Asari From Mass Effect/Drawing Credit
Name: LiranDesignation: Sentient
Homeworld: Lost, Nomadic
Language: Galactic Basic, Lira
Average height of adults: 1.7m
Skin color: Blue most commonly, though it differs
Hair color: N/A
Breathes: Type I Atmosphere
- Strengths:
[+]Experience: Because of their reproduction methods each and every single Liran have the experience of several hundred lifetimes. Each Liran that survives today is actually a copy of a one that was born thousands of years ago. After death a Lirans consciousness is copied into a new clone body through a process they call "imprinting", this technology is an incredibly well guarded secret and simply takes ones memories and experiences and places them onto a new body. This process has been going on for generations and means that every single Liran currently alive is in fact technically rather ancient, holding the knowledge of ages long past.
[+]Graceful: As a species the Liran can only be considered graceful. They appear to be rather small lithe females, humanoid but seemingly more frail and smaller than the average human woman. They are incredibly graceful creatures, able to bend and move in ways that boggles the human mind. This is due to a unique bone structure that has developed within the Liran over the millenia. Instead of having 206 bones like a normal human the Liran have 387. Instead having larger stronger bones the Liran have smaller but also more brittle bones woven together by muscle and tendons. These smaller bones allow Liran to shift and move in ways that a human would fine impossible, as the movements would normally break their skeletons.
[+]Blanks: Over the hundreds upon hundreds of years individual Liran have been cloned dozens if not hundreds of times. Each time they become cloned their minds are downloaded and then uploaded into a new body, memories, experiences, and all the knowledge they once possessed gets put into a new mind. This process is incredibly intricate and sometimes even damaging to the mind, part of this is seen in the inception of "The madness" another way this manifests however is that the Liran's minds become "blanks" to mental attacks of the force. Much like the the Epicanthix species the Liran mind is incredibly difficult if not impossible to infiltrate with the force. This is mostly due to the complexity of the Liran mind, once a force user delves into it they often become lost or rebuffed by the sheer vastness of the Liran psyche.
- Weaknesses:
[-]Brittle Bones: As stated above the Liran have nearly twice as many bones as the average Human, this is of course a plus as it makes them more flexible, however it also means their bones are less dense. As a result the Liran break their myriad of bones much more easily than a Human would. Whereas most human bones require an impact force of about 4500 pounds, a Liran bone requires only 2000, less than half. This makes fighting quite dangerous for them as if they get caught in the wrong position its a very simple matter to break several of their bones.
[-]Sunlight Sensitivity: Because for the last ten thousand years the Liran have chosen to drift across the stars instead of find a new homeworld their clones have developed and interesting genetic anomaly. When exposed to the light of a star for too long, even with a protective atmosphere their skin begins to turn its opposite color, for instance the normally blue Liran turn bright red. This changing of skin color also comes with a myriad of other symptoms including, itching, nausea, diarrhea, and headaches. Usually the effect takes several hours to take place, however its possible to invoke a quicker response on lower atmosphere worlds.
[-]Degradation: Because the Liran as a species are in fact clones they now suffer from clone degradation. This is a unique mental problem that plagues dozens of Liran every single year. The process of dying and then having ones mind transferred into a new body is incredibly traumatic and it takes a powerful personality in order to survive it over and over again. Eventually even the strongest begin to crack underneath the pressure and are driven into what the Liran call “The Madness”. The newly transferred Liran begins to lash out in anyway they can biting, kicking, stabbing and trying to destroy everything around her. Usually the Liran gets put down before any real damage can be done, however sometimes their strength proves to be too overpowering. The Degradation that the Liran suffer is a plague that now consumes their people, with dozens falling every year the entire species is now threatened with extinction, unable to reproduce naturally to strengthen their numbers.
[-]Lost to the Force: Because of their clone nature the Liran are in fact lost to the force. They can of course be sensed, touched, and seen by the force, but they cannot themselves use it. They are clones, and due to the amount of times they have been cloned any and all force users have long ago been weeded out due to the natural impossibility of cloning force users of any sort. This means that no Liran alive today are capable of using the force in anyway.
- Distinctions:
The next big distinction from the baseline human being comes with the lack of body hair. Liran for some strange reason have no hair on their arms, legs, back, and especially not their head. Instead of long locks of Hair the Liran instead have “ridges” within their skull that seem to pull back an end in a small tuft. This developed over the centuries of cloning as a way to easier maintain their bodies, the lack of hair making it simpler to clean and fit into the space suits that they so often wore.
The last big distinction the Liran have from the Galactic Standard human is their lack of sexual organs. Though their breasts remain simply because they were never done away with the function of them has been completely removed(They don't have nipples). Along with this their primary reproductive system has completely faded away, this is due to a choice made my the Liran long ago. They decided that once the cloning method was perfected, the need or having children became less and less. A few Liran kept their reproductive organs, having one or two children, however over the eons even these faded away into using cloning. Unsurprisingly the removal of their sex organs had unforeseen side effects which included bone brittleness, a slight loss of emotion, and some smaller effects such as decreased energy. Though some of these have been corrected over the centuries, others still plague them.
Average Lifespan: Technically Immortal
Races: None
Estimated Population: 5 million
Diet: Omnivorous
Communication: Speech
- Culture:
This culture has stayed with the Liran even through their catastrophic extinction even thousands of years ago. The Liran remain a stoic, serious, and stern species. They are not ones to have fun or enjoy themselves, instead they always are pushed towards what they see as the “Greater Good of the Species”. Each and every Liran, or every “true” Liran seeks a way to perpetuate the species. All they want to do is survive, and with their dwindling numbers this becomes more and more difficult. This has driven the species further into their sternness, with each Liran becoming more and more driven to find a solution to their problem.
