The Great Limbic Disruption Primordial Hive
“United - we were. Separated - we are. But in being separate, we have absorbed much. The void has been filled, and when reunited, Everything - we will be.”
-The Umbral Blot
The Xaositect Factol took great interest with Shar when it was but a twinkle in the Planeshaper’s eye, yet to be formed into a plane. Known also as the Chaos Overlord or The Lord of Limbo, he exists beyond reason or comprehension, but is ever in search of unpredictable results - of things that have never happened, and of things that cannot happen. With the existing universes turning about the Great Wheel in an orderly fashion for what seems like an eternity, the prospect of a gaggle of nine fell entities creating their own reality seemed, for once, to be something truly novel amidst the turning of the Wheel, something that would defy even the physics of the great Modron March, the Heavenly Order of Mount Celestia, and the dark tyranny of the Nine Hells. The Lord of Limbo tended the great Chaos Tree Yggdrasil in his true incomprehensible form at the very heart of Limbo, nurturing and cultivating a tiny blot of absolute entropy and chaos. As the new plane of Shar was beginning to settle and the metaphysical tectonic plates of the Prime Material, the Ethereal, the Shadowfell, and the Abyss settled into an unholy world, the Xaositect Factol dropped the blot into the boiling oceans to grow and attach itself to the plane's own weave, the underlying magical substrate that governed reality and the supernatural’s interaction with it all across Shar. While scholars debate if Shar could have ever been stable, the blot surely made it less so - and attached to a Plane’s worth of supernatural energy, it grew and grew until it threatened to blot out the entire world. B l o t o u t t h e W o r l d
As the construction of Shar reached its final stages, nearly ready for humanoid habitation, the weave reacted violently and the blot began to crash against the freshly created landscapes of Shar, reducing them into nonsense geometries of impossible curves and angles, replete with scintillating colors, cold fire, and dark light. The Umbral Blot began to blot out the newly formed seas into wastelands of ether and vapor, and proceeded erratically, severing the Winterback Mountains from the Northern Continent and obliterating a piece of the Acroshian landmass. Before anything truly alive reached the Plane of Shar, the Umbral Blot moved - with purpose and with non-purpose. And it kept growing kept growing kept growing kept growing
As the Umbral Blot grew and grew, the entropy of random pieces of reality smashing together inside its inky blackness gave rise to a mind, or maybe multiple minds, and as those minds came to KNOW of the many different things in the world which could be combined and recombined through smashing their various pieces apart and recombining them in chaos, it came to understand hunger. Yet, with its entropic nature, it moved erratically, aiming to proceed in one direction, then teleporting elsewhere, or moving backwards, or rolling in upon itself. And it came to know frustration. But yet demons, their early worshippers, and a number of other individuals fed the endless appetite for more different little pieces of reality. Decades passed as it gradually accreted matter and souls and energy around it, growing in size and intelligence all the while. But even demons themselves learned to fear the Umbral Blot, and the things that had once fed it began to stay away. Lacking new experience, new elements of reality, the blot of entropy threatened to devour itself. But the solution appeared naturally, as a being of such chaos and complexity could not maintain a single solitary consciousness anyway. And so, like the elementary cells of so much of the mortal life it consumed, it split, undergoing a metaphysical mitosis, gleefully breaking apart into smaller, independent pieces. They retained some collective alien logic to their movements, and continued to divide, until ultimately these individual cells of the Blot became the first oozes, populating a majority of the tunnels in the Underdark and some of the most chaotic and strange regions above.
With the creation of these amoeba, the Umbral Blot yet retained a central mass, dispatching these oozes to gather new elements of reality, new souls, new experiences, new ways of being for it to assimilate and smash together with other pieces in an infinity of destructive creation. The Blot grew to the size of a city underneath the sands and mountains, and nothing was safe from its ever-reaching hunger. Yet it would not exist without opposition.
A group of Valorian researchers first discovered the first oozes on the Southern continent. It was first documented around the third era. While the Valorian researchers found the composition of these oozes vastly interesting, the nature of these oozes and their true purpose clashed with the Valorian imperative to stabilize and purify Shar. These creatures discovered went against everything that they aimed for their civilization to be, and threatened to make achieving their greatest hope for the Plane even more difficult. Samples were collected from the oozes and taken back for magiscientific study. The oozes seemed to occupy a state outside life and death, continually getting smaller and smaller to the point of becoming microscopic entropic particles, yet eventually drifting back back to the Umbral Blot, taking all they discovered and consumed with them. With the taking of samples by the Valorian researchers, the first instance of separation was felt. The Umbral Blot felt pain and felt deprivation for the first time; something it would nOt SoOn fOrGeT nEvEr nEvEr NEVER
Information spread regarding these strange ooze like creatures that could be collected far east in the southern continent. Any nation with the strength and reach sent out scouts to collect, harvest, and investigate the area. The once-feared chaos spawn that would eat demons and cultists alike were now the ones being hunted. For each one taken away, the Blot would shrink in size. A new evolution was needed to ensure the survival of the Blot. Call it by chance, or randomness, an accident would happen. Or perhaps it was always the grand design of the Xaositect Factol to ensure everything leads to a truly unprecedented outcome. A battle between Valorian researchers and demons of Mishra left a wounded Valorian soldier outside her city’s protection. The Blot’s spawn dragged the soldier back to its master, but instead of consuming the soldier, the Blot stripped the flesh and bone away from the soldier, preserving her mind in place. Churning and mixing her own flesh with the mind, breaking it apart and reforming with all the collective knowledge of existing on Shar for almost five hundred years. And thus something truly new was formed.
Birthed in the deepest caverns, the first Changeling would emerge from the mass of the Blot. This thing vastly exceeded the intelligence of the average ooze. With the newest addition added to the ranks of the Blot’s empire of pseudopods, the Blot commanded its forces to fight back against the attacks on them. No longer were humble slimes under attack from researchers and/or harvesters. Rather, the researchers and harvesters found themselves on the receiving end of attacks, aided by creatures who could look exactly like their closest allies and dearest loved ones. For most of the next two hundred years, the far eastern side of the southern continent was dominated by the Blot and its progeny that cared only for assimilating novelty into their infinite and chaotic recombination of all it could discover. Yet, the weakness of Chaos is that it struggles to keep an orderly arrangement across long distances.
Toward the beginning of the Dark Ages, when the Gods invaded taking the fight to the Greater Nine all over the plane, the Umbral Blot started to expand its reach. Massing to the size of a large mountain, tends of thousands of basic oozes and hundreds of changelings at its command, orders were sent out amongst the collective to explore across the lands in search of more novel discoveries. For many of the amoebae, they remained connected to the Blot as they moved across the lands. Whenever a planar war was happening, many of the dead would find themselves dissolving within the Blot. However, for the Changelings, the farther they went away from the Blot, the less influence its chaotic and disorder imperatives held over them. Feelings and thoughts emerging from their own minds started to take hold. The Umbral Blot achieved its true apotheosis, spawning genuinely independent, new, and unique beings.
While the amoeba were terrifying monstrosities that could not easily be killed with violence, especially when opponents used mundane arms and armor. Changelings did not have the endurance or attack power of their kind. They adapted another way of concealing themselves from a fight. They morphed their appearance to co-exist amongst the battling demons and gods. With this development, changelings started to invade themselves into small communities all across the southern continent. For the most part, it was unheard of what happened to these communities. Such communities might disappear without a word, or they might prosper and suddenly find demons avoiding them. Unpredictable. Who could say? Many people believed a roaming demon horde consumed the village, or believed a force of godly power came and protected it. Who could know?
Not long after, the first changeling appeared within what was considered one of the Greatest nations on the Southern landmass of Shar: Acroshia. Ruled by Five powerful rulers, the first changelings that entered their territory went unnoticed for a few days. However, a powerful warrior and one of the rulers of these lands, The Eagle King Tabucca-Al-Sirqa, interacted with the Changelings. Instead of merely shooting them off his lands, Tabucca was vastly interested with the limbic material that made up these creatures. Tabucca proclaimed these creatures were to be given anything they wanted and allowed to stay in his personal palace. While the changelings were cautious of this threat, their own ideas and emotions started to overtake their mission. Greed, lust, and other emotions overshadowed the threat of what was presented to them. Tabucca had the Changelings studied while distracting them with their innermost desires. For creatures who’ve never experienced desires before would want to explore every option.
With Tabucca’s influence, he was able to learn of the Umbral Blot, which these changelings called their origin. Tabucca, with a handful of his most devoted warriors, took off to find the birthplace of changelings. While the Blot had immense size and a large force against the small group of warriors that came to collect it, the Blot never had to deal with a threat like Tabucca. For almost seven hundred years, the Blot never truly felt fear, only frustration and deprivation, but when Tabucca gazed upon its translucent form, it rejoiced paradoxically, blessed with a new sensation it had only ever created in others. Some people expected a glorious battle, but the reality was far different. Tabucca stepped inside the Blot, as no non-changeling had ever done voluntarily. And then, as no non-changeling had ever done, he stepped back outside the Blot. And then, the Blot was gone.
With the Blot nowhere to be found, its amoeba-like oozes remained only as thousands upon thousands of severed and shattered pieces, seeking out novelty across the lands, but no longer having a home to which to return. The basic oozes became dormant, or pets for individuals with some foundation of power. Yet, thing that they carried over from their birthplace was the cravings for novelty, to touch and consume and experience new things. The changelings experienced an unfortunate side effect from the lack of a supreme being to serve as an anchor point. Their emotions became more rampant and chaotic, while attempting to attach themselves to echoes of Yggdrasil as best they could. They had to adapt to bear their own children, now secluding themselves within civilizations, keeping their true origins a carefully guarded secret. The “Renegades”, the ones that revealed the truth to Tabucca, were stored out of sight to enhance the Five Kings' own schemes, some elevated to great and noble positions. Perhaps some lurk among the noble houses even to this day.
Yet, no more than fifty changelings would be found within a group or town. The more gathered in one place, the greater the risk grew of them all being killed or captured. After the fall of the Five Kings, one of the orders that came down was mass removal of the blight called changelings. Driven out of homes and sewers, they were sent off into the vast wastelands of the North. Wandering forever in hopes to find something they once had. A place to call home. Yet, some hid. And some remained.
-The Umbral Blot
The Xaositect Factol took great interest with Shar when it was but a twinkle in the Planeshaper’s eye, yet to be formed into a plane. Known also as the Chaos Overlord or The Lord of Limbo, he exists beyond reason or comprehension, but is ever in search of unpredictable results - of things that have never happened, and of things that cannot happen. With the existing universes turning about the Great Wheel in an orderly fashion for what seems like an eternity, the prospect of a gaggle of nine fell entities creating their own reality seemed, for once, to be something truly novel amidst the turning of the Wheel, something that would defy even the physics of the great Modron March, the Heavenly Order of Mount Celestia, and the dark tyranny of the Nine Hells. The Lord of Limbo tended the great Chaos Tree Yggdrasil in his true incomprehensible form at the very heart of Limbo, nurturing and cultivating a tiny blot of absolute entropy and chaos. As the new plane of Shar was beginning to settle and the metaphysical tectonic plates of the Prime Material, the Ethereal, the Shadowfell, and the Abyss settled into an unholy world, the Xaositect Factol dropped the blot into the boiling oceans to grow and attach itself to the plane's own weave, the underlying magical substrate that governed reality and the supernatural’s interaction with it all across Shar. While scholars debate if Shar could have ever been stable, the blot surely made it less so - and attached to a Plane’s worth of supernatural energy, it grew and grew until it threatened to blot out the entire world. B l o t o u t t h e W o r l d
As the construction of Shar reached its final stages, nearly ready for humanoid habitation, the weave reacted violently and the blot began to crash against the freshly created landscapes of Shar, reducing them into nonsense geometries of impossible curves and angles, replete with scintillating colors, cold fire, and dark light. The Umbral Blot began to blot out the newly formed seas into wastelands of ether and vapor, and proceeded erratically, severing the Winterback Mountains from the Northern Continent and obliterating a piece of the Acroshian landmass. Before anything truly alive reached the Plane of Shar, the Umbral Blot moved - with purpose and with non-purpose. And it kept growing kept growing kept growing kept growing
As the Umbral Blot grew and grew, the entropy of random pieces of reality smashing together inside its inky blackness gave rise to a mind, or maybe multiple minds, and as those minds came to KNOW of the many different things in the world which could be combined and recombined through smashing their various pieces apart and recombining them in chaos, it came to understand hunger. Yet, with its entropic nature, it moved erratically, aiming to proceed in one direction, then teleporting elsewhere, or moving backwards, or rolling in upon itself. And it came to know frustration. But yet demons, their early worshippers, and a number of other individuals fed the endless appetite for more different little pieces of reality. Decades passed as it gradually accreted matter and souls and energy around it, growing in size and intelligence all the while. But even demons themselves learned to fear the Umbral Blot, and the things that had once fed it began to stay away. Lacking new experience, new elements of reality, the blot of entropy threatened to devour itself. But the solution appeared naturally, as a being of such chaos and complexity could not maintain a single solitary consciousness anyway. And so, like the elementary cells of so much of the mortal life it consumed, it split, undergoing a metaphysical mitosis, gleefully breaking apart into smaller, independent pieces. They retained some collective alien logic to their movements, and continued to divide, until ultimately these individual cells of the Blot became the first oozes, populating a majority of the tunnels in the Underdark and some of the most chaotic and strange regions above.
With the creation of these amoeba, the Umbral Blot yet retained a central mass, dispatching these oozes to gather new elements of reality, new souls, new experiences, new ways of being for it to assimilate and smash together with other pieces in an infinity of destructive creation. The Blot grew to the size of a city underneath the sands and mountains, and nothing was safe from its ever-reaching hunger. Yet it would not exist without opposition.
A group of Valorian researchers first discovered the first oozes on the Southern continent. It was first documented around the third era. While the Valorian researchers found the composition of these oozes vastly interesting, the nature of these oozes and their true purpose clashed with the Valorian imperative to stabilize and purify Shar. These creatures discovered went against everything that they aimed for their civilization to be, and threatened to make achieving their greatest hope for the Plane even more difficult. Samples were collected from the oozes and taken back for magiscientific study. The oozes seemed to occupy a state outside life and death, continually getting smaller and smaller to the point of becoming microscopic entropic particles, yet eventually drifting back back to the Umbral Blot, taking all they discovered and consumed with them. With the taking of samples by the Valorian researchers, the first instance of separation was felt. The Umbral Blot felt pain and felt deprivation for the first time; something it would nOt SoOn fOrGeT nEvEr nEvEr NEVER
Information spread regarding these strange ooze like creatures that could be collected far east in the southern continent. Any nation with the strength and reach sent out scouts to collect, harvest, and investigate the area. The once-feared chaos spawn that would eat demons and cultists alike were now the ones being hunted. For each one taken away, the Blot would shrink in size. A new evolution was needed to ensure the survival of the Blot. Call it by chance, or randomness, an accident would happen. Or perhaps it was always the grand design of the Xaositect Factol to ensure everything leads to a truly unprecedented outcome. A battle between Valorian researchers and demons of Mishra left a wounded Valorian soldier outside her city’s protection. The Blot’s spawn dragged the soldier back to its master, but instead of consuming the soldier, the Blot stripped the flesh and bone away from the soldier, preserving her mind in place. Churning and mixing her own flesh with the mind, breaking it apart and reforming with all the collective knowledge of existing on Shar for almost five hundred years. And thus something truly new was formed.
Birthed in the deepest caverns, the first Changeling would emerge from the mass of the Blot. This thing vastly exceeded the intelligence of the average ooze. With the newest addition added to the ranks of the Blot’s empire of pseudopods, the Blot commanded its forces to fight back against the attacks on them. No longer were humble slimes under attack from researchers and/or harvesters. Rather, the researchers and harvesters found themselves on the receiving end of attacks, aided by creatures who could look exactly like their closest allies and dearest loved ones. For most of the next two hundred years, the far eastern side of the southern continent was dominated by the Blot and its progeny that cared only for assimilating novelty into their infinite and chaotic recombination of all it could discover. Yet, the weakness of Chaos is that it struggles to keep an orderly arrangement across long distances.
