Necromancer

Spooky and dread-inducing even in presence, necromancers are the shorter in height, shorter in tail cousins to the spellbinders. Like their cousins, they have a gaunt appearance, with high cheekbones, thin jawlines, hairless bodies and slit-like noses. While it is less common, just like spellbinders they can be pejoratively known as 'snakes'. The key difference between them and their fellow willowy snake-people, as their name implies, is their specific magic tailored around controlling the dead, or in strong cases, making puppets of the living through their spine.
Necromancers are a critically endangered race. Their presence as a troop revival race in Galdus became redundant upon the discovery of ascension, and those necromancers who ascended were often comparatively weak compared to spellbinders and plagued with involuntary telepathy. Despite this, their cultural influence persisted, as their gruesome, intimate knowledge of bodies influenced the manner Galdusian cities refer to their streets and residences (as veins and tissues).
In Ilazar, their community leaders' loyalty to the Golden Galdusian Empire during its initial bid to become a freehold led to race massacres, leaving only Arkheran scions remaining. These scions swiftly rose to dominance following the collapse of the Ilazari Plague Empire, but the new necromantic regime was so despotic and despised that even here, necromancers would become the targets of vengeful extermination efforts.
Now with low birth rates and high rates of hybridisation with spellbinders, it's estimated necromancers have less than ten generations remaining as a separate race to their longer-tailed counterparts.

Additional Information

Facial characteristics

Like their cousins, the spellbinders, necromancers have high cheekbones and small, slit like noses most of the time. They tend to have darker hair colours than their spellbinder counterparts, to the point where spellbinders with black hair are likely to have some necromantic heritage.

Geographic Origin and Distribution

Necromancers are almost extinct, once being prevalent in Galdus and Ilazar, but now rarely present in either. Its largest population is in Arkhera, where they are still an endangered minority.

Average Intelligence

They are sapient and capable of self awareness and empathy. However, they have a notable psychological quirk which gives them a drastically reduced revulsion to corpses, and can easily separate a person's corpse from the loved one they used to be.

Civilization and Culture

Naming Traditions

Necromancers are rarely any culture other than Galdusian or Galdusian-Arkheran, and as such have highly limited variance for naming conventions. They tend to focus on us, um, ra, li, la, and as suffixes, with some families also adopting the Arkheran yn suffix from elven immigrants. Males tend to have us suffixes more often than females, while females tend to have more la and ra suffixes.
Male name examples: Baltus, Eridius, Pavium, Rowyn, Plutyn, Vance.
Female name examples: Quira, Serella, Plutera, Inera, Rina, Priora.

Major Organizations

The House of Khanas (Arkhera)
The House of Abraxas (Arkhera)
The House of Senheil (Arkhera)
Purple Division of the Order of the Shade (Arkhera)
Gardener's Cult of the Shrine of the Dead (Arkhera)

Interspecies Relations and Assumptions

Necromancers have a unique relationship to the corpses of fellow humanoids in that they're chattel, used to perform any tasks the necromancer can control them to do. Despite this, their psychological separation of living people versus their corpses means that modern necromancers are likely not to feel this callousness for living people. This was not always the case, however: Arkheran necromancers, following the collapse of the Ilazari Plague Empire,considered all races but their spellbinderly cousins to be inherently inferior, enslaving them in both life and death. This has directly contributed to their innocent descendants being a despised race by all but the most well-intentioned people of Arkhera.

Genetic Descendants

• Serenian (species)
• Spellbinder-Necromancer Hybrid

Scientific Name

Homo magicis mortensis

Origin/Ancestry

Kakajuan Humanoid

Lifespan

120-200 years (exceptional cases can reach around 300)

Average Height

6'3''-7'4''

Average Physique

Tall, ectomorphic and delicate just like spellbinders, albeit slightly shorter, with slightly more defined bodies and shorter tails.

Body Tint, Colouring and Marking

Generally pale skinned, though some can tan towards a light olive. Their eyes vary in colour, covering pretty much every area of the spectrum, while their hair tends to be on the dark side.

Geographic Distribution

• Arkheran Isles
• Ilazar
• Nortez
• Sula

Related Ethnicities

• Arkheran
• Galdusian