Lilims Species in Gates of Eternity [2.0] | World Anvil

Lilims

Lilims are the faulty children born out of desperation. They were created in the prehistoric times after the human invasion (counterinvasion, technically) has succeeded in dislodging of the northernmost tribes of the umbral beastkin of Telya. It was achieved solely because of said tribes suffering grotesque casualties in their recent war against the local colony of the Menorian Federation. And soon, as one can expect, the beastkin began to strike back.   Humans quickly understood that they simply cannot hope to stop the beastkin, who were not only physically superior to them but also had a technically endless amount of troops for whose lives they really didn't care. Worse, the only alternative was surrendering their independence to the Federation, something they wanted to avoid due to how 'different' it was from them. As a result, they had to get creative to survive.   The tribes that were to become the ancestors of the lilims (and lilims themselves) had numerous supernatural goods in their arsenal, courtesy of the Xylian Dominion through which territory (now, after the Black Iron War, in ruins) they passed through along the way. This lead to a large-scale genetic manipulation project done by shamans in their tents, a true sign of desperation.   If anything, lilims are a proof of how lucky said shamans were since they actually pulled it off. What's more, once the lilims fully replaced the local human population, they actually succeeded in repelling the beastkin counterinvaders. On the other hand, certain side-effects made a ot of the lilims wish the shamans didn't succeed.

Basic Information

Anatomy

Lilims are technically humans that have been altered with a certain collection of genes (who on its own are at least partially magical in nature). The result is a human-derived species easily recognizable by their set of horns, and thin yet quite strong and very flexible tails (that can be used by the lilims as a sort of weaker but more agile third arm). Some cases grow even stronger and taller (from the already quite tall and strong lilims) and additionally have both leathery wings and even cloven hooves instead of feet.

Genetics and Reproduction

The problem of the lilim reproduction - and the most glaring mistake of their ancient shamans - is extremely skewed gender ratio. Lilims have only one male per approximately six females (1:10 when it comes to those for whom their 'lilimness' settled deeper, resulting in development of hooves and wings). This has resulted in massive societal changes and rather extreme form of polygamy becoming the standard among them, although even that isn't enough to keep all women 'occupied' (and results in large emigration of 'surplus' lilim women into the countries with large human population).   The lilim genetics are predominantly human, however their 'special' genes are all de facto recessive. As a result, their uniqueness evaporates entirely after two or three generations (at best) of interbreeding with non-lilims. This, among other things, is why they are so much against said interbreding unless it's done on their terms (so primarily outside of their countries by lilim emigrants, or - in the past - with the people who were going to leave their lands eventually, such as imperial soldiers stationed there).

Additional Information

Perception and Sensory Capabilities

In no way different to the baseline humans, even if an average level of all the basic senses is slightly above their average.


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