Vy'keen

The **Vy'keen** are one of the sentient species in the Euclid galaxy. Humanoid-like and native of Euclid, they Vy'keen resides within the Outer Edge. Used to dominant the Edge until recession in The Aerons War, back-stabbed by Gek the First Spawns and lost the war. Now they are a nomadic race but still have their warrior blood, which boils on with a very rigid honor system.

## Vy'keen

### Anatomy

The Vy'keen stand upright on two legs and have a posture that is hunched over. While the body is primarily humanoid, the facial features of the Vy'keen can vary.

The Vy'keen can be found with either a beaked mouth, primate mouth, two large canines, or two short tentacles. The Vy'keen appear to favour those with tentacles, as one of the ancient plaques transcribes "those blessed with tendrils did extend them." Additionally, those with mouth tendrils are often described by the term "virile" by the Vy'keen. One Vy'keen member of the Engineering department, Consul Akyun, was able to shed some light on the differences between the facial structures. He writes.

> *"Grah! Of course! They are simply from different origins. We too changed when we reached for the stars the first time."*
>
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The Vy'keen have yet to permit Obsydian Corp study any of their bodies internally, and so their internal organs and structure are a complete mystery.

### Culture

The Vy'keen have developed into a warrior species with a reciprocal honor system tightly in place. This system obligates a Vy'keen to do a favor upon a favor being done for it, and vice-versa. They have a deep veneration for their ancestors. However, unable to excel at few things without resorting to simple brute force leads to some problems with outsiders, as anyone who may accidentally offend a Vy'keen can find themselves on the receiving end of physicality as a Vy'keen will seek to be rid of their problems.

Almost the entirety of their culture and by extension their technology seems to be focused on combat, from everyday tools to ships. For instance, they are known to use Grahgrah Gas to temporarily increase lung capacity to facilitate high quality battle screams.

Through the usage of plaques, the Vy'keen have left a history of their people in a manner analogous to that of the Gek and the Korvax. This history indicates to outsiders that they are a theistic race, worshiping a deity known as Hirk the Great. Monoliths that test the meddle of those approaching them can also be found, which release a hostile creature and toss a sword at the challenged. Failure to complete a challenge can cause physical harm to the individual as well as drastically harm their reputation with the overlying Vy'keen culture. Success instead will bolster reputation, and some sort of reward such as upgraded weaponry and artifacts.

As the sentinels prohibit true freedom of the hunt, destruction, and war without providing governance, the Vy'keen have grown to possess great disdain for both the machines and their creators. They also believe as a warrior culture that death is inevitable and see The Sentinels' direct attempts to prevent this from happening through preservation as an affront to the natural order. Even so, they consider the Atlas as all-powerful beings that rule over the universe with a limitless supply of war machines.

### Language

Vy'keen language primarily consists of considerable amounts of body language and posturing, with actual spoken words and more primitive roars, growls, and rumbles peppered throughout. This makes them appear very ape-like to races such as Humans. While only 459 words are reported as existing in the Vy'keen language, it is believed the actual number is far higher than that.

The Vy'keen language is hard to transcribe, and even harder to speak. There are a total of three humans who have mastered the tongue, two of which are currently employed by Obsydian Corp. What is known about their language is that it is very basic, with no unnecessary words being used. For example, where someone speaking English may say "Turn off the lights", a Vy'keen would say "Make dark".

Upon learning English, which is significantly more common than vice-versa, a Vy'keen typically has difficulty understanding the use of complex sentence structure. However, after becoming more experienced with the language they understand, and even make liberal use of complex sentence structure, as is the case of Consul Akyun.

Their language makes liberal use of the word "Grah", a word for which there is no exact translation. It appears to not even have a translatable meaning, as the word is essentially sprinkled anywhere in a sentence.

#### History

Through the interaction of Plaques and Monoliths, the lore and history of the Vy'keen is slowly revealed. The species' history is stored in a text known as The Saga of the Vy'keen, each of these are revealed thorugh the use of plaques that litter the surface of planets.

***"*Hirk foresaw the weakness of the Vy'keen warrior kind. The star ascent of our noble race was blocked by the weak-minded Sentinels. Nine times nine fold, Hirk commanded, we would have our vengeance and dash the metal demons against the rocks of damnation.*"***

After speaking to the Great Monolith and hearing about the travellers, Hirk stood atop the sacred mountain of Dun's'kaareen, with the crowd of Vy'keen awaiting its speech. 'The Great Monolith has answered me. It has awoken. It has told of the coming of the Travellers. They will be spared. The Vy'keen shall honour this decree' Hirk loudly proclaimed. After the crowd asked Hirk about the Sentinