Races

Ocrim

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Canish

A sturdy and well-mannered people, the Canish are equally at home in most locations and professions but tend to prefer inland locales with untamed swathes of land for hunting or building. For all that the Felish are seen as fast and free, the Canish tend to be slower to adapt to change and more preferential towards laying down strong roots and creating robust communities. A people who deeply enjoy the satisfaction of crafting, many are artisans, masons, jewelers, smiths, weavers, and carpenters. They tend to show little interest in farming, but will readily take up bow and sword for the thrill and challenge of hunting: not all butchers are Canish, but butchers offering exotic, fresh selections are overwhelmingly of this demographic. Canish species tend to be less distinct and striking than those within the other Ferrum branches, so broadly, they as a race are less affected by— and thus less concerned with— the restrictions on mixing blood. Getting away with partnering to any other Canish— or visibly similar Multin permitted to seek Canish partners— is not particularly difficult when one's main identifying feature is simply "gray fur".

Much like the Felish, the Canish also have digitigrade paws (albeit unapologetically noisy), fangs, claws, tails, and ears in varying shapes, sizes, and tones. They tend to exhibit muted colors and simple markings, if any at all, and their semi-slit pupils aren't overly adept at seeing in the dark but are conversely not handicapped by day, either. The Canish primarily shine when it comes to their sense of smell: while none of the Ferrum are competitors to true animals in regards to the senses, Canish are able to track very strong, fresh scents for short distances. They have noses well-suited to determining the shelflife and quality of perishables, closing in on elusive game when hunting, and possess an undeniable edge as perfumiers and alchemists. If ever there's a fire or gas leak, a Canish will most certainly be the first to notice.

Kerim

The ruling race of the continent of Leifr concerned only with their idea of racial purity, which even they cannot fully define or agree upon. They are the modern day effort of centuries of Otorim interbreeding with the other sapient races in an effort to salvage their depleting numbers. While at first it was a desperate free-for-all— which resulted in the Otorim genepool being spread far and wide among every group of Ferrum but also very diluted in turn— as soon as their population swelled and stabilized and began solidly identifying as "the Kerim", widespread efforts were made to try and couple with 'the next best thing': any Ferrum who had even a trace of something similar to an Otorim's features. Naturally, this manifested in Kerim preferentially choosing bovidae Ferrum partners: those whom were large and strong, with antlers or horns. This hardly checked all the boxes on a list the Kerim couldn't even be positive was accurate to begin with, and threw extraneous features into the mix as well (hooves, tails, horizontally elongated pupils, soft woolly hair and fur, floppy ears), but it was the closest match the Kerim could strive towards in a steadily increasing frantic race to reclaim something impossible.

Because of this rapid evolution and pseudo re-volution, the Kerim of the current day have largely subsumed and replaced the majority of Multin who once had hooves. Modern Kerim always have their unique hallmark— four arms and frozen runic patterns upon their skin— but are otherwise a sliding scale of either something closer to what an Otorim might have been similar to, or closer to a Ferrum. The former is, of course, more desirable and is considered "pure". This encompasses individuals with strong distinct runic patterns, no tails, round pupils, large and stately horns, powerful builds, an aptitude for magic, and tapered ears. The latter end of the spectrum— Kerim considered to be "muddy"— comprise those weak runic patterns, tails, 'livestock' eyes, droopy ears, short and unimpressive (or lopsided/odd numbered) horns, smaller statures, and poor magical skill.

Due to the Kerim becoming so widespread during their progenitors' initial gambit to preserve themselves, and by virtue of being physically and magically superior in most cases, they came to be the dominant force on the continent even if they were not closely united in appearance with many still having the tails and ears of Canish and Felish, the wings of Volucrin, the stout claws of Multin, etc. At that time, only rapidly-fading Otorim features here and there could further identify them at all. At first, this position of broad power had little unified aim beyond the usual goals of running any society and vaguely 'trying to marry within the community'; soon though those Kerim exhibiting traits closer to the lost Otorim received more attention and respect, even rising to local celebrity status. As more arranged marriages begun to take place between Kerim deemed 'most Otorim' and produce even more refined children, naturally, a hierarchy of royalty and affluence arose alongside the practice. Now with a population galvanized by and fascinated with both the concept of unity and a return to something "better" for their legacy, the Kerim sought to chase this ideal form at all costs. Those costs eventually manifested in the outlawing of any species mixing, punishments backed up by threat and followthrough of execution, discriminatory laws, and a forceful co-opting of the country's main religion.

