Endless Blue - Week 13 - Lumulus

Biology

Lumulus – Alien Minds from the Ocean’s Floor

Swarming along the floor of the Lumulus Basin, between the weeping chemical seeps and bellowing thermal vents are the strange crab-like race of the Lumulus.  Avoiding interaction with other races, they keep behind their side of the border, and keep others on theirs.  Through strange rituals and enigmatic practice they dip into the volcanic apperatures that dot their homesea and produce wonders of art and war that the Known World covets.

Personality: Familiarity from any other source but another Lumulan is offensive to them, and could result in an immediate assault or a later planned ambush.  Otherwise, they tend to keep to themselves, vacillating between periods of slothful inactivity and bursts of manic activity.
Physical Description: Short, squat, and wide bodied, the Lumulans are covered from head to tail in a natural chitinous armor that must be molted every year.  Their hands are a peculiar radial arrangement of three powerful digits, and a series of three more primitive digits alternate between their gill slits.  It is exceedingly difficult to distinguish between male and female Lumulans and gender-confusion is common, so the Lumulans themselves preferred to referred to as the neutral “it” in a further attempt to keep the promiscuous piscean races at a distance.  What is easily discerned is which of the subspecies a Lumulan belongs, by simply noting the coloring of their chitin: the red r’hakol’va (rakova), the blue j’hastog’ke (jastog), and the black m’horst’ki (morski).
Relations: Most other races of Elqua are treated as somewhere between untouchable and feared.  Inter-racial dealings are avoided at most times, with this instinctive avoidance being ignored in brief spurts of trading.  Metals are rare beneath the waves, and those that do not corrode due to the saline water even more so.  This gives the Lumulans a huge economic advantage as they produce metal and glass items for general consumption.
Alignment: The thought processes of the Lumulus are so different than those of other pisceans that they may seem to be chaotic in nature, but the truth is that they lean more towards the lawful part of the spectrum.
Homeseas: The Lumulus Basin is a deep basin buttressed against the Spine of the World.  The floor of the basin is covered in geothermal vents that spew heat and chemicals into the stagnant waters of the lowest levels.
Religion: As hard as it may be to glean the mind of a Lumulan, it does become pretty clear that they view theology as much an alien concept as other Elquans view them.  If they have any faith at all, it would be in the power of science.
Language: Lumulans speak their own complex language, guttural in nature and punctuated heavily with clicks and chirps.  Learning the language is so difficult for non-Lumulans that they must spend two skill points each to learn how to speak and write it, but will be utterly incapable of becoming fluent as the manner in which Lumulans converse is cryptic and obfuscated.  A Lumulan can always tell when a non-native attempts to communicate in this tongue, and it is a dead give-away for individuals trying to disguise themselves as a Lumulan.
Names: There seems to be no gender bias in Lumulan nomenclature.  There are only eight clan names in the entirety of the Lumulus, but sharing the same surname does not indicated close relation.  An apostrophe (‘) in Lumulan is a gulping click from the back of the throat produced by slapping the vocal cords together.
First Names: A’klan’tlo, G’qwash’u, N’kos’zna, T’thikol’she, U’ua’ka
Forgeclan Names: G’dlu’mauex, J’warh’abvo, K’honk’coshe, M’zims’he, N’dlan’gisa, Q’oma’ithi, T’dlang’athi, X’hamel’af
Adventurers: Lumulans make strange party members.  They are difficult to relate to, work alongside, or even communicate with.  For a group of adventurers willing and patient enough to put up with the strange quirks of Lumulan existence, the pay off can be immeasurable.  The few Lumulans that achieve some kind of synergy with non-shellback races still keep them at arm’s distance.

