The Runk

The Runk evolved as a big-headed orange-skinned species on the planet Trolsa. A physical description of what the Runk look like is irrelevant, because Runkish religious tradition states that most of the body is unimportant and can (or even should) be replaced by cybernetic technology that allows for a greater range of abilities. Moments after birth, an infant Runk is modified, and that never stops. It is considered evil to replace ones heart, lungs, brain, bladder or eyes with cybernetic technology (though, adding an additional cybernetic copies of those organs is fine). Though it is not deemed blasphemous, it is considered a faux pas to replace or even cover one’s face. Other than that, everything should be upgraded.

The Runk have reached into space and met other species in their galaxy, such as the Ugder.

Wilnad Unken lives on the homeworld Trolsa. There are three large nations still on the homeworld, two of which are focused on space travel and trade with alien species. The third nation, however, prefers to stay within the Olkai star system that is their home. Though living on the planet with an ideal atmosphere for the species, Wilnad, like many Runk, lives in a fully contained atmosphere that allows them to maintain their preferred living condition.

Off-world Runk rarely feel the need to gather together into tight-knit communities and generally melt into the other cultures with ease. Frudfuhl Te is such a case, living in the seedy underbelly of a multi-cultural city on the Ugder homeworld. Making a living as a hired thug, Frudfuhl is a menacing machine of death, or at least looks enough like one to make enemies afraid.

Tesky Weel lives in a monastery called the Runka Zongit on a tiny planet called Remmik which had no native life of its own. The monks of the Runka Zongit are trained in various virtues including kindness, benevolence and having cybernetic tails.

A Fact About the Runk: In general, but especially among those who have colonized other worlds, there is a strong desire among the Runk to creates statues and monuments. Almost every planet they’ve reached will have some sort of monument celebrating their arrival.

Universe: Narsidon

Clobgins

The Clobgins are a four-armed bipedal species that has a singular large eye on their head and a thick tail. They stand only two feet tall, but their technology is so advanced that they would appear to us to be magical little beings. They’ve tapped into forces of the universe we can’t understand, so we can safely call them a race of alien wizards.

The Clobgin homeworld, Clobb, has been heavily modified since the forest world where they first evolved. Using their magic powers, the Clobgins have transformed it into a multitude of mystical domains, separated by bubble-like domes, that each have their own internal physics. From space, Clobb doesn’t even look like a planet anymore, it looks like a collection of multicolored soap bubbled floating through space where a planet once was.

Collesho is a wizard who lives in a domain that preserves the forest style of the world’s original form. The denizens of that particular sphere are the traditionalists of the Clobgins, the ones who protect the “old ways”. The rest of the domes are fine with that. They don’t care about the old ways, so let the forest wizards protect them if they want it so bad. Collesho lives in the old ways, tending an orchard that produces fruits that are perfect for potions and elixirs and unguents and all that.

Vydarn is a gruff miner in an underground domain. When the planet was normal, this domain would have been uninhabitable, the pressure and heat being too much for life. But now, the Clobgins can walk around in tunnels that run next to streams of magma with ease. Vydarn is mining for gold, which is great for making magical talismans.

Marmoi lives in a sky domain full of floating islands and airships. Marmoi is an adventurer who seeks opportunity wherever it arises. A lot of the time, this means that doing crimes, though. A particularly common “adventure” is gliding onto some island and looting their goods. Fun and profitable, but not particularly respectable.

A Fact About Clobgins: In most of the various domains of Clobb blood sacrifice is a very common procedure. In domains that can’t convince the population that being sacrificed is an honor, it is often a punishment for criminals or prisoners of war.

Universe: Brown

Fuzzadons

A furry, quadripedal species without the ability to see, the Fuzzadons have no eyes. Their sense of hearing is also considerably weak compared to human standards, but the large nostril slits on their head give them very good senses of smell. Their homeworld is a small one, orbiting an old red star.

Nestwa, like most of his kind, lives in a pack made up of close friends and cousins. Though there is no “leader” of most packs, there is almost inevitably a Favorite, one who is most loved by the rest and who the others are most likely to listen to. Nestwa is the Favorite of his pack, so it is because of his own restless nature that his pack has a tendency toward wandering the lands without a plan for settling down. Luckily, Fuzzadons are not very territorial, so they don’t end up in fights with anyone, but there is a lot of danger in not knowing what kind of landscape they might be in on any given day.

Keddul is a rare Fuzzadon without a pack. She is also a wanderer, but instead must take shelter with the local packs wherever she ends up. This is a viable lifestyle for her because of her species’s altruistic customs regarding taking in guests, and Keddul repays the kindness by offering her skills as a repair carpenter (Fuzzadon structures are all built from woodlike materials that must be regularly repaired given the planet’s frequent windstorms). Though Keddul can enjoy the many packs she encounters for a time, she is most happy when she is on her own, between jobs, camping out in the wilderness.

