Manticore

"The Ancients lived in fear of it, trembled at its very name"

- Geoffrey on the Manticore

The manticore is a creature of dark magic and one of the most fearsome and dangerous creatures in existence.

History
The manticore is a creature of the Old Religon, and a native of the Spirit world. Able to travel to the physical world, it can be summoned through a portal in a magical box. It is unknown if the manticore can travel through without being summoned.

The manticore was first sighted almost a thousand years ago. It was described as one of the most fearsome of all beasts; the ancients lived in fear of it, and trembled at its very name. However, a millennium later, it seems to have turned into a myth, as it is believed such creatures do not exist.

Alice managed to summon one manticore, hoping to use its power for good. However, it turned out to be too powerful for her to control and it forced her to enter into a plot to kill Uther Pendragon.

After using its poison, the plan was put in place, however, the manticore was destroyed after Merlin summoned it into the real world and Gaius destroyed the box its portal was bound to, thus effectively destroying the portal and saving the King (Love in the Time of Dragons).



Abilities
Despite its small size, the manticore is shown to be a very fearsome and dangerous creature. Its venom is too deadly for any cure (possibly except the power of life and death; however, this was never tried and it is likely the person would already be dead by the time someone used it). It is strong enough to kill a person in less than a day.

The only way to save someone from its poison is to kill the manticore from which the poison came. However, as the manticore is a creature of the Old Religion, and draws its power directly from that source, it cannot be killed directly. However, it cannot last long outside the Spirit world. If its link between this world and the Spirit world (via portal) is destroyed, the creature is also destroyed.

The manticore also possesses great magical powers. It can control another being and force them to do things against their will. It is also shown to be quite strong, despite its small size, and can attack with its claws, teeth, and tail.

Description
The manticore is small, about the size of a cat. Its body is a cross between a lion and a scorpion, as it has a lion's body, legs and paws, the tail of a scorpion and the face of a man. It is brownish in color and has a roundish browny-purple face, with yellow eyes, long pointed ears and and sharp teeth. It also has a mane, or rather two manes, both seemingly made of skin and has several points. It has spikes down its back and sharp claws. Its scorpion tail could suggest some connection to the Serkets, although the two creatures share few similarities.

Trivia

 * The manticore was voiced by Eddie Marsan.
 * It wanted Alice to kill Uther Pendragon which may suggest clashes between the species and the king; however, this seems unlikely because, as already stated, they are widely considered mythical, although it's possible that they didn't recognise it at the time.
 * The manticore is originally a creature of Persian mythology and religion, which dates back to around 1000 BC, however it has none of the lore attached to it that is mentioned in Merlin, such as magical powers or a short lifespan in the mortal world, or ties to a spirit world. The oldest mention of the creature, however, is from the fourth century through a remark by Ctesias, a Greek physician at the Persian court of King Artaxerxes II, in his book Indica ("India"), which circulated among Greek writers on natural history that has only survived in fragments, or references by those other writers. The fourth century BC is about 2500 years from the 2010s, making Geoffrey's comment about the first references of the creature being "over a thousand years ago" accurate.