Pre-Erulian Races

Physiology and Physical Adaptation

Talians were short to medium in height, compact and powerfully built, with dense musculature and a low centre of gravity. Their bodies prioritised balance, grip strength, and endurance over speed or raw size. Limbs were proportionally thick, with heavily reinforced joints—particularly in the shoulders, hips, knees, wrists, and ankles—allowing prolonged climbing, controlled descents, and sudden shifts in posture without injury.

Hands and feet were the defining anatomical features. Fingers and toes were elongated, flexible, and multi-jointed, with thickened friction pads and keratin-reinforced ridges along palms, soles, and fingertips. These adaptations enabled secure purchase on wet stone, lichen-coated surfaces, and narrow ledges. The skeletal structure was compact but resilient, absorbing repeated strain and impact over a lifetime of vertical movement.

Musculature favoured slow-fatiguing endurance fibres. A Talian could cling, climb, or stalk prey for extended periods with minimal rest. Cardiovascular efficiency was high, supported by strong hearts and large lung capacity adapted to thin, wind-scoured plateau air. Skin was thick, textured, and mottled, typically appearing in stone-grey, moss-green, bark-brown, or ash hues that mirrored local geology. Natural ridging and pebbling often resembled rock strata or lichen growth, providing effective camouflage.

Hair grew coarse and fibrous, forming stiff mats rather than flowing strands. It was tightly bound into cords, braids, or spines using resin, bone, and woven fibres to prevent entanglement while climbing. Facial features were sharp and expressive, with forward-facing eyes providing excellent depth perception in fog and broken light. Eye coloration commonly ranged from amber to gold, adapted for low-light conditions rather than symbolic meaning. Ears were large, pointed, and highly mobile, aiding spatial awareness across echoing cliff environments.

Lifecycle and Reproduction

Talian reproduction was slow and deliberate, shaped by the hazards of their world. Birth rates were low, with intense parental investment considered essential for survival. Gestation periods were long, and infants were physically fragile compared to adults. Early childhood focused on grip development, balance, and terrain familiarity rather than mobility.

Young Talians were introduced to climbing gradually, beginning with controlled vertical spaces within settlements. By early adolescence, they were expected to navigate exterior cliff paths independently. Teaching survival skills was not optional but obligatory; failure to properly instruct offspring was regarded as a serious breach of duty to both family and Crown.

Talians aged steadily, remaining physically capable well into later life. As endurance declined, individuals transitioned from active hunting or scavenging roles into instruction, toolcraft, planning, and custodianship of Crown knowledge. Elders were valued less for authority and more for accumulated terrain wisdom and cosmological insight.

Communication Systems

Spoken language varied significantly between Crowns, with dialects shaped by isolation and local conditions. Beyond speech, Talians relied heavily on non-verbal communication adapted to vertical environments. Hand-signs, rope-tug codes, stone taps, and controlled echo-calls allowed coordination across ravines, fog, and cliff faces. Visual markers—such as carved stone symbols, pigment smears, or arranged cords—were used to convey warnings, routes, or territorial boundaries without sound.

Social Structure and Crowns

Tal was a world of natural fragmentation, and Talian society mirrored this geography precisely. Each tepui supported a distinct cultural lineage known as a Crown. A Crown functioned as a complete social unit, composed of several interrelated clans bound by blood, marriage, and shared stewardship of the plateau. Family was central; identity was rooted in lineage first, Crown second.

Within each Crown, society was divided into two primary castes.

The Stayers remained within the plateau settlement, responsible for child-rearing, instruction, tool-making, food processing, and maintaining infrastructure. The Hunters and Scavengers operated beyond the immediate settlement, descending cliffs, traversing exposed ledges, and engaging megafauna or resource zones in dangerous territories. Both castes were essential and interdependent, but roles were rigidly defined.

Gender roles were culturally enforced. Males hunted and scavenged; females did not. Females were central to family cohesion, instruction, resource management, and the continuity of clan knowledge. This division was not symbolic but practical, reflecting risk management and survival efficiency in an unforgiving environment.

