[center][h1][b][color=0054a6]Klaarungraxus[/color][/b][/h1][/center]

The Old Growth Below pondered on its circumstances as it wallowed deep beneath the waves.

A deep pit had been formed by his movements, a slump in the seafloor that served as residence to Klaar after all his numerous works had been completed. In many was it was reminiscent of the pool the tentacled god had once resided in and to the many-minds of Klaarungraxus it felt like home. After the creation of the surface reefs Klaar had retreated to the sump and had simply been content to observe. His vast size had grown to almost mind numbing proportions and now his tentacles reached far and wide like the roots of the Tree of Genesis. Across the ocean Klaar could throw his vision, words in the Deepspeak letting him feel as the waters did on the opposite side of the world from him. His observations, of course, gave him a great deal of insight. 

What he had learned had shocked him. As the surface world became populated through the works of the other primordial deities of Galbar, nature was ever more pressured. The awareness inflicted on Klaar of this growth gave even his labyrinthine mind some pause. Consequences upon consequences in a tight, intricate web would no doubt arise from their works. This realization held Klaar in a trance that seemed impenetrable even to his most wanton of moods. 

[color=0054a6]”Where, I wonder, doth our tides take us. The world shakes, reality quakes, and all the Gods hath continued. A lonely and quarrelsome affair . . .”[/color]

As Klaar’s intonations echoed through the oceans, causing all manner of weather anomalies across the seas closest to him, his mind's eye turned inwards to himself. Alien and unknowable, the prophecies that were spun by the skein of Klaar’s unconscious pooled like melted wax to be peered into and observed. Dream upon dream twisted on one another showing the numerous potentials the complex mathematics of Klaar’s multilayered visions prophesized. There, before his very eyes, was one potential among many; a world that could not coexist with the gods. Klaar pondered the meaning of this fell augury with his overmind while the slaved minds of his tentacles lashed at the concept, tearing it apart and twisting it to get at the meat of the matter at hand. Surely, there must be a reason?

Irrespective of such a catalyst, it was clear to Klaarungraxus that the possibility of his ejection from Galbar was not a preposterous one. Indeed, the likelihood of such an event seemed ever increasing. The number of the gods, for one, was seemingly unbound by any limitation and their willingness to act upon the world and increase its complexity was vast. Even the very lifeblood of reality from which he had been spawned seemed more active, acting in utterly erratic ways and determining to tread paths that opposed or even contradicted others. It did not take thirteen minds to determine that this was not a sustainable path.

[color=0054a6]”Twelve vast and boundless limbs of flesh and blood lay dead in the deep . . . Near them, on the bottom, half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose six-pointed gaze, shattered beak, and glare of dark designs, tell of darker portents still . . . My name is Klaarungraxus, God of Deeps; Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair . . .  Nothing beside remains. Round and decay of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, the lone and level sands stretch far away.”[/color]

The poem of depthless contents rolled from Klaarungraxus’ mind as a flowing of icey cold waters from the poles. Above, in the world where other gods reside, a storm formed of monumental proportion that crashed and thundered. Klaar’s foul mood rocked the surface, an awareness of his inevitable irrelevance. In his mind Klaar raged at this possibility, at the loss of what he believed was rightfully his, but in his heart he knew the truth. In the end he would be cast down and what would there be left of him on this world? 

[color=0054a6]”Painfully little . . .”[/color]

Klaar’s thoughts moved to the creatures of his creation; a legacy, in a sense, but one that was too formless. [color=0054a6]Which of them,[/color] Klaar considered morosely, [color=0054a6]could remember their creator or praise his works?[/color] A dread realization indeed. Though they lived and died by his designs and to them he provided a world of incalculable possibility, no Deep Drake nor Shorecattle would ever look to the sea and see he who had created them. They would feast on flesh or graze on grasses and continue their lives, unabated by his ridiculous preening. 

[color=0054a6]”How disappointing . . .”[/color]

Forward-Right Down-One wriggled in contemplation and then blessed recognition. There was, of course, a solution to this problem! Though the overmind that was Klaar tempered his expectations of his proposed concept the other tentacle-minds shared thoughts on the matter, twisting and pulling and molding the idea before sending it up the chain to the central thought. Klaar marvelled at the concept. He would take what he made and grant it more; a greater gift still than any he had lavished upon them.

A Sapient mind.

Klaar’s overmind immediately invented the image of the Vrool, spawning in that vast chasm that was his thoughts one such lifeform for consideration. A powerful race indeed, built to last and formed from his very own flesh and blood. It was as if from the very start, when he looked upon them with disappointment, that they had been designed for just such an ascension. Their brains were large, though devoted to numerous tasks, and they had considerable space in which to grow. Though they were primarily solitary, this had little bearing on what Klaar was interested in; they would be as he. With little effort he could grant them minds as his, albeit limited in capacity, but each one would become ever more a mirror of their creator than before. A single mind with numerous additions granting them thoughts swift as a zephyrous tide. Then they could look upon the works of their great progenitor and give thanks, appreciate as he did what was left for them upon his eventual passing!

