CW: inflation fetish

((Intro

The Belouries (pronounced Bailoori in English) are a hybrid race of wolves and rams. They are intelligent creatures who used to live in a snowy highland kind of place. They are mainly known for their ability to move and survive in cold rocky environments, they are good walkers and climbers thank to their impressive stamina and endurance, and most importantly, their ability to make their body grow to impressive size under certain emotions. If most of them still live in their homeland, many of them now live in modern society with the other species.

The name Bélourie is a mix of the words "Loup" and "Bélier" which mean respectively wolf and ram in french.


((Origin

The origin of the race isn't fully known yet. What is known for sure, is that their distant ancestors were 100% wolves and that most of their rams like a feature like horns, wool-like fur, climbing skill, and ability to eat plants, don't come any kind of actual hybridization with rams but simply from adaptation to their environment.
This suggests that their ancestors used to live in the warmer, forest-like ecosystem, but the species was forced to migrate toward highland in a very short amount of time, forcing them to evolve quickly and this would be the reason why they look like they were caught between 2 steps of evolution.
Even tho many of their genetic feature seems to be unstable and unfinished, they still manage to survive and prosper in this environment, and this lead to their body not evolving much more past this event, the only real mutation that is worth mentioning is the same increase of intelligence that many other species ended up going through.

The first sign of society among this species start around 5 millennia ago, which is pretty recent compared to other species but not abnormal.
Their culture seems really close to the Celtic one. They lived in small clans, most of the time one per mountain or plateau. Being an omnivore, they lived from hunting and gathering, some conflicts between clans did happen on some occasions, but most of the species' wars happened against other species surrounding their mountain.

Since food wasn't an issue thanks to their omnivorous diet, there was little to no reason to fight against other clans.
The Bélourie never created a written language, many draws and other symbols of this period can be found, but no texts whatsoever. Their culture was transmitted verbally, which is the reason we have little knowledge of them today.

But we know that they weren't an expansionist species, they had many occasions to leave their mountain to claim more fertile land, but they never took the occasion to do so. This also constitutes a reason to not fight each other between clans. This caused them to not participate in the medieval war that came later and only been discovered 3 centuries ago.

After their discovery and multiple failed attempts to turn them into slaves, they have adapted to modern society as regular citizens, they founded the country Brellitagnia, which is a union of the historical tribes of the highland.

Today they have access to all aspects of modern life: electricity, water, motorization, etc. They kept some of the old traditions, but those aren't as important as they used to be.

Brellitagnia economy is greatly supported by snow stations and other touristic activities. If the majority of the species still live here, many bélouries has moved to other countries for various reason.


((Body

Bélourie's body seems pretty average at first aside from the horns, but as mentioned in the history part, their genetics gave them a wide variety of abilities at the cost of not being perfectly "calibrated".

Bélourie's body has an anthropomorphic shape that has most common features with wolves, the main differences are of course the horns, but also their fur, which appears as a mix between classic canines and goat fur who give them strong resilience to cold. They have extremely large legs because both their bones, muscles, skin, and fur are above average thickness to allow them to walk without stopping for days, no matter the cold, water, uneven terrain, and no matter the weight they carry (they do have a limit of course, but they are far beyond what most other species can do).

If Bélouries are well known for their stamina and resilience they of course have their weakness. The first of them is, obviously, the hot environment, which happens to be the one factor that can truly reduce their ability to walk for a long period.
One other weakness is their agility, not very surprising either. All the added layer of fur, and their very muscular lower body, make them pretty heavy. If they can manage to run to a decent speed, their acceleration and turning speed are the real troubles.
But one other weakness is quite surprising: If bélouries aren't particularly weak, they aren't that strong either. Aside from their legs, their muscle mass isn't particularly impressive. If they can carry heavyweight with the right posture, it's entirely thanks to their legs muscles, all their upper body isn't capable to do more than average peoples.

With all those weaknesses, it seems they wouldn't be efficient warriors, but despite that, they manage to push back many invasions and rituals fight is an important part of their culture.
Indeed, if bélouries lack strength and agility, they became strong warriors thank their ability to resist damage and manage to win by exhausting their opponent, often by simply letting them freeze in the snowy environment, this adds to the explanation of why they never tried to conquer more territory and stick to the highland.

Other features of Bélouries body are worth mentioning before talking about their most impressive one:

The pregnancy of bélouries last for 6 months and can give birth to between 1 and 4 children, in some very rare case it can go up to 8 children at once.
Bélourie became major at the age of 18 and has a lifespan of roughly 90 years, the record being 120 years old. tho it use to be around 65 years during the tribal area.

Bélouries have retractable claws, they aren't sharp but they are pretty sturdy, their main purpose is to be used as a climbing hook, which allows them to climb easily on trees, dirt, and soft rocks.