Those who violated Crown law or endangered collective survival could be banished. Banished Talians became nomadic cliff-wanderers, living without Crown protection. Rarely, a banished individual might be absorbed into another Crown, but this required extraordinary proof of worth and carried lasting stigma.

Political unity between Crowns was rare and temporary. Coordination occurred only in response to existential threats such as ecological collapse, megafaunal migration, or catastrophic weather cycles. Even then, Crowns remained autonomous, cooperating without surrendering internal authority.

Cosmology and Worship

Talian belief systems were heavily cosmological and directly tied to survival. They worshipped no abstract deities. Instead, reverence focused on the Ando sun and Tal’s two moons, which governed weather patterns, tidal flows in the lowlands, predator movement, and seasonal resource availability.

The sun was understood as the great stabiliser, defining growth cycles, stone warmth, and the survivability of exposed routes. The moons were watched obsessively; their phases dictated hunting windows, safe descent periods, and times when certain cliffs became unstable due to moisture, wind, or gravitational shift. Cosmology was therefore practical rather than mystical—misreading the sky could mean death.

Rituals were observational rather than devotional. Sky-watchers tracked celestial movement from exposed spires, recording patterns passed down orally through generations. These observations informed decisions on migration, hunting, and construction. To ignore cosmological signs was considered reckless, not heretical.

Environmental Knowledge and Ecology

Talians possessed an advanced, inherited understanding of their environment. They classified stone by grip quality, fracture likelihood, and moisture retention. Winds were named and mapped according to how they behaved along cliff faces. Mosses, fungi, and insects were catalogued for nutritional value, toxicity, or use in binding agents.

Megafauna were not uniformly hunted. Some species were actively avoided, others tolerated as environmental constants, and only specific creatures targeted for food or materials. Hunting was a communal act requiring precise coordination across vertical planes rather than brute force.

Material Culture and Technology

Talian technology was deliberately constrained. Tools were crafted primarily from stone, bone, fibre, resin, and limited metals scavenged from exposed veins or fallen debris. Lightweight durability was prioritised over complexity. Ropes, harnesses, hooks, and bone-tipped weapons were often inherited, repaired across generations, and imbued with lineage significance.

Conflict Resolution

Internal disputes within a Crown were resolved through ritual trials rather than violence. These often took the form of endurance tests, climbing challenges, or survival demonstrations, reinforcing communal values while avoiding unnecessary loss of life. Violence within a Crown was considered an admission of failure.

Summary

The Talians were not merely adapted to Tal—they were shaped, constrained, and defined by it. Their biology, society, cosmology, and culture formed a closed system optimised for vertical survival. They did not seek expansion, dominance, or abstraction. Survival, continuity, and respect for terrain were the highest virtues. Their extinction during the Convergence ended one of the most environmentally integrated sapient civilisations to exist in the pre-Erulian era.

Origin and Biological Philosophy

All Morians descend from a single ancestral lineage. Rather than diverging into separate species, Morian evolution favored extreme adaptive plasticity. Physical form was never fixed at birth. Instead, Morian offspring were born with a wide physiological potential that resolved only through prolonged exposure to a specific environment. As a result, aquatic and amphibious Morians are not distinct peoples but adaptive expressions along a continuous spectrum.

Reproduction is fully compatible across all Morian forms. Offspring morphology is determined primarily by environment of upbringing, not parental phenotype. Juveniles raised in deep or open ocean environments develop fully aquatic traits; those raised in liminal zones stabilise as amphibious; surface-dominant environments suppress overt aquatic features but never remove internal adaptations. Placement of juveniles is a communal decision, governed by long-term ecological need rather than family preference. Morphology is therefore understood as functional obligation, not identity.

Morians mature slowly, with extended juvenile phases devoted to observation, memorization of routes, seasonal cycles, and ecological relationships. Lifespans are long, resulting in societies with deep living memory and little reliance on written historical record.