Toward the beginning of the Dark Ages, when the Gods invaded taking the fight to the Greater Nine all over the plane, the Umbral Blot started to expand its reach. Massing to the size of a large mountain, tends of thousands of basic oozes and hundreds of changelings at its command, orders were sent out amongst the collective to explore across the lands in search of more novel discoveries. For many of the amoebae, they remained connected to the Blot as they moved across the lands. Whenever a planar war was happening, many of the dead would find themselves dissolving within the Blot. However, for the Changelings, the farther they went away from the Blot, the less influence its chaotic and disorder imperatives held over them. Feelings and thoughts emerging from their own minds started to take hold. The Umbral Blot achieved its true apotheosis, spawning genuinely independent, new, and unique beings.
While the amoeba were terrifying monstrosities that could not easily be killed with violence, especially when opponents used mundane arms and armor. Changelings did not have the endurance or attack power of their kind. They adapted another way of concealing themselves from a fight. They morphed their appearance to co-exist amongst the battling demons and gods. With this development, changelings started to invade themselves into small communities all across the southern continent. For the most part, it was unheard of what happened to these communities. Such communities might disappear without a word, or they might prosper and suddenly find demons avoiding them. Unpredictable. Who could say? Many people believed a roaming demon horde consumed the village, or believed a force of godly power came and protected it. Who could know?
Not long after, the first changeling appeared within what was considered one of the Greatest nations on the Southern landmass of Shar: Acroshia. Ruled by Five powerful rulers, the first changelings that entered their territory went unnoticed for a few days. However, a powerful warrior and one of the rulers of these lands, The Eagle King Tabucca-Al-Sirqa, interacted with the Changelings. Instead of merely shooting them off his lands, Tabucca was vastly interested with the limbic material that made up these creatures. Tabucca proclaimed these creatures were to be given anything they wanted and allowed to stay in his personal palace. While the changelings were cautious of this threat, their own ideas and emotions started to overtake their mission. Greed, lust, and other emotions overshadowed the threat of what was presented to them. Tabucca had the Changelings studied while distracting them with their innermost desires. For creatures who’ve never experienced desires before would want to explore every option.
With Tabucca’s influence, he was able to learn of the Umbral Blot, which these changelings called their origin. Tabucca, with a handful of his most devoted warriors, took off to find the birthplace of changelings. While the Blot had immense size and a large force against the small group of warriors that came to collect it, the Blot never had to deal with a threat like Tabucca. For almost seven hundred years, the Blot never truly felt fear, only frustration and deprivation, but when Tabucca gazed upon its translucent form, it rejoiced paradoxically, blessed with a new sensation it had only ever created in others. Some people expected a glorious battle, but the reality was far different. Tabucca stepped inside the Blot, as no non-changeling had ever done voluntarily. And then, as no non-changeling had ever done, he stepped back outside the Blot. And then, the Blot was gone.
With the Blot nowhere to be found, its amoeba-like oozes remained only as thousands upon thousands of severed and shattered pieces, seeking out novelty across the lands, but no longer having a home to which to return. The basic oozes became dormant, or pets for individuals with some foundation of power. Yet, thing that they carried over from their birthplace was the cravings for novelty, to touch and consume and experience new things. The changelings experienced an unfortunate side effect from the lack of a supreme being to serve as an anchor point. Their emotions became more rampant and chaotic, while attempting to attach themselves to echoes of Yggdrasil as best they could. They had to adapt to bear their own children, now secluding themselves within civilizations, keeping their true origins a carefully guarded secret. The “Renegades”, the ones that revealed the truth to Tabucca, were stored out of sight to enhance the Five Kings' own schemes, some elevated to great and noble positions. Perhaps some lurk among the noble houses even to this day.
Yet, no more than fifty changelings would be found within a group or town. The more gathered in one place, the greater the risk grew of them all being killed or captured. After the fall of the Five Kings, one of the orders that came down was mass removal of the blight called changelings. Driven out of homes and sewers, they were sent off into the vast wastelands of the North. Wandering forever in hopes to find something they once had. A place to call home. Yet, some hid. And some remained.
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