(Image "Federwanderer" by Andreas Sommer is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)
Long-time readers will be familiar with my personal hobby of reducing and keeping miniature monsters. Some might see this as an abuse of magical power. However, I think it is certainly better than killing them outright, which is a choice many hard-pressed adventurers will make when they encounter these creatures in the wild. Furthermore, I assert that I provide an important service in preserving individuals of these species, many of which are greatly endangered (thanks, in part, to the aforementioned adventurers). Additionally, due to their aggressiveness, lethality, and inhospitality of their habitats, they are exceedingly difficult and dangerous to study or observe in the field, so my menagerie provides a safer alternative for the inquisitive. So I feel that this is a perfectly acceptable application of magic.
Of course, there are a few easily bored and unscrupulous wizards who, not content with mastering existing fauna, will endeavor to create their own monstrosities. They often combine features of existing animals to construct hybrids with by degrees whimsical, perplexing, or downright terrifying appearances. An illustration of one such assemblage graces the top of this post (hat tip to sommerlich.art for gracious permission to use it). Occasionally, a less wise practitioner will create a partner for their monstrosity out of pity or malice. This is how the menace of the owlbear, that hugely destructive union of two deadly predators, began. As soon as I have posted this, I must travel to a nearby village to eradicate a nest of the beasts. I certainly side with the protagonist of Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein, who at great personal risk declined to deliver his creation a suitable mate. In doing so, he may have saved the world. He certainly saved a mage such as myself a significant amount of clean-up work.
For my own purposes, I find that the existing complement of megafauna is quite enough to feed my personal hobby. The unadulterated products of nature (with some slight magical intervention to get them down to a more manageable size) provide me endless hours of fascination and entertainment.
Through my own efforts, via this blog and elsewhere, I have seen this rewarding hobby of keeping small monsters grow in popularity. While scrolling through my Mastodon feed, I came across this post from @Alice_Swaggen@flipping.rocks showing off her miniature aberration:
Awfully cute, I say. Imagine my surprise when I was informed that this creature is at its normal size! Alice tells me that this sort of insect is common in her portion of the material plane. In my own area, the only way I could acquire such an adorable crawly would be to shrink one down from their usual 8 feet long. But, I suppose that is just the beauty and variety of nature at work.
Well, for now I must be off to apply my magical arts in the service of the villagers, who have promised me eternal gratitude, if only meager of other remuneration. At least I should be able to add one or two tiny owlbears to my collection.