Chapter #9Elven Degradations by: Yote   Everything in this world comes at a price and immortality is no exception. For the High Elves that price comes in the form of degradation. Every hundred years or so of their lives, an individual High Elf will spontaneously undergo a change, a mutation that warps their body or mind until what emerges is no longer a High Elf but something new, one of potentially thousands of flavours of elf, each more troublesome than the last. Additionally a degradation can be induced if an elf is brought to near death.
For our first example, I present the degenerated clade known as the Night Elf. Notice the altered pigmentation of the skin and the eyes that glow with a lunar radiance. This variant is nocturnal, half-feral and lives mostly on the ground or even within in, inside dens built into the roots of trees. They dress in furs and they are extremely territorial, even by elvish standards, yet as long as you respect that they are actually more amenable to outsiders than High Elves. So you can see, not every degradation is bad, at least from the perspective of the Order.
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Now, while this degradation may be relatively mild, others leave them barely recognisable and completely insane. The poster child for this, the Drow variant are habitual torturers and rapists with no exception. White hair, black or purple skin, seen here. Kill on sight.
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Given enough time and the appropriate treatment, these changes can be reverted. The High Elves invest much of their energies to containing and reverting their mutated brethren, for all are an affront to their perfection by their mere existence. They purge the degradation, or put them down if this fails.
Now I could go on all day listing elvens subtypes because there are hundreds, and new variants pop up faster than the Jade Order can document them - but certain ones are common enough that at some point in the past they have gathered together in sufficient numbers to reproduce, forming stable, divergent populations of that elven subspecies. The High Elves generally hate these wayward splinters of elvenkind, and vice versa, which is great for us because we don't much like the High Elves either.
So today we're just going to go over the most common variants. Tomorrow we'll have a look at some of the rarer ones. In the exam you will be expected to identify samples of these creatures and know how to combat them, so do pay attention.
Wood Elves
One of the most friendly of degradations to humanity. The pale skin of the High Elf darkens to a nutty brown, and the elf will descend from the treetop cities to dwell on the forest floor where they seek to become one with nature.
Night Elves
Similar to Wood Elves, except nocturnal and more aggressive. Adopt a matriarchal society where the females hunt and govern, and the males meditate and worship the moon and the spirits.
Drow
Once again, a matriarchal society. Males are treated little better than slaves. The Drow are fortunately rare on the surface. On occasion they send hunting parties from their underground cities to capture surface dwellers as slaves.
Vorelves
A deeply degraded offshoot, Vorelves resemble their elven forebears only from the waist up, possessive serpentile tails in place of legs. They live in underground warrens, rarely seeing the sun except when they come up to hunt, and their skin is a pale yellow - like a maggot's - as a result. They number in their millions, and perhaps represent the greatest threat to mankind should they ever emerge en masse.
They take a sadistic pleasure in hunt and consume only sentient beings. For this purpose, their jaws can unhinge and their bellies swell, allowing them to eat their prey hole. Where this is not enough, their saliva has the effect of shrinking organic matter, allowing them to make mere bite-sized morsels out of larger prey. While their corruption has robbed them of much of their elven heritage, some are still capable of disguising themselves with glamour and walk the world above unseen.
They employ creations known as Bronze Hatcheries to contain and farm their prey. These labyrinths, composed of tightly coiled bronze pipe around a handspan in diameter, remind some of giant brains, though they may be any shape and range in size from just a few coils to the size of a room. Inside, they are are complex mazes which keep their tiny inhabitants in comfort and indulgence. Just lick 'em and pop 'em in the entry hatch! Mosses and fungi, both delicious and a potent aphrodisiac, grow on the wall, guaranteeing the hatchery's vorelf owners an endless supply of plump, juicy prey "on tap". Sections can also be sealed off and rendered far less pleasant, for the aspiring sadistic god.
Time passes more quickly on the inside of the hatchery, and while the vorelves lounge in torporous slumber, millenia have passed within. What current conditions are like inside the hatcheries is unknown.
Deviants are elves whose minds have cracked from the intense boredom that only immortality can offer. Hungry to experience something of novelty, they leave their forests to hunt out the new, the strange, and the exotic. They revel in highs and lows of emotion. They abandon the High Elves' notion that immortality must be closely cosseted, instead throwing themselves into danger solely for the thrill. Living amongst the other races, they relish foreign cultures. Life outside of the shaded forests has a notable effect on the pigmentation of their fair skin, turning it to shades of dark blue or purple, and their golden hair to silver.   indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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