Tabor

Many people mistakenly assign a humanoid description to tabor, but a closer examination reveals that they are more tree-like than humanoid. Their bodies a left-right symmetric with a surprising degree of top-bottom symmetry as well.   Starting at their trunks, tabor begin splitting going up and down. Their trunks are narrow compared to their ends, but much harder than their tendrils. The bark covering their bodies is thickest here, with little rigidity.   Moving down, their trunks splits into eight tendrils, but these tendrils stay bundled into two larger structures of four tendrils each. They stay tightly wrapped to form two legs, folding into themselves at the ends to make pseudo-pods. Their legs remain in this state until they rest to feed, where they will partly unravel and dig into the earth.   Moving upwards, six of these limbs split out to form the equivalent of arms. They each split out roughly evenly from the trunk, allowing full 360-degree range for their arms. Each arm, in turn, can split into six smaller tendrils, used for manipulating tools.   The "head" of the Tabor is actually two tendrils wrapped tightly together and merged into one another. They wrap around and tuck into one another so that the ends are inside a large knotted mound. These tendrils end with complex bulbs that seem to function as a brain of sorts, with other unique organs present.   In addition to acting as the "head", these two tendrils are also the only part of the tabor to grow leaves. These leaves grow in long, thin, and in large quantities. The end appearance results in the entire head bulb being covered in a thick coat of grass-like leaves.

Tabor will grow into one of three roles. Administrators, Guardians, and Workers Administrators are generally the smallest, with moderately long lives, Guardians are the largest and longest living, while workers, making up 80% of the population, have the shortest lives.

Despite being highly mobile, tabor do not start their life as such. A tabor seed is shaped like a rain drop with a bottom diameter of about an inch and a half. Tabor will often comb their seeds from their own leaves and cultivate them in a communal structure, ensuring their growth.   In dirt, the tabor will grow rapidly. They develop temporary root structures instead of their leg tendrils. The roots help them accumulate nutrients faster as their permanent, mobile leg tendrils grow. On top, a tree like trunk sprouts until their body is fully shaped. Sapling tabor resembles many other tree saplings, but contains six nude branches around their thin trunks and two entwined tendrils above that grow thin leaves.   About a year after growth, the sapling begins to split its trunk at the bottom. Once it has done so, it will pull its legs from the ground and begin to walk and find richer areas to feed. At this point they have very poorly developed senses and tend to stay around their initial rooting. During the saplings mobile years, they will steadily grow taller and thicker.   At about ten years of age, the sensory organs are developed enough for the tabor sapling to begin to learn. Once able, they begin to go through their education. Their bodies continue to grow to for next several decades, usually reaching full growth at approximately forty years of age.   Fifty years from from being planted many tabor begin to grow their first flowers. It is also when they start to grow into the roles they have been most attracted to. Many tabor will go on to a second form of development at this point.   In the span of a few years, the tabor may reach it's full adult form, based on the role it receives in society. Culturally, they exclaim a tabor's role as a preordained outcome, but it's believed that its related to pheromones of the community and what roles are needed.   Reproduction is accomplished the same, regardless of role. A tabor will develop buds in their leaves, which will bloom to flowers. The colors vary dramatically from each tabor, but all have the same two-layer, ten petal display with small pestles. Each will have one or two tones in color, with many being highly reflective of UV light.   Various bugs will pollinate across all tabor, but most villages cultivate a preferred bug, with a few using small bird species. If successfully pollinated, a small fruit, containing the tabor seedling will grow. While it will fall on its own, it is more common for them to cultivate by hand with combs. These seedlings are planted, but only a small portion of these seedlings will often grow.   All tabor’s life cycles will end in usually the same manner, via starvation. Though they do not experience the same hunger as animals, they do experience lethargy from not being able to keep up with energy demands. After they reach adulthood, their ability to take in nutrients starts to degrade. In addition, they will slowly lose their ability to grow new leaves. This can take hundreds of years, but is the inevitable conclusion to a tabor.   When they finally reach the point where movement is almost too taxing, they will often migrate to a withering garden, the tabor version of a cemetery. Here they will set their roots and never retract them again. They can live in this tree-like state, functionally asleep, for months to years, but will move little until they finally pass on, their branches hardening and locking up like statues, each Tabor becoming their own sarcophagus and tombstone.

