The Driftborn
Origin: Born from the children and young adults raised entirely in Defiance since the last major rebuilding cycle—those who have never known another home and see the Driftlands not as a threat but a spiritual or ancestral homeland.
Social Change Catalyst:
As Defiance stabilized and birthed a new generation, some youth began to see the old fears of the Driftlands as outdated. They don’t remember the horrors directly—they’ve grown up hearing stories, seeing strange lights, and feeling the pull of the snow. To them, the Drift is not a curse but a calling.
Cultural Traits:
- Wear garments adorned with frostglass, snow-cracked bone, or pale blue pigments.
- Practice "Stillwalking": silent, meditative treks into the snowy woods to seek visions.
- Use reclaimed language—fragments of Whisper-Script (from Fey echoes or Others' tongues).
- Often adorned with facial scars in stylized patterns resembling ice fractals.
Beliefs:
They believe that Viriala is a misunderstood force of change and rebirth—not destruction. Some even claim to have received dreams from her, or found “gifts” left in frost pockets.
Conflict:
Older citizens see them as dangerously naive, possibly even heretical. Accusations of ritual madness, child abductions, and voluntary disappearances swirl around Driftborn enclaves.
Some of us remember the last Drift Event—the wolves, the stags, the long-lived breeds—but more and more, Defiance fills with short-lifers. Rat-born, opossum-souled, rabbit-hearted. Good folk, but they live fast, burn bright, and vanish before the frost speaks twice. There are Animysts now who think the Drift is just a story. That kind of forgetting? It hollows the city from the inside out.
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