Iphelele
Description
The Iphelele people are a moth humanoid race that has thrived and prospered thanks to the mutations from a meteorite, this allows them to not need water, food, sleeping or even to breath which gives them a lot of time to focus on themselves in the form of perfection. They are experiencing a population boom which is leading to internal issues, the biggest issue is the old ocean god traditions from the elderly dying out and a new religion Zuru the idea of self perfection which itself can be divided for each individual’s perception, but the overarching theme is body manipulation and modification through magic mutations to achieve perfection using the meteorite. This idea has led to youths to start exploring the world to find their own self perfection or find and utilize more meteorite pieces for their own gain.
Current National Crises
A serious issue effecting the Iphelele was the recent theft of the meteorite by a member of the Zuru religion and took it for their own selfish reasons. A young child by the name of Ette, a genius of magic mutations studies and wanting to use the meteorite for creating something that is unknown at this point and is considered a wanted criminal and is currently being hunted down by members of the Zuru and the Iphelele court offering a high reward on return of the meteorite. This event led many Iphelele people to leave Bogmire, some wanting the return of the meteorite, some wanting the meteorite for their own perfection and others just wanting to test their skills and abilities in the greater world and perfect themselves further. The search for the stolen meteorite has already expanded for any meteorite with the same magical mutation properties with the court and Zulu religion seeing it as a way to gain greater perfection.Good Things Happening Right Now
A new safe spot section in the outer swamps has been discovered and it is relatively close by to the city. A certain kind of giant beetle was found making tunnels to it making passage easier and safer to travel. It has not yet been explored but safe enough passages are being set up currently and fortification and security in the section of the mud wall in the city is being built for safety before exploration can continue. Who knows what could be found. Perfect Roll Table: Roll to see what Perfection you seek| 1 | Efficiency | Maximize skills/animals/people or items potential with little waste |
| 2 | Beauty | How it looks like, however bazaar the artists choice is |
| 3 | Power | Strength and dominance or control, perfection means power |
| 4 | Intelligence | Perfection is from the mind and the knowledge it comes with |
| 5 | Wisdom | It's about inner peace |
| 6 | Talent/skills | It's about being the best and going beyond it |
| 7 | Errors | They hate seeing imperfection and must fix it, skills/blighted/other |
| 8 | Creationism | They want to make something new perfect animals/people/other |
| 9 | Social | It's about culture, finding mates, producing perfect children, friends/love |
| 10 | Alien/outside thinking | Alien/outside thinking, they want something so outside whats considered perfection |
Basic Information
Biological Traits
A humanoid shaped moth person. They have 2 legs, 2 arms and a pair of wings. The body is made of hard chitin with the arms and legs looking like elegant chitin forms for the limbs but distinctly insect based. A silk like fluff is based on top of the head acting similar to hair and the thick fluff goes down to join with the wing and upper body, but can vary wildly from person to person. The chest and lower body has a thinner less thick layer of the silky fluff. The ears looks like leaves sticking out from their head. The face looks quite similar to a human female with it being feminine in appearance and the body can be considered an elegant look. These appearances makes it hard to tell male from female and the Iphelele use pheromones to tell the difference.
The Iphelele sight is perfect, one of their unique characteristics is seeing without the need for any light. Another feature is the lack of need for food, water, sleeping or even breathing, this is thanks to the mutating effects of a special meteorite that muted the Iphelele people. The chitin of this species is quite hard and durable with those of the Zuru religion and exposed to magical mutations and its knowledge are able to freely manipulate it at will, the shape of a person can change wildly based on what they want. Thanks to wings flight is also a possibility but you can find members who's wings are not functioning due to art choices that impede flight for the sake of art.
