Biome concept: the candle peak mountains

One biome ive been thinking about ive actually seen in a game once. That game was Yonder,¹ and the biome was a mountain peak filled with candles of all sizes. Admittedly in that game it was man made, but I have been ruminating on how it could work as a natural biome, something which the senseless genetic tinkering the Shee did would make possible.

Hollow, icy peaks, glittering with thousands of little flames. These caves are full of life. Boreal brushland stands at the foot of these mountains. The waxy moths (inspired by a short story²) that nest in the peaks flutter down during the night, harvesting resin and eating pine needles. They find their peaks through the light of the natural candles. The nests and cocoons they grow with waxen secretions form natural candles.

moth and waxen cocoon

The smaller hitch bee gratefully nests in the cocoons of the colossal moths. They feed on moth larvae and on pupating moths. Horrid as this sounds, the idiotic moths do not seem to notice the scant few devoured, and the agressive protection of the hitchbees protects them as well.

hitchbees and their nest

The lack of light in this place leaves plant life rather underrepresented. Fungi and mold fill the niche, and a thick layer of moth guano feed that microbiome. A small variation on fruitbats adapted to living on the fungii, adaptations to the large amount of chemical compounds in the fungii turns these dragonbats into ticking timebombs, and inevitably they explode in fiery glory, often lighting the natural candles that are candlemoth cocoons.

puffball shrooms on a cave floor with a drakebat

As for the creatures living here, the ecosystem seems unwelcoming to normal creatures. Either the ability to eat bugs and eggs is essential, or a toxic norn-like ability to digest volatile compounds in the mushrooms. The stark contrast between the moist and warm caves and the utter blizzard outside on the mountains means that a creature adapted is likely forced to remain inside.

"Lithe and with a scraggly pelt, the trogdolyte norn keeps his massive eyes on the drakebat. Armor like scales protect him against the caustic guano, an adaptation which betrays toxic norn heritage. Blotted brown on grey gives him a fair camouflage in the dim, candlelit cavern as he stalks his bloated prey. Barely able to fly, the critter would soon blow out of its skin. All the norn will have to do for a meal today is to be patient..."

"It was an awkward looking and pink naked thing. Carefully the harvestman grendel creeped over the slippery rock. His spindly front limbs sought and feeled in the semidark before him, but by sound alone he could find his quarry. A great, pulsing nest of hitchbees hummed nearby. What prevented the bugs to assault him he wouldnt know, but his today they were not his hunger. With the thin, overly long arms he reached into the warm hive. It was full, filled with a fatty, bile like honey. Rather than flower nectar, hitch bees parasitesed the candlemoths, and the protein rich honey was likewise sourced."

Perhaps as a biome it makes as little sense as the last, but the visuals would be so cool, and I hope my theoretical biology could at least in a game make sense!

1: Yonder: the cloud catcher chronicles

2: The city of the singing flame by clark ashton smith