Native to forests in Valakola, tabor are surprisingly resilient to many of the worlds environments. As long as they can get enough sunlight and the soil is fertile enough, they can survive in most areas of the world, pole-to-pole.   They are slightly more susceptible to dry climates than other races, and can lose leaves from dehydration, but can construct or find shade where other plants cannot.

As a plant, tabor need access to fertile soil that is well watered and sunlight. For the average, fully grown adult, they need a scant 3 hours a day, usually consecutive, in order to maintain normal function. They cannot "overeat" in the same way that animals can, with their bodies simply ceasing to absorb if they reach a limit. Their ability to feed does slowly dwindle, and older tabor will need to spend longer and longer feeding.   One careful consideration tabor take into account is their food grounds. Tabor consume from the soil at a much more aggressive rate than other plants, and will starve plants nearby. While some tabor practice nomadic behavior, many more have learned to farm the land, replenishing the soil they use to feed, rotating between them.   Though still experimental, many governments have been experimenting with "feeding pads" that tabor can stand in to give them their entire dietary needs in a single spot. Complimented with a sunlight lamp, and these tabor may be able to live in virtually any part of the world. Taking this concept further, it may even be possible to dramatically increase a tabor's natural lifespan, making multi-millenial tabor.

Tabor sense the world primarily in two ways: pheromones and arcana. Both methods are poorly understood, but the limitations are slowly being learned.   Chemically, tabor relate virtually all personal conditions. This is primarily a method of relaying mood and intention. As tabor speak to one another, they consistently release invisible clouds that other nearby tabor can pick up on. In addition, they can tell who is releasing the pheromones, and how long the pheromones have been in the air.   These chemicals have been notoriously difficult to study. Much is yet to be learned about them with little headway being made. For now, these chemicals remain unreadable to other races.   Arcana is the generic description of their primary world sense. Much like their chemical senses, it's largely a mystery. What is known is that, through a singular sense that originates from their head bulb, they can make out the space around them, including the vibrations of the ground and air.   This blindsense of theirs gives them a wiremap like view of their surroundings several meters away, passing through many obstacles. It allows them to see textures to a fine degree, but not color. Sensing the vibrations of the world gives them a sense of "hearing". This false-hearing is not developed enough to be able to decipher speech without a great deal of practice.   In addition to sensing the area, they can focus it to push concepts to each other. In this sense, they have a form of speech that combines with their pheromones to convey intent and provide clarity. Not too surprisingly, this speech is not recognizable to other races. When attempting to push these concepts, others get sensory hallucinations that do not seem to be related to the intent of the Tabor.   Beyond these, they have a sense of taste and smell, but they are not particularly relatable to standard animal senses. Their "smell" is mostly a way of detecting the pheromones, able to be perceived through their entire bark. Taste is achieved through each tendril, mostly used for sampling soil for fertility when feeding.

Tabor do not use names in the same way other races do. Their communication does not generally require it, with a few rare exceptions of historical tales. In this cases, they generally simple refer to the individual by their deeds.   Where interracial communication is common, communities will give names to individuals based on some tradition. In Vigrent, it has become common to use musical artists, especially classical and modern orchestral composers names.

Generally, most nations where tabor have existed, even into antiquity, have had a policy of giving them space. Tabor rarely lived in environments that were of strategic interest and tended to show relatively little interest in other races. Where they existed, they were generally revered as Earth Spirits, and to be acknowledge by one was a blessings.   As world populations grew and it became harder and harder to avoid the tabor communities, more interest grew. In many areas of the world, people would attempt to replicate what they viewed as a earth-friendly view of the world. Tabor, for their part, would start to show more interest as well, especially as agricultural practices advanced.