Often depending upon the purity of who you ask, the Kerim will have a wide spread of opinions on the matter of attempting to return to their roots; though most will agree— however reluctantly, for good or for ill— that the Blood Mandate did objectively work as intended for all species.

For the Kerim's efforts, all in society have been made Whole.

Felish

The Felish have settled primarily along shorelines of Leifr and have a long, rich history of being the backbone for many maritime industries. Shipping and sailing, fishing and diving… their sure footing and a shared love for seafood finds most members of this race involved with the ocean and rivers if not personally, then either tangentially or by way of their family members. Felish are free spirited and taken easily by whims; their lives and decisions are viewed as chaotic and impulsive, constantly changing trajectory and location and even partners. As a result of this dabbling in many varied things throughout their lives, Felish also make for excellent storytellers and raucous bar patrons. If a Felish is not married to the water, it is likely that they are married to the performing arts, instead.

With thin whiskers, sharp claws, silent digitigrade paws and exceptional agility, the grace of the Felish assuredly compares to that of their fully-animal counterparts. Aside from some Multin and particularly blessed Kerim, Felish boast the most eye-catching patterns: trails of rosettes or spots may run down the length of their spines or dust the arches of the cheeks, or stripes and patches may decorate their legs and collarbones. They have a faintly cleft lip and sharp fangs, and are capable of purring or hissing although such undignified displays are reserved only for close relationships or when pushed to the extremes of their normally jovial tempers. With slit pupils and the telltale shine of tapetum lucidum, their night vision is surpassed only by the Vesper and other nocturnal Multin. (A Felishes daytime vision is poor; many will wear glasses to slightly alleviate this.) Ears atop the head are on a constant swivel, eternally interested in anything and everything going on around them that might provide some manner of entertainment to break the monotony that the Felish so loathe.

Volucrin

As do the avian origins they clearly hail from, the Volucrin come in all colors of the rainbow and countless shapes and sizes. Although dispersed to every corner of the country and most in their element when cutting through the sky, all Volucrin call Corvata home whether by birth or recent ancestry. They are solely responsible for the country of Leifr's intricate network of shipping— that of news, that of legal records and money, and that of moderately sized packages— and are able to do so significantly faster and more safely than the nascent railways. It is nearly impossible to run into a Volucrin who does not have some manner of hand or history in the postal service, as the job is contested only by Vesper and that which is too cumbersome to deliver by air at all.

Along with the Vesper, the Volucrin generally are not practicers of Pittance: the sucking, dead space above the Holes fills flighted creatures with dread, and they are no exception. Holes are respectfully feared, not revered, and their home island's Hole, Arioso, has a complete dearth of civilization surrounding it for many miles compared to mainland counterparts. Flight paths and delivery itineraries are plotted entirely with Holes first, and weather immediately second, for most Vol and Vesp would heartily agree that being caught clipping the airspace of a Hole is far more terrible an experience than flying headlong into a hurricane.

Volucrin specialize into niches of the postal service or other jobs that their wing types most suit; high-speed and elliptical shapes dominate local and emergency deliveries, wide and sturdy broad wings handle cross-country transit, and long, narrow soaring wings are both a blessing and a curse. Any Volucrin of this designation— ones capable of leaving the country of their own volition at any moment— are earmarked as such, and often "convinced" to work exclusively for the Crown itself as a liaison to foreign lands. The expectation is that they will make the long, harrowing overseas flights as necessary for whatever the Crown desires, and have two choices: one, to return faithfully and be paid handsomely and breathe not a word of life abroad, or two, to remain forever abroad and forfeit their lives in Leifr, never to return. A high rate of trans-continental fliers regularly go missing, and nobody ever truly knows if it's death… or if whatever is out there is worth it as to vanish so completely.

The Volucrin are a naturally flashy race and a people that take pride in art and fashion. Wings are never fully dyed— to work with one's existing patterns and colors is more admirable— but the ends of flight feathers are occasionally lined with ink or small designs to bring out contrast or draw the eye. Having scruffy, ill-kept wings is a faux pas, as many products and services are available to keep them looking presentable (exceptions are not made for molting, during which an individual is better off simply hiding inside for the week.) Replacement feathers can be imped onto damaged ones to provide a temporary fix. The Volucrin have a facial 'crest', a section of more darkly pigmented skin stretching from nosetip to the forehead, and generally thin and fragile builds that belie their strength. Tall and slightly awkward at walking, their four-toed birdlike feet suit them better to perching on branches: an evolutionary vestigiality, as the modern Volucrin clicks and scrapes their claws along paved road and wood floor more often than they spend any notable time in trees. There is, naturally, little to no market for any sort of "shoe" for this race. Preferring to fly only during the day, most will voluntarily ground themselves at sundown; this both prevents accidentally flying over Holes, and mollifies the Vesp who take over at the 'shift change'. Volucrin have neither fangs nor claws nor exceptional hearing, but most have excellent long-distance vision and nearly all Volucrin can sing quite capably.

