Winged Microdragon

Winged Microdragon
Creator	HorrortheTerror
Information
Status	Extant
Common Name(s)	Winged Microdragon
Zones	J
Roles	Base-Consumer, Decomposer
Classification
Genus	Pyrrhocytos
Species	Pyrrhocytos oviptera
Evolution
Date	January 18th, 2021
Ancestor	Soil Microdragon
Descendants	Microseaserpent

Dimensions: 50μm(length), 15μm(height)

Pyrrhocytos chomos relied mostly on its mobile trophont life stage to disperse and had to regularly encyst due to the dry season. To avoid high competition, some developed projections on their cyst that could be caught on eroding sediment, Muscals, or the wind allowing them to disperse. These became Pyrrhocytos oviptera

P. oviptera's trophont life stage is mostly identical to its ancestor, possessing the same chemoreceptive organelles, 3 groups of 5 cilia, and dimensions. Though it still feeds on Extremosuperstes acidogenii and Nanocalvus zephyrum, it has also adopted detritivory, which arose as a result of its hydrogen ion reception leading it to decaying organic matter through the acidic byproducts of decomposition. They would ingest the usable chemicals at these sites, alleviating the pressures of competition for microbial food sources and causing their descendants to evolve chemoreceptors that are able to detect a variety of compounds, including residual organics and ammonia from the breakdown of organics.

It still reproduces through mitosis and it still encysts under xeric conditions. The projections on the cyst are temporary modifications of their cilia, which, instead of being encased with the rest of the cell, sticks outward and are covered in the polymer that makes up the cyst, causing them to become rigid.