Nausilythe
The Nausilythes are a sub-branch of the Chayatiem. Antropomorphic individuals closely related to birds, they have a harrowing history. There are Nausilythes from the Peocock, Swan, Owl, Crow and Eagle families. It is likely that there are more families, unknown to humans.
Origins
Before the Dark Skies, before the First Vaults happended and the Reign of Cieux began, the Nausilythes covered the world of Bellyem with their majestic wings. Both winged and anthropomorphic creatures, they once formed a multitude of clans, each linked to a guardian bird. The Owls, the wisest of all, read the stars to tell their fate. The Ravens, for their part, served an ancient force, a primordial will from before light and matter. The Peacocks ruled over splendour and vanity, the Eagles over war and conquest. Other lineages still existed, but their names were lost in the abyss of oblivion.
In the name of war and conquest, men subjected the Nausilythes to the ordeal of Grecian Fire. A fiery liquor, a liquid curse that they had to pour onto the battlefields, setting armies and cities ablaze in storms of black flame. Many were burnt alive, screaming as they fell from the sky like living torches. And so their agony lasted, not decades or centuries, but two thousand years. Until Nausicaa appeared, the bearer of hope, the daughter of ashes and wind. Her name heralded a new age.
Then came the Fall. This was the time of The Dark Skies, an era of hunger and despair when the Living tore each other apart in an endless war. But it was the Nausilythes that the cruelty of man attacked most greedily. Their Egg was a gift of life, a source of flesh and drink. Driven mad, the starving humans believed that the Marvellous Egg was hiding in their homes, and that it would wash away their suffering and misery. And so they began to hunt down the Nausilythes.
Hunted, enslaved and broken, the Nausilythes were chained in cages of bone and iron. Their ancient civilisation, much older than that of man, was trampled underfoot and forgotten. The females, stripped of their wings, were forced to lay eggs without respite, reduced to the status of farm animals. The males, were tamed, harnessed and ridden like celestial mounts by those who dreamt of new territories. But the worst came when they were turned into weapons.
The Great Migration
The rebellious feather
During the twilight skies, Nausicaa was a female peacock who, when her wings were amputated, managed to escape and fly away. She was pursued by archae riding their celestial mounts, but in a show of solidarity, seeing that Nausicaa was able to regain her freedom, the mounts, which were none other than Nausilythes, sacrificed themselves, taking the archae with them on their backs. Its plumage, a mantle of azure, captured the dying light of the world. Her flight, a wake of hope in the orange sky, was joined by others, growing larger every day. Nausicaa the Radiant, the Bringer of Dawn, who broke her chains and gathered her people together.
In Tyrinthius, the labyrinthine jungle is a dangerous place. The beasts that prowled in the darkness had no names, no faces, only hunger. They flew low, above the twisted branches, avoiding the claws and fangs of the living jungle. They landed near a river to cool off when a Vorabyssiem, approached them. Blind and disorientated, the unpredictable creature posed too great a danger. So Nausicaa cut off one of her wings and offered it to this ancient creature of the forest. In exchange, the Vorabyssiem let them pass, all devouring its offering. Beyond the jungle, they finally found vast plains of freedom. In the name of all those who had perished, they embraced their new world together, Nausicaus
The First Flight
They fled at breakneck speed, abandoning the obsidian perches and ivory cages where their ancestors had been broken. By the dozens, by the hundreds, they rose up, although the fiery harpoons that humans hurled in their direction claimed victims. The first test came in the Valleys of Erzlygion, where violent winds and torrents of rain threatened the migration. There, the sky belonged to no-one, and yet only death passed through it. Scarlet storms tore away feathers and flesh, breaking the wings of the weakest. Under Nausicaa's command, the Nausilythes cut through the storm, following its light through the chaos. Many fell, devoured by the precipices, but the survivors finally reached the other side of the sky, where the winds die down and the next abyss begins : the Desert of Ynopherys.The Supplication of Ynopherys
