#beahuil

[digitalsatyr23]

Races of Arachnia (Beahuil)

Beahuili, sometimes known as shifters, are distant cousins of humanity. By living in harmony with nature, they have gained mastery over the beast in their blood and can change their forms at-will, if subtly. Though mostly human in appearance (except for striking eyes), a beahuil can change or “shift” into a bestial form, taking on traits of a certain animal decided during their proving. They are hardy, wise, and well-adapted to the harsh climates of Tirachna where most surviving members of the race make their home. Though the beahuili have a long history protecting the weak and innocent from the deadly Accursed, few tribes have survived the rigors of Arachnia’s history. Of the surviving tribes, those of the Crescent Valley remain the most powerful and numerous. On occasion, exceptional members of the tribe are sent out to seek unnatural forces and extinguish them, for long have they fought against the terrible alien things of this world. Perhaps one day the hunt will come to an end, but until that time, the beahuili press on.

Physical Description: Beahuili are similar to humans in appearance, sharing traits reminiscent of several ethnicities (most notably utheran), and can be as short as 5’0” or as tall as 6’8”. They are stockier, however, with thicker muscles, bigger bones, and more durable frames. Beahuili reach maturity around age 16 and maintain a youthful appearance for many years. They live about as long as humans, if a bit longer due to their natural-borne hardiness. Few among them grow earlobes, for most are well-acclimated to hotter climates. Men can be quite hairy, with forearms and chests full of shaggy hair. Women are not overly masculine, but they retain a tomboyish quality that is hard to miss. Their hair can naturally grow quite long, with colors of black, brown, and red (orange) being the most common, though it is said that those born under a full moon may have white or silver hair. Blonde is not unheard of, but it is also quite rare. Their eyes are striking, with colors like gemstones. Ruby, amethyst, turquoise, lapis lazuli, and similar shades. It is not to say that they look like gems, more that their colors bring to mind treasured stones. Their skin tends towards a light tan, like a shade of the vibrant rock of Tirachna. When a beahuil shifts, they take on an animalistic appearance. Angular faces, cat-like eyes, sharp fangs, and similar features may manifest. This is dependent on their spirit animal, which is said to be the echoes of a past life watching over the beahuil (though whether this is true or not, none can say). By calling upon the beast within their blood, they transform and gain great power.

Society: Due to the connection with nature they try to maintain, beahuili rarely live in cosmopolitan cities. Their settlements are small and often change location throughout the year. A typical beahuili village will amount to family-sized yurts of 10-50. Tribal society is simple, with hunters and gatherers out and about throughout the day while dedicated caregivers remain at the village, tending to the village young. There is no distinction between male and female in a given role, nor is a tribesman expected to remain in the same role their whole life. They might aid their village first as a gatherer, then as a hunter, then later as a caregiver, then return to the life of a gatherer. Acquiring many skills and become self-reliant is encouraged about the beahuili. Though beahuili are often monogamous, their family structure is less strict than other societies. A child has a “birthing mother” and a “birthing father”, but the whole of the village is considered family, so the children are taught by all sorts of people in the tribe. A term like “warrior” is superfluous when describing members of the tribe because every member is trained to fight should the need arise. Obviously, there are those who are better at it than others, but those out in the field do not need guards for good reason. Should trouble arise, each tribe has a dedicated shaman who is often the oldest and most magically gifted member of the tribe. In sufficiently large tribes, there may be multiple shamans. Chieftains are the only authority above shamans in tribes, and even then, they are not as ironclad as one might think. Beahuili rarely have internal strife and sort out their problems when they arise. A chieftain’s main duty is to find solutions to problems that the rest of the tribe cannot, and as such, the chieftain is the most capable and well-respected member of the tribe. There is no special ritual for deciding a chieftain. Should a chieftain die, retire, or step down, a simple vote is held to decide the new chieftain.