Keever is a much more “settled-down” sort. Living with a sizeable pack in a valley full of dozens of similarly-sized packs, Keever is the Fuzzadon equivalent of a city-dweller. Although Fuzzadon’s are generally nice, skittish beings, when they live in such close quarters, tempers can flare. As a fast and agile specimen, Keever is considered the default “Calmer”, whose job it is to separate Fuzzadons who have gotten into a fight and keep them separate until they have cooled down.

A Fact About Fuzzadons: The Fuzzadon language is a completely physical one made up of rubs and taps, which means that it must be done up close and personal and, very often, one at a time. Scent marking can be useful for spreading a message quickly, but complex conversation is a very intimate experience between two Fuzzadons.

Universe: Red

Jawmeodds

The Jawmeodds are a four-legged species who have two arms growing out of what we might call their head. They have a large mouth on their forehead with a frog-like projectile tongues. Though they live underwater, the Jawmeodds are actually unable to swim, instead walking on the floors of their world’s oceans and lakes. Jawmeodd culture is currently very fragmented, with thousands of individual nations spread over the planet (which, in their most prevalent language, is called “Desthup” which is their word for “All Waters”), and there is political turmoil and war, all the things you’d expect. Most of these nations are made up of theocracies who worship the souls of the founders of the nation who they believe have ascended to godhood (often, the supposed founders are purely fictional anyway, the real founders having been long forgotten).

Mativox is a denizen of the shallowest nation on the planet, Etekko. There are parts of Etekko where one could wander so close to the shore that one can stick their hands above the surface (though this is risky, as there are predators up there). Mativox is the Jawmeodd equivalent of a fisherman, except Jawmeodds have traps that float to the surface and attract animals there, which are then caught and dragged below to drown. This occupation exists in all the nations on the planet, but most of those are further from the shore, so they can only trap the planet’s numerous flying surface animals. Etekko’s, and especially Mativox’s, specialty is rare land-dwelling delicacies that are the exported across the planet bringing much esteem to the nation.

Frandox is a mime. They have mimes on Desthup.

Pryzzz is an ice manufacturer. The temperature on the planet never gets below freezing (except on mountaintops that have never been seen my Jawmeodds), so the discovery of ice was fairly recent and, as of this point, can only be achieved in technologically advanced nations, and even there, ice manufacturers are seen as the height of intellectual types (the way people might talk about “rocket scientists” on Earth).

A Fact About Jawmeodds: There is a form of art on Desthup that involves creating a box, the inside of which is covered with interesting textures. The viewer will go inside the box, unable to see or hear outside, and feel the textures.

Universe: Indigo

Strondovarians

The Strondovarians are an intelligent people. Their planet, Gurx, is not terribly large and it had quite limited resources, which meant that the Strovdinians had to learn quickly to work together. Their culture came to value intellect and cleverness because those were the traits that ensured their survival. But for all their focus on brains, they are not weak by human standards. The average adult Strondovarian stands over two metres tall and their four powerful arms are strong at both pinching and punching.

Gloueb is an astronaut. With the resources of Gurx running out, the Strondovarians were quick to seek out other worlds that could be useful, and they found them. They now have a vast space network of spacecraft that are gathering resources to build a New Gurx, a giant artificially-created world that will be more appropriate for their race. Astronauts like Gloueb have, for generations, been collecting asteroids, comets, and materials from other planets and gathering them together in orbit around the chosen star where construction on the superstructure has begun.

Evpel is a contributor to the Knowledge Base Of The Strondovarians, the massive digital collection of all information deemed important to the species. For whatever reasons, the Knowledge Base is not a complete repository of information, but just that they deem “Noteworthy”. It is part of Evpel’s job to determine what is Noteworthy and, unfortunately for Evpel, there are Strondovarians who want little more than to be remembered throughout history by getting declared Noteworthy. These attention seekers don’t care what they get famous for, as long as they are famous, so they will try to become famous for all sorts of criminal acts. On one occasion Evpel was even kidnapped by someone trying to prove their importance. After Evpel’s was rescued, all information that could even suggest the kidnapper existed was stricken from the Knowledge Base, from making sure the crime was not mentioned, all the way to reducing the stated population for Gurx by one.

And Bukkel is devoted to the study of the mind and unleashing any and all mental powers that could be possible. A lot of Strondovarians consider the ultimate goal of life to be the transcending of physical form to become beings of purely mental energy. That may still be a long way off, but Bukkel is hoping to make strides toward turning that into a reality. A lot of the research involves actually performing operations on living subjects, either volunteers, infants bred for the purpose, or unwilling subjects sentenced to this as punishment. Bukkel also makes puzzles for fun.

A Fact About Strondovarians: The design of Strondovarian knees (which they have several of in each leg) is such that they move almost every which way. This makes it very hard for a Strondovarian to be knocked off balance, but they can’t run particularly fast because of how complicated it gets.

Universe: Blue