An endless ocean of sand in Ynopherys where the sun burns and the night bites. No flight could be sustained here, for the air itself grew heavier, weighing down the wings until they fell. They had to walk. For forty moons, they wandered under a mute sky. The weakest fell, the eggs were left in the dust. The wind itself whispered promises of death. Men followed in their footsteps, like shadows lurking behind the dunes. When all hope seemed lost, Nausicaa sang. Ancestral songs, inked by humans and yet still taught, whose power summoned the ancient forces of the earth. Oases appeared and the people could rest there. As they set off on their exodus, the howling wind became a storm and the nomadic clans of Ynopherys found them. Nausicaa sang again. The sand roared, rising like a wall of splinters. The desert itself rose up against the oppressors, burying the hunters under waves of dust. The Nausilythes then advanced, crossing the jaws of the cataclysm to the edge of the last peril.The sacrifice of Nausicaa
Culture
Even before the first humans forged bronze, the Nausilythes ruled the skies. A winged people, linked to the winds and the stars, they were reading the skies long before humans were able to do so. Ravens are masters of cosmology, accompanied by owls, observers of the stars. The Swans dance in honour of Aenigma's river daughters, while the Eagles hunt Vorabyssiem, defending their territory.
The Peacocks, now sadly extinct, taught the other Nausilythes their protective songs, whose melodies keep the Vorabyssiem away during Vaults. Although the Nausilythes understand and can speak human languages, they prefer to communicate via their own languages, a variety of songs and complex calls. Similarly, their writing system is similar to notes on a score. They carve the wood of their home so that notes ring out in the hollows of the tree when the wind rushes through.
Their clothes, which are soft and light for flying, are made of fabric from Tyrinthius. Embellished with necklaces made from human bone and wooden masks to show off their beaks, the Nausilythes have a coquettish appearance. They live in open palaces, sanctuaries where the light dances on the aerial arches, which have no doors or partitions. The wind blew in freely, creating a gentle whistling sound. The pillars, made from two spiral-growing trees, have a temple at the top where the Nausilythe people pray to their ancestors.
Peocock
Swan
Owl
Crow
Eagle
Appareance
The Nausilythes, winged beings in the image of birds, roam the skies in fierce harmony with the winds and the stars. Their faces are bird-like, their eyes pierce the visible and the invisible, and their arms merge into powerful wings, capable of long crossings or lightning attacks. Diurnal for the most part, except for the Owls, who keep watch under the stars, they understand the language of beasts and whisper to birds like ancient oracles.
Although they feed on small prey and rare fruits, in ancestral rituals they sometimes feast on the flesh of fat children bought at the Lion's Gate slave markets during celebrations. Fearsome in combat, they wield swords and axes with their talons in mid-air, swooping down on their enemies like death incarnate.
Beliefs
The Nausilythes have faith in what remains beyond mortal sight. Their greatest prayer is addressed to the Broken Skies. They scan the heavens as others read parchments, searching the arrangement of the stars and the movement of the winds for traces of a lost balance. Some claim that Nausicaa has never disappeared, that her song still echoes among the constellations, guiding her people as she once did during the Great Migration.
At night, when no star responds, the Owls and Crows turn to another entity: the Spider of the Cosmic Web . A silent deity weaving her work in the folds of nothingness, she embodies destiny, patience and the inescapable.
In each clan, a chosen one is chosen to undergo the Trial of the Cry of the Dawn. With a celestial chant, he summons a Phantasmagoniem to take possession of the body of the chosen one, who becomes a messenger, a bearer of truths from an unfathomable elsewhere. But no mortal can contain such a burden for too long - which is why the ceremony ends in blood: the sacrifice of the chosen one, accompanied by protective songs, ensures that the spirit departs without defiling another host.
The Nausilythes prophesy that a day will come when the Wings of Stone will unfurl, when what was frozen will take flight again, breaking the chains of the world and freeing the heavens from their sins.
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