Growth Rate & Stages
Eggs: Iphelele females give birth to considerable amount of eggs but their is a collective area called the egg pools in which they are deposited to for safe caring. They look like tide pools but much more muddy and swampy, several such places exist around Ipey and are guarded heavily for safety. It takes roughly a year for the larval to hatch.
larval Stage: Once born the first 5 years are in the form of a big silk worm unable to talk and only perceive the world. Each child has a unique scent that the parents can tell the difference despite all looking similar and they themselves have a build in pheromone tracker that can tell parents and family. Larval are freely allowed to move and explore the city to their hearts content able to go up and down walls and not needing to eat or sleep so are left unchecked. Once they reach the age of about 5 years old they seek a safe location preferably close to their parents often in their home and form a massive silk cocoon which is highly valued for its quality and after a year develop into a child humanoid.
Child Stage: The child is now able to move, fly and manipulate things with their hands. They are given a mimic stone at this age, its purpose is to be molded by the child as they learn and seek their own perfection in life and once they reach the age of 20 adulthood its made into a metal forging their ideals. Children are like open books and easily written on, they explore sections of the city and what others are doing to form their own opinion on the world and perfection. Though outside of Iphelele thinking, they are easily influenced or manipulated till they reach the age of 10, but directly influencing someone coming up with their own perfection is a taboo. The children often try to learn from their parents and observe their forms of perfection but dedicated schooling in the upper layer is available upon personal choice of the child.
Adulthood: Once you are 20 you are considered an adult with your perfection forged into your mimic stone, but finding out what your ideal perfection is one thing, achieving it another and thus they attempt to do what they can by any means to carve a path towards it.
Civilization and Culture
Naming Traditions
Naming traditions are a bit different here, the parents of course pick the first name for their child but vary based on their interpretation of perfection. When the child reaches adulthood they pick their own last name on something based on what perfection they wish to seek.
Major Organizations
Beauty Ideals
The ideals of beauty are complicated and to say eye of the beholder is an understatement. The Iphelele are individualistic in every aspect of the nature and how they present themselves or find beautiful can end up completely incomprehensible. From the way they walk to their chest fluff or disregarding it all together can be forms of beauty. But some common things of beauty you will find are chitin and wing art where body artists will make themselves or others into walking pieces of master works. Silk to quite common here as well and elegant clothing would be the standard amongst the populace. Those looking for a mate use pheromones to find a suitable mate, they are able to change the scent at will. Unlike most animal pheromones that drive mating, these scents are intended to be used to give inspiration and creativity and a courtship dance takes places representing their ideal perfection, if they are a match they begin a normal relationship. When looking for an ideal partner they often look for complementing or similar perfection ideals or trains of thought. Examples can include an artist paring up with a dye maker or those seeking genetic perfection in their children pairing up.
Average Technological Level
Typical fantasy level of technology comparable to the rest of the world. Though thanks to a meteorite their advancement in biology and magical mutation is considerably advanced.
Common Dress Code
As chitin acts as clothing and chitin and wing body art are pretty normal, going in the buff is not frowned upon or even considered odd. But those wanting to appear more elegant wear beautiful silk clothing.
Culture and Cultural Heritage
Painting/body art thanks to rare dyes and more recently thanks to Zuru magic mutations. There has been a splinter between skilled body artists using dyes and paint to create tattoo-like artworks on chinton who is in conflict with those that would use magic mutations to achieve different works of body art, leading to rivalry and jealousy. There is a poor court member determined to patronize a young genius artist as best they can so help fulfill their desires of perfection, except their ideals are completely unworldly and abstract. Old traditions for the ancient ocean god include making statues and paintings music and dances, but typically only the elderly practice these.
History
The Iphelele people were once a simple race of sentient moth like monsters living in the Bogmire swamp with no contact with the outside world, savage and uncouth, ignorant of all. They worshiped an old ocean god, they painted pictures and colored and decorated their chinton and moth fluff with dyes from beetles to celebrate and worship the perfect being. The tribe has always been ruled by a council of elders those chosen having exceptional or unique skills.