To keep their children strong and physically fit, a beahuil youth is raised on a diet of lean meats, tubers, and vegetables (beahuili find the dairy products of other cultures strange and fascinating). A child’s training begins first by having them help with chores around the village, such as carrying water, tending to animals, or working alongside gatherers. Physically active games and sports are encouraged among children, including a version of Hide & Seek called “Predator & Prey”. During such a game, one child is made the predator and the others their prey, and each group is supposed to start thinking like their respective role in order to hide, seek, and generally outsmart and outmaneuver each other. When prey is found, they must flee the predator until they either are tagged or find a new hiding spot. Once all prey have been tagged (a simple tap on the body, though fruit dyes are sometimes employed), the game ends and can begin again. Another game popular among the youth is “Chieftain’s Circle” where a red dye is used to establish a large circle. All participants gather within the circle and then beat the snot out of each other, doing what they can to throw everyone else out of the circle until only one child remains. The winner is named “second chieftain” and is given authority over the other children for a week. Perhaps because of these games and the culture surrounding the beahuili, many tribesmen grow up to have either calm and stoic personalities (like calculating predators) or aggressive and rambunctious personalities (like wild beasts).

Every year, starting on the first day of Gerova, a weeklong festival is held where all the tribes of the Crescent Valley gather in one place. During the festival there is dancing, games and contests of athleticism (including Chieftain’s Circle, but with adults), storytelling, and music. Musical performers use a variety of instruments, including the gadoulka (a four-stringed bowing instrument with a teardrop body), the tamboura (a strumming instrument with three to eight strings), the kaval (a long multi-segmented wind instrument), and the gaida (a multi-part instrument comparable to a bagpipe). In addition to festivities and cultural exchanges, the different tribes will also exchange members on occasion, either as part of marriages to tie two tribes closer together, or for tribesmen to live among another tribe to learn from them and experience what it’s like in their part of the world (think exchange students, but for adults). On the 8th day of the week (Riveday), a chosen member from each tribe will plant a seed in the soil of the festival grounds, with the seed being a plant from the tribe’s homeland. When the seeding is complete, the tribes offer each other good wishes, pack up, and return home. While some seeds do not always sprout and survive, those that do tend to naturally hybridize, blending together over time to create new types of plants, and given time, birth new spirits into the world.

The beahuili people usually establish their settlements in places where ether is said to gather and course through the world like rivers. These places are referred to as ley lines, and the beahuili use these ley lines to tap into the natural world and “communicate” with it so that they can better understand its problems. Like the leeu tribes of Ugankka, the beahuili wish to protect the world and maintain the natural order. Threats to the world are found via a tribe’s ley line then sought out, either to be corrected or exterminated. For most problems, only a single tribesman is sent out, but when a great threat arises, a whole pack of 6-10 may be sent on the quest. The primary enemy of the beahuili are aberrations, strange alien things that either attack indiscriminately or try to subvert the natural world to their own ends. To combat these creatures, the beahuili train vigorously in many fields, including physical and magical combat. They also make use of the beast within their blood, a power that beahuili gain mastery over during their Proving. This ritual, which takes place just after a beahuil turns 16, is a rite of passage before that member is considered an adult. They are tested by being given a place to journey to or a specific beast to slay, often without provisions. Once they have completed their quest, the beahuil receives a vision of a beast, and by establishing this connection, they are able to call upon the power within their blood and transform. This ability is referred to as “shifting”, which is how the beahuili earned the name “shifters”. Those that fail their proving may try again the following year. While there is always a risk of death during a Proving, there is always at least one adult skulking around the area to make sure the youth does not get in over their head. Rather than abandon a weak youth to the wild, the tribe will always prefer to save them and bring them back so that they can be better taught for the next year.

