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I had an interesting thought which inspired this picture.

What if Grendels, like Ettins, were made for a purpose? The wiki says they were an experiment gone wrong. This got me thinking what that purpose might be and what they may have originally looked like.

Since Grendels are always stealing eggs, I imagined maybe their purpose was to collect and care for the eggs of other creatures. Perhaps they used to be cute and fluffy, covered in feathers, that they then lost to adapt to a dirty jungle environment full of hostility.

Anyway, here's this little guy's story:

The egg layer was given very vague instructions, simply to create a creature capable of caring for other creature's eggs. The Shee had grown quite tired of always looking after the Norn's eggs, which never seemed to make it into the incubator despite how hard the Shee tried to teach them. It was starting to inconvenience tea time. The fluffy critter popped out of the egg and stared with large reptilian eyes at the gathered expectant Shee. They whispered among each other, agreeing it had a certain charm to it. At this, the little creature's feathery crest raised in interest.

"We'll see how it performs later in life," they decided.

It quickly became clear that of all their creations, he was the dumbest. Frequently he would seek out Norns and mindlessly steal their eggs. When the Norns protested, he'd slap them away, causing serious injury. He would be drawn to the hatchery, the home of Norns, as intended. But once there he would cause utter chaos, slapping indiscriminately and shaking the egg around.

"This is a disaster," one of the Shee said.

"What shall we do?"

"We'll just have to care for the Norn's eggs ourselves. Let's just shut off the egg layer and shoo him out of here," they decided.

The confused Grendel took refuge in the jungle. The Shee tossed their malfunctioning egg layer into the trash in said jungle, certain the creature would live out its confused existence and then their troubles would be over. Instead, the egg layer continued on its quest, creating more. Every time a Grendel died, it would replace it with another hatchery worker better suited for the environment. No matter how many times the Shee shut it off, or tried to destroy it, it kept appearing and creating more. They started to become distorted, they were thriving in the jungle instead of the Norn hatchery. The egg layer was so persistent it showed up in all their ships there after. Like a virus, their biological technology was infected with it. It was clear that for as long as their were Norns and Ettins there would be Grendels. Some even took a liking to the creatures, whose egg keeper traits became twisted by necessity.

I hope you guys enjoy my goofy little story!