The Dreaming Forest/Treekin
All Of The Different Trees That There AreThe dreaming forest is the collective name for the Trees and their various designed offspring who sit at the top of the empire. Only the static Trees are capable of reproducing, either naturally creating more Tree seeds or by carefully magically modifying their offspring to have them grow to be one of the other various subspecies, the mobile children among the subspecies being collectively known as Treekin . The collective name for the Trees and their children comes from an interpretation by a human of a description of the psychic dreamscape that binds them all together, a fuzzy mental landscape filled with the slow, deep thoughts of the Trees that are its source. All of the Dreaming forest species are highly magical in nature, but most of it is used to maintain their unnatural minds, motion and senses. They have difficulty using that energy for other tasks, and as a result improving mana throughput is much harder for them than it is for many other races.
Being plants, the only internal organ exhibited by the members of the Dreaming forest are the rudimentary digestive systems found in dryads and living ships. Lacking even a center of their minds and being made of sapwood wood covered in bark they are all unnaturally hard to kill. If one of the Dreaming Forest is cut in half the consciousness of the individual remains in the largest part while they also maintain a connection to the severed part, which is what allows Yaval to spread their influence through planting of it’s branches to form new growths. Therefore the only way to kill Treekin is to reduce it so that no part consists of more of a quarter of its mass, burning it or starving it, generally done by removing its ability to feed and then leaving it to die.
Ever since the great fire, a blaze caused by a lightning strike during a particularly dry year in the otherwise rain soaked isles, the Trees have had an understandable fear of fire. This fear has been passed down unintentionally to their offspring, though living wood is rather damp and is, as a result, somewhat harder to set on fire than might be expected. This fear is particularly notable because the treekin lack a fight or flight reflex found in animals, meaning that young Treekin are well know for picking overestimating their own ability when picking fights. They generally outgrow this fearlessness, either by being ought or learning from mistakes, something their tenacity fully allows.
The TreesAncient
sentient trees that grow on the Evergreen isles that are rich with primordial essence. They can grow to ancient ages and immense sizes and can communicate telepathically with one another over long distances. The ones in their home islands can all stay in touch with the neighboring islands, but can’t reach far enough to stay in touch with the mainland. To facilitate staying in contact the great Tree Yaval has had some of it’s immense branches cut off and planted on the continent, where they have grow as smaller trees that are extensions of their own will. These can be found anywhere the Empire has settled in force, surrounded by groves of lesser Trees.
Culturally the Trees see themselves as the wise philosopher kings of their kind, they thirst for knowledge and endlessly debate among themselves about high minded topics. Generally they only get involved with their children and subject’s affaires to give advice or when there is a threat to themselves or the empire as a whole. The trees are unquestionably loyal to the Empire, primarily because they have little to gain from leaving or undermining it. So long as a Tree’s own patch of ground and sky are unmolested they value the company of their kin’s collective consciousness over any minor improvement in status or living condition.
Trees have basically the same life cycle as normal trees, however once they reach about 50 years of growth, be it natural or magically accelerated, they develop the potential for consciousness. This potential is stimulated through psychic connection with their neighbors, as the elder Trees mentally raise the young Tree to be a fully fledged sentient being. As a tree grows and ages it’s psychic and magical capabilities grow as it’s mind slows down. The oldest and largest of the trees are incredibly intelligent and wise, but can take hours to respond to inputs. The Trees sense the physical world through the psychic dreamscape, though the resolution is rather dull and puts a lot of priority on motion. They can also hitchhike on the eyes of their children, sensing what they sense, though they have some difficulty interpreting this alien input.
Carnivorous Trees/plants these
Trees have been grown with violence in mind. Similar to their natural progenitors in that they are routed to the spot as plants should be, they have various animated limbs, vines and flowers all made to catch and kill unsuspecting lumberjacks. Most alive today are either survivors of the war that birthed them, peaceful living lives almost identical to the Trees, whereas those on the continent have been deliberately as planted guards or as part of a fortified position during or before a battle.
For the ability to fight the carnivorous plants sacrifice a lot of their psychic potential and some of their intelligence: the young carnivores are rather feral and simple minded for the most part. Once they start to become very old and large, the plants slowly start to lose their ability to move their weapons until they end up as rather monstrous looking Trees. Time spent as a living weapon stunts their growth however, and so a former carnivore will generally be smaller than a standard Tree relative of the same age.
Carnivorous Plants are the younger version of Carnivorous Trees who, instead of having a solid trunk are instead 90% weaponry and are practically animals in their intelligence. This younger stage is often used to quickly reinforce defensive lines or create what are basically minefields, the seeds can be carried by Dryads and grown to a useful sizes in a matter of hours, though the Dryads are naturally left vulnerable while doing this.