Racial Traits

Ability Adjustments: Dexterity -2, Wisdom +4, Charisma -2
Automatic Class Skills: Decipher Script, Intuit Direction, and Speak Language.  Additionally, Lumulans are the only species with access to Profession (metalsmithing) and Profession (glassblowing), but they are not automatically known.
Skill Bonuses: Appraise +2, Decipher Script +2, Innuendo -2, Sense Motive -2.
Bonus Hit Dice: None
Natural Armor: The shell back of a Lumulan affords them some resistance to damage in the form of damage resistance 2.  This resistance will stack with any other form given by items or situation.  Shed shells are usually kept and consumed in a special ceremony commemorating the experience gained in the past year.
Natural Weapons: They hands serve as crushing claws, dealing 1d6 crushing (bludgeoning) damage as the Lumulan’s fingers constrict and crush whatever is caught between its digits.
Movement: Medium creature (1 cube tall), base speed 20 cubes.
Senses: Ultravision
Buoyancy: Shelf (adjustable)
Trance (Ex): The physiology of the Lumulan brain is so utterly different than that of other pisceans, and that fact is expressed most succinctly in their need to trance. Lumulans do not sleep; instead they enter a meditative state where they are completely aware of their surroundings, but completely incapable of acting on that knowledge.  It is impossible to rouse a trancing Lumulan from its meditative state and they are considered helpless until the required period of trancing elapses.  After any strenuous or extended activity (exiting combat initiative, taking 20 on a skill check, or spending any power points), a Lumulan must succeed a Will save DC 10 plus their level or immediate slip into their trance for a period of time equal to event that triggered the save.  For example, after a combat of four rounds, a 10^th-level Lumulus must make a Will save DC 20 or trance for four rounds.  Events that overlap (such as using psionic points during combat) will not cause the trance to trigger until all qualifying activities have ended.  Otherwise, a Lumulan must trance for four hours to achieve an equal rest to that of a Mer’s eight hour rest.
Improved Grab (Ex): Whenever a Lumulan makes a successful unarmed attack, it may immediately start a grapple as a free action that does not invoke an attack of opportunity.
Favored Class: Lumulans are the only race of the Known World with the ability to affect the waters around them with mere thought.  As such, they can take psionic classes, and do not count any such class against their multi-class levels.
Social Flaw: Xenophobic
Base Height: 3”9” (+ 2d4 in.)
Base Weight: 130 lbs. (+ height mod. x 2d6 lbs.)
Automatic Languages: Lumulan
Bonus Languages: Any.  Lumulans are so adept at languages that they can achieve the epic level feat polyglot as soon as they meet the prerequisites.  They still pay any extra skill points necessary to learn the foreign language.
Level Adjustment: None

The whole nation of the Lumulus Basin is divided into eight smaller states called forgeclans.  More than a family or a nation, all species of Lumulans co-mingle in the populace but maintain a clear respect of individual class and relation.  Each forgeclan specializes in a different aspect of national infrastructure, such as defense, agriculture, health, and so on.

Lumulan individuals are free to belong to any forgeclan they wish – heredity nor wealth play any part in the determination of their forgeclan surname, and a Lumulan may change affiliation multiple times in its lifetime.  This switch may illict ill feelings between individuals on a personal level, but socially it is as common as starting a new career is for other races.

Along with the Chelon, the lobster-like Lumulans are known as shellbacks, and an ongoing hostility has existed between the two races for as long as most can remember.  The Lumulans are just as much the aggressors in these wars as the Chelon, but more due to economic taxation than territorial annexation.

Their natural xenophobia is practically foremost in their unfathomable minds, and they will even relocate a settlement rather than co-exist with other species.  This extends even to themselves, as no Lumulan ethnicity would ever mate with a different one.  Keep in mind, this xenophobia does not originate out of fear or hatred for other races.  The closest it can be explained is that Lumulans cannot “think right” around others.

“Nothing natural is ever seen by looking into the eyes
of  a Lumulan, let alone through them…”
A common Chelon racist remark

Endless Blue - Week 12 - Chelon

Biology

Chelon – Elqua’s Caretakers of the Coral Reefs

The Chelon are a race in its twilight, a species of piscean more concerned with their own insular ideas and convoluted knowledge than the status of the races around them.  Egalitarian and deeply entrenched in process and Chelon-centric needs, they view themselves as the true piscean and all others of the Periphery as second-class races and those of the Hinterseas as no better than savages.  Despite their self-absorption, it was the Chelon that gifted the world with the ability to manipulate arcane magic.

