Bionid
Bionids, or bionoids, are large insectoid humanoids created by the Imperial Elven Navy (IEN) during the First Unhuman War from elven and human volunteers.
Discarded by the IEN after the end of the Unhuman War, bionids had continued to survive on the fringes of the Known Spheres, harboring a deep distrust and hatred for elfkind. This resulted in many bionids joining the Scro during the Second Unhuman War, fighting against their once-elven creators.
Basic Information
Anatomy
In their "base" humanoid form, bionids appear to be normal elves, half-elves, or humans that may be more slender, muscled, or taller for their race. Despite their normal appearance, bionids tend to eschew unnecessary movements.
At will, bionids can undergo what they refer to as the Change, a near instantaneous transformation into their combat form. These forms can stand between 9 and 11 feet tall and resemble insects with an iridescent exoskeleton. Chitinous blades protrude from the head and arms of their exoskeleton. Their face is dominated by large compound eyes that are supplemented with four secondary eyes capable of independent movement.
In between their compound eyes lies the bionid's crystal eye, both the item responsible for their creation and the weak point of a bionid. The crystal eye remains hidden inside the skull of a bionid in their base form, but becomes visible in their combat form. Should a direct blow shatter the crystal eye, a bionid will die, reverting back to their base state. If a crystal eye is removed, bionids appear to die, but the soul of the creature is actually located within the eye, from which it can be regenerated.
Biological Traits
As biological weapons of war, bionids are supremely dangerous in combat. They tend to favor unarmed, close range combat, using their superior strength to quickly close distances with a leap and attacking opponents with their forearm blades, spiked fists, or heel spurs. Bionids that fight with weapons do so with a unique double-bladed halberd that posses both a bladed and pointed side which further takes advantage of their strength and speed.
Additionally, as a last resort, bionids can open their chest plates to expose two highly charged membranes that are capable of shooting jets of fire up to 30 ft. in front of them, similar in destructiveness to the spell Fireball. However, doing so is extraordinarily draining on a bionid, requiring a full day of rest to recover from.
Genetics and Reproduction
The process of creating a bionid is extremely invasive. Mature bionids can produce a disc-shaped "egg" that contains a new crystal eye. When a potential host touches the egg, their soul becomes ensnared within the eye, which then lodges itself in their head, creating a new bionid. Alternatively, if a crystal eye is removed from a still living bionid, the eye may recognize its taker as a stronger host than its current one, overtaking their soul and discarding the soul of the original host.
As a result of their creation as soldiers of the First Unhuman War, if an orc, goblinoid, ogre, or kobold grasps a crystal eye, it explodes in a mass of corrosive filaments, typically destroying the eye and killing the offending individual in the process. Rarely, half-orcs may be turned into bionids instead of being killed, the result of their human ancestry.
While bionids can have natural born children, such a union was not intended by their elven creators and is exceptionally rare. Most newly created bionids are the result of recruitment, accidents, or trickery.
Civilization and Culture
History
During the First Unhuman War, the Imperial Elven Navy was in dire need of shock troops that could go toe to toe with the ogres and orcs they were fighting against. Their studies resulted in the creation of bionids, which were created from elven volunteers to serve as shock troops for ground and boarding assaults. Humans were also accepted as bionid candidates, as many fought as mercenaries during the war.
The bionids were extremely effective as organic fighting machines, helping to neutralize the advantage brought by the superior strength of many orcs and ogres. However, after the war many elves began to view bionids like plague victims or genetic freaks. The knowledge that they only way they could reproduce was through luring or tricking others, a practice that rarely happened, was enough justification for many elven communities to shun bionids. While not universal, and some sympathetic elven communities accepted individual bionids, many left their homes to travel and live along in solitary or small family groups.
Occasionally, larger bionid communities would form from hundreds of members. These communities were often spiritual in nature, viewing their combat augmentations as something that should be honed through careful practice and rarely deployed. However, some bionid communities became united in their bitter hatred for the elves that abandoned them, and in the centuries since the First Unhuman War many of these battle clans have launched bloody, brutal attacks on IEN outposts and communities. Due to the harm such attacks would cause to the wider bionid community and the IEN's status as the hegemonic leader of wildspace, the knowledge of many of these attacks were suppressed.
In the mid-15th century, the ancestors of the ogres, kobolds, goblinoids, and ogres defeated during the First Unhuman War began reunifying. Calling themselves the Scro, this new organization formed to get destroy the hated IEN and end elven dominance over wildspace. As a militarized and disciplined force targeting the IEN, many bionids were drawn by the Scro's goals and sense of commraderie, and when the Second Unhuman War broke out in 1479, the IEN found themselves fighting against many of the same creatures they had created four centuries prior.
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