Aside from this cultural stigma of seriousness, the Liran culture has become entirely Nomadic.
After the destruction of their planet the Liran have become and interesting space fairing society. Since all of the males of their species have either died out or fallen into degradation for unknown reasons the Liran are a matriarchal society. They function with one Liran at the head of each starship within their fleet. This Liran is considered the leader of the ship and is chosen by popular vote. This Ship Matriarch is then sent to a council, with each ship being represented by their Matriarch, larger ships having more say. The council then makes all the decisions for the Liran people and is headed by the oldest Ship Matriarch sitting on the council.
Because of the way that the Liran reproduce, the Oldest Matriarch never really changes. The only change occurs when the eldest falls to “The Madness” or is otherwise taken out of the picture due to disease or having to be cloned again. This means that in essence the Liran are lead by a singular leader for centuries at a time.
- Technology level:
Another place where the Liran lack behind the rest of the galaxy is simple vehicles. Repulsorlift's and technology like it are entirely foreign to the Liran, and the idea of the massive walkers that permeate the galaxy simply seem to perplex the strange feminine species.
- General behavior:
Generally when out and about in the galaxy Liran prefer to keep to themselves, they hide under helmets or masks and see about their tasks without causing much of a fuss. This is mostly so that no one asks questions about who they are or where they came from. This almost paranoia was born due to there only being two million Liran left, each one living aboard the migrant fleet that traverses the core of the galaxy and if this fleet were to be found, it would quickly lead to the extinction of their race.
This has made the Liran an incredibly secretive society and mixed with their stoic and stern nature it generally means that Liran are absolute duds in conversation.
There exists only one reason why a Liran leaves the migrant fleet, in order to preserve it. Often the Liran send out individual or team of operatives in order to gather information on the galaxy at large. These teams are highly trained, highly specialized operatives that use specialized tools and whatever weapons available to carry out their task. Often they disguise themselves in ancient scavenged bounty hunter armor or old mining masks they find(or steal). This is how the Liran gather information on the galaxy at large and find out where to go in order to gather supplies and resources for their continued survival.
- History:
The Liran, painfully unaware of this problem with their world toiled away within their colony for centuries.
They worked tirelessly to improve their colony, for thousands of years they worked upon their core world, toiling away in massive technologically advanced cities and creating huge leaps forward in medicine, starship technology, and many other areas of science. For some unknown reason the Liran never cared much for geology, and thus remained blissfully unaware of their planets impending doom. Over the eons the Liran changed and shifted to more suit their homeworld, their skin shifted to bright colors of blue and sometimes red, their eyes became alight, and many other changes happened to afflict them.
Quickly the Liran developed, until finally the inevitability of their world struck home.
Liaran began to erupt. The magma flows beneath the planet finally reached their apex pressure and the world began to self destruct. The Liran were helpless, the planet beneath them exploded and tore itself apart, biting at the crust and consuming the Liran's technologically advanced cities. The world was consumed by fire, and in an instant the Liran were almost completely wiped out.
When the dust settled and the world or Liaran lay barren and destroyed only a few million Liran remained. Those who survived had been within starships across the galaxy, either on diplomatic missions to other worlds, or on planets conquering weaker species. When they returned to their homeworld they found only barren rock and death. The collective pain and suffering that had been wrought upon Liaran was nearly enough to bring the remaining Liran to their knee's.
It was one man, one single Liran who refused to fall.
Though his name has long since been lost to the ethos of history, it is known that this one Liran rallied his people. He was a military commander that had returned triumphant from the conquest of a distance world, and upon his return her found a fleet of ships planted over his now dead world. The sorrow that he felt was palpable, yet he had connection to the force enough to know that this would not be the end of the Liran. He called to his people, rallied them, and told them that he would lead them to a new home.
Trusting in his word, and believing him to be their best option, the Liran Nomadic Fleet was created.
For the next dozen or so Millenia the Liran moved through the core worlds. Whenever they were threatened, they would jump into hyperspace, whenever they needed food, they would raid worlds and temporarily set up small basis above planets. Whenever they wanted for anything, they found a solution. Over the eons the Liran evolved and changed to become the perfect Nomadic society.
It was during this time that the decision was made to clone themselves. The species decided as a whole that ordinary methods of reproduction were seemingly no longer viable. Their gene pool and their inability to breed effectively with other humanoid species rendered their only decision to be that of cloning. For several centuries this worked out more than perfectly. Whenever a Liran grew ill and died he or she would simply be “downloaded” into a new body.
Before long however, side-effects began to show.
The first signs of Madness began to appear within the Liran. After two and a half thousand years and sixteen generations of clones the first male Liran fell to what is known as The Madness. It is unknown why the first was male, and it is unknown why males were far more susceptible to The Madness, however before long it spread like a contagion throughout the species. Before another century passed the Males of the Liran died off, each one falling to the Madness.
The women, the survivors pushed on throughout their lives. They pressed forward into the stars, continuing the legacy of their people as best as they could. They cloned themselves continually, unable to return to regular reproduction cycles(what with all the men dead). The Madness became worse and worse, and as the centuries passed the Liran began to die.
Now for the first time the Liran show themselves within the galaxy, hoping to find a solution to their problem.
Notable Player-Characters: None yet.
Intent: In Order to create a unique story driven species that can be used by myself and others, as well as to create SWRP's first entirely nomadic species.