Personality: Chelons are an obsessive people, obsessing on themselves, their exploration of self-created magic, and their eventual fate.  Generosity is hardly a quality attributed to the species.  They spare more mercy for the precious coral reefs of the Endless Blue than the species that live in them.  It is this strange, seemingly magnanimous dedication to preservation that belies the hidden compassion of Chelon.
Physical Description: Chelon are descended from shelled reptiles.  Their skin is wrinkled and loose, with hardened growths along the edges of their flippers and a collar of folded flesh around the neck.  Their skulls appear as if squeezed in on both sides by the jaws of a toothless predator and their round eyes are heavy lidded, giving them a look of distraction and a lack of lucidity.  Their upper lip has hardened into a vestigial beak over a down-turned lower lip and weak chin.  A hardened shell forms around their shoulders, extending down their backs to the mid of their pelvic bones, from which their stunted, leathery tail extends.  While genetically analogous, Chelons do have some variation on par to hair or eye color.  Terrapins tend to have more segmented shells,  Turtle shells are usually a single sloped carapace, and Tortoises shells are more bulbous, actually expanding outward before covering the back.
Relations: Chelon treat most all other races as unrefined.  This inherent racist bent does not express itself in hatred or fear, but instead as a dismissive demeanor of ambivalence, as if they could not be bothered to interact with other pisceans.
Alignment: Chelon can be any alignment, though their society tends to nurture more lawful minded individuals that conform to the expected behaviors best becoming a Chelon.
Homeseas: Chelonite settlements are usually located on the intersection of imaginary lines of natural energy that criss cross the sea bed of Elqua, and are camouflaged in well tended coral reefs that the citizens have cultured for generations as a matter of civic pride.  Admirers of the natural beauty are welcome among the Chelon, but they should not forget their lesser place.
Religion: Chelon believe themselves above such things as worship and supplication, and have developed a deity-free version of the Source, the same Source that fuels their magic, which they revere.
Language: Chelon speech is soft and well-mannered. While easily learned, writing the language is exceedingly complex, and requires non-Chelon to devote an additional skill point to Speak Language to learn the intricate script that Chelon used to eventual discover magic.
Names: Chelons receive their names by community consensus, with all members of the local settlement able to suggest names and debate their merit.  It can be a long, arduous process in more densely populated areas, but so important are progressive generations that it is one of the few things they willing let drag their attention away from mystic research.
Male Names: Aulus, Decinus, Gnaeus, Tiqus
Female Names: Appia, Malia, Quilia, Vibia
Family Names: Cloelius, Lartius, Sapvius, Vilsanius
Adventurers: While not reclusive, it is uncommon for Chelon to leave their homes without some purpose that furthers their race in some way.  It can be as simple as sending funds back home, as patriotic as protecting national interests, or as direct in advancing along the path of magic.

Racial Traits

Ability Adjustments: Intelligence +3, Dexterity -1, Charisma -2
Automatic Class Skills: Knowledge (arcana), Spellcraft
Skill Bonuses: +2 racial bonus on Decipher Script, Knowledge (arcana), and Spellcraft.
Save Bonuses: Chelon have a +2 racial bonus to saves against spells and spell-like effects due to the race’s intimate link with magic.
Bonus Hit Dice: None.
Natural Armor: The shell back of a Chelon affords them some minor resistance to damage in the form of damage resistance 1.  This resistance will stack with any other form given by items or situation.
Natural Weapons: None.
Movement: Medium creature (1 cube tall), base speed 30 cubes.
Senses: Low-Light Vision
Buoyancy: Shoals (adjustable)
Coralcutting: Chelon gain a +2 racial bonus on Search checks to notice unnatural alterations to coral growth such as those made by animals using severed branches as cover or shelter, or any warping made by magic.  Any Chelon passing within 10 feet of a creature in concealment or cover behind coral is entitled to make a Search check to notice it as if they were actively searching.  Further, they enjoy a +2 to Tracking checks through areas of coral growth, just sensing the agitation of the coral polyps in the wake of a passing creature.
Favored Class: Due to their intrinsic link to the arcane arts, Chelon excel at any class that is based on arcane spell-casting.  No arcane-based class counts against a multi-classing Chelon.
Social Flaw: Racist
Base Height: Male – 4’9” (+ 2d6 in.)
Female – 4’1” (+ 2d6 in.)
Base Weight: Male – 225 lbs. (+ height mod. x 2d6 lbs.)
Female – 175 lbs. (+ height mod. x 2d6 lbs.)
Automatic Languages: Chelon, Lumulus

Bonus Languages: Elquan, Koutonese, Locanthic, Sahaguin
Level Adjustment: None

Chelon life is in every aspect graceful and delicate, just like the coral they life amongst.  Xanthellae is the Chelon method of deriving magic from the natural world around them.  By tapping into the vital life essences of the world around them, Chelon spellcasters have learned the art of growing calcium carbonate – coral – into usable forms.  It is the fundamental building block of Chelon construction, and not only comprises most of their shelter, but also their ungues and nautiluses.  These growths of still living coral are permanently attached to the Chelon’s flesh and remain with them all their lives should they choose not to alter or remove them.

