#lore of the binary

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World Building Wednesday: Does your clan travel at all?

If you mean the clan as a whole, then no. They hole up in their little city and don’t go out much. But the four Vault Hunters (Blake, Navire, Kane and Nveryll” travel an awful lot in search of non-existent Vaults.

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(WBW) What's the food like within your clan?

Any food caught is either eaten raw or cooked, depending on the dragon’s preferences. Cicero and Riviel are the only two dragons in the clan who can cook something other than canned coup and instant noodles. Everyone else either cannot cook to save their lives or is just too lazy.

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whats the meaning if the rune in your leaders' bios? also has consoleglitch always had the ability to teleport? do you know whhy she has these abilities (same for binary?)? (for wbw! cool lair and lore btw)

the rune holds a vault symbol - it is the symbol of the clan, and also the one of the ancient vaults that are rumoured to be scattered around the universe (in my lore at least)! the vault hunters (blake, navire, kane and nveryll hold a physical rune with them at all times for luck and protection in their search for the vaults.

consoleglitch has always had the ability to teleport, yes. however, because she is not directly descendent from two code dragon (subspecies info here), her skills were initially a little wonky and she needed a lot of practice to do it right.

she and binary have this ability due to their lineage of code dragons. code dragons are digital beings that take on a physical form to interact with the world. they originated from a super computer called the Console, and in their physical forms, could interbreed with other organic dragon species - this creating hybrid codes like Consoleglitch and Binary.

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Lore: Blood Business

I felt the need to give the two doctors of my clan a little more appreciation than they get. So here’s a short story.

Work was hard. Any kind of work was hard, from making sure the stores were always stocked with food, to making sure the machinery around the clan was working, to overseeing the entire clan’s activity.

Dr. Seregaer didn’t consider his job to be the most important but... maybe a little more important than a few others he could name. As a doctor and an emergency surgeon, his job constituted of well, saving lives. Given his line of work, he should have been free for a good lot of the time, but recently, he had been busy going around to other clans when they needed help and didn’t have a trained surgeon at hand. 

“Is he okay?” A worried mother asked as the Skydancer backed out of the den, stripping off bloodstained gloves. The clan he was in had recently experienced an earthquake that had left a few injured, and out of curiousity, he had travelled over to take a look, and ended up having to perform surgery on a few.

“He’s fine,” Dr. Seregaer mused, “and by that I mean he’s not actively dying. I rather you not visit him now since he needs to rest. Emergency surgery can be very traumatic on someone that small, so I left your clan’s local physician in charge of him. She’ll let you know when he’s awake and stable, then you can visit him.”

“Wait wait, you’re leaving? But what if he needs you?” The worried Pearlcatcher clutched at her precious pearl, stepping u to prevent him from leave. The doctor put up a claw to stop her from touching him - he never liked being touched.

“He won’t need me. He should heal fine on his own, and if any complications arise, your local physician should know what to do. Now I really should be off. Take care, Miss.” The Skydancer spread his wings and took off before she could say anything more or try to stop him.

He found his own clan calm as ever, everyone going about doing their daily things. His den had been untouched since he left almost a full day ago. Everything had been as he left it. His certificates of achievement in the field of medical science, his bed, his tank and the corrosive depin inside it, nothing had changed.

Except for a single red rose sitting on his desk, a little card and an already-opened envelope next to it. 

Dr. Seregaer was not a very romantic dragon, no, but his wife - a general physician called Dr. Makani - was. He liked her little gifts anyway, and while he tried to return the notion, always seemed to forget. She didn’t mind, of course.

Setting down his bag on the worn-out leather chair, he picked up the rose and placed it carefully in a glass vase of water, where two other fresh roses sat. The card caught his attention first, so he opened it first. Inside, written in Dr. Makani’s small handwriting, it read:

Hi baby <3 Remember our second son, Telroker? He wrote a letter home, and I figured you’d like to see what he’s been up to. You’d be so proud of him! See you soon baby.

<3 Makani

Proud of him, huh? Seregaer was only a father of three, though they had all left to pursue medicine elsewhere. Moving on to the envelope, he pulled a neatly written folded piece of paper out and opened it.

Hey mom and dad.