Their fur is often Brown, black, gray, ginger, or blond and can be monochrome, striped, or spotted and more as most other species, but you can find some bélouries with very extravagant colors like red, green, blue, or basically anything else as a rare mutation.

The same goes for the horn, their size and shape may vary, as well as their color. The only common feature is that they always at least vaguely wrap around the head, as their main purpose is to protect the skull. The most common colors are yellow and blue, either very light or very dark, but once again some individuals have more unique colors.

Bélouries can shave their fur fully or partially if they want to reduce their weakness to heat, but it's tedious work, that requires good equipment, and their fur grow back from bare skin to normal in 2 weeks on average when cut this way. A fun fact about their fur is that females can grow beards the same way males do, but males still tend to have bigger beards, and females often like to shave their beards which isn't as difficult as the rest of the body.

Their jaws are still pretty close to the one of a wolf with the addition of bigger molars. They very rarely use their bite in combat cause of their poor agility. Most bélourie with no knowledge in fighting will more likely fight using his fist and kick and maybe his horns.

Tho in a dangerous situation, most of the time they will have to use their most surprising quirk, and this whether or not they want it...


((Mood inflation

By far the most impressive feature of the bélouries is their ability to grow under strong emotion.

The reason why and how to develop this ability is yet to discover. As it was stated before, at some point in bélouries prehistory, they did evolve very quickly and in a short amount of time, and this ability probably appear at this moment and somehow was kept by natural selection.

To put it simply, under emotions like anger, fear, or excitation, their body triggers an inner mechanism that makes their fat reserves and muscles mass increase rapidly in volume at an incredible speed. The size and shape they take when this happens can vary a lot depending on the individual and the situation, same goes for the speed of inflation and deflation.
(note that even if the word inflation is most commonly used, they aren't filling with air but gaining fat and muscle mass)

On average, they tend to first see their belly grow round with their legs and arms getting thicker, then the all body expand while keeping pretty much the same round shape, but if the bélouries swell more than he is used to, he can end up immobile with their belly getting too big in proportion compared to their limbs.
In some particular cases, bélourie can grow smaller or bigger than they use to, and sometimes have partial or weird proportioned body growth. The reason for them isn't random, but very situational and hard to predict, it's also important to note that in absolute, bélouries maximum theoretical size doesn't seem to be limited.

While being inflated that way, bélouries are extremely heavy often gaining 10 times their original mass. In this form their stamina and strength become supernatural, but their agility is of course even more limited. Without any weapon, it's almost impossible for any creature to get rid of a bélourie who has grown big enough, but fleeing from them is possible by absolutely anyone.

If this metamorphosis seems pretty useful and therefore it makes sense that it wasn't removed by natural selection. But as useful as it is, the main drawback is its difficulty to be controlled.

Most bélouries learn how to control themselves when they are young. If the urge to grow will come each time they are getting emotional, most bélourie will be able to prevent the growth. But if they are distracted, or if the emotion is too strong for them to handle, they will end up growing whether they want it or not. If this happens they can still try to slow their growth and maybe reduce a bit their size or focus the growth on a part of their body. But once inflated, it's very hard to deflate by pure will, at this point the best solution is just to wait until it calms down.

On the other hand, bélouries can trigger growth by themself but it's not as simple. They can do it by focusing hard enough on an emotion. It is not a simple task, it requires a few seconds of focus and needs a good amount of mental effort. The result depends on the strength of the emotion chosen, and the result can vary a lot depending on the willpower of the individual.

One other specific application of this ability is how fast it happens when a bélouries feel that he is falling. In that case, the inflation is very quick and strong and make their body way softer, this protects the bélouries from deadly falls by making them bounce away. While being very hard to control, this, fortunately, doesn't happen every time a bélouries drip or is pushed backward, only when their survival instinct thinks they gonna die or get heavily injured by the fall.

If a bélourie has a very good muscular build, his inflated form can change from the traditional round belly to a comically increased muscular mass, with arms, pectoral, abs being exacerbated. This multiplies the bélourie strength even more in this mode, but it had one drawback, the center of mass is, therefore, way higher making the bélourie way less stable than a regularly inflated bélourie

The body growth ability also happens in a particular social interaction... mating. Female bélouries, when they are aroused by someone they love, experience body growth as well, but unlike regular growth, this one mainly increases the size of the breast and the posterior. But because nothing with this ability seems to follow clear rules, sometimes bélouries still grow into their average big belly shape, and even more funny, males can also experience that kind of sudden love growth. Tho it happens to female way more often and when males do swell because of love it's more often their regular form or the butt that grow and rarely the breast. And once again, the reason for it to happen depends on individuals and situations.


((Culture

Bélouries culture is, as stated, basically Celtic. They used to be very territorial, with a strong focus on the tribes, and worshiped the most strong and resistant of their kind.

