Skinless Carp

Skinless Carp

rating: +12

14 votes (+13, -1) 4.6★

rating: +12+x

Entity Classification

Aggressiveness 1/5 They are relatively slow-moving fish and are generally passive to wanderers. However, they possess sharp fin claws that they can use to defend themselves if need be. The resulting cuts could risk infection.
Frequency 4/5 Skinless Carp can be found on any level of the Backrooms which has enough bodies of fresh water. They have adaptations that could allow for habitation in both flowing and stagnant water conditions.
Intelligence 2/5 Despite the unassuming appearance of these fish, they show signs of relative intelligence. Skinless Carp can learn from past experiences and tend to gain intelligence as they age -which ability allows them to distinguish environmental factors.
Pritoria Index 2.33/5 Although this fish is widespread across the Backrooms and has some intelligence, they typically pose little harm to wanderers, unless provoked.

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fig 1.0 (The "Skinless carp")

Description

Skinless Carp are relatively slow-moving fish that can be found in many bodies of freshwater within the Backrooms. They heavily resemble baseline common carp, but with the exception of lacking both scales, or a skin layer on their torso. Instead, they have exposed flesh, which is covered only by a thin layer of mucus, giving the fish its name. Though, in water that is a bit more stagnant, they are known to form a thicker, transparent layer of mucus to better avoid mold infections. However, around the head and fins, typical scales can still be found.

As this entity lacks an adequate skin layer, these fish are unfortunately quite vulnerable to parasites, infections, and diseases. Due to this vulnerability, symbiotic relationships with cleaner fish and shrimp species are vital for this entity's survival. One will often find such species in close proximity to Skinless Carp.

This entity also possesses hooked fin spines on both their pectoral and pelvic fins. This can be used for locomotion or defense.


Behaviors

Skinless Carp pose little harm to wanderers. These fish can even be both tamed, and trained to perform basic tricks/tasks. Despite the unassuming appearance of these fish, they show signs of relative intelligence. With their ability to grow wiser as they age, Skinless Carp can learn to distinguish threats, food, locations, and allies (such as cleaner fish, and other carp) in their environment.

Skinless Carp are generalist omnivores, so they are known to eat most things that can fit in their mouths. However, as they are mostly made of exposed flesh, and thus highly vulnerable to attacks, they are very wary of both predatory entities/fauna, and anything larger than them. However, with enough patience, time, and food, one could eventually gain the trust of an individual, or an entire group of Skinless Carp. The Skinless Carp's ability to gradually trust humans is a useful characteristic for domesticating these fish, for the aquaculture industry and aquarium trade.

While Skinless Carp can swim like typical fish, they do have a secondary, more specialized method of locomotion -they can use their hooked fin spines to cling onto rocks, wood, or a variety of other solid materials on the ground or walls. They do this to fasten themselves in place against flowing water, to climb objects to either obtain out-of-reach food or to escape aquatic threats. However, it is worth noting that if something or someone tried to attack or injure a skinless carp, these fish have been known to occasionally retaliate by using their fin spines to slash the flesh of their attacker. The resulting cuts on the skin can be deep, and could potentially risk infection if not properly treated.

Skinless Carp are known to have a variety of predators both in and out of the water. In water, there is an entire classification of aggressive, predatory fish entities known as "Pescathora" that are known to hunt skinless carp in a variety of hunting strategies (depending on the species of Pescathora in question). The primary strategies that Skinless Carp use to defend against their aquatic threats are to:

• Slash their enemies with their hooked fin spines, typically leaving notable flesh wounds in their attackers.

• In an emergency, if there are any stones or trees that rise out of the water, then the carp can use their hooked fin spines to climb up stone or wood to escape the waterline and escape aquatic predators.

However, Skinless Carp prefer to stay in the water. In addition to threats present within the water, on land, the Skinless Carp isn't completely safe either -Skinless Carp can only survive 20 minutes out of water, and a variety of terrestrial baseline animals and Backrooms entities, such as hounds, also have a taste for carp.

