Everliving Ones

The legend of the Everliving Ones is a well known tale told by orcs. Adult orcs pass on the story to younger generations in all clan structures, the legend somehow remaining uncannily identical across all retellings. The orcs fear the Everliving Ones despite being unable to point to a source for this fear. The most paranoid orcs believe the Everliving Ones to be constantly watching, waiting for a lonely orc to stray from the protection of the clan. Orcs use this tale to stress the importance for clans to protect freshly bloomed orcs and teach those orcs about the dangers which lie outside of the clan.

Summary

The orcs tell of beings small and waifish, whose stature hides a terrifying capacity for horror. These beings are said to dwell in cave entrances and glow a faint cold colour in darkness even wrapped in thick clothing. Known as the Everliving Ones for their rumoured agelessness, these beings are said to capture orcs who find themselves far from the clan's protection and primarily fresh blooms. By some kind of manipulation, Everliving Ones can prevent orcs from ever meeting Dretha or be given Dretha's Comfort .
Those taken by the Everliving Ones rarely ever return. Those who do are forever changed and often carry lifelong trauma. The only reason the orcs know what they know of the Everliving Ones comes from the very few who return.

Historical Basis

In the higher levels of the Darklands lives the small society of derros. Descendants from fey, the Derros have ruptured their connections to the First World and thus lost their immortality.
In seeking to regain their immortality on the material plane, they have taken to lead experiments with cytillesh to extend their own lifespan. Cytillesh, is a Darklands fungi which can slow the aging process of certain species to a crawl. The derros capture vulnerable individuals of the Darklands and the surface alike in order to study the effects of cytillesh to find a way to regain their immortality. The long-lived derros can experiment on one individual for many lifetimes.
Usually dwelling in the deeper tunnels of the Darklands, derros moved to the higher tunnels following the dwarven Quest for Sky. Derros have taken inhabitance in the now sparsely populated tunnels of Nar-Voth.

Spread

The legend of the Everliving Ones is known by all orcs, it is spread by witches in seed clans and Dreti (parents or tutors) in legacy clans alike. The myth exists also in clans of the surviving Darklands orcs and the wet orcs' Fleet. Across all cultures of orcs, the myth remains identical with additions to it as small as they are extremely rare spreading very fast to all orcs.

Variations & Mutation

The myth is ancient, the derros practices of abduction can be found described in ancient dwarven texts be they fiction or strategic conversations.
Though it doesn't vary in orcish retellings, it figures in many different cultures both in the Darklands and above but under different names drawing from different cultural associations with the derros. Notably, most dwarven depictions paint the derros in a neutral to favourable faintly glowing light.

Cultural Reception

The Everliving Ones are one of few things orcs seem genuinely afraid of. Though they can feel fear as other humanoid species do, the orcs' fear of the Everliving Ones is existential. This is because they are the only known beings able to rob them of their natural end. This fear is the main reason that despite being ill suited to life under the sun, surface orcs do not return to the Darklands and avoid cave entrances they have not secured or guarded.

Date of First Recording

Ancient

Related Species

• Orcs