Should a Chelon reach a significant venerable age and not have succumbed to the dangers of living on Elqua, they bequeath their worldly belongings and take on a final pilgrimage to an unknown area of the Creche of Civilization.  This migration is one full of sadness and feelings of loss, as the departing Chelon is never seen again, and no sane Piscean would dare travel into the ruins of the Kraken Empire to discover this racial graveyard.  What goes on during this trek is unknown, but conjecture is that those that are not consumed by roaming predators or destroyed by hidden, left-over evils of the Kraken are rewarded with ascendance.

Bringing additional sorrow, for far too long – far longer than any Chelon is willing to admit even to themselves – the death rate of their species has outstripped their frequency of births.  With each succeeding generation the number of offspring halves, and there seems to be no slowing of this decline  This has made children a valued communal commodity, and offspring are treated as if the whole community gave birth instead of just the parents.  Heavy emphasis is placed on the greatness and accomplishments of the nation’s progenitors to such a degree that no Chelon child ever wishes to achieve less.

“The pulse of coral is the tide of life.”
Chelon explaining true xanthellae

Endless Blue - Week 11 - Orcan

Biology

Orcan -- Poet Warriors of the Endless Blue

Orcans are a contradiction in piscean form – massively built but essentially peaceful, unfathomably wise yet explosively rash.  They consider themselves the first civilized race on Elqua despite their barbaric origins, and take pride in the fact they converted their original savage ways into a strict martial lifestyle that married with their artistic and philosophical minds to become a race of contemplative poet-warriors renown across the oceans of the Endless Blue.

Personality: Usually reserved and patient, Orcans find spiritual fulfillment in investing extensive effort over long periods of time.  Forward thinkers, they have an astute ability for visualizing goals and taking the necessary steps to achieve them.  They are perfectly suited for tasks that require prolonged dedication and delayed results.
Physical Description: Orcans are a Large race, reaching 9” to 10’ long.  Their skin is thick with blubber, yet their bodies are well toned.  Their heads are somewhat bullet shaped, with their faces extending into a curved snout.  Instead of conical ears, the Orcans possess a tympanic membrane on either side of their head just above where their jaws meet their thick necks.  Ruffled bands of muscle extend from their lower jaw to just above their solar plexus, and their chests are barrel-shaped.   Their pelvic and tail fins evolved into flippers and a fluke, and their hands consist of three fingers and a thumb each.
Relations: Orcans view the other intelligent races as bickering children, and will often chide them for their behaviors, yet will resolutely not interfere.  They have allowed the Shellback War between the Chelon and Lumulus to rage for countless centuries despite their homesea laying between the two antagonistic bodies of water.
Alignment: Orcans are usually lawful, even those of the Narwahl that still cling to the old Cetacean Barbarian ways.
Homeseas: The homesea for the Orcans lies in the northern and western section of the Periphery around the Core.
Religion: As one of the “civilized” races, Orcans have abandoned the practice of Pantheon worship.  However, they still cling to the old ways of ancestor deification.
Language: Orcans speak Cetacean, a complex language perfectly suited for their vocal flexibility that at its root puts more emphasis on the pitch of speech than on the words spoken.
Names: In contradiction to their physical presence, Orcan names tend to consist of soft consonants and extended vowels, with a melodious sound well suited for singing.  Males tend to be named after their grandfathers (patriarchal, then matriarchal), while females are named after their grandmothers (matriarchal, then patriarchal).  On the off chance parents conceive of more children than the convention allow, the granduncles/grandaunts are then honored, descending in age.  Family names are the same as that of the pod.