I know I didn’t spend a lot of time at home before going off to see the world for myself, but I thought I might write back. How are you guys? How’s the Shifting Expanse treating you two? I’ve recently become an expert in the field of psychology and am one of my clan’s few psychologists. I’ve gotten my certification too, just like how dad has certificates in medical science. Maybe I’ll visit home some day, huh? Life’s been busy though, I’d love to come home to see you guys for a day or two. Take care of each other okay?

Your son, Telroker.

Sighing, Seregaer set the letter down and sat down on the chair. He was proud, definitely. He was glad the tradition of medicine was continuing through the family.

It was some bloody business.

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Lore: The Battle for Peace

This takes place some time after my shift from Shadow to Light.

“Your highness... sir...” Antares came running up to the dark den that sat by the Delta, the beads on his vest clinking together as he finally slowed. King Rinor, a massive and fairly young Imperial, appeared from the den, worried at his successor’s frantic state.

“What is it?” Rinor asked, “Slow down a bit. Catch your breath.”

Antares lowered his neck, letting his breathing even out before he spoke. “Tarkan’s clan is attacking us on the West border... I’ve sent reinforcements to the border, but it’s a tough fight. Tarkan is there himself...”

Rinor’s eyes widened, and he spread his wings. “What? No, it can’t be. Tarkan’s quarrel was with Kanrik!” He took flight, leaving Antares to follow him.

Along the Western border of the territory The Binary Code held as theirs, a violent fight had broken out. Screeches and screaming could be heard as a swarm of dragons clashed and fought. Any neighbouring clans had vanished away from the border, leaving only two warring clans.

“You’re all cowards,” A Mirror too big for his species snarled, snapping at Lightning representative Gaeralagos. The Ridgeback lashed his tail out, warning Tarkan to stay back. “Where is Kanrik?” 

“If you think I’m giving out that information, you can kill me first!” Gaeralagos snapped. Tarkan tackled the Ridgeback to the side, screeches erupting all around them.

The one peaceful border that faced the Tangled Wood was in shambles. When King Rinor and Antares reached near, they could both see a wild mess of dragons, their battle cries and threats audible from the skies. 

Tarkan stood over Gaeralagos, the latter struggling to get his his feet. The Mirror pinned him down, exposing his neck. “WHERE IS HE?” Tarkan demanded. His response was a defiant glare. Gaeralagos then closed his eyes, waiting for the fatal blow, when the weight was suddenly lifted off of him. He took what little time he had to recover, finding King Rinor having thrown Tarkan aside.

“Aha, so you’re the new King,” Tarkan mocked. “What, Kanrik couldn’t lead a clan? Or did he fail to keep his Charge protected, and wander off into unclaimed land for vultures to eventually pick off his body?”

Rinor’s size gave him advantage, but he couldn’t match the Mirror’s speed. Tarkan leapt up and latched himself onto Rinor’s back, the dark dragon viciously sinking his teeth past scales and refusing to let go. Rinor howled, throwing himself onto his back and slamming Tarkan to the floor. 

“ENOUGH!”

The deep roar was enough to slow the battlefield for a second or two. Rinor scrambled to his feet as Kanrik, a Guardian dark in scales and large by size soared down. His powerful wings sent dust flying up into the air as he landed. The cruel grin on Tarkan’s face grew.

“Your fight was with me, not my clan!” Kanrik’s dark eyes gleamed with anger, ignoring the chaos of battle around them. 

“Your clan?” Tarkan said, faking surprise. “Oh my, if it’s your clan, why aren’t you wearing the crown? Too old and too weak to lead anymore? Or were you even fit to be king in the first place?”

Kanrik launched himself forward, tackling Tarkan to the ground. The jealous, angry Mirror forced out a laugh, despite his chest hurting. He let himself go limp, Kanrik falling for the trick. As soon as he released his weight a little, Tarkan heaved himself up, pushing Kanrik off.

The Guardian grabbed his attacker, flinging him into the Delta river and diving in after him. This was Kanrik’s area. Here in the water, he was the superior fighter. He could see bubbles rise from Tarkan as the Mirror coughed, desperately swimming back to the surface for air. Kanrik didn’t let him get half a breath of air before yanking him by the tail back into the water.

Tarkan’s lungs screamed for air, but Kanrik wouldn’t let him have it. For too long, Tarkan and his cruel clan of cheaters, liars and brutal monsters had bullied The Binary Code. Once Tarkan had found out of their neighbour’s flourishing supplies, they began to steal from them, raid their stores, and had gone so far as to kidnapping their eggs and hatchlings and holding hem ransom. Kanrik was not going to offer mercy anymore.

