This is an IHeart podcast.

Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of IHeart Radio.

Welcome to Animalia Stupendium. My name is Argo Mandenis,

Professor Emeritus at the Silk School of Wizardry, Transfiguration Enjoyer,

and tireless creature chronicler.

Alas, as you well know, mere monsters hold no mystery for me these days.

Cyclopses are half as fun as they used to be, and Eatans are twice as dull.

Thus I turn my attention once more to the strange fauna of a land called Earth.

Travel with me, gentle reader, as we consider the musk deer. Common name,

Musk Deer. Scientific classification, eight species of the genus Mocious. Frequency and range, mountains

of South Asia. Size between 50 to 70 centimeters, 20 to 28 inches, at the shoulder.

Diet mostly leaves flowers and grasses.

Treasure Hort, highly prized scentland or musk sack.

Challenge rating, too.

As you well know, my own world is one of intensely magical creatures, and while you may find

dragons and centaurs intensely interesting, to me, their not only old hat, they're illogical.

Their study reveals nothing about the world of nature.

Instead, these studies reveal only the world of human magic and invention.

And while Earth has certainly known the corrupting touch of human invention, it is at least thus far free of actual magic, and

that, in my opinion, is its beauty. I, for instance, find more beauty in a mule here than in a

manticore, and thus word of the musk deer initially horrified me.

A diminutive deer said to carry a sack of valuable perfume, and despite its herbivorous diet,

...