Male Names: Anzaan, Ensho, Fuyoo, Sunyan
Female Names: Enmei, Farahl, Issoh, Lulesh
Family Names: Fushin, Hoyun, Mumol, Zenish

Adventurers: Adventuring Orcans have a little more of that hereditary wanderlust that drove the Cetacean Barbarians warring across the waves of Elqua.  They will enjoy venturing to new places, meeting new people, learning new things, and fighting new foes.  The race as a whole has an almost rapturous viewpoint in all things, be it lethal combat or uproarious camaraderie.

Racial Traits

Ability Adjustments: Orcan – Constitution +4, Charisma +2, Dexterity -2
Narwahl – Strength +2, Constitution +4, Wisdom -2
Automatic Class Skills: Listen, Perform (sing)
Skill Bonuses: +2 racial bonus on Intimidate and Innuendo checks.
Bonus Hit Dice: Orcans and Narwahl start with +1 Hit Die at 1^st level
Natural Weapons: Orcans have a Bite (1d6), while Narwahl instead use their dental tusks to Gore (1d6).
Movement: Large Creature (2 cubes tall), base speed 40 cubes.
Senses: Echolocation
Buoyancy: Shelf (adjustable)
Toughness (Ex): Orcans of both varieties posses damage reduction equal to their Constitution modifier from non-lethal damage.  This ability applies to non-lethal damage regardless of the source, be it from subdual attacks, environmental hazards, or biological stress.  However damage can never be reduced to less than 1 point.
Favored Class: Orcan – Monk (Monk Orcans can multiclass, ignore the restrictions of the Monk class).
Narwahl – Barbarian (Narwhal do not need to meet the non-lawful alignment criteria to become a barbarian).
Social Flaw: Hubristic
Base Height: Male – 9’1” (+ 2d6 in.)
Female – 8’5” (+ 2d6 in.)
Base Weight: Male – 500 lbs. (+ height mod. x 3d6 lbs.)
Female – 450 lbs. (+ height mod. x 3d6 lbs.)
Automatic Languages: Cetacean, Elquan
Bonus Languages: Chelon, Lumulus, Koutonese
Level Adjustment: +1

Orcan society is ritual based, and beginning essentially from birth the young are trained, tested, and re-trained in every facet of their society.  It is rare that an Orcan will pass these tests on the first try, and their civilization acknowledges this fact by incorporating a belief that failure is not catastrophe.  In a savage world like Elqua, failure results in damage and death, and as a result of their embracing failure as a lessoned learned, scars have become a bragging right. Scarification has become ingrained into the society, comparable to what tattoos are for ours.

One of the most important rites of passage for a young Orcan is mastering their pod’s school of martial combat.  Nothing means acceptance to an Orcan than knowing they have mastered the same fighting prowess as their father and mother, aunts and uncles, cousins and siblings have for generations before them.  It is common to find the entirety of a pod possessing the same feats, wielding the same ungues, armored in the same nautiluses as their brethren, unified in belief, in skill, in blood – a communal martial family.

This does not mean their style of fighting is rigid or antiquated, incapable of innovation or adaption.  Indeed, Orcans are very open to learning new ideas and techniques, and successfully incorporating them into their established methods.  It is of particular honor to have one’s innovation officially incorporated into the pod teachings, to be taught to subsequent young warriors on into eternity.  This most frequently happens with marriages, where one of the two bonded chooses to join to the other’s pod, and as a sort of dowry contributes a part of their original pod’s style to his or her new family.

But might is not all that defines an Orcan.  They challenge their minds as well as their bodies, and many of their martial teachings also teach philosophy and reason.  Claiming spirituality rather than religion, Orcan revere their ancestors as guiding spirits that watch over the lives of an Orcan and help guide it towards prosperity and happiness.

Leadership over a pod is usually assumed by the most hale and healty, eldest male still of functional age.  The pod’s alpha, this is not just a matter of whichever Orcan can best the previous alpha in combat.  There are traditional rituals both Orcans must test themselves with, and though there will always be physical trails due to the harsh surroundings on Elqua, wisdom and charisma are just as important to a leader as strength is.  Most alphas are aware of their progressive age and dwindling faculties, and will usually accept the challenge to their leadership thankfully, for the better of the pod.  But they will still insist on the completion of the trials to prove the new leader’s abilities.  No alpha would pass on the mantle of command to an unfit successor and still live.  And even if a new challenger deposes the established alpha, the pod can refuse the usurper’s status of their free will.  It is inconceivable for an Orcan pod to be controlled by a tyrant unless the majority of the pod shared in his cruelty.

