Yuan-ti

Yuan-ti, also known as Serpentfolk, are a snake-like species that take a manifold of serpentine appearances. Scholars believe that they originated as the human Yuan ethnicity before transforming into their current forms.

Physiology

Yuan-ti have a variety of snake-like appearances, which are separated in their culture into castes. The species internally fertilizes with hemipenises and cloacas. All yuan-ti hatch from eggs, which are held in communal hatcheries and are seen by the species as sacred. All species reach adulthood at age 12, and live until a period of 80 to 120 years. When near death, yuan-ti become lazier and begin sleeping for longer and longer periods of time, until they eventually fall into a coma and die. Yuan-ti say that higher caste yuan-ti live longer, but scholars are unsure of this claim.
Yuan-ti display esoteric harmonization related to enchantment magic. In addition, malisons, abominations, and anethemas have the ability to Shapechange into snakes.

Yuan-ti Pureblood

Purebloods are yuan-ti who have retained most of their ancestors’ hominoid features. Most purebloods look like humans with minor serpentine marks, such as forked tongues, slitted eyes, patches of scales, or fangs. Unlike other yuan-ti, scholars classify Purebloods as humanoids, with magic that affects humanoids supporting that hypothesis. Like other Yuan-ti castes, “Pureblood” is an exonym; yuan-ti call them Tsniijan, which translates closer to “lowborn” or “accepted pariah”. In yuan-ti societies, purebloods act as merchants, diplomats, and spies, often spending much of their time away from home. Purebloods living in the yuan-ti cities would act as low-ranking warriors.

Yuan-ti Malison

Malisons, occasionally referred to as “halfbloods”, have humanoid features with more obvious serpentine aspects. Scholars categorize the differences in a malison’s primary serpentine feature into “types”: type 1 malisons look like humans with a snake head, type 2 malisons look like humans with snakes for arms, type 3 malisons look like humans with a serpentine lower half, type 4 malisons look like humans with serpentine tails, and type 5 malisons look like humans covered in serpent scales. Like other yuan-ti castes, “malison” is an exonym; yuan-ti call them Essrakta, which translates closer to “near-perfect” or “between apprentice and master”. In yuan-ti societies, malisons act as the primary warrior caste of a city. Some malisons also acted as priests.

Yuan-ti Abomination

Abominations are the highest form of the standard yuan-ti castes. They are mostly ophidian, with snake heads, the lower half of a snake tail, and a body covered in scales, only retaining a humanoid torso and arms. Like other yuan-ti castes, “abomination” is an exonym; yuan-ti call them Shiidhta, which translates closer to “perfected”. In yuan-ti society, abominations acted as the leaders and priests.

Other Forms of Yuan-ti

There are two other known forms of yuan-ti: the Yuan-ti Anathema and the Yuan-ti Broodguard.
Anathemas are Abominations that have undergone a ritual, making them immortal. They look like abominations with clawed hands and a set of six snakes for heads. Anathemas almost automatically become the rulers of the yuan-ti settlements they inhabit, acting like demigods. Like other castes, “anathema” is an exonym; yuan-ti call them Zshashata, which translates closer to “ascended” or “demigod”.
Broodguards are former humanoids that have been transformed into monstrous, hunched, ophidian forms by the yuan-ti through a magical potion. The minds of the broodguards are gone, only looking to serve the yuan-ti. Broodguards are used for simple tasks, such as guarding individuals or hatcheries. This gives them their name by the yuan-ti, histachii, which means “egg-watchers”.

Culture

A large majority of yuan-ti societies are oriented into a caste system, with the Abominations at the top, the Malisons under them, and Purebloods underneath them. Broodguards and slaves rank underneath the purebloods. Yuan-ti can perform rituals that transform individuals into members of a higher caste, but this was performed rarely. This ritual could also be performed on regular humanoids to turn them into yuan-ti.
Yuan-ti prefer to stay hidden from the outside, obscuring themselves within cities deep in the wilderness. Instead of conquest and war, yuan-ti prefer to exert their influence and gain power through intrigue, whether political or religious. To these ends, the yuan-ti purebloods, who can easily pass as humans, are sent to infiltrate various societies, turning them into pawns for the yuan-ti.
Yuan-ti appeared to experience emotion less than other intelligent species. However, scholars are unsure if this is part of their innate psychology or a cultural form of suppression. Regardless, much of yuan-ti communication is done non-verbally, with facial movements, small flicks of the hand, and other such microexpressions. Traditionally, the higher an individual is in the caste system, the more they will communicate non-verbally with the lower castes.
Yuan-ti value self-improvement greatly. Even the lesser purebloods are expected to have a firm grasp on fields such as philosophy, dialectics, science, religion, history, and the arts. Magical proficiency is also a highly valued skill within yuan-ti culture.
As would be ascertained by analyzing their history and religion, yuan-ti value reptilian forms, and especially serpentine forms, to be aesthetically perfect and revered. The yuan-ti caste system itself is arranged in order from those with the most serpentine aspects to those with the least. As the inverse side of this coin, many yuan-ti view themselves as innately superior to non-yuan-ti, and non-reptilian species especially. Nearly all the gods that yuan-ti choose to worship are serpentine gods, or, if the god is not snake-like, given serpentine aspects.
Yuan-ti partnership is usually done strategically, and not necessarily from the result of romantic feelings. If two yuan-ti of differing castes procreate, the offspring will often retain the features of the lower caste in the relationship. As a result, yuan-ti rarely mate outside of their own caste. While not usually romantically involved, yuan-ti spouses become very intimate and close with one another; the word for “spouse” to the yuan-ti is t’iss’tess, which translates roughly to “dear” or “intimate one”. T’iss’tess is also often used as a pet name of affection. Yuan-ti often have close familial bonds, with most of the extended family living within one household. Yuan-ti eggs, in particular, are seen as gifts from the gods, and to damage or affect one in any negative way was an insult met swiftly with the death of the offender.
Yuan-ti are mostly carnivorous. Their cuisine emulates the diet of the snakes that they revere, often eating meals with poultry, eggs, insects, molluscs, mammals, amphibians, and fish. Eating snakes was taboo, and was even punishable by death in some societies. Some upper caste yuan-ti were even cannibalistic, and devoured humanoids.
Yuan-ti are perhaps most famous to outsiders for their religious practices. Yuan-ti believe in a doctrine similar to the Sanctity of Sacrifices in the Urbnata Church. They believe that the creator bestowed power upon beings and that the more worshippers and more sacrifices a god has in their name, the more powerful they will be. Blood sacrifice of sentient life is the most beneficial type of sacrifice a deity can receive, so many yuan-ti communities practice it. This doctrine also states that mortals can ascend to godhood through a similar process. Yuan-ti also view their gods somewhat like “mentors” - beings who help the yuan-ti, with the yuan-ti wishing one day to succeed or surpass them. The creator deity mentioned in the yuan-ti mythos varied depending on the community - popular creator deities include Uil, Io, and Dendar. The most widely followed deities to the yuan-ti are Dendar, Merrshaulk, and Sseth, an aspect of Zehir.
Yuan-ti speak the language of the same name, which is a creole of Common, Draconic, and Abyssal. Each yuan-ti community or state speaks its own dialect, which is still at least partially intelligible with the other forms of the language. The language was never taught outside of yuan-ti communities, so translators for the culture usually had to decipher it from the three languages that it was made up of. Non-verbal motions made up a more significant part of the language when compared with other languages.