In that instant the Vrool of the oceans vast stopped in their flight through their environs and halted, floating in the watery void. Eyes across the oceans glowed with internal illumination, bright and colorful just as those of Klaarungraxus. Back in the sump in which Klaar remained prone, tentacles wriggled and beak clashed. One by one the lights fled from the eyes of those great predators, leaving behind in them an unquenched awareness demanding to be filled. For the first time their senses led to something more than a deep hunger, their mind’s eye filled with alien thoughts. They were left to their own devices, single minded as they were, and Klaar had no intention or desire to hold their tentacles through this growth; their lives would be hard and harsh and if he was to one day pass on then he knew he need wean his offspring early. 

Klaar left in the newly sapient Vrool several gifts, bound to them by instinct alone. Though by no means masters, each was granted an understanding of the Deepspeak their God communicated in, the Holy Vonu that would be their language. Though they would need learn the depths of the language to truly speak as he, it would bring them on the beginnings of their journey. Next, he seated them with a deep and all encompassing curiosity; they would see the world as he had, desire it to be theirs as him, and know no end to their cravings for awareness. Finally, he granted them the greatest gift of all; knowledge of Him who was their creator, so they might know from whence they came and to whom they were going. Though they were simple now, cold-blooded and perhaps slow-witted, they would be his creations most capable of recognizing him.

He was aware, in some capacity, of his new creations’ limitations. By nature of their carnivorous diet and the numerous, anti-social qualities built into their species by design they would never create great cities or magnificent civilizations on their own. Several tentacles theorized that their biology would create in them an innately malign desire towards all life, even their own, but Klaar paid them little heed. It was no business of his, after all, that they should fight one another; surely that was how nature was already, so in the Vrool there should be no difference. They would be fractious, fratricidal, and belligerent by nature and Klaar was most thoroughly pleased. The strong and the smart would certainly rise above the rest, after all.

At the bottom of his sump Klaar set to work creating one last thing for his people to be. A simple basalt altar, black and oily in appearance, was cut into a plain rectangular prism and set at the bottom of the sump. In it Klaar dumped much of his attentions, his power, and from there whispers of Deepspeak played at the ears of the world. When his people were ready this would be their first altar, the place by which they could speak to the oceans as he did and perhaps speak unto him. Perhaps, even, it could be the beginnings of something far greater. Upon it he left the Vonu word [color=0054a6]Ku[/color], denoting its position as the first place that mattered. 

[color=0054a6]A good start.[/color]

[hider=Post Summary]
Klaar is struck by an awareness of a potential future where he, for whatever reason, may not exist. This strikes the Elder God with a crippling awareness of his own eventual demise; begin Cephalopod Midlife Crisis.

Seeking to be remembered and making a dope reference to Ozymandias, Klaar gathers all his minds to him to think of a solution. One tentacle-mind, Front-Right One-Down, provides a potential alternative to simply being forgotten; why not give something a proper mind?

From this idea Klaar works to uplift the Vrool species to Sapience. Though their natural cold-blooded biology makes them noticeably slow-witted and sluggish in thought, they have all the prerequisites for intelligent life. 

As a parting gift (to sate his own need for appreciation), Klaar grants the Vrool three in-born, instinctual capabilities; a rudimentary understanding of Deepspeak (Vonu), an unquenchable curiosity, and (best of all) knowledge of their creator, Klaarungraxus.
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[hider=MP Summary]
Start 5MP/5DP

> Alteration of Vrool to Sapient Race (-2 MP)  
> Conferring on the Vrool the extraordinary ability of inborn Deepspeak (-1 DP) [Sorcery Portfolio]
> Consecration of the Holy Site of Ku, the epicenter of Deepspeak. (-2 DP) [Sorcery Portfolio]
	> Thalassophon II - Ku, as the epicenter of the natural Deepspeak of the world, is the center of all 	 
                               tidal forces, ocean currents, oceanic weather, and undersea geological shifts. 	 
                               Due to its nature as the center of Deepspeak, all oceanic telluric energies 
                               radiate into and then outward from Ku, making it an ideal place for Telluric 
                               sorcery and the heart of the growing Leyline skein. 
	> Pelagonoia II - The nascent center of Deepspeak acts in strange ways, altering the forms of those 	 
                       organisms that reside on its cyclical area of of effect. Greater proximity has a powerful 
                       effect on mortal life, altering them physically to be more adapted to life at sea; growth 
                       of gills, fins, and coloration changes are most common. Farther from Ku, where tides and 
                       currents take its energies, people living on the sea find themselves better swimmers, 
                       deeper divers, and greater fishermen from its effects.

End 3MP/2DP
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