What happened during the meteorite: Generations ago a meteorite flew through the sky's of The Impaled Planet breaking into pieces as it flew. One such piece crashed into Bogmire opening up and exposing the underground swamp to the outside world where the Iphelele live. At first the ignorant Iphelele people were confused, a new world surrounded by new people they knew nothing about. Interactions were peaceful during this time, with cultural exchanges and knowledge sharing. This led to the villages finding out the values in Bogmire swamp, it was a deadly area but it held rare bugs that could be used to produce pure dyes of all colors. When the dyes were sold outside the island by the villagers, a wave of interest took hold of the island with flocks of people rushing to get rich despite the dangers of the swamp. The Iphelele people were happy of the influx of people working together to help them avoid the dangers and gaining access to all sorts of knowledge and goods being brought to them.
Unknown to both the people and the Iphelele at the time, something in the meteorite contained some sort of magical mutating effect, it was slow at first, the environment and animals of both the above and underground swamp began to change ever so slightly. The first wave of issues with mutations were thought to be a plague of some sort, being in a swamp it was expected something like this would happen at some time, but it wasn't enough to stop people from the riches. When those who figured out what was truly happening it came far too late, when the first blighted were born to the world, the mutations on the first people there was light or had no mutations in appearance it would be their children taking the full force of the effect. The blighted children that were born off the island were either dumped back on the island or killed outright, while the village and those who decided to stay had no choice but to embrace the mutations. Over time this made the island a more chaotic place with the mutating effects to those that it has never been touched before far worse than it was before. This did not stop the greed of people as adventures, merchants and daredevils still trying to strike it rich.
The Iphelele people on other hand were affected just the same but instead of deformities and abominations a certain kind of perfection was born from them. Through the generations they found themselves growing stronger and more powerful, gaining certain attributes such as chitin manipulation and they are nourished by invisible radiations and not needing to eat, sleep, nor breathe and see clearly even in the absence of any light.
Historical Figures
The first contact: The most famous Iphelele is an explorer by the name of Spiddle, she was the first to venture past the upper swamp and outside it making contact with humans in the time when the meteorite first fell.
The first adventure: In the old days, when the Iphelele were less established an adventurer called Bliker came to explore Bogmire and learn about the Iphelele. They told us about the world, its cultural and stories and in turn we gave him our silks and dyes.
The first merchant: Sometime after the first adventurer a caravan from outside Skull Island came to bogmire, beat up and tested in battle to get to the Iphelele a shrewd looking person Esmeralda bringing a massive amount of goods and supplies from the outside world wishing to trade for valuable pure dyes and silks. This led to our first cultural boom changing the very heart of how Iphelele society, thanks to an influx of outside wonders.
Common Myths and Legends
Immortal spinner: A massive heavily mutated immortal spider. The spider is unable to climb like most spiders as its functionality is that of digging through the dirt making tunnels and finding prey. In the time when the meteorite first struck it is said a certain spider monster came forth reeking havoc for the Iphelele for a generation, but as the Iphelele evolved they fought it back and it has said to made a new home for itself looking for easier prey.
Gem moss: The moss might not be actual gems but its appearance when fully grown looks like whatever it covered a crystal or gem. Only two people in the history of Iphelele, both long dead claim they found a new safe spot in the outer swamps filled with nothing but moss of all kinds and that some of them were hardened gems or crystals growing. Not being real crystals or gems its price isn't worth it for outsiders, but moss architectures and home owners the thought of a new form of beautiful moss to shape into whatever they dream would bring tears to their eyes if ever recovered.
Heart of the Giant: There has been a legend around since the start of Iphelele and its the heart of the giant. No one has ever seen it or even know if it even exists, but living in a giants rib cage brings forth amusing made up stories of the heart coming to life or its made of gold.
Consumer Tree: Legends talk about a horrific mutated tree deep in blighted territory in the upper swamp that consumes blighted and people by fusing their bodies to itself in a horrifying display of body parts and people screaming and wailing in pain. Some say the tree mutated as it is has intelligence of sorts which is dedicated on reproduction which it has trouble doing so.
Genetic Ancestor(s)
Genetic Descendants
Scientific Name
Lepidoptera
Lifespan
120 Years
Average Height
1.5 to 2.2 Meters
Average Weight
50 to a 80Kg's
Geographic Distribution
Related Materials
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