Vesper

Vesper resemble bats and are the smallest of the races. With tall, wide ears and exceptional hearing and night vision, they have carved out a niche for themselves as being both willing and eager to burn the midnight oil working shifts and locations most others don't care for (caves, mines, overnight delivery flight.) Their leathery wings are fast and maneuverable with a membrane that connects from shoulder to the base of the spine, making most forms of shirts impossible or largely unpopular. With even worse daylight vision than the Felish, Vesp out and about will be heard clicking quietly to help navigate as they squint. Flatfooted and strong despite their size, the Vesper mostly hail from the northeast corner of Corvata, but a few splinter pockets have built towns inside cave systems and cliffsides across the country. Industrious and clever, the Vesp have engineered networks of cablecars and pulleys to keep their otherwise treacherous homes accessible for both visitors and the young/elderly/infirm.

Initially considered Multin until the steadily growing Kerim empire reclassified them as an extant branch of the Volucrin, the Vesper have recently been acknowledged as a separate race unto themselves. Despite there being stark physical differences between the Vol and the Vesp, both are the only races gifted with flight and were thus lumped together. Prior to the Blood Mandate, the Volucrin and Vesper were a mixed bag of either side's features— as were all the races of the country at the time— but separating and delineating "who was meant to pair with who" was a simple task for the Kerim: convergent evolution made both flighted, but morphologically quite different. This restriction on possible partners did make the new and already-small Vesper population struggle for a time, but the crown was unwavering: they would persevere and be made more pure for the hardship.

The Vesper argued that if they were not permitted to mix with the Volucrin anyway, they deserved to be their own designation. The petition thus granted, some amount of lingering bitterness still exists between the two recently-split races as the change in designation caused a period of much upheaval regarding records, land ownership, sovereignty, representation, and other complications that came with such a sundering.

Multin

Any person who does not clearly fall under the Canish or Felish umbrella is classed as a Multin. As the most diverse group of Ferrum, this is also the race that suffers most heavily from the Blood Mandate: Multin individuals are rarely a perfect species match, so in order to prevent a bubbling pot of resentment from boiling over into a rebellion, leniency has been extended to the partner options some Multin may choose from. However, such decisions are arbitrary and ever-changing, and frequently does it happen that Multin are accused of being Alloys and will ultimately suffer the consequences such a designation entails. For this reason, Multin are the least populous group; finding an "allowable" partner is difficult, and frequent disruptions to family lines are a constant lingering threat to their communities. Multin are contradictorily thought of as being either too picky about their partners, or not nearly picky enough. For the Multin, there is rarely any winning; only slipping under the wire in order to not lose.

Multin are comprised of those who take their ancestry traits from bears, rodents, mustelids, and many other mammalian clades. (There is a sparing headcount of remaining ungulates persisting to present day, but nearly all other hoofed species have long since been absorbed into the Kerim.) Ears may be upright or on the sides of the head, legs may be digitigrade or plantigrade, tails may be short or long or nonexistent, naked or densely furred, with eyes and noses and patterns and dentition coming in all manner of shapes and sizes and colors… a Multin's uniqueness is also their greatest detriment. Due to the hardships imposed upon them by the Kerim to prove and sustain species purity, the Multin as a whole— although few sweeping generalizations can be made of such a wide-cast net— are typically deeply invested in their families and also deeply critical of the Blood Mandate. Jobs requiring frequent travel (merchants, traders, doctors, rail workers) or regular interaction with different clientele (customer service work, vendors, mercenaries, innkeepers) are favored by Multin, as it increases their chances of finding an allowable partner if they opt to stray from their hometown.