“Life began in water; today it ends in blood…”
Warcry of the Cetacean Barbarians

Endless Blue - Week 10 - Species of the Endless Blue

Biology

Species of the Endless Blue
Scholars divide the races of Elqua into the civilized and primitive nations.  Claiming enlightened criteria, this dichotomy forced on intelligent species in actuality is an arbitrary and elitist separation based on homeogenic qualities that the societies among the Periphery and Crèche of Civilization share in common: namely a non-representative alphabet, an educational system, a lack of ethnic diversity, and an abandonment of Pantheon worship.  Some hypocrisy remains in this division of higher evolved grouping, as two of the four Civilized races still reproduce oviparously (via egg production) instead of viviparously (live birth); conversely, two of the primitive races carry their children to term.

Civilized Races of the Periphery

Chelon [kappa sapien] – The Chelon are a race in decline, having long ago reached their nation’s height of power and now suffer through the long, agonized slide into obscurity.  Chelon live to great age, but for far too long their birth rate has been outstripped by their natural death rate.  So old is the race that whatever ethnological variation they may have had homogenized into the sole race known of today.   Aristocratic in nature, they gave the Known World many of its inventions, and the Chelon Sea is believed to be the birthplace of magic.  They have chevron-shaped heads with a flat cranium, with small, inset eyes on either side of beaked mouth and a weak chin under that.  They possess a shell from their stooped shoulders that covers their back and most of their notably short tail.  Their skin, while not a bony as the shell on their back, is toughened with calluses.  Along with Lumulus, they are sometimes referred to collectively as “Shellbacks”, and the on-again/off-again war between the two distant nations has been coined after that appellation.
Pl. Chelon; adj. Chelonite

Lumulus [rakovica sapien] – Xenophobic and withdrawn, the Lumulus are the most alien of all the sentient races of Elqua’s Known World.  Masters of heat and the rare metals and glass of the ocean societies, these beings from the Lumulus Basin participate in a detached yet heavy commerce with the other bodies of water.  They possess a haunched, banded exoskeletal shell that they must shed yearly to grow.  Lumulus never stop growing, but only the rarest specimen has ever grown nearly as large as a Mer.  They have two main arms that end with three fingered hands that are heavily yet naturally armored, and a series of three “digits” interspersed between their gill slits.  Their eyes are completely black, and they possess long, fine, wiry hairs from their upper lip.  Perhaps the most notable feature of the Lumulus is their blue blood.  Their society is broken down into eight forgeclans, with their three ethnicities (rakova, jastog, and morski) freely intermixed.   Even though they are separated on either ends of the Known World, the Lumulus and Chelon nations have engaged in hostilities for most of their history.
Pl. Lumulus; adj. Lumulan

Mer [piscean sapien] – A race in ascendance despite some truly tragic self-induced calamities, the Mer are coming into their own.  Half-mammalian and half Piscean, the Mer were the most varied in appearance and were organized into thirteen tribes called “currents”.  These currents each form their own autonomous yet interdependent state under the banner of the Mer species.  At the present time, only eight of those original ethnicities still exist.  Despite this seeming turn toward extinction, the remaining currents are thriving, and now consider their expanse of the known world to be claustrophobic and have begun to look outward for more breathing room.  The Merfolk are perhaps the most diverse coloration (which determines in which current they belong), with a myriad of patterning that varies from family to family.
Pl. Mer, Merfolk (antiquated); adj. Mer

Orcan [cetacean sapien] – Considering themselves to be the first race of Elqua, the Orcans are warrior poets descended from the once marauding Cetacean barbarians.  Their skin is smooth, yet thick, with a rubbery texture that belies the practiced lethality of their martial history.  Ridged folds of skin contract from their where their lower lip would be down over their broad, barrel chests to their solar plexus. Strict vegetarians, this ruffled skin expands on their distendable jaws to swallow massive volumes of water, and the plates hanging from the back of the throat strain the great amounts tiny plankton they need each day to survive.  This does not mean the race is toothless, as they posses a series of similarly spaced out, pointed incisors that can inflict a vicious bite.  Indeed, one of their two subraces – the Narwahl – still feature the pair of dental tusks that jut from the upper lip which the Cetacean Barbarians were so well reknown.
Pl. Orcans, Cetacean (antiquated); adj. Orcan