History

Scholars often trace the origin of the yuan-ti back to the Invasion Era, usually based on the myths of the Dendaran yuan-ti. According to them, the yuan-ti originated as the Yuan ethnicity of humans. Some Yuan became religiously and aesthetically fascinated by the snake. It was at this point that Dendar began to appear in their dreams, bestowing upon them magical rituals that allowed them to acquire a more ophidian form. The Yuan who underwent these rituals began to call themselves the “yuan-ti”, which meant “better Yuan” or “ascended Yuan”. The cult of the yuan-ti grew in yuan society and, while remaining a minority in the larger Yuan society, overthrew many yuan societies in coup d'etats. The yuan-ti then formed an alliance, known today by scholars as the Yuan-ti Empire, located in current-day Lurean and Hariwana. Yuan who did not become yuan-ti were enslaved, becoming the ancestors to the modern-day Mitotlan. The Yuan-Ti Empire was known to be rich and powerful, and it collapsed sometime either around the end of the Invasion Era or during the Age of Restoration.
After the collapse of the Yuan-Ti Empire, yuan-ti were forced into seclusion, either hiding out in secret cities deep within the wilderness, or fleeing to elsewhere in Diaghal. Around this time, a new philosophy of influencing societies through political manipulation and cult activity began to take hold, rather than forthright attempts at conquest. Yuan-ti believed that, if they tried the latter, they would almost certainly be eliminated like they once had been, but by using the former they could regain the great power that they had lost.
This new philosophy was influenced in part by the rise of a new religious movement among the yuan-ti. Soon before the collapse, a winged yuan-ti abomination prophet appeared. Some record their name as “Sibyl”, though many scholars theorize that was instead a translation for “prophet”, because of the similar name of the religious title in Ardulese history. The other name, Sseth, has become much more widely known. Sseth evangelized that Merrshaulk, one of the primary yuan-ti deities at the time, had grown weak and tired, and that they would lead the yuan-ti into a new golden age through political intrigue and secrecy. Many of Merrshaulk’s faithful turned to Sseth, believing that he was either a prophet of the god, sent by the god, or even an avatar of the god. While worship of Sseth was not adopted by all yuan-ti, his philosophy became highly influential. Ssethite theology even influenced the worship of Merrshaulk, as many Merrshaulkans began to believe that their deity had fallen asleep and needed to be roused. In the modern day, many of those who worship “Sseth” perceive him as male, while those who follow “Sibyl” believe her as female. Both groups understand that they are worshipping the same deity. Because of the similarity of the deities’ providence and linguistic root, scholars today believe that Sseth is an aspect of Zehir.
During the Arcane Age, most yuan-ti civilizations remained isolated. However, their value on knowledge and self-improvement led many yuan-ti to study the influx of arcane knowledge, leading to the development of many theories. While many of these theoreticians concentrated only in yuan-ti culture, the female abomination Ako Khilina the Scale-reader proposed theorems that were incredibly influential in understanding Psionics.
After the Retreat, yuan-ti civilizations began a golden age. During the Dark Ages, two influential, open yuan-ti civilizations were known: the empire of Kailayu in Hariwana, and the alliance of Nayarantli in Qamenkas. It was from Kailayu that the Mitotlan fled from, under the leadership of Itzcuintli. Kailayu fell to civil strife at the end of the Dark Ages, and the fractured remnants of Nayarantli were conquered by Tyfilion.
In the modern day, yuan-ti are found spread throughout the world. The only regions of Diaghal with few yuan-ti societies, if any at all, are northern Tuatha and Olcaris. Yuan-ti remain hidden, with few exceptions, such as the state of Melshasulan in southern Qamenkas.

Origin/Ancestry

Yuan humans

Lifespan

80-120 years