Soul Reavers.Species.Soul Reaver
.Characteristics.Soul Reavers are born without anything that sets them apart from the rest of the members on their planet. In other words, a Reaver born on Earth will be born as a human or any other Terran animal. The only distinguishing feature is the physical appearance of an
'Unlucky Seven' marking on some part of their body, in varying sizes. (One Reaver's marking may cover an entire limb, while others may be only a few inches wide.) These markings are permanent and cannot be removed through any surgery, as they will reappear. If the limb on which the marking rested was removed, it will materialize on some other part of the body.
.Homeland.Soul Reavers have no distinctive homeland, as they inhabit each and every planet in the universe. There is one born to each world, and only one (though they are not restricted to their own planet or realm and can freely move about from place to place). Should the representative Reaver somehow be killed, there will be no others Reavers born to his or her original planet.
.Abilities/Features.Soul Reavers are notorious for their immortality. Stab them, burn them, impale them ... and they will live. Speedy metabolism not only kicks off food digestion but provides almost instantaneous healing. Limbs cannot be regrown, but if the original is found and placed against the stump, it will reattach. Their high metabolism also means that it is almost impossible for them to get drunk off of alcohol (though many have bypassed this problem by creating their own mixes, usually containing poisons such as cyanide). All of the species can teleport from one planet, or realm, to the next - but
only if they have a clear mental image of their destination, or they will be inadvertently sent to
between: a cold, dismal, black place which is neither here no there and has made many a Reaver go mad because it will numb their senses, their minds ... They can telepath with one another no matter the distance, a secretive form of communication. All Reavers can reave, or devour, the souls of the living (and undead). This act replenishes lost energy at the cost of completely, permanently destroying the victim.
.Life Cycle.Reavers are born as average residents of whatever planet they happen to be on. They grow up and develop both physically and mentally. However, their mortal life is inflicted with incessant bad luck and they have a high probability of being killed within the first twenty years or so. When the inevitable does occur, a Reaver's spirit leaves their mortal bodies which are left to decay as normal corpses would, but the souls do not drift off into the ether. Rather, they are reborn into secondary manifestations of their former selves (often, if not always, naked). These bodies are more or less shells for the Reaver's spirits - casings that provide mobilization and shelter. From this moment on, they are immortal and incapable of aging beyond the point at which they were killed. (IE: If a Reaver is killed at the age of fifteen, he or she will remain fifteen forever). Biologically standing, Soul Reavers can mate with others but cannot reproduce - both females and males are sterile.
.Cultural Description.In the beginning, there was It. It was, by all means, a God. It had no sex. It had no race. It had no physical form. It was simply it: everything and nothing compressed into one and all. It does not exist but is tangible to a 'T': a fake reality; a false image of what is and what can never really be.
It created the megaverse and all universes in between. It birthed the galaxies and the black holes and the supernovas. It implanted the forever abysmal skies with stars and planets. It exhumed carbon dioxide and oxygen and methane and arsenic. It created life: from the primordial ooze to the first
Homo sapiens; from the alien life forms to the closest relatives; from the smallest insect to the largest mammoth. Volcanoes emerged. Hurricanes and typhoons raged. The sky became blue and the clouds became white. It created everything that we know and see today, and It created everything we have yet to witness.
But when it came right down to it, It had its hands full. So It created demi-Gods that would help to rule the megaverse alongside It. One, or multiple, Gods were assigned to each planet, which would lead to a complex strings of religions concocted by the beings inhabiting the worlds. It also created Kamiri, a Phoenix Goddess like It in every way except that Kamiri created the Spiritual Realm and governed the life after death and what came after. Like It, Kamiri had her wings filled to the tips of her feathers, so she birthed beings called Soul Reavers: one to each planet, like the Gods, to keep the precious spectral lifestream of each world stable and clean from all evil and corruption. The Soul Reavers would be born at some point as living beings with crooked seven markings - 'Lucky Sevens' - upon some part of their body. Together, It and Kamiri generated peace. The Soul Reavers, symbiotically bound, were referred to as Guardians. The Reaver Pillars, built on the periphery of the Living and Dead Realms, were erected to display the life span and spiritual health of each Reaver and thus monitored the wellbeing of each world's Spirit Realm.
All was well.
But as we all know, good things don't last forever.
