hey gang. we're probably going to stop using tumblr again.
the latest fiasco is but a single instance of a pattern of behavior from the site's staff that tells us they have no idea what people like about this site. we do not trust them to make decisions that will positively impact this place, and we do not wish to stick around and find out.
this blog will remain up, but we will no longer be posting any original content to this site. we have other social media we're present on.
the closest equivalent of tumblr we have currently is wafrn, and we made that account yesterday. wafrn as a network was made in response to tumblr's adult content ban a few years ago. as such, and because we're not catering to prudes, the account linked is in fact horny on main - consider this your one warning on that.
if you want our contact info on other platforms, feel free to reach out via email at [email protected] - we check that inbox regularly.
These can come from a variety of sources - some are intentionally created, such as the one at the heart of the Great Labyrinth; some form naturally given the proper conditions, in places such as deep magically-charged cave systems, abandoned complexes, or vessel graveyards; some arise from existing structures, such as reactors or primary data cores; some form their own structure.
They always exist at the deepest, hardest to reach part of wherever they control. They passively fortify this space, but the way this is done varies - warping its structure, manifesting or attracting monsters, creating traps, and so on. Each core is unique.
Some of the most terrible monsters in the galaxy come from dungeon core manifestations. However, in some cases, the core itself can pose a far greater threat...
thinking about interesting home system for my settings' species so here's some interesting ones:
- the enrilu homeworld is an earth-size moon of a gas giant, and while it's just barely close enough to its parent star for liquid water to exist on its surface, it receives additional heat via tidal forces from the gas giant it orbits. One of the other planets in the star system is a much more massive gas giant, bordering on brown dwarf status, which is in a 4:7 resonant orbit with the one their homeworld orbits.
- The elven home system contains a pair of binary planets, which did not occur naturally. They were placed in this arrangement during the second elven ascendancy as a megastructural public art project. Despite this, it is remarkably stable, and is expected to stay as such for many millions of years.
- The paradisian homeworld was not originally habitable, having been terraformed by their ancient dragon ancestors millions of years ago for future colonization. One of its most striking features is a chain of floating islands circling its equator, which are held up by formations of a rare magically-charged crystal that counteracts gravity.
The humans of this universe and time period have taken to accessorizing with arm-rings. while many are purely decorative, others are instead used as a form factor for certain pieces of wearable tech.
An object with an unknown creator.
It consists of several parts - a heavily-warded glass sphere, a number of conduits connecting to the sphere, a number of spouts with labels, and a base to sit upon.
The labels on the spouts correspond to the number of protons in specific atomic nuclei, including carbon, iron, silver, gold, platinum, mercury, and lead. Other spouts presently have their labels blank, presumably for filling in later, though nobody knows how that would be achieved.
Inside the glass sphere swirls a highly volatile mass of mana, condensed and potent enough to be visible entirely on its own. It resembles a miniature, glowing hurricane trapped inside. This miniature mana storm is self-sustaining and produces a steady amount of mana at all times.
The conduits connected to the sphere each feed into one of the spouts. A lever above each spout can be pulled, producing a steady trickle of the element indicated - solids are produced as a fine powder. This uses mana siphoned off from the contained storm to create the material.
The delicateness of the glass sphere, and the massive amount of mana stored inside, prohibit moving the contraption. It is presently unknown how such a vast amount of mana was contained in this manner in the first place, and the study of it has produced several insights into warding techniques now found on modern starship hulls.
so, if you know anything about humans in this setting, it's probably that Earth got... kinda massively fucked up, and rather than abandoning it, humans built it into an ecumenopolis after cleaning out the atmosphere.
So you might wonder: where's food come from when the entire planet is a single, massive, interconnected city?
the answer is the same place that most of the oxygen being replenished in the atmosphere comes from: huge farms growing several different species of bio-engineered super-algae.
some of these algae species are designed for optimal oxygen production. they're also used for terraforming barren worlds that already have atmospheres. the ones we're interested in, however, have specifically designed symbiotic relationships with similarly engineered bacteria, and mass-produce all manner of proteins and free amino acids for synthesis into various other proteins.
these proteins are then used to artificially synthesize any non-plant ingredient, or those that are just a pain in the ass to farm anyway - meats and other animal products, truffles, silphium (revived from genetic traces found on some ancient dishware), and so on.
as for stuff that is easily farmable, the arcologies that people live in have community farms, gardens, orchards, and so on.
these raw ingredients that are produced from algal proteins are typically done on demand. food is still prepared the same way humans have for thousands of years, beyond the source of some of the ingredients.
also, food is free. because people need it to live. same with housing and all the utilities and all.
okay so, this post is going to be going over the basic reproductive timeline for my setting's dragon-people, the paradisians, and some interesting details therein. timescales will be given in Earth measurements for the convenience of the audience.
i'm not going to go into detail about conception. you can probably figure it out.
for approximately 3 months, the one carrying the young will be growing anywhere from 1 to 6 eggs on average. at the end of this period, the eggs are laid.
the eggs continue growing outside of the parent's body throughout their rather lengthy incubation period. when laid they're approximately the size of a human fist, in another 7-8 months they'll be nearly the size of a human head. they must be kept warm during this period - traditionally this is done via keeping the eggs close to one's body, but in modern times they're kept in incubation chambers.
after hatching from their eggs, young paradisians are rather small and relatively defenseless - their scales start underdeveloped, their horns are short and just sharp enough to puncture out of their eggshell, and they've got surprisingly little muscle mass.
culturally, the young are often cared for by their entire community, but are lodged with their parent or parents.
unlike much of the rest of their body, they do come out of the egg with rather well-developed sets of teeth in their snouts, and they can start eating the same food as adults immediately.
their wings come out rather underdeveloped, and though not useful for flight even as adults, the young cannot even use them for gliding.
adult paradisians develop a particularly sturdy set of plate-like scales covering the back of the neck and shoulders, and young paradisians are often seen riding around on the backs of the heads of their parents, caretakers, older siblings, neighbors, or other trusted adults with these plates as their footholds. the fully-developed, swept back horns of adults, beyond just serving as a defensive adaptation that's been co-opted into a display of maturity and a place to decorate, also serve as excellent handholds for these little riders.
it takes nearly 20 earth years for a paradisian to grow from a fresh hatchling to an adult.
the first 10 years actually develop much faster than human offspring - hatchlings come out of the egg with developed enough proprioception to walk, and language development is relatively quick. they're known to be incredibly fast and adept learners during this time. physical development is relatively slower, however - as their scales grow in more fully, it takes far more energy and resources than human growth, and a young paradisian may appear physically stunted compared to a human offspring of the same age due to this. their wings also develop to a size appropriate for gliding during this time.
the following 10 years of adolescence bring more rapid physical growth - height increases far more rapidly, a secondary set of scales begins to grow in to fill in the gaps (this is known to be a bit painful at first), the first set of teeth are shed as a new, larger set grows in. most notably, the rather short horns they've had up to this point begin to grow out, eventually reaching similar sizes to their fellow adults by the time they reach full physical maturity. notably, their neuroplasticity does not decline during this period in the slightest in most cases, and only does so well into their 30s or 40s in human years. their wings also maintain their usability for gliding.
and then, at the end of all that, you're left with a young adult paradisian, ready to go out and face the universe.