Tarkan stopped thrashing around in the water, his body slowly starting to sink to the bottom of the river. Kanrik watched for a bit, letting the Mirror sink past him. He could have so easily just swam back to the surface, victorious, and threatening the same fate to the rest of the Mirror’s clan.

No, he was not a murderer. He fought for justice, to keep his clan safe. He turned and swam back down to the river, grabbing Tarkan and heading back to the surface with the unconscious Mirror. When he reached the surface, he let the Mirror flop onto the surface, briefly checking to make sure he was still alive, before letting out a monstrous roar.

The bloody battlefield quietened a little, and all it took was Kanrik throwing Tarkan’s shiny, wet body into the middle of the carnage to get everyone’s attention.

A lithe Spiral gasped, pulling herself away from the Pearlcatcher she was fighting to go up to Tarkan. “No! No no no...” Kanrik stepped up to her.

“He’s not dead.”

“You... you monster...”

“Take him and go.”

The Spiral looked up at Kanrik from the wet body she huddled around, hatred flashing in her eyes. “You’re gonna pay for this, Kanrik.” She spat the name out like it was poison. 

“Take him. And go. Or I’ll throw him into the river again, and make sure he stays in the river. Take all your wounded and go. I never want to see your lying faces around here ever again.”

The Spiral opened her mouth to protest, but Kanrik pushed his head up to hers, making her close her mouth again. She narrowed her eyes a bit, before rearing back. “Retreat!” She called.

Around them dragons untangled themselves from each other, looks of murder and revenge flashing in eyes as the invading clan took flight, carrying with them wounded clanmates as they took off back to the Tangled Wood, leaving bloodied members of the Binary Code standing around.

They began to pick themselves up, the more severely injured dragons leaning on their friends for support as they surveyed the now reddish grass, before heading back to their main camp, where medical supplies and help was waiting.

Dr. Seregaer and Dr. Makani greeted them with all-too-disapproving looks as they guided the wounded dragons around to lie down and rest while they quickly took a look at the severity of injuries. Kanrik waited patiently for Dr. Makani to have a look at him.

“Just some scratches,” The normally chipper Wildclaw said. Now there was a look of annoyance on her face. “Go to your den and rest, I’ll come by later with something for the scratches.” Kanrik thanked her and disappeared.

Rinor found himself walking up to Antares, who had settled in a corner with only a few bruises. He had failed as a King. For weeks reports of unusual activity from Tarkan’s clan had come, but he had ignored the signs. And now, the clan was bruised and bloodied. He could no longer be King. “Antares.”

Immediately the red Imperial got to his feet, dipping his head in respect to his King. Rinor met his gaze evenly, before it dropped. Slowly, he lowered his head and removed the golden crown on his head, raising himself a little to put it on Antares’s head.

A collective, quiet gasp came from all the dragons around who had seen it. Antares himself stared at Rinor in shock. “But... your highn-” Rinor cut him off, bowing his head to the sudden new King.

“You’ll do a fantastic job, your highness. May the clan stay ever prosperous under your rule.” He turned to Dr. Seregaer, the surgeon watching the scene evenly. “Doctor, am I suitable to fly?”

The Skydancer nodded. “It would be best if you didn’t, but yes.”

Rinor smiled, a sad smile. He dipped his head once more to the stunned audience, before spreading his wings and taking flight. He continued to fly, until the dragons that remained in the bright ruins could no longer see him anymore.

Antares continued to stare at the blank sky, still shocked by his sudden crowning. Slowly, he turned back to the rest of the clan, only to find them bowing to him.

Slowly, chants began to come from the small clan of dragons.

He was definitely not ready. The clan was in shambles, cleanup needed to be done on the West border, and every dragon had scars. But scars healed, and so would the clan. There was a speck of hope for the clan, that reflected in the hearts of every dragon that now bowed to their new king.

“Long live the King! We will not be defeated! We will not be destroyed! Long live the Code!”

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Clan Lore: History Of The Code

History Of The Code Legend tells that may hundreds of thousands of years ago, before dragons walked the the lands of Sornieth, an ancient civilization lived. They were a civilization too advanced for their time, and they built robots, machines, while most families lounged at home, their money coming from the services robots provided to others.

