Ophidians

Ophidians are delightful chaps. They are not around much, but if you cross paths with one, they’ll make you the deal of a lifetime. Just don’t look too closely into their hood - there might be too many eyes staring back at you.

An ophidian is one, and it is many. They are a single organism made up of around two hundred individual organisms. Quite extraordinary! Two hundred individual serpent-like-creatures come together with a shared mind, twining into a humanoid form. I don’t know why humanoid, so don’t ask, but that’s what they do. The interlaced serpents, individually known as “medaga”, form legs, torso, arms, fingers, and head. They are loathe to separate, even in sleep. After about two minutes apart, the medaga begin to become unresponsive, and after an hour apart the medaga dies.

Interactions

Ophidians are perhaps the most self-reliant of the common species. They keep to themselves, though some individuals are inclined towards wanderlust. They are non-intrusive and non-militaristic; perhaps their shared mind makes them prone to cooperation and peace. They appear to largely keep to themselves not from xenophobia, but due to community self-reliance and because most other species find them unsettling. That and they prefer the damp, dark places of the world that repel the rest of us.

They have a particular affinity to baubles and trinkets. A string of shiny beads traded with an ophidian can earn you a full-day’s-pay-worth of goods from anyone else. It’s hard to dislike a fellow who is equally delighted with such a trade.

And confound the man who spurns a quest’n ophidian for their serpentine nature. Why, they even sound like us good ol’ humans. Their speech is nothing short of a miracle of sound. Several medaga of each ophidian appear to have developed specialized tonal glands. These medaga harmonize into flawless speech, indistinguishable from you or I. Twins regard them!

They tend to wander about in full coverings, including shoes, gloves, and a hood. They blend in all the right human-y places. They might as well be your hooded aunt who is afraid of the sun.

Ophidian in Combat

If caught in a tight spot and forced to fight, an ophidian displays several remarkable traits. They wield weapons as you or I might, but you will never see an injured or crippled ophidian. If mortally injured, the affected medaga will be shed from the body, and the whole is readjusted to operate without the lost part. It is quite the spectacle to see an ophidian take damage. A lethal strike to any other creature merely results in a reforming and shrinking of the ophidian, with a few discarded medaga left on the ground as the only evidence. Upon seeing a strike coming, an ophidian may either turn to take a lethal blow against a single medaga, or they may turn to take a non-lethal blow against multiple medaga.

True fighting ophidian are rare, though they are deadly. With extreme training and experience, an ophidian can overcome the great discomfort of breaking its humanoid form in order to instantly contort away from a weapon. You stab at the creature’s center mass, only to find that center mass is empty air with all the individual medaga dodging out of the way.

Further, they are venomous but not immediately deadly. It takes eight to twelve poisoned bites to kill the average human. Each medaga has a single venomous bite that restores over the course of a week. However, all this is moot, because if you have a problem with an ophidian, the problem is you. Animals may be a bit skittish around them, but we boast a higher intelligence.

Lifecycle

As stated, ophidians don’t typically like to fight. While born of roughly two hundred medaga, a lost medaga is lost forever. As medaga age, experience the accidents of life, and reamalgamate, their size and mass shrinks. Shrinking below fifty medaga or so means death.

How do they eat, you ask? Well, that bit is a bit disconcerting. The meal is broken apart and individually fed to each medaga. Waste? It is excreted as a mucus and disposed of... discreetly.

The ophidian lifecycle is fascinating. Ophidians as a whole are asexual. Reproduction appears to be the only time the medaga will separate for any length of time. Two ophidians will build a nesk. They separate into their madaga who then mate, lay eggs, and reamalgamate as two doting parents. The eggs hatch as medaga with animal-like intelligence in what is known as “First Birth.” Over several months the medaga grow to their full size and then amalgamate in the revered “Second Birth” into a sapient ophidian. They gain a child-like intelligence and grow mentally into adulthood over eight years. The ophidian life naturally spans roughly fifty years.

Community

An ophidian community is something to behold. There you are, trudging through a murky cave, and suddenly a thriving town lays before you. The baubles, trinkets, and shiny bits of trash decorate all surfaces. Glass beads hang from lines strung between homes. Reflective bits of metal are worked into the fences. The tinkle of ornaments fills the air with delight. Most ophidian artists utilize baubles brought in from outside to create masterful installations across one or multiple rooms, almost always utilizing light to bounce a twinkle across the whole thing.

Where did these mysterious beings come from? Nobody knows. One ophidian scholar might point to evidence of extraterrestrial origin. Another ophidian, a priest, may point to a divine source. An ophidian of science will direct you to a convincing line of evolutionary progress. My wanderings have proven all theories, and thus no theories. What I can say is Aropria hosts about 400,000 ophidians all told, as far as I can glean.

It is my sincerest hope you share a table with an ophidian one day. They are an absolute delight, what!