Nil

An anomaly, the Nil are a 'race' that can barely be called as such as there appears to be no rhyme or reason to them whatsoever. Nils are so named because they seem as though they are both an amalgamation of all the races, and yet also the most "nothing": rounded ears and flat feet, no fur or tails, no claws or wings or horns, exceedingly average senses, and utterly no ability at all to cast any magic, the Nil are like looking into a strange mirror where all defining features of a given race have been pared away to leave behind the blank template each could, conceivably, begin from. And yet, the Nil are not considered a race unto themselves because they are incidental and sterile. Any coupling of any people— sanctioned or otherwise, from the highest noble to the lowest beggar— can result in a Nil offspring. To have a Nil child however is not seen as an outright failure. Rather, it is seen as something to be pitied. Nil are not barred from society or the possibility of a good, holistic life in the same way Alloys are, but their perceived 'handicaps' do make things harder in all theaters. In matters of documentation and slip usage, and preclusion of any magical fields of work and study, and dead-end bloodlines further clouding matters of succession, Nil are both rare and disadvantaged even if most are still loved and accepted. Because they are sterile the Kerim regime pays them no mind; as a silver lining of their inability to conceive, Nil are never targeted or accused of being Alloys and are given free rein to court whomever they please, meaning sex work is a common trade. Nil are often considered the "last ditch effort" for Multin with heavy restrictions on partners that are fed up with attempting to stay within the Kerim's lines: such unions will never produce children, but they will also never be harassed. Nil, while notably unable to use magic, are oddly resistant to it. Unknown to science and the public at large, a Nil is closer to an Ocrim in this regard than even the most pure Kerim; but unfortunately their biology disallows them from using any magic at all.

Alloy

As the illegal offspring of any two races disallowed to intermix, Alloys scrape the bottom rung of society in the luckiest of cases. To be an Alloy is a crime one can never recover from, and one whose parents pay the ultimate price for committing: death. For as long as rules exist so too do those who break them, and retribution is avoided in any way possible. To claim kinship with an Alloy is as much a social death sentence as an actual one, and as such, many Alloys do not even know their families. Discarded at birth, left orphaned by executed parents, turned away from orphanages and foster homes, refused medical attention, and denied employment and aid in any form, the true number of Alloys in the world is unknown and impossible to measure because it can be argued they must surely expire at nearly the same rate they are created. Alloys that are unlucky enough to be registered are harangued by the government at every turn— forced to check in frequently, to declare intent to move, to disclose income sources— and these additional pressures and restrictions make an already hard and lonely life even harder. Further complicating the requirements to merely existing is the fact that most things are barred from Alloys either implicitly or explicitly. They cannot own land; cannot have employees; cannot be employed by any governmental posting; cannot marry or reproduce under any circumstances; cannot utilize the slip banking system in any way; and any crimes they commit are met with harsh backlash. Naturally, most Alloys turn to crime anyway, begging, or self-sustainment (hunting, fishing, living off the land and out of sight, or selling their own wares.) Others simply die be it from hunger or exposure, or from hate crimes in places the Enforcers turn a blind eye and closed ear to.

Alloys that are unregistered face a similar host of problems, but for them at least, a glimmer of hope may exist: depending on presentation, if one can 'get away' with posing as the full blooded race of either parent, they may sneak under the knife's edge and have themselves registered as a normal citizen later in life. Remaining unregistered is itself a crime, one which is partially waived if an Alloy comes forward willingly before eighteen but which is treated as worthy of execution if they do not. There is a small underground market for permanent alterations: tail docks, ear cuts, limb or fur removal, pedicle burnouts, deliberate scarring of the cornea to trade blurry vision for erasing the identifying hallmark of slit eyes… these surgeries are shoddy and risky, and few can afford them anyway. The very best and most realistic thing an Alloy can hope for is simply to be 1. unregistered, 2. not visibly of mixed descent, and 3. to scrape out some semblance of stability or a decent living in any way they possibly can, and make it past their late forties.

There is a level of intersectionality and shared misery among Alloys and the Multin, as both classes suffer from the Blood Mandate albeit to different degrees. Where sympathetic minds can be found among the Multin, so too can hostile ones that blame Alloys for catching them up as collateral damage. The general populace of Leifr ranges from being dismissive of Alloys to unaware of just how many lurk and suffer in their midst, to actively persecuting them, to discreetly— or overtly— offering assistance and defending their existences (however ineffective such a thing may ultimately be, given the power structure of an immovable, implacable monarchy.) Much support for Alloys comes from the same place the antagonism does: Pittance. A stubbornly surviving branch of Arlian (the original iteration of Pittance), Behemism is seen by many Alloys as something to cling to to try and justify themselves. It tells them they are already Whole, because Be seeks only the harmony and growth of one's inner self. The Lovian denomination however— the current primary religion of the country, made by the Kerim's twisting of Arlian for centuries— instead condemns them for their mixed blood, claiming that a person of two mismatching halves can intrinsically never be Whole.

For Alloys, most days are a struggle, and the odds are stacked against them in such a way that giving up is generally the path of least resistance.

Nidus