The Phoenix (not to be under any circumstance mistaken for the Cockatrice) is an exceptionally large flightless species of game bird located within the interior of the Takanashi Kaisereich, with small populations found over the border in Akushio, Wah, and Pagi. They are split into two sub-species: The Smaller Orange variety found in the forests of the Subtropical Highlands, and the Larger White and Turqouise variety found in the Prairies inland.

natural range of Orange Phoenixes (in Orange) and White Phoenixes (in Blue)

Genealogy

While it was, and still widely is, believed that Phoenixes are related to Chickens due to them both being gamebirds originating from the Kaisereich with similar sounding calls the Phoenix is actually a far removed off shoot of the pheasant.
Its generally believed that the common ancestor of the Orange and White Phoenix split off from the Golden Pheasant approximately 9 Million years ago before diversifying into the 2 sub-species at later dates. The Golden Pheasant has since gone extinct in the Kaisereich

A Golden Pheasant. Similarities can still be seen between it and the Phoenix, primarilly in its tail feathers, the plume of orange feathers protruding from its head, and the salet like feathers extending down its neck.

Physiology

Phoenixes in general are defined by several key physiological traits: First they both posses long, pheasant like, tail feathers, a set of spurs on the back of their legs. More famously both produce a thick, flammable, wax coating that can be set ablaze using an electricity producing organ found around their eyes. Phoenix feathers are flame retardant, and Phoenixes themselves have anomalously high heat tolerance. This, while being an incredibly impressive self defense mechanism, makes their feather disproportionally heavy as well as giving them poor drag which when combined with their size makes them incredibly weak flyers.

Orange Phoenixes are smaller in size, weighing around 25 Kilograms at maturity, and have shorter tail feathers, generally measuring between 1.6 to 1.9 meters tail to beak at maturity. They are orange in collar, with a vivid golden plume of feathers similar to that of the Golden Pheasant protruding from its head. Orange Phoenixes possess spurs of about 7 to 8 centimeters in length season around, which are used for territory battles, spars during mating season, and killing larger prey such as deer or warthogs.

White Phoenixes are larger in size, weighing around 30 Kilograms at maturity, and have longer tail feathers, measuring 1.8 to 2.2 meters tail to beak. They posses Salet like feather coming down from the back of their head similar to that of the Golden Pheasant, with a turqouise collared interior. Unlike Orange Phoenixes spurs are only found on the males of the White Phoenix, and are only present on sexually competing males during mating season, and are shed when out of heat.

While Orange Phoenixes are orange across their entire body with the exclusion of their golden crown feathers, the White Phoenix has Turqouis highlights along its wing tips.

Phoenixes have uniquely long lives for game birds, living up to 30 years in the wild. In captivity they may live even longer, with the oldest phoenix being Kotori, a the 63 year old Phoenix that currently resides in the Kaiserins own aviary

hunting and feeding

Phoenixes are Omnivorous, substiting off of nearly anything they can find, however they have a special preference for the Honey of the Continental-Amebee, and will go to great efforts to dig up their underground hives: A Phoenix will often ignite themselves while doing this to deter be stings. While they are not predatory by nature, subsisting mainly on seeds, berries, and grubs, they are capable of hunting when needed, and have on occasion been known to rustle livestock from farms.
Orange and White Phoenixes have fundamentally methods of attacking and killing from each other, however both produce distinct easy to recognize results: Orange Phoenixes attack in a manor not dissimilar to a cock, lunging forward with their spurs and repeatedly stabbing and slashing at their target: kills can be recognized by the presence of numerous deep gouge wounds around the neck and upper torso of the targeted creature often (but not always) with burn marks found around the places of gouging.
White Phoenixes leap onto their prey, gripping into them using their claws before using their sharp, hooked, beak to produce large, gaping, cuts. kills can be be identified by one long, relatively shallow, cut along any region of the body with soft flesh, however typically the neck or stomach, accompanied by shallow claw marks from grappling. Burn marks are still common but significantly more rare, as White Phoenixes are slower to produce wax, and thus more reluctant to use it.
They are also allegedly especially partial to Lasagna, however its likely this is predominantly because of the popular comic strip (or "Lafferstrippen" in native Pölitid) character Kiarfield the Phoenix, who is often depicted as enjoying Lasagna.

