Shardmind

Shardminds are comprised of hundreds of small shards that form into a bipedal, humanoid shape. They are generally made up of shards of the same color, generally translucent green, white, red, amber, or purple, but occasionally mix and match colors. The shards that make up a shardmind are generally in constant motion, which can speed up or slow down depending on their mood or circumstances. A shardmind knocked unconscious, for instance, may lose a few shards that will then reattach themselves when they wake up.   Shardminds generally have eye holes, from which their animating force glows, but may or may not have mouths, as they aren't needed to speak.   As constructs of crystal and psionic energy, shardminds are immune to disease and don't need to sleep, eat, or breathe.

Shardminds are not "born" in the traditional sense. When enough shards of the Living Gate are brought together, they may resonate with one another and form a shardmind. This process can be manipulated or encouraged by others bringing together shards. Otherwise, shardminds are born by the results of either chance or fate, as scholarship is divided as to whether individual shards are capable of seeking others out.   New shardminds are born fully developed and with an innate desire to stop the threat of the Far Realm, but this general belief can be changed or altered as they gain more life experience.   Shardminds also do not have parents or children. Should a shardmind be created intentionally by another gathering pieces of the Living Gate, neither will view each other as being more or less kin than between them and another shardmind.

Shardminds are rare, but can be found across the Known Spheres and the Astral Sea.

The long-lived nature of shardminds and connection to the lost Living Gate means that shardminds are generally quite intelligent.

As creatures of thought and energy, shardminds are natural psionic users. In fact, their entire bodies are held together by the psionic energy that gave them sentience and life. Shardminds are able to speak using their psionic powers as well, broadcasting verbally their words so that they can be heard. Additionally, shardminds can communicate telepathically with a single creature, though that creature cannot respond in kind unless they are also capable of telepathy.   Some more powerful shardminds have mastered control over their own bodies, allowing them to shape themselves at will or even fragment themselves to be reformed nearby.

Though shardminds may take "masculine" or "femanine" forms, they have no genders. Pronouns are decided based off of the preference of the shardmind or by what makes non-shardminds most comfortable.

Shardminds generally speak Common (or Wildspace Common) and Deep Speech, the language of the Far Realms.

Before recorded time, the Living Gate existed as a portal that connected all realms of the multiverse and served as the only connection between reality and the Far Realm.   According to legend, a group of gods in the days leading up to the Dawn War visited or discovered the Living Gate, peering inside and viewing the Far Realm beyond, witnessing terrible secrets that forever changed them. The gods promised one another to leave the Gate alone and never return.   But one lied. During the Dawn War, one god returned to the Living Gate, killed its guardian, and flung the portal wide, releasing the corrupting power of the Far Realm into the multiverse and allowing the aberrations that live there to enter into reality. Later during that same war, a few gods returned and, unable to close the portal, instead shattered the Living Gate. Doing so prevented the leakage of the Far Realm but also allowed entrance into and out of the Far Realm from anywhere in the multiverse instead of it being relugated to only the Living Gate.   Following the Gate's destruction, its shards were flung across all planes and crystal spheres. These shards, imbued with the power of the Gate, were both anathema to abberations and possessed the ability to weaken the borders between planes. Over centuries, some shards eventually found one another and were coalesced into the shardmind people, fragments of pure thought given substance with the desire to rebuild the Living Gate and once and for all seal away the Far Realm. To do so meant collecting each and every scattered shard, including their own.   Though originally united in purpose, shardminds over time developed differing beliefs on how best to protect the multiverse from the intrusions of the Far Realm. The Thought Builders, them most common faction of shardminds, pursue shards of the Living Gate to assemble into a new Gate, collecting pieces and safely storing them for the time when they can all be gathered again. God Shards are individuals that believe themselves to be the inheritors of the Living Gate, seeking to empower themself with the pieces they find to form new bulwarks against the Far Realm. Finally, Shard Slayers believe that the Living Gate will reform naturally only when every shardmind is slain, so that their life essence may return to the site of the original Living Gate and form it anew. And beyond these three factions are lone shardminds that have, for one reason or another, chosen to ignore the call to resist the Far Realm and travel the Known Spheres.   In 820 CR, a group of Thought Builders established a colony in Mindspace, drawn by the latent psionic energy in the sphere. This original settlement on the ringworld Haltus eventually grew into a safe haven for shardminds across the Rapide Frontier and its neighboring spheres to find community and gather pieces of the Living Gate.