How to translate the fictional name "yuan-ti" into meaningful Chinese words? In the tabletop game Dungeons &amp; Dragons, one of the monsters is a snake/man hybrid named "yuan-ti." The earliest appearance of this name is in Dwellers of the Forbidden City (1981), in which the name supposedly translates to "demon men." The name is gibberish that sounds vaguely of Chinese origin (and the monsters are sometimes depicted in clothing/arms/architecture with a Chinese-influenced aesthetic), perhaps a combination of the syllables yuan or you an plus ti or di.

Is there any possible way that a Chinese phrase approximating that could translate into an appropriate name for said monster? I know virtually nothing about Chinese besides what little I read online.  I looked through Chinese dictionaries and the best I could come up with was 妖蜿者 yāo wān zhě, which is not a real phrase but approximates the apparent pronunciation and meaning of the monster's name... if filtered through game of telephone, I guess?
imo, "yuan-ti" is a transliteration of chinese, using older scheme of romanisation. the characters represented are "軟體" (a pliable body), quite a good description of "snake-related-monster".

the "華英萬字典", printed in 1907, 



had the entry of "軟" (juan3, jwan)

https://archive.org/stream/chineseenglishdi00pole#page/339/mode/1up

and, 體 (ti3)

https://archive.org/stream/chineseenglishdi00pole#page/386/mode/1up

it's not far away from "juan" to "yuan" :)