Valtiel was an angelic being who was the second Soul Reaver ever endowed. He saw Kamiri's power and was overcome with a great greedy lust: a powerful desire to seize it. Overcome by his own jealousy, Valtiel used his magic to summon Kuro, a demonic rabbit overlord bathed in Corruption who ruled over the Third Realm where everything is backwards, rusty, and coated in dry blood. Valtiel sent Kuro to kill Kamiri. The demonic Rabbit managed to devour and corrupt half of her soul while the other fled into the unknown, seeking a viable host of pure spirit and empty shell which she could use as a home until both pieces of the soul could reunite as one once more. Incognito, Kamiri's second-in-command and second ever Reaver, found out about the Valtiel/Kuro scheme. He tried to stop Kuro, but was Corrupted: Kuro cursed his 'Lucky Seven', infecting it (physically visible thanks to the presence of two spots, one above and one below the original marking). Wracked by this 'disease', Incognito plunged into a madness which overflowed and infected all other existing Reavers who are symbiotically bound.
Kamiri's assassination was expertly calculated. The entire circle descended into madness, and all of the new Reavers untouched by the insanity were tainted from the moment of their first cries, instantly rendered incapable of fulfilling the role Fate had prepared for them. Kuro instilled a time of fear: the mortals It created grow terrified of the Reavers who were no longer guarding them: the Reavers who were letting the stagnant souls of murderers run rampant to be brought back to life again and again and again ...
Kuro assumed Kamiri's 'throne' taking the bunt of the blame while Valtiel worked his scheme alone in the shadows.
A deep-seated hatred thrived towards all Reavers. Kuro, in his delusional grandeur, began a genocide of sorts - finding and Corrupting other Reavers, new and old, so that he may control them and, in the process, tainting the life force of the planets those poor souls were meant to protect. Those who were not taken captive were now trying hard to simply survive: forced into hiding and often forming small bands with other Reavers for protection and heightened awareness. Times were trying. But there was hope, however minute. Rumors spread about Kamiri's possible revival, that she was not really dead, that things were about to change for the better.
And they did.
All thanks to a little girl with a pure heart named Nakéminae, her protective - though nonbiological sister - Naira, and a handful of close friends. It turned out that when Kuro destroyed Kamiri, her soul had split into six feathers that spread throughout the globe. Kuro devoured one (fire), granting him some of her powers. Naira, unknowingly, obtained possession of a second (dark). A third (light) absorbed into Nakéminae. And the other three (earth, water, wind) were scattered about Greenwood, a small town in Maine, Earth, that had been taken over and demolished by Kuro. Greenwood was the demon rabbit's 'den'.
It turned out that Kamiri's Light feather was also the carrier of her spirit. It needed to possess the body of somebody who was pure of heart, untainted by hate or misery. That person was Nakéminae. Slain by Valtiel, Nakéminae's soul departed from her body to make room for that of the elemental phoenix goddess. But she lay dormant, inactive due to the lack of Nakéminae's spirit. It would take a great sacrifice to unite the two ... A sacrifice provided by Naira, who traveled to Greenwood in hopes of finding her sister and ending the plight of Reavers once and for all. Alongside friends acquired from her new domain, Naira gave her life so that Nakéminae would return. In one dramatic moment, Kamiri revived ... absolving Kuro, dissolving the body of Valtiel, who was killed by Naira and her allies in battle ...
And everything reset.
The Reaver Pillars collapsed. Kamiri imploded. Every Reaver on every planet suddenly up and vanished ...
It would be two long years of hibernation and recovery before any sign of life came to be. Suddenly the Pillars sprang up for a second time, pristine and refilled. Reavers captured or destroyed by Kuro and Valtiel's madness breathed once more, their planets reforming from the muddled mess of confusion. Those who disappeared simply came back with clear heads. Kamiri herself was returned to the megaverse, reclaiming her throne s the Reaver Goddess. Nakéminae has become something of her shadow, having obtained the phoenix's powers as well as holding onto her own.
For now, everything is normal once again.
For now.
The marking? It remains an 'Unlucky Seven', the dots of Corruption forever permanent. They are reminders of what happened: assurances that it will never be forgotten, and never happen again.
.Religion.There are no organized religions for Reavers unless an individual believes in one. However, there is a general acceptance of anything and everything, because It and Kamiri are certainly not the only gods out there.