Alignment and Religion: Due to their comparatively unstructured society, their reverie of beasts and nature, and their duty to protect others, beahuili are most often Chaotic Good. Beahuili have little respect for laws and regulations that hinder their ability to help people, which sometimes gets them in trouble when abroad. Older, wiser beahuili may lean more towards Neutral Good, and less compassionate members of the tribe may be closer to Chaotic Neutral. Very few beahuili are truly evil, and these are often troubled members of a tribe who are too ambitious and headstrong to get along with their fellow tribesmen, eventually leading to their exile. Sometimes a beahuil who has traveled the world may return jaded and bitter. These beahuili either turn their back on the world or see the other races as the source of its woes. Chieftains are quick to correct these mindsets in such beahuili, but for those that will not change, exile or execution may be the only options. Those who escape the chieftain’s wrath and flee their village and become estranged hunters of men are known as the Scorned.

Beahuili most often pay homage to Ererah (Goddess of Seasons), Gerovi (God of Nature), and Nyttania (Goddess of Creation and Destruction). They are not as devoted to these gods as other cultures might be, though. Most beahuili see the gods as wise (or at least experienced) elders that represent different aspects of the world, whether it be war (Cheruvyx), time (Cephenia), the sea (Adraedana), or death (Atumex). The only deity beahuili are truly wary of is Kutkhi (God of Night), who they see as a strange and possibly dangerous outsider. They do not wage war on his followers, but rather take anything he and his followers say with a grain of salt.

Beahuili also (and primarily) pay homage to nature spirits, elementals, and the fey, and they do this by either leaving offerings to these spirits or creating protective barriers for them, such as tying a talisman-laden rope around an ancient tree. When they hunt and kill something for food or materials (often both, as beahuili dislike wasting things), they’ll offer a small prayer in that creature’s name so that it has swift and safe passage to the other side. They do much the same when they hold a funeral, burning the body in a bonfire so that the person’s spirit may be released. When the ashes are collected, they are placed within a ritual urn. Then one of the tribesmen (typically whoever was closest to that person) takes the urn all the way to the sea or to the top of a mountain. There the ashes are then released to the winds and waves.

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Thank you @serenanymph for taking an interest in one of my fantasy races! I really appreciate it. Since you asked, I figured I'd share their lore here on my blog. In case you're wondering, my fantasy content is used for both fantasy stories as well as D&D games, so in this case I shared the lore I formatted for my player guide. They were originally inspired by shifters from D&D since one of my regular players loves shifters, so I decided to finally format and put my own spin on the race so they could continue playing them whenever I run games out of my Arachnia setting.

[digitalsatyr23]

find the word tag

Tagged by @space-writes over here. Thanks for always including me in these, and sorry for taking forever. I've been in the mines... My words this time are bronze, climb, shimmer and wake. I'm pulling from a current WIP comm, "What She Left Behind."

Gently tagging @gummybugg, @serenanymph, @thepitflower, and @skymeria with the words wrong, find, dream, and cloud.

Bronze

Two of the others attacked during this time, to which Toma answered by pulling out a pair of acorns. In a flash, he infused them with concussive magic, threw them with his right hand, and watched them burst on contact, blowing the two beahuil away. He was then forced to back away as the fourth beahuil came in attacking with a sword of bronze. His vines cut, Toma ducked and dodged the incoming sword swipes, at one point getting slashed across his left arm. The cut didn’t worry Toma, though. It was shallow and would be easy to heal. What worried Toma was the frightened look on his attacker’s face.

Climb(ed)

When the night grew dark, Toma climbed up into a tree, setting his travel pack against a thick pair of branches that could support its shape and weight. Then he kicked back and rested his head against his hands, looking up at the starry sky through the foliage. He felt… Content. He didn’t have to fight or kill something all day. He was at peace with the world, and the world was at peace with him.

Shimmer(ing)

     “Wren!” Toma shouted as he left his yurt. “Wren!”      “Yes, what is it?” the beahuil woman asked, approaching Toma. She was using her waist apron to carry shimmering river stones.      “Have you ever written a letter before?”      “A… Letter? Oh, you mean message! I have, yes. What of it?”      “It’s been a while and I wanted to write to my friends back in Boccovia, but I can’t even find the words to start.”      “Hmm… I could help you, yes. Give me a moment.” Wren moved to her spot in the village, opening a clay pot before depositing the stones inside. After brushing off debris from her waist apron, she said, “All right, I’m ready.”