Aquatic Morians

Aquatic Morians inhabit the open seas, pelagic routes, and abyssal depths of Mora. Their forms vary significantly depending on depth, pressure, and light, yet remain recognizably unified.

Shallow-water and shelf aquatic Morians retain elongated, humanoid silhouettes optimized for maneuverability rather than speed. They possess smooth or finely textured skin, often patterned for camouflage, with fins or crests along the spine, arms, or head. External gill structures are common, protected by ridged plates. These Morians interact most frequently with amphibious communities and often serve as navigators, scouts, and seasonal intermediaries.

Pelagic Morians are highly hydrodynamic, with elongated torsos, powerful tails, and reduced drag features. Bioluminescent markings are common and used for communication, identification, and ritual signaling across long distances. These Morians maintain migration routes, flotilla movements, and open-sea stewardship zones.

Abyssal Morians exhibit the most extreme adaptations. Dense musculature, reinforced skeletal structures, pressure-resistant dermal layers, reduced or altered ocular systems, and heightened vibration or electromagnetic perception are typical. To outsiders, they appear profoundly alien. Within Morian civilization, they are regarded as depth-specialists, often serving as wardens of deep ecological zones and custodians of dangerous or sacred waters.

To other Erulians, aquatic Morian descendants existed only as myth. They were remembered as sea-spirits, abyssal guardians, or monstrous watchers beneath the waves—symbols of danger, depth, and unknowable persistence rather than living peoples.

Amphibious Morians

Amphibious Morians occupy the transitional zones between sea and land: coastlines, mangroves, estuaries, reefs, and island interiors. Their defining trait is credible dual-environment viability.

Mangrove and delta-dwelling amphibious Morians tend toward heavy, powerful builds with clawed or webbed extremities, thick abrasion-resistant skin, and strong torsos. Their tails are secondary, used primarily for balance or short aquatic bursts. These Morians dominate shoreline defense, construction, and territorial stewardship of liminal ecosystems.

Rocky coast and reef-edge amphibious Morians are leaner and more upright, with pronounced agility and fluid transitions between swimming and bipedal movement. Their physical resemblance to aquatic cousins is strongest, reflecting constant interchange between shore and sea.

Surface-dominant amphibious Morians retain internal aquatic adaptations but display reduced external features. Skin tones favor coastal and earthy hues for camouflage. Facial structures are expressive and forward-facing, with visible nostrils and recessed or concealed gills. To Erulians, these Morians could plausibly be mistaken for an isolated reptilian or coastal race.

Unlike aquatic Morians, amphibious Morian descendants actively concealed themselves from surface-dwelling Erulians. Contact was minimised, identities obscured, and origins suppressed. Where interaction occurred, they presented as insular shoreline peoples. Knowledge of Morian history was intentionally fragmented, even among descendants, to prevent exploitation or ecological harm.

Economy, Mobility, and Labour

Morian civilization was not trade-driven. Extreme distances between settlements and hazardous seas made sustained inter-settlement commerce inefficient. Instead, Morian life followed semi-nomadic seasonal travel cycles, tracking nutrient blooms, spawning grounds, and migratory fauna along routes refined over millennia.

Labor stratification was strict and functional. Roles were assigned early and rarely changed, not as a caste hierarchy but as preservation of irreplaceable expertise. Roles included depth-wardens, reef-keepers, current-readers, flotilla navigators, surface stewards, and memory-bearers.

Morians claimed stewardship, not ownership, over non-sentient life. Flora and fauna were protected, guided, and selectively culled only when ecological balance required it. Most Morian cultures were vegetarian, relying on cultivated marine flora, filter organisms, and symbiotic ecosystems. Certain warrior traditions practiced ritual consumption of defeated foes as an act of honor and remembrance rather than sustenance.

