Lemures

Lemures are huge humanoids found now and then in temperate forests and jungles across the known world. Like their distant cousins the yeti, they are counted among the oldest human-like species, and some scholars even argue that humans descend from lemures crossed with a vanished race called the Rhmoals. Powerful and quick for their bulk, and able to move silently 75% of the time, they have coarse tawny-brown to black fur, with tough bare hide on face, palms and soles. This coat guards against insects and somehow makes them immune to venoms and systemic poisons, though swallowed toxins still harm them.

They eat only fruit, berries and certain leafy shrubs and are not naturally aggressive, but they attack anyone threatening their young or mates or approaching their lairs, sometimes together as a group. An angry lemure can knock a man flying or crush him in its bear-like arms, a hold that deals fresh damage every minute it lasts. Defending family, it fights to the death; otherwise it usually flees rather than die.

Lemures live in groups like apes. A female bears one cub a year for two or three years and then can have no more; mates share foraging, child-rearing and building round nests of leaves, vines and boughs. The biggest, strongest male leads and protects the clan until a rival bests him, usually through howling, shoving and display, though sometimes by real violence. The loser is driven out forever and becomes a rogue lemure, extremely dangerous and prone to unprovoked attacks. Once common, the species now nears extinction, with little resistance to the diseases humans carry.