungi species on the forest floor alongside common forest floor litter, with strange, starfish-like slugs and giant insects ruling here, mostly due to the fact groups like grazer snails not living on the islands, but in the shallow sea all around the archipelago is an abundant environment. As you dive into the ancient waters things seem rather lifeless, sand is everywhere and abundant in wave-like patterns that cover the seafloor, with the only thing visible in the dim watters being a gelatinous mass, almost looking like wriggling intestines that barely move. But these aren't the remains of an unlucky fish, it is truly alive.

The giant false stinger octopus (tabidermata ichthyovenator, meaning corrosive-skinned fish hunter) is a unique species of cnidarian, more specifically a giant group of anemone larvae. They have a ring of several tentacles, giant outreaching tentacles that are used to catch and subdue their prey. Small species of fish are known to weave in, out and between the tentacles to stay safe from predators, though usually stay in open water, only staying a couple meters away from them, only dashing towards their stinging defence at the sight of predators. In turn other, slightly larger fish try to catch the ones that hide within the false stinger octopuses. Having so much prey bob and weave between its tentacles makes it easy to catch any of the individual fish near it. But when it eventually does catch something in its tentacles it releases a lethal amount of neurotoxins into its prey, with its spiral, coiled arms quickly moving towards its body to make escape impossible before digesting it alive, but paralyzed. Like any other anemone they eventually become fully grown and sessile, with its diet of abundant fish making it grow giant until they themselves mate and produce another generation of false stinging octopuses.

After a while of the false stinging octopus seemingly the only creature in an endless aquatic desert a blurry shadow appears, far in the distance is a much larger silhouette of an animal around the size of a man, as it gets closer it becomes clear that this isn't some giant shark but instead a giant bony fish followed by a trio of smaller fish. The bright orange fish following look strange, appearing like they have a tail inside of their tail… and they do.
The flathead sougoby (rotundocephalicthyis spp, meaning rotund-faced fish) is a specific genus of geminacaudidae, (meaning twin tails) which are a specialised group of gobies who already had enlarged posterior dorsal fins and anal fins, eventually growing so large in an evergrowing preferance for giant tails for sexual selection that their true caudal fins grew smaller which became a disadvantage when true apex predators evolved, developing their already giant dorsal and anal fins into secondary “tails.” They grew to be lunate-shaped, specialised for speed as millions of years passed, whilst others grew to live in caves to avoid their newfound predators. Sugoby are a part of the first group, double tailed fish that follow alongside the giant fish seen above, pecking and preening it from parasites but also swimming down toward the seafloor to catch the occasional snail, showing that they have a very generalist diet. They live alongside the bigger fish, similar to how small fish occasionally hide near the false stinger octopuses mere meters away, though these fish live close to the larger fish for protection, after all, why would a shark go for tiny, fast fish when it could be seriously hurt by the larger fish that could thrash and hurt it?

At this point it is clear that this seemingly barren environment is teeming with life, both those with backbones and those without but the largest one found in this shallow ocean is the giant fish that the smaller sougobies follow, a large, yellow form with a brown coat. Although much more antisocial than its pelagic relative it's clear that this is another species of giant anchoveta descendant, small filter feeders that got larger and larger due to the lack of any other filter feeding species.

The sandgrazers (littugnathus veluspinus, meaning sand-jawed sail spine) were a particular group of anchoveta descendants, closely related to the striped sunwallowers found commonly in pelagic environments. With them already having adaptations to sifting and filtering, it just was a matter of time before they’d specialise for a niche of sifting through the sand, developing a flattened face to dig up sand and anything hiding inside it, may it be small crustaceans, snails, annelids or any other small organism in the sand. The developed specialised pouches inside their gills for holding the smallish organisms inside their mouths before pushing the excess sand out of their gills before swallowing the food they had been able to capture. Their way of filter-feeding was very different from the way the pelagic formes did it, with the latter instead filtering microscopic organisms, only having to sift food from water instead of the harder way sandgrazers did it as the sand grains were many, many times larger than the water molecules and so developed to filter in a very different way, with larger cavities and inlets to hold small prey but to also spit out the excess sand that would be in their mouths. With them living in an environment that wasn't as abundant in food as the open oceans, they have developed to live solitary lives, not needing the protection of living in groups anymore as predators were uncommon in the seas covering the archipelago, whilst sunwallowers needed such protection due to pelagic air-breathing sharks, but above the seas the islands above are even more abundant in life…