Along with utilizing their fin spines to evade threats, during intense droughts, by using their fin spines, they may traverse through land -in search of new bodies of water.


Biology

Skinless Carp start small as young juveniles (about the size of a typical goldfish), and over the course of around five years, they'll grow to about 4ft in size. The Skinless Carp have an average lifespan of 30 years. The age of an individual carp can be identified by counting the concentrated rings (or annuli) on the head/fin scales of the fish, similar to rings on a tree -one ring is analogous to one year in age.

Wild Skinless Carp have been known to congregate in groups of between 5 to 16 individuals.

Skinless Carp take on a similar niche that carp have in baseline reality -these fish are generalist omnivores that are known to live on a diet consisting of a large variety of plants, planktonic organisms, invertebrates, and small fish.

Due to their high vulnerability to parasites, the symbiotic relationships that they make with certain cleaner species are vital for survival. Creatures such as freshwater cleaner fish and shrimp can help Skinless Carp avoid or recover from infections, and become clear of parasites. One entity species that has specifically evolved to provide such symbiotic relationships with the carp are Koipecca Wrasse; a cleaner wrasse, which has adapted to living in both freshwater and almond water. Skinless Carp groups will often be found in the same areas as Koipecca Wrasse shoals.

In the case where a Skinless Carp has taken major bodily damage, they have been known to regenerate entire sections of damaged or lost body parts over the course of a few weeks. This behavior can be compared to baseline reality salamanders. This could be useful for aquaculture, as one could take moderate, controlled cuts out of non-vital sections of the carp over time, to harvest pieces of seafood without having to kill the fish.

As mentioned in the Behaviors section, Skinless Carp have the ability to survive out of water for 20-minute intervals. To pull this feat, the carp shuts off certain parts of its brain, slows its heart rate, and concentrates oxygenated blood towards vital organs. This behavior is similar to baseline epaulette sharks.

Skinless Carp are known to naturally have their breeding season within the summer months or dry season of their respective levels. However artificially heating water to a certain extent (such as the use of a water heater), can trigger reproductive responses out of season, which is useful for aquaculture in the Backrooms. One characteristic about these fish that allows them to be so widespread in the Backrooms are their eggs; Skinless Carp eggs are quite durable, and will usually survive the digestive tracts of animals and entities, which allows for widespread dispersal of these eggs across the Backrooms.

These fish cannot survive long in the saltwater of ocean levels, as salt causes the nerves on the fish's body to violently twitch and convulse, causing much stress and intense pain for the fish until it's eventually too much for the fish to handle. Because of this, they are only found within areas where the water isn't salty enough to damage their nervous system.


Value in Aquaculture

In Backrooms aquaculture, the Skinless Carp are livestock valued for their meat and caviar.

The skinless carp are ideal for aquaculture, as they have easily consistent breeding conditions. The carp's breeding conditions are tied to water temperatures between 78°F and 88°F, so a water heater is all that's needed to restock the carp population.

After the carp breed, fertilized eggs are collected by qualified personnel, and placed into small incubation tanks. When the eggs hatch, the fry are transported into multiple holding tanks until they're old enough to be put into the juvenile aquaculture ponds/pools. In aquaculture, juvenile and adult carp are raised and kept in aquacultural ponds/pools that are separated by age, size, and fitness of the fish.

However, not every egg gets to be fertilized and collected for incubation, as there is a demand for caviar/pickled roe. For caviar harvesting, adult female carp are cut open to release unfertilized eggs/fish roe -the female carp does not survive this. The roe is then salted and put through the fermentation process to produce caviar for the seafood trade.

Although Koipecca Wrasse provides little commercial use to humans, they are still vital for the hygiene and survival of domesticated Skinless Carp, so they are often raised in the same ponds/pools as the Skinless Carp within aquaculture facilities.

The Skinless Carp are fed with feed made from a mixture of grains, vegetables, fish meal, and shellfish. The Koipecca Wrasse are fed with feed made from a mixture of insects, mealworms, fish meal, and shellfish.

