The Hybrithræne --The Hybrids Bound by Metamorphoses

The Hybrithræneare a rare, feared, and revered subspecies of Hybrid that reside in the twilight-streaked dominions of TVD to Vevryxa'Varn and the safe havens of TCOSA-controlled bioregions. They are creatures that undergo a drastic and frequently disastrous metamorphosis over their lifetimes. The Hybrithræne are born with dormant Evolyst Cores, which are unstable matrices of power ingrained in their marrow that remain silent unless a particular trigger awakens them. This is a contrast to regular Hybrids, who are either born of Titan, divine, mortal, or otherworldly bloodlines, or injected with the poison that turns them.

"We are not born. We have unwrapped."

They refer to it as The Unveiling--a transformation so holy and so horrific that it is spoken of in the realms with both fear and wonder.

Not all Hybrithraene are created equal. They have a form. Their existence stems from complex genetic awakenings buried deep within their cores, blending them from several bloodlines--god, beast, machine, and shadow. A first glance, a Hybrithræne youngster seems to be rather stable: quiet, strangely perceptive, and with too-still eyes. However, that is before the body starts to recognize it.

Even worse, it isn't.

Let's start with the bones. The Hybrithræne goes into a slumber period of quiet that can continue for days or weeks at the age of fourteen, though it can be younger or older. When they arise, they are not the same. Like old marble, their skin cracks to reveal new textures and pigments. Organs break, recover, and reorganize. Some develop wings. Others acquire horns made of light and code, silvered claws, and eyes that can see into the future. They lose their teeth. They rewire their nerves.

Through it, they scream.

The change is not clean. The agony is legendary. The result is never certain.

They don't change throughout time. They break.

The genetic realities concealed within each Hybrithræne assert their superiority over the others one by one. Some become cold-blooded and scaled as a result of being eaten by their draconic ancestry. Others become more tech than flesh as a result of the strain of the machine blood in their veins. Some disappear, no longer tangible, into clouds of pure shadow. Unstable godcore radiation hums as a select few become divine-adjacent. Those are closely monitored.

The saddest of all? Those who divide themselves too widely, who are unable to control it all, screaming, crying, pleading; they exploded, then dissolved into something indefinable. They don't make it through The Unveiling. They are dubbed The Shattered.

Those who make it out alive?

They develop into genuine Hybrithræne. Afraid. Unable to control themselves. Yes, it is unstable, but it is incredibly powerful. No two are alike. They don't belong to any species.

They are results.

Once, a forbidden hybridization produced the tragic Hybrithræne, a slow poison that was passed down via injection. They are now species.

They destroy everything.

The Hybrithræne, once broken souls barely surviving their own metamorphoses, became something permanent--predatory by intent, not by chance. Animalistic. Primordial. They no longer doubt their identity. Their eyes, lighted by madness and remembrance, hunt with purpose.

The worst one? The descendants of demonic Azruv blood are known as the Azruv Hybrithræne. Their bodies are constantly changing. They never stop eating. And they like it, unlike others of their sort. They savor worlds rather than merely devour them. Where they walk, cities become quiet.

They are no longer the victims of their own invention, the Hybrithræne.

They serve as its weapon.

And there is no known cure for any of it. This is forever.

Aeryssia, a girl, once struggled through a three-week Unveiling. She was blind by the end, but she had the ability to see into people's souls. She never touched the ground again as she drifted. She broke glass with her voice. Both of her parents were unable to look her in the eye. "It is not our daughter who returned," they muttered.

Perhaps she wasn't.