A bélourie tribe's lead was composed of a war chief, who was most of the time a male, and a peace chief, who was most of the time a female. One was a military general, the other a political governor but in a much more simple way in both cases. Both chiefs strangely didn't have that much importance in the tribe, whether it was in fight or casual life, bélouries used to rely a lot on tradition and not many aspects of daily life needed an active leader to organize the group.

Religions-wise, bélouries were polytheists, but each Bélourie used to pray only one god, one of their tribes. The base of their religions was that each mountain was inhabited by a god, who was responsible for the weather, resources, and other misunderstood phenomenon. Those gods were the main symbol that united the tribe. To stay in the good favor of their god, each tribe had their own druid, which had the purpose of talking with and interpreting the message from the mountain god. Those messages often had more importance chief's decisions, for example, the druid was the one who chose when it was time to change the actual chiefs of the tribe.

Whether it was for defining a war chief or to settle a dispute between 2 members of the tribe, bélouries used to organize traditional wrestling competitions, or endurance challenges, such as isolating in the cold for multiple-day or weeks and being the one to resist the cold for the longest.

All those facts are pretty common in ancient tribes, no matter the races or the part of the world, but cause bélouries got their very unique inflation ability, this led to unique behavior surrounding the ability in question.

The first, important detail, is that Bélourie didn't use clothes until the modern-day for obvious practical reasons.
They did wear ornaments on their ears and horns, or tied them to their fur, but nothing that can get in the way of their expansion.
Today, even if some of them still walk around only covered by their fur, clothing has been adopted by most of them. Since some modern clothes are stretchy enough for them to grow in them, bélouries were able to appreciate not having dead leaf or snow sticking all over your body, how useful pockets are, or simply how expressive you can be with clothing.

Opinion of bélourie on their mood inflation could differentiate a lot depending on which tribe they used to live in. Some tribes saw this as something bad, cause it was hard to control, and therefore was more focused on avoiding it as much as possible and associate it with a lack of self-control.

On the contrary, some other tribes saw this ability as their greatest strength, worshipping the biggest member, as they were the stronger and most resistant of them all.

As time passed, all those different mentalities around the mood inflation mixed together and became pretty much the same between all tribes. Today, whether or not going all big and round is a good or a bad thing depending on the situation.

To put it simply, getting big for something unimportant such as striking your pinky in the table, losing your phone, or getting spooked at a bird lifting off next to you led to other bélouries laughing at you.
On the other hand, getting big in a dispute for an important subject, getting attacked, or defending people you like is seen either as intimidating or heroic.
Simply put, growing big reveal what caused is serious to you.

As for inflating when you see someone you love, it's pretty much the same as blushing... but way harder to deny. This can be seen either as cute or laughable depending on the context, people, situation, etc. But often when a male has his pectoral swelling as if they were breast cause he couldn't hold himself in front of a loved one, he will be laughed at more often than not cause it's not common, but most of the time, when this happens between two bélouries (or bélouries and other species) no matter the shape they take or the gender they have it's often simply considered as a mark of affection.


((Conclusion

There is still a lot of unknowns around bélouries, a lot of details are yet to be discovered (or written) but I think it was detailed enough for a first presentation.

The goal of this guide is to get people to hype about the species, and also to invite them to create their own bélourie OC's or fursona.
I hope that I made the species open enough for people to make their own. For example, if bélouries often only have natural colors for their fur, they still can have any colors or motifs, and their horns only require to be kind of looking like a ram.

On the behavior, I took a lot of time talking about how ancient bélouries used to think, but modern ones are free to have whatever behavior and beliefs they want. You can make a bélourie who still stick strongly to ancient moral and tradition or just have a character who doesn't care at all about that and have his way of seeing the world.
This also allows you to choose if your bélourie use clothes or not, or maybe wear only top, maybe only the bottom, without or without shoes, it's all up to you.

As for everything regarding their inflation ability, despite adding a lot of description around it, if you understand it well you will see that pretty much anything is possible with it as this ability since it changes a lot depending on the individual. If you want a male/trans/anything bélourie who only does breast inflation no matter the situation, it is not usual for the species but it's not incoherent with the lore of the species.

If you doubt what a non-binary bélouries can or can't do, just know that there are no features that are strictly reserved to male or female bélouries, so just take the one you like and feel free to ignore the one you don' like, no matter the choice you make on that front it will no be against the rules of the species.

If somehow you managed to create a bélourie that doesn't respect those rules... well I'm not gonna pursue you, harass you or do anything like that. It would be nice to keep at least a bit of coherence with the species but my worst nightmare would be making a conflict between people for something dumb as respecting or not the lore of a fictional creature.
Still, if you want to create a bélourie but feel too restricted by what was said in this guide, you can hybrid this species with one of your choices to create a variation that you like.

I hope everyone will appreciate this species no matter how they do and that it will bring happiness to our fandom. ^^

If you have question, you are curious or just want to talk more about the species, you can talk about it in discord and share you creation on my tweeter

All the links are here: https://linktr.ee/modnaryug

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