Kiarfield the Phoenix, the protagonist of a Lafferstrippen popular with children within the Kaisereich. She is characterized as having a love of Lasagna and a hatred of alarm clocks.

Reproduction

During mating season a male phoenix will produce a call not dissimilar to that of a cockrel in an attempt to signal its presence to females, as well as any potential rivals. Females will gather around a calling male and eventually, at peak fertility, the male will pick on to mate with once they are both at peak fertility, which is at around the summar solstice. If a male is unable to attract any mates with his calls he will follow the calls of another male and spar him for territory. While these spars are not usually fights to the death it isn't uncommon for them to become such. Phoenixes are monogamous, and mate for life.
Phoenixes will not engage in sexual behaviours every year of their life as reproduction is a relatively costly exercise for them. Orange Phoenixes sexually compete every one to three years once they have reached sexual maturity, White Phoenixes compete every 2 to 5 years.
Like most Avians, creat nests and protect and warm their eggs however they go about this differently to other birds. A bundle of 2 to 5 eggs are layed are layed into a depression in the ground created by the Phoenix, which is sat on by the mother for purposes of warming. The father hunts for food, which he regurgitates into the mothers mouth. Once the embyros of the chicks inside the eggs have hatched, the parents will work together to create a pyre of sticks and dry leaves over the eggs, which they will set ablaze. The heat from the flames signals to the chicks that it is time to hatch, at which point they crawl from their nest.

Significance to KFP

Orange Phoenixes, as the national animal of the Takanash Kaisereich, hold a lot of cultural significance to the KFP, culturally and economically, largely due to the religious practices of the KFP: Takanashism (the worship of the Kaiserin, who is in the KFP faith the human embodiment of the Fire Goddess herself) depicts the Kaiserin in her original deific form as a Phoenix, or a woman cloaked in the form of a flaming bird.

This is an example of incredibly rudimentary, early art, depicting the goddess of the KFP. This specific example was found on a cave wall located in the central highlands.
Due to how Phoenix eggs are hatched, and their ability to set themselves ablaze as a self defence mechanism, Phoenixes are seen to represent endurance, strength in times of adversity, and Ürnbfl (a Pölitid word used to refer to a willingness to go to extreme lengths to achieve ones goals).
While Phoenixes have not been domesticated they have been tamed and are kept in Aviaries around the Kaisereich where they are farmed for their fire proof feathers and flamable feather wax, as well as to be rented as exotic pets to the wealthy.

an orange Phoenix on a noble estate in the western slopes of the Kaisereich. Phoenixes are generally sedentary so they are usually kept free range since its unlikely they'll run away.

Role in the Economy

Phoenixes, as previously mentioned, hold a lot of value in the economy. Phoenix feather wax, a flammable oily substance that coats the Phoenixes feathers, is highly valuable as not only an export, but is a staple of large parts of the KFP military.
Phoenix feathers are collected by a small number of farms (15 in KFP territory and one more just under a mile across the border in /wah/). Wax is removed by soaking the feather in alchohol, which acts as a solvent for the wax. the now wax free feather is then sold off to either have its barb removed and woven into a fire retardent fabric by a specialist tailor, or sold off as an expensive ornament or decoration.
Phoenix wax is general dissolved into very small masses of Ethanol, producing a thick dark orange solution that tends to sit at around 40% Wax and 60% Ethanol. From here the solution either has a set of exotic sugars added to it to refine it into Phoenix Gravy (the preferred fuel for the Orange Beret's incidiary weapons, especially the Flamschwert), or left to compress and thicken into a soft sticky solid called "Kaiserins Butter", similar in consistency to (as the name suggests) butter.

The overwhelming majority of tamed Phoenixes are Orange, with White Phoenixes being a novelty in captivity. This is due to White Phoenixes needing more food, reproducing slower, and being slower to produce Wax.