Both trees and plants are capable of disguising themselves in order to catch passing foes unawares. The trees use camouflage and a little inherent nature magic to make themselves look like a mundane tree, while the plants hide their armaments under the ground or inside neighbouring plants.
Ents: the second of The Tree’s weapons, Ents were the first attempt to make a mobile fighter to defend the Dreaming forest. They are large and have the same uncapped growth as the Trees themselves but also have the same issues as the Trees in terms of the speeds of their thoughts. Large Ents are incredibly strong and smart, but have poor reaction times. They also need to root themselves down in order to grow, absorbing nutrients from the soil during which they enter a hibernation like state that makes them almost the same as a regular Tree. Ents, unlike the smaller Dryads, do not have a particularly set shape and so, while vaguely humanoid is the most common form it is not the only one they can take: some ents are made in the shape of breasts with mouths full of thorns, others are wholly alien in appearance.
Smaller Ents associated primarily with the Dryads and some could indeed be mistaken for their kin, a bit mute and cruder in appearance. As they grow they begin to drift away from active life, becoming more permanent fixtures in the Tree Groves, only awakening to come to their home’s it’s defence. The rate of this growth is based mostly on the individuals, some deliberately slow or pause their growth while others hibernate for most of their existence in order to become as large as possible. As a result of their shifting from one group to the other, the Ents are the awkward middle children of the Dreaming Forests, not quite fitting in with either their stationary or mobile peers.
The DryadsHumanoid creatures made from living wood, who can grow from heights of 4 - 8 feet. Appearance wise they resemble humans, but the accuracy of this resemblance varies based on how long the individual has to grow. Dryad born in peacetime look almost perfectly human in structure, while those hastily grown for war are often crude facsimiles, their bodies made from roots and branches rather than seamless wooden flesh. Dryads are either designed by a normal tree and then taken away to be planted somewhere or are grown trees specifically designed to produce only Dryad offspring. In either case, the seed sets routs and grows into a small tree which slowly takes on the appearance of a sleeping figure buried in wood. Once the Dryad is ready to be born, the tree forces all of it’s life force, energy and magic into the dryad, awakening it. The dryad then tares it way out of the shriveled cocoon of roots, trunk and branches. A newborn has about the intelligence capability of a human adult, but lack wisdom, which they gain from interacting with their kin and progenitors through their psychic link with them.
They are now the face of the empire and the driving force behind its expansion. They are the most warlike of their kin, and have a strong warrior culture where martial prowess is highly praised. The Dryads can only communicate telepathically if they are within range of one of their larger kin, but they have been given mouths with which to speak and thus are the only ones of their Genus capable of communicating with other races. 50% of the time this is used to hurl insults at foes, but some have become diplomats and merchants with, sometimes literal thanks to deliberate pigmentation choices, silver tongues.
Culturally they are primarily focused around war in all its forms and needs. What separates them from simply being a warrior cast is that they deal with not just fighting, but also preparing the materials of war such as armor, perform research into military technologies and are the face of diplomatic meetings to form military alliances. Beyond war they have a lot of interest in art, particularly the art of cooking. A Dryad’s normal diet consists of bland if nutritious fruits produced by The Trees of their home groves, The Trees maintain a meticulous control on the amount of children they produce, and as such food shortages are a rarity. This makes any and all other kinds of food a luxury and Chef’s are highly regarded among Dryad society for their ability to make eating interesting. This also makes those that go out to get food, be it viea taxation, trade or marauding, more highly valued by the Dryad’s than would be expected of warriors.
Dryads are technically full time soldiers, but outside of crisis periods only have to be on active duty for half of the year. Dryads are divided into 2 seasons, spring and autumn and get their season, plus half of winter and summer, off duty. When not on duty they engage in hobbies or professions like cooking, smithing, fletching, painting etc. or travel to receive instruction from famous warriors, mages, chefs or artists. The only real exceptions to this rota are the merchants and explorers who travel with the Living ships to far off lands, they are often away for years at a time on what technically counts as their duty. This distinction is not entirely rigid or binding, some Dryads simply swap season and remain in the military/civilian population full time, but adherence to the system is common, gives rhythm to the Dryad’s lives and is required if a Dryad wants to hold a leadership position.
Dryads live in and around Groves of their Tree parents. On the home islands this means they are rather disparate, living in small wandering communities that for the most part act as a garrison for the homeland. The only exceptions to this are the myriad of docks, into which the wealth of empire, conquest and trade flow. In the provinces they live in groves of young Trees planted around a planted branch of Yaval. These groves are generally located near major towns over which the Dryad’s act a feudal lords.