Ceph [vulgaris sapien] – These are the degenerate descendants of the dominating Kraken.  Considered lower than the Primitive races of the Hinterseas, yet found collectively among even the most effluent societies, the Ceph have proven they are survivors, if anything.  They fill any niche they can, desperately trying to eek out a living in the face of the bigotry leveled against them.  Heightening this estrangement is the curious fact they are the sole intelligent race that does not share the torso/tail morphology common to the sapient races, and instead appear as larger, more advanced octopi capable of speech.  They also posses three subspecies, differentiated by the ridge patterns formed on their foreheads by their cuttle bones.  They all posses the eight limbed form and strange “w”-shaped pupil form of their forefathers, but at a greatly reduced stature.  Ceph do have an interesting natural camouflage ability that helps them hide even in the brightest lit waters of the Shore.
Pl. Ceph; adj. Cephic

Primitive Races of the Hinterseas

Kuoton [kaeru sapien] – The Kuoton are an old race that has harassed the other intelligent races for millennia, using many forgotten secrets of dangerous evils that dwell in the oceans beyond the Known World.  Their form is roughly amphibian, resembling a frog, with slimy skin hanging loose around inflatable jowls and a mouth filled with tiny, needle shaped teeth, giving the species an appearance of having it face smashed flat.  Their blunt snouted head is diminutive in proportion to their bulging, wide-spaced eyes that each posses a sideways nictitating eyelid.  Their arms and tail are thin, but strong, and their hands appear webbed like their tail flukes.  Over all, their oily bodies are reedy except for a paunch around their pelvic flukes.
Pl. Kouton; adj Koutonese

Locanth [peixe sapien] – The Locanth are still a nomadic race, just as their ancient forefathers were, migrating around the Gulf of Locanth in pursuit of their traditional meals.  They have dim, oval eyes on either side of the skull like herbivores, yet they maintain a mostly carnivorous diet.  Since their gaping mouths lack any teeth, and their slender fingered hands do not end with claws, the species on the whole are not aggressive and tend to distrust outsiders.  Large fins sprouting from their arms and sides of their tail work in conjuction with their pelvic fins, making Locanths perhaps the fastest intelligent race on Elqua.  There is little to tell the difference between the male and female of the species other than the dark markings around the female’s egg sacs.
Pl. Locanths; adj. Locanthic

Sahaguin [vis sapien] – Sahaguin are a primitive race, larger than any other of the Known World races save the Cetaceans.  They also have extended fins along their arms and tail like the Locanth, but the more predatory eyes and mouth like the Kouton.  There is little to no fat on the body of a Sahaguin, and the muscles underneath their heavily scaled skin are visibly rippled, like coils traveling from the head down to the tip of their tail.   Over all, they are superbly fit for their predatory lifestyle, and their aggressiveness knows little restraint.  They have maintained a constant animosity to the Mer to such an extent that the two cannot co-exist in the same living area for long before hostilities break out.  They are deathly secretive about their children, and any inquiry about their noted absence results in violence.
Pl. Sahaguin; adj. Sahaguani

Yaun-Teel [anguiliformes sapien] – Originally thought to be an offshoot of the Mer, the Yaun-Teel will usually be mistaken for Mer with a casual glance.  However, upon closer inspection, their subtle eel-like features betray their origins.  Their bodies are lithe and agile, with slender necks and tapered fingers.  Perhaps the most telling feature of their form is that their eyes never blink.  They are a guileful and manipulative race, believing without exception in the superiority of their bloodline.  As such, any adept race other than themselves is considered fair game for slavery, including their close cousins, the Mer.
Pl. Yaun-Til, adj, Yaun-Til

Keep in mind, while these are the races of the Endless Blue setting, they do not define the nationalities beyond the area of the Known World the races first began.  Outside of physical limitations (i.e., the Shelf of the Cetacean Oceans) and national dogma (the xenophobic Lumulus Basin), there are cross border bloodlines: Mer that have lived in the Chelon Seas since the original thirteen currents, or Narwhal in the Sahaguin Lagoons, and the Ceph in nearly every body of water.  Individuals of these multicultural upbringings will have mixed their biological heritage with their societal surroundings to form towns, even metropolises, of unique character and vision.