Wake

“I am unsure. Some of the other warriors were trying to smash apart that petrified beast, but we couldn’t crack it. I think I will stay here for now and wait for it to wake up. I hear that it worked for the man in that… Metal… Thingy. I don’t really understand it, but I don’t think that beast has a reason to fight anymore. I’ll give it the news and tell it to go back to where it came from, and should it resist, it will know the wrath of Jakar Bahdur!!”

[digitalsatyr23]

WIP Intro: Arachnia Fables

Genre: Dark Fantasy, Horror, Science Fantasy Setting: Arachnia

Tropes/Features: Introspection, violence, bloodshed, gore (occasionally), wilderness, survival, adventures, old ruins, spirits, monsters, animal people, vampires, shapeshifters, demons, angels, unreliable narrator, varied POV, flawed deities, grey morality, world building/history, magic, alchemy, technology mistaken for magic, the familiar and alien co-existing, eldritch horrors, monsters that look like people, people that look like monsters, melancholy, tragedy, and little things that give the protagonist hope.

What are the Arachnia Fables?

The Arachnia Fables are a series of mostly unconnected short stories that take place in the dark fantasy setting of Arachnia. There are some reoccurring characters, but many of the short stories and novelettes are one-and-done type fables. An Arachnia Fable can take place in virtually any part of the world setting in any time period, though I will generally not comment on the when and where except in the text itself. There is an underlying, broader narrative going on behind the scenes, but there is no harm in simply reading one of the stories and moving on.

Who are the reoccurring characters?

Vernar and Sonja

Most often written as a pair, Vernar met Sonja in the Summer of 1180 AC (After Cataclysm). Sonja lived in a village that had been taken over by a cult that performed profane acts in order to keep the famine and drought at bay in their land. Sonja, who lived most of her life locked in a cage in her family's basement, was eventually set to be burned at the stake in order to bring the rain. However, Vernar happened upon the village and decided to save Sonja, slaughtering anyone who got in their way. They summoned a rainstorm to quench the flames around Sonja, but the girl's feet were badly burned and it was likely that she would suffer a slow, miserable death due to her injuries. So instead, Vernar gave Sonja a little of their cursed blood, forever changing the girl into what are known as Accursed (which are sort of like lycanthropes, though different Accursed often change into things besides wolf-men). Having taken Sonja under their wing, Vernar and the child travel the land of Besalbrie in search of a place they can both call home. Vernar, who was once the second-in-command of the infamous Black Hand organization, is an extremely capable hand-to-hand fighter and assassin. They can also use lightning to empower their body, strike foes from a distance, or even control them via the electrical signals in their nervous system. Sonja had her magical abilities unlocked by a fey at one point in her adventures and uses ice magic, though she is still learning how to best utilize it. Both Sonja and Vernar are capable of regeneration - though as Sonja has learned, scars do not always heal.

Reah Fenae

A plucky adventurer from around 512 AC. The daughter of the famous Toma Fenae, Reah took to adventuring and combat like a fish to water. Reah loves to travel and experience new things. This is partly because Toma used to tell Reah all sorts of stories about his adventuring days, which gave Reah a great deal of comfort and inspiration when she was a child. She hopes that by traveling the world, she can eventually bring back her own stories to tell, and with luck, these tales will give her father some degree of comfort as well. Reah is known as a beahuil, a kind of human-like shapeshifting race that draws power from animals in subtle (and sometimes not so subtle) ways. A hunter and warrior both, Reah uses her dual-bladed weapon Bonespur, which has the jaw bones of a dinosaur she once slew in a rite of passage ritual.

