Shuddeni

Overview
STR	17
INT	25
WIS	23
DEX	17
CON	17
CHR	23
Resists	Negative
Vulnerable	Light
Bonus	+2 mana per level
Special	Blind immunity, increased movement in darkness

Hailing from the labyrinthine underground realm of Kutlaset, the shuddeni are an isolationist people widely reviled on the surface for their association with Ashur and their role in the War of Night as agents of destruction.

Biology

Shuddeni are subterranean, sapient humanoid marsupials, between six and seven feet tall on average. They lack eyes, instead perceiving the world with a psionic organ that allows them to discern depth, colour, and shape, albeit not the way those with eyes do. Their skin is grey in tone and noticeably wrinkled and their bodies are hairless, making their most notable physical change during maturity the depth and prominence of their skin creases. Their diets consist primarily of fungus, insects, and spiders, and they have numerous sharp teeth and strong jaws. Though otherwise physiologically similar to other marsupials, the shuddeni are bidirectional sequential hermaphrodites, their sex changing based on external social pressures. In addition, the shuddeni possess a unique experience of physical pain, which is perceived without unpleasantness or suffering. They recognize it as potentially harmful, which may lead to subsequent anger or other arousal, but the emotional dimension of the pain itself is described as neutral rather than inducing suffering or agony.

Culture

Shuddeni are near-universally agender and lack the same kinds of gender roles possessed by most surface lineages. Instead, their pronouns refer to relative status, changing based on the situation and interaction. In the mingling of humanity and shuddeni however, 'superior' and 'inferior' (in truth very complex social concepts for the shuddeni) became simplified and translated as 'male' and female.' Most surface shuddeni and many Kutlatsen shuddeni who deal with people from the surface default to masculine presentations as a result, though there are shuddeni who exclusively use the feminine for personal, social, or political reasons.

Shuddeni culture is rigidly hierarchical, with power, control, and dominance playing significant roles in their interactions with one another. A complex intersection of factors determines ones' social role relative to another, and there is equally complex etiquette concerning social climbing, often involving the outsmarting, humiliation, or ousting of ones' social, religious, or academic rivals. The rise of Arkhural saw the observance of many of these mores fade in favor of raw aggression, and the assertion of Rveyelhan order after the War of Night never quite blunted those teeth.

Though the shuddeni reputation for violence is not undeserved, much of their aggressive interpersonal impulses are sublimated into eroticism and sex. Such relationships tend to be contentious shading to violent, though still consensual, with the ideal of such relationships being thought akin to striking flint; ideally, both are sharpened by the impact. Shuddeni eroticism is exemplified in depictions of their gods, Arkhural and Rveyelhi, who are commonly thought to have such a relationship on the deific scale. In contrast, they are nearly always utterly monogamous in their romantic partnerships, viewing their partner as an extension of themself, and tend to remain so entangled for life. Shuddeni live together in groups called clans made up of such partnerships, who raise any children communally.

Kutlaset

Kutlaset is the collective name of the shuddeni underground where the shuddeni build their cities, and the labyrinths which connect them. Each of Kutlaset's cities is dominated by a single clan for whom it is named, ruling over other clans in the region. Yithoul is the most famous of these, noted for its dominance of the underground in the northern parts of the continent of Avendar and for its modern use of kidnapped people, particularly chaja, as material for void rites and research, a practice which most other clans refrain from or do not practice on the same scale. Shuddeni are famed for their cultivation of various species of giant spider for everything from food to silk, which they trade with the surface. Owing to their unusual perception, they favour bright colours and unusual textures in art and clothing. Their history, erudition, and surprising charisma have made them the ideological enemy of many on the surface, some of whom will respond to shuddeni with violence on sight.

The individual Kutlasen shuddeni prioritizes themself and their partner, followed by their clan, followed by their ruling clan and city. Ruling clans tend to be very entrenched and stable over time, and rarely change in a city or region; wars between them are common, both to claim territory and resources and to preserve their own power. Non-shuddeni are broadly regarded with disinterest shading to antipathy, more akin to animals or scenery than people; their opinions are often coloured by the violence their presences can provoke and the clashes between the alien mores and perceptions of the shuddeni and those of the surface world. Outside of Yithoul, the shuddeni tend to be incredibly isolationist and xenophobic as a result, and rarely if ever allow non-shuddeni into their clans.

Yithoul

The most powerful clan in Kutlaset for millennia, Yithoul is a primarily Arkhuralite stronghold and the only living shuddeni clan with direct access to the surface outside of Harrud. It is through Yithoul that the rest of Kutlaset does trade in the northern reaches of the continent, making it a very rich city. Though much of it remains inaccessible, hidden behind the nigh-uncrossable basalt catacombs beneath, the parts it shows are a hub of the kind of black pageantry most visitors of the surface expect -- which is precisely how they like it.

Surface Shuddeni

Most commonly found in Var Bandor and Earendam, surface shuddeni tend to be decently integrated with communities in those cities, having twisted the laws in those places to grant them maximum freedoms in their areas of interest. They are more likely to be worshipers of Rveyelhi given the Black Staff's legacy and rise to power, particularly in Var Bandor.

Religion

The shape of shuddeni culture traces directly to the worship of Tzet-Askhari, their creator and parent. Its touch is heavy, permanently skewing their resonance towards black and rendering them somewhat alien in outlook and behavior. The arts of summoning they perfected were religious rites, and they revered the demons they subjugated as fellow creations of the Dragon.

History

The shuddeni emerged unknown eons ago from the places light has never reached. Living in vast caverns connected by labyrinthine networks of tunnels filled with traps and dead-ends, the shuddeni lived for millennia without contact with any other sentient people.

Though unquestionably bloody and cruel, their society was stable until the torpor of Tzet-Askhari, which the shuddeni claim happened in the century before the War of Night in contradiction to other lineages' tales about the war. The power vacuum left behind by the absence of stable Askharan power resulted in the ascension of a deity known as Arkhural, driving the shuddeni down a more aggressive path that culminated in their failed invasion of the surface. Though shuddeni have since integrated relatively well on the surface, many retain a lingering resentment towards the ch'taren for the Day of Two Dawns, and many still say if not for the ch'taren, they would have triumphed.