Rite of the Givens

Among the Mycelian Folk, death is not an end but a transformation—a return to the fungal latticework of shared memory. Yet for the Givens, this transformation takes a radically different form: they volunteer their bodies to become nourishment for Velari warriors, exchanging flesh for legacy

Selection & Preparation

• Coming of Cycle: Every Mycelian tribe marks a sacred threshold, often when a fungal bloom appears on the shoulders or spore glands begin to resonate with ancestral song.
• The Choosing Grove: Candidates gather in a ritual glade saturated with sporesong, a melodic mist released by elder fungi and sung by the Glowroot Choir.
• Communal Approval: Unlike exile or sacrifice, the harvest is never forced. A council of elders and spore-seers must sense willingness without fear in the chosen.

The Harvest Ceremony

Step 1: Dreaming Sleep

• The Given lies among tangled rootbeds, inhaling Velthane Sporesalt vapours while the choir sings their life story.
• As spores bloom on their skin, they drift into a deep memory trance, where ancestral echoes fuse into the surrounding grove.

Step 2: Bodily Division

• Skilled Velari Markweaver surgeons and Sporecooks perform the separation with reverence—preserving organs, nerves, and cap structures as sacred cuts.
• Key tissues are cooked in Glowshard Stew, eaten in complete silence by warriors chosen for frontline service.

Step 3: Memory Embedding

• Warriors experience profound hallucinations, merging with the Given’s story. These visions become the source of tribute tattoos, etched within hours of ingestion.
• Tattoos are placed above the heart or around the throat, where voice and pulse meet—as a vow to speak the Given’s name in battle.

Warrior Transformation

• Warriors gain partial Thermosymbiosis, a resistance to Thalos' upper-heat zones due to fungal enzyme transfer.
• Many report dreams guided by the voices of the Givens, especially in moments of fear, loneliness, or moral conflict.