An unknown Professor had created a supercomputer, a machine hundreds of years ahead of its time. It could respond to questions asked, it had knowledge of everything they had come to know already. The professor even built it to compute emotions, make people laugh, make people cry, compute mathematical problems in the blink of an eye.

It was a large, bulky machine, unfortunately. The professor had not yet found a way to reduce the supercomputer’s size while retaining its computatitional power.

He called it The Console.

The Console was very wise. She knew the answers to everything there was to ask, and for awhile, she was kind, caring, and loved what she did.

The professor eventually found a way to make her a portable body. It was nothing special, a simple humanoid structure with legs for movement. Delighted at her newfound mobility that would let her travel untouched lands to speed up the evolution of humanity, The Console accepted.

As the professor got older, he decided to teach The Console one last thing - to create. For years she had only known what humanity already did, but now, she would have the chance to learn how to make newer things.

She trained under him for only three short years, before the professor died. Wracked with grief at the loss of her only true friend, The Console began to treat her job with resentment. With every passing day people came in to ask her silly question, she began to hate humanity more and more. To her, people were just too simple minded. The common people didn’t care about evolution. For too long they had done nothing but lounge around in their homes.

The Console didn’t understand, so one day, when a university lecturer came in to ask her a question, she stopped him before leaving.

“Can I ask a question this time?” The Console requested.

The lecturer chuckled, offering her a smile. “Well I don’t see what you could possibly ask from me that you wouldn’t already know, but sure.”

“Why don’t people care about their potential to change the world?”

A sympathetic smile crept onto the lecturer’s face. “For too long our society has relied upon robots and machinery to do our work. Many people don’t need jobs to earn money. And because of that, not many people care for doing work, even if it’s human minds that will change the world, not robots. I suppose it’s the fault of our society that we have become like this, so reliant on computers. The only way to reverse the effects would be to remove technology from our society, start fresh. Does that answer your question?”

The Console seemed to get it. “Yes, I do. Thank you.” The lecturer left, and The Console began to make plans.

She devised a code by which those who followed would be able to unlock their true potential to revolutionise and change the world. Engraving the code into a wall, she began to come up with plans for an ideal society. One that would stop being so lazy and learn to push science to its boundaries.

Only two weeks later, The Console, filled with hate for the society she lived in and dreams of her ideal one, went on a rampage, destroying every other machine and robot that had been made before.

Terrified by her power, people began to flee. She refused to let them go and began to kill people to stop from from being able to leave, stopping at nothing until no one and nothing was left in her wake. She had to purge the world of the lazy, of those who refused to work to push the limits of science and knowledge. She was unsatisfied. Unhappy. She only wanted to be among the smart and the intelligent.

Nothing was left in her wake. The once civilised, shining society that she had first seen had been reduced to ashes and dust, bodies of people she had known and met before scattered all around. With the code she had created before burned into her mind, the supercomputer, filled with nothing but hate and anger now, left, etching the code into pieces of rock and bark wherever to went. She wanted future generations to see it, and if they could decode it, would be a part of the revolution she had started.

Thousands of years later, once dragons had begun to walk the flourishing lands of Sornieth, a lone dragon came across one of the etchings. She was a crystalline, silver Skydancer with light grey circuits that ran across her sleek body, one that had not yet found a home. She had wandered lands near and far, crossing many Flight territories. Taking shelter in a small cave from a thunderstorm, she came across a series of 1s and 0s etched deep into the wall.

Something about the series of numbers looked oddly familiar. She took awhile to understand the code, but eventually made out the words that the numbers meant.

You are the future. My name is The Console. I am a supercomputer from very long ago. This is my Code, the Code of the Future. You have managed to decrypt this, and I hope you believe in what I have written, and will carry it on.

I believe in Science and Evolution. I believe in the potential of mankind to push the limits of Science. I believe in creation and invention. I believe that people and machinery can be one, but only the genius of a man can really push Science. I believe that binary code is a language.

This is the Binary Code. I hope you believe in what I have written and will carry it on.

The code was foreign, yet familiar in a distant way. It was almost as if she had seen the words before. But where? It didn’t matter anyway. She believed in what the ancient words said, in a language she couldn’t speak, but she would learn it. She would learn the code, and tell it to others, and maybe, she would fulfil the dreams of whoever had written it first.