Gaap, the Pillar of Curiosity

One of the 72 Pillars of Creation, Gaap is a mischievous being that can travel through space and time at will using interconnected portals. A demon thousands upon thousands of years old, she rarely takes her true form, and instead will shapeshift into a variety of different appearances she's grown fond of over the millennia (such as the one pictured above). As a Pillar of Creation, Gaap acts as something of a supernatural agent, helping transport other beings from place to place, though occasionally she gets a "vacation" which tends to end in disaster for everyone involved. Because of her unique position and abilities, she rarely gets into fights, and if she does feel like fighting, she'll either use her portals (known as the Mouths of Mundus) or a shotel she enchanted to be indestructible.

Rosalina, the Saint of Hope

A sort of child of destiny that experienced ultimate sorrow. She crawled out from the ashes and was reborn as a saint, thanks to the help of a certain band of heroes. Rosalina uses her divine magic to vanquish evil and save the innocent from harm. Rosalina was most active between 491 AC - 500 AC, after which she lost her saintly powers and created an orphanage for children left as orphans by the Black Sky War. Even without her saintly powers, Rosalina is still possessed of immense strength and magical might, as well as a great deal of longevity, aging very slowly over the centuries. Rosalina has a moss-covered staff that was made from her own grave marker. She transforms this staff into a variety of weapons, most commonly a longbow, which she can shoot arrows of golden light from. Rosalina and Gaap have an unusual friendship, and have both helped and hindered one another many times over the years. They also bear a striking resemblance to one another, though only a handful of people know the reason why...

Additional Information

This WIP has an irregular upload schedule, as each fable is its own short story. However, many have already been uploaded to this blog and can be found on my master list if you'd like to read some of them. I also have uploaded bits and pieces of world building info and will continue doing so, mostly to have it up online somewhere for those who find that kind of thing interesting. You can find anything related to it using the Arachnia and Arachnia Fables tags on my blog.

Art Credit

Banner (sunshinememoir), Vernar pic (aortic-inkwell), Sonja pic (_Harleequeen), Reah and Toma pic (VoksMoth), Gaap pic (mihke). All the art featured on this post are commissions drawn by the artists listed, and they're all very skilled, wonderful people. I encourage you all to check out their stuff.

[digitalsatyr23]

heads up 7 up

Tagged for this by @space-writes, so thank you for that! Your post was lovely. :D

For mine, I'm gonna lift a part of the comm I've been working on. The commissioner has been cool with me posting his comms before, so I thought I'd give people a preview. (will be slightly longer than seven sentences...)

     The beahuil turned, narrowly dodging a dagger that would have gone in his backside. Makau had changed back and stood up in the commotion, ready to kill. Toma was still stumbling from the sudden and awkward dodge, to which Ashar yanked Toma away by the arm. In those precious few seconds, Toma noticed an eerie glow around the eldest chieftain’s right hand.      Then, in a flash, the eldest chieftain was on the other side of Makau, his still beating heart in the chieftain’s hand. Blood gushed from Makau’s mouth as he trembled and collapsed.      “You have shamed your ancestors and put a stain on this sacred celebration. May the fires consume you.” Thus spoke the eldest chieftain.

No pressure tagging: @gummybugg, @mindfox-writes, @aether-wasteland-s, @reysfictionalworlds, @literarynecromancy, and @skymeria. As always, if you don't have the energy or motivation to participate, that's totally cool. Have a good day everyone. :)

[digitalsatyr23]

It occurs to me that my Arachnia lore might be a little on the intimidating side. Like I want to share as much as I can about any given subject for that place, but at the same time, for those who may be curious but don't have any investment in it yet, it probably feels like they gotta pry open a textbook or something. Like the other day someone was like "Ooh, what's a beahuil?" and I was like "I shall tell them everything" and uuuh in hindsight that might have been a bit much.

SO, for those who are reading this, would you prefer more condensed lore from now on? I can reword topics so they're shorter but still get the main points across. If no one is worried about it, I'll just keep doing what I'm doing. I just felt like I should ask.