Void Breached

Void Breached are individuals born with an unnatural affinity for one of the Voids that has broken through into the world of the Feran Hegemony. This affinity often allows them to navigate within the void or, in some cases where the conditions of the void make it particularly virulent to human life, simply survive it where others would perish.

Symptoms

The symptoms of Void Breach are unique to the void producing it. In some cases, such as the Tebren Void, it manifests merely as a mental sense of direction for whatever one is seeking within the void. In more extreme cases it might produce actual physical changes within the afflicted, allowing them to traverse the void in safety.

Treatment

As there is no known cure for this manifestation of a lack of the Divine, for how does one cure spiritual depravity that is rooted in the blood itself, the Sciential has decreed that all the Afflicted are under their care, that their moral corruption might not spread its contamination to the general populace.

What this equates to in literal terms is slavery. The Breached become the property of the Sciential in all but name. The severity with which this ownership is enforced depends greatly on the usefulness of the resources within the void and the local social conditions.

Affected Groups

Breached only appear in a population that is in the area when a void first breaks through. According to the Sciential, this alters the very composition of the blood in those who survive the cataclysm so that any of their descendants becomes a candidate for being born with a connection to the void.

For example, in the case of the Tebren Void, the void had already broken through before the arrival of the Ferans. The native population were therefore the only ones affected by it.

Thus in New Padras, neither the Ferans nor any slags they have imported are able to be born as Breached. Nor any of the population of citizenry who has migrated there since the Feran domination of the region. The native population are therefore the only source of spice runners who are able to find and bring the spices out of the Tebren Void. Because of this they receive more privileges and protections than many of the other native populations. Without them the entire spice trade would be non existent.

Cultural Reception

As voids are considered by the Ferans to be a result of the loss of the Divine in the world, this affinity is considered to be evidence of the lack of the Divine in an afflicted individual and therefore something akin to a spiritual illness. Albeit a useful one.

Type

Supernatural

Origin

Magical

Cycle

Chronic, Congenital

Rarity

Rare