I found this critter in a vast steppe. It was not very tall, maybe as big as a turtle and it had a shield plate on the top of its head as well as some protective plates growing out of its jaw region. I think, that the head armour’s function was to protect it when it was fighting male rivals. Also, the rest of its body was covered with an extremely thick leathery skin.

The creature had short, sharp claws which – without doubt – were excellent tools for digging tunnels. Indeed, although it did not seem frightened by my presence, it never went too far away from one of the entries to its tunnel system below the ground.

It was very curious, I think that it had never seen a human before – or at least not a human who was sitting still in front of it doing strange movements with his hands (which means: drawing). At one moment, it was standing still without moving for about two minutes – closely observing everything I did. This gave me the chance to sketch the outlines of its portrait you can see here.

Then I pushed my luck and tried to touch it, but it did not like that idea and disappeared as fast as a little arrow into one of its holes and did not come out again.

But still, when I moved on, I felt two little eyes looking at me from a safe distance – curiously registering every of my movements.