Technology and Warfare

Morian technology emphasized durability, modularity, and ecological integration. Settlements and tools were grown, accreted, or assembled from living or semi-living materials capable of self-repair or recycling. Weapons were optimized for underwater resistance, ambush, and movement denial.

Warfare was rare, localized, and non-expansionist. Conflict focused on restricting movement, manipulating currents, and isolating opponents. Long-term ecological damage was considered a greater crime than loss of Morian life.

Spiritual Framework and Cosmology

Morian spirituality centered on water as an eternal balancing force. The ocean was revered, not personified. To violate its rhythms was the ultimate transgression.

They worshipped three moons:

1. One moon was believed to have birthed the aquatic Morians.

2. The second gave rise to the amphibious Morians.

3. The third birthed surface-dwelling beings who rejected the ocean. These beings were believed to have been consumed by the world itself and died out, serving as a cautionary myth against surface dominance and ecological arrogance.

This cosmology reinforced Morian ethics: survival is conditional upon respect for the ocean.

Language and Communication

Morian communication was multi-modal, combining spoken language with pressure clicks, low-frequency vibrations, posture, and bioluminescent signaling. Meaning was layered and contextual, making Morian language difficult for outsiders to fully interpret.

Architecture and City-States

Morian settlements functioned as city-states, but were not fixed geographically. Structures were inherited, dismantled, submerged, or recycled as environments shifted. A city was defined by continuity of function and people rather than location. Entire settlements could migrate, fragment, or dissolve without cultural crisis.

Secrecy, Legacy, and Limits

After the Great Convergence, Morian civilization did not collapse violently. It dissolved, dispersing its people and memories into survivable fragments. Aquatic descendants faded into myth. Amphibious descendants chose concealment.

Morians were ill-suited to rigid territorial politics, prolonged dry environments, and extractive economies. Their civilization depended on ecological stability and long temporal horizons.

In Erulian history, the Morians endure as a deliberately obscured precursor civilization—defined not by conquest or remembrance, but by stewardship, adaptation, and the belief that continuity matters more than being known.

Physical Characteristics and Posture

Lethians were bipedal beings capable of full upright stance, though their natural posture was forward-hunched. This stance reduced wind exposure, lowered the center of gravity on ice, and conserved heat. Their bodies were compact and densely muscled, with broad shoulders, thick necks, and short, powerful limbs. A heavy head with pronounced brow ridges and strong jaw structure dominated their silhouette. Dense, layered fur covered the entire body, thickening around the shoulders, neck, and upper back to form a natural insulating mantle. Extremities were reinforced for cold exposure, with broad, padded feet and strong, blunt-nailed hands adapted for load-bearing, digging, and tool use.

Subsistence Model: Semi-Pastoral Survival

The Lethians practiced a semi-pastoral subsistence system adapted to extreme scarcity. Herding formed the backbone of their food economy, focused on cold-adapted fauna that grazed near geothermal margins or migrated between oases. These herds were carefully managed rather than expanded, with strict cultural norms preventing overexploitation. Hunting supplemented herding, targeting migratory surface fauna, cavern-dwelling creatures, and fish harvested from subglacial rivers and geothermal caverns.

Plant cultivation existed but was limited, slow, and highly controlled. Flora was grown communally underground rather than on the surface. These plants were selected for heat dependence, low light tolerance, and nutrient efficiency. Agriculture was not surplus-driven; it functioned as a stabilizing buffer during harsh seasons when external food acquisition became impossible.

Settlement Structure and Spatial Organization

Lethian settlements were constructed as clusters of igloo-like hovels partially embedded into snow, ice, and stone. Architecturally, these dwellings emphasized rounded forms, thick insulating layers, narrow entrances, and minimal external exposure. Most settlements expanded downward rather than outward, forming interconnected underground networks.

At the core of each settlement lay a large communal chamber located at the warmest and most stable geothermal point. This central space served multiple functions: it was the primary cultivation area for communal flora, the main gathering hall, and the political and ritual heart of the settlement. Tunnels radiated outward from this chamber, connecting individual hovels, storage vaults, tool rooms, and animal enclosures. The spatial hierarchy was deliberate: food growth and communal decision-making occupied the most protected and resource-rich location, reinforcing collective dependence.