As mentioned in the Biology section, Skinless Carp have regenerative abilities that could allow for one to harvest sections of the fish's body for its meat, while keeping the fish alive.

This process is done by putting the carp into a temporary sleep with a shot of anesthetics, wrapping a tight band around the fin spines to minimize injury on the personnel, then taking the carp out of the water to perform two quick, but precise operations on the carp. In each operation, qualified personnel makes three incisions in an equilateral triangle shape (typically 7 inches in length, and half an inch in depth), on a particular side of the fish's body to harvest the meat. Once one side of the fish is harvested, the fish is then lowered into a sterile tank for around a minute before being lifted back out of the water to repeat the operation on the other side.

Once the two triangle-shaped slabs of meat are harvested from the fish, qualified personnel take care in cleaning out the carp's wounds, and bandaging them up. The carp is then put into a quarantine tank, where the tight bands are removed from the carp's fins, the carp eventually wakes back up, and heals for a week before being released back into its regular aquaculture pond/pool.

The two triangle-shaped slabs of meat are properly washed with icy water, cleared of potential parasites, thoroughly cooked, salted, breaded with crust, and packaged for human consumption as "Carp Chips™."

In the aquaculture process, the carp don't fully trust in their human caretakers; only just enough to associate a human with potential feeding time, and not immediately dart away from humans, but not much else.


Value in the Aquarium Trade (as trained pets)

In this case, skinless carp are not raised as livestock for their meat but instead are treated as pets.

The process of properly taming a skinless carp and gaining its trust involves plenty of time, patience, involved interaction, and food.

Whenever a skinless carp specimen trusts someone, they make for nice companions in the Backrooms purgatory. The carp can recognize the faces, voices, and movement vibrations of their caretakers, and will happily swim towards them if they sense them nearby.

As skinless carp are relatively social creatures, one skinless carp who trusts a particular human can spread the information to their fishy peers, and convince them to slowly start trusting that particular human as well.

Once a skinless carp specimen gains enough trust with their caretaker, they become more willing to become trained. With enough treats and gentle back pats as rewards, they can be trained to perform basic tricks and tasks -ranging from not so useful, but neat tricks (such as spinning, rolling, jumping, or climbing), to more useful tasks (such as fetching items, and transporting objects from one place to another).

Within their first year and a half, juvenile Skinless Carp are often raised in aquarium tanks -between 40-75 gallons are recommended. However, adult tamed skinless carp are often kept in larger freshwater koi pond-like pools.


Discovery

The exact origins of Skinless Carp are unknown, but it is theorized that they initially arrived into the Backrooms long ago, as a population of common carp who no-clipped from baseline reality, and eventually adapted to their new Backrooms environment. As Skinless Carp are so widespread throughout the Backrooms, it is difficult to say when wanderers first encountered these carp.

However, there seems to be a few surviving documentations of Skinless Carp from ancient times, some in the form of old Japanese style paintings which depict koi-like skinless carp which could glow bioluminescent colors, which could occasionally be found on the walls of certain levels, such as fancy hotel and restaurant themed levels. Other documents are in the form of old, tattered papers with ink writings in various Southeast Asian languages, that seem to describe an ancient practice for almond grain/aquaculture hybrid farms, in which Skinless Carp were placed in shallow trenches of water between plots of almond grain crops, in order to grow both in the same space for consumption.


Survival Guide

It is advised that if you decide to consume Skinless Carp, you should make sure to properly clean, cook, and prepare the fish before consumption, as the likelihood that a raw Skinless Carp contains harmful diseases and parasites are considerably high.

If you get cut by a Skinless Carp's fin spines, it is advised that you seek treatment, as there is a potential risk of infection. This could be done by washing out the cut with clean water and bandaging it up with supplies from a medical aid kit. However, in the case where there are no medical aid kits available, one could possibly use certain foliage for bandaging material, or for medical properties.


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