The Living ShipsSentient Trees grown into the shape of ocean going vessels, propelled by leaf sails and animated oar like arms. So long as it can get sunlight the ship can indefinitely sustain itself and a small crew, and it can be repaired with magic and biomatter. The ship is it’s own captain, navigator and helmsman, the crew are generally along to repel boarding attacks, though the ship is not entirely helpless in this regard, to move cargo about and to act as envoys to land folk. There are three primary roles in life a ship may take. Some are part of a standing navy, bred for war and conflict they guard the isles and coasts. There are the transports who ferry goods and soldiers around and, as most of the internal trade and transport is done viea ship, they are always busy. The third are explorers, who go off far from the psychic contact with the rest of the Dreaming forest, carrying a small hardened crew they sail the oceans of the world to trade, talk and sometimes engage in piracy.
Living ships are made to a specific design by the Trees and are planted by the shoreline where they slowly grow into a fully formed ship while rooted to the earth. Unlike Dryads, the Ships are conscious during their growing period and learn everything the need to know as they mature, often getting to know or choosing the crew that is going to join them once they leave the shoreline. Once fully formed they carefully detach the roots that held them to the earth, which they will subsequently use as anchors, and slip into the water. Like the Dryads, the ships are capable of eating, though unlike their small kin they gain most of their energy from photosynthesising, and thus only really need it for elements that cannot be created from the absorption and splitting of Co2 and of water.
Like the Ents, some Ships are not content with the standard form of a boat. Some instead deliberately grow to resemble sea monsters instead, such as great whales, serpents or squids of bark, leaf and vine that are often terrifying to behold.
The Others
Human citizens The subjugated citizens of the former feudal Kingdom of Shenra where once traders, raiders and explorers who sailed the seas on ships made from the wood of the Tree’s continental relatives. Now they live under the thumb of the Empire but for the average peasant and the poor, very little has changed, their lords simply now live in the dangerous forest rather than in splendorous manors. For the formerly well off, the Empire’s conquest has had a much bigger impact. The biggest change is that the private creation and ownership of ships is banned, which, thanks to the poor and dangerous state of the north south roads, restricts the freedom of movement of the native population and massively reduced internal and external trade, the old lifeblood of the kingdom. The only kinds of ship available are fishing vessels which don’t have the capacity to survive the open eas or long voyages. Despite this a thriving black market of trade exists using these small ships, most especially in and around the Sea of Lights and in the north where the small ships have a chance of reaching foreign shores with the wears of the populace.
Though it has been several generations since the Empire’s total conquest of the region tensions still run high, with both the Dreaming Forest and the humans looking down on another as inferior to themselves. The Dreaming forest consider the humans a useful tool for doing things like farming, mining or textile work, something few Dryad’s have any interest in, and consider themselves incredibly merciful for not committing genocide on the human population. The humans are resentful of not being ruled by their own kind, angry at the damage to takeover of their lucrative export economy and frustrated with the fact that the Empire does basically nothing to help the people they rule. In Fact they barely rule at all.
Friends of the Forest: Every change in rulership has its Talleyrands, people who see the end coming and jump ship to the new regime before the old one sinks or just those that think it best to suck up to the new boss, same as they did with the old boss. The self proclaimed Friends of the Forest are a loose group of old and new powers who work to support the empire in order to get to the top of the bottom of the pile. Bureaucrats and taxmen who “streamline” things for their masters by acting as middle men, ruling the local populace in terms of law enforcement, handing out justice, planning public works and other mundanities that the Dreaming Forest does not have time for. Sometimes specifically chosen, sometimes self imposed and rarely elected, for the most part they are a corrupt and self serving lot, but they have their uses.
Gweldgale islanders: The population of the colony of Gweldgale consists of roughly equal numbers of humans and
Koirari. The Koirari are natives to the island who have lived there since before written history. Their legend tell that they were once true creatures of the sea, rather than the air breathing amphibians they are now, but they were driven out of the oceans by demons sent by their primordial god, who was punishing them for some great sin. Human and Koirari alike where once traders and sailors like the peoples of Shenra, but are now working under the same servitude as the provincial humans. They are now primarily farmers of the varios exotic crops that can grow on their islands and their ability to leave is strictly controlled, the ports are closed to all non empire ships and all local ships have been decommissioned. That is not to say they can’t leave, passage can be purchased and the pay offered to farmers in return for their work on the profitable crops can pay for it if saved. There Is even some immigration of people looking for work. The Koirari however have nowhere to go and so while the human population slowly changes as people come and go, they all remain in place, resenting their new overlords.
Exports
The Empire produces furs, leather, lumber, wool/cloth, Hiver venom and honey, monster parts(venom, blood, furs, bones etc.), whisky, truffles, tin, iron, wine, tomatoes, olives, olive oil and various enchanted items.
Izurich
Drifting Pollen
Rezod92
Lexisheeps
xxjessicaxx
Timemaster
Eviledd1984
pkken
VitaVitaAR