Social Organization and Governance

Lethian society was explicitly communal. Individual identity was secondary to settlement survival, and private accumulation was culturally discouraged. Governance was exercised by an elder council composed of the most experienced survivors within the settlement. Leadership of the council was typically held by the strongest individual, where strength was defined by endurance, proven survival capability, and leadership under extreme conditions rather than physical dominance alone.

Leadership positions were held until death in most cases. Dynastic succession occurred only rarely and only when lineage strength, communal approval, and demonstrated competence aligned. There was no centralized planetary authority; settlements functioned as largely autonomous units.

Reproduction and Child Rearing

Reproduction among the Lethians was rare but biologically intensive. When births occurred, offspring were produced in large numbers, typically ranging from three to seven at a time. These events were infrequent and closely tied to long-term resource stability.

Child-rearing responsibilities were shared communally among the females of the settlement. Males were often absent for extended periods, engaged in herding, hunting, scavenging, or long-range travel. During the harshest seasonal cycles, most of the population remained sealed within their hovels, relying on stored resources and geothermal heat, while only the most capable individuals ventured outside.

The Frostborn

A distinct and highly respected segment of Lethian society consisted of those trained from early childhood to survive prolonged exposure beyond geothermal zones. Known informally as frostborn, these individuals were conditioned physically and psychologically for travel across the frozen wastes. Their roles included herding, long-range hunting, fishing in distant caverns, message carrying, and limited inter-settlement trade.

Frostborn typically possessed weak or deliberately severed family ties, as constant movement made permanent settlement impractical. On rare occasions, banished individuals who survived exile and discovered an unclaimed geothermal oasis could establish a new settlement, effectively re-entering society through endurance alone. Frostborn were regarded as elite survivalists and warriors, and many eventually became elders due to their accumulated experience.

Law, Conflict, and Social Enforcement

Internal conflict was rare but treated with extreme seriousness. All disputes and criminal acts were judged publicly before the elder council. Crimes that threatened communal survival—such as hoarding, sabotage, or reckless endangerment—were met with the most severe penalties.

Punishment for such acts typically involved branding, forcible removal of fur, and permanent banishment into the wastes. This sentence was understood as a near-certain death. However, the offspring of the condemned were not punished for the crime. Instead, they were adopted by those harmed by the offense and required to serve that household until adulthood, reinforcing accountability while preserving population continuity.

Technology and Material Expertise

The Lethians were masters of insulation, heat retention, and material durability. Their technological focus centered on interconnected underground construction, advanced insulating techniques, food preservation, and long-lasting tools. Innovation existed, but only within narrow parameters that improved survival reliability rather than enabling expansion. Fire was used sparingly and treated with reverence, while geothermal heat served as the primary energy source.

Belief System and Collective Memory

Lethian belief centered on an ancestral catastrophe known as The Collapse, during which the world was believed to have frozen after once being fertile and thriving. This event was understood as irreversible. Geothermal oases and fire were regarded as manifestations of life itself. Light emitted from vents, steam fissures, and glowing mineral formations was believed to guide both the living and the dead.

The deceased were cremated, their remains returned to the geothermal heart of the settlement. Communal meals and gatherings reinforced the belief that survival was a shared, sacred responsibility rather than an individual achievement.

Post-Convergence Legacy

Following the Great Convergence, Lethian populations were severely reduced through displacement. Those relocated to polar regions of Erul—where environmental conditions most closely resembled their origin world—experienced higher survival rates and retained more cultural continuity. Others declined rapidly through attrition or assimilation.

In Erulian historical memory, the Lethians are remembered as a civilization defined by restraint, endurance, and collective survival. Their society represents a model of adaptation under absolute limits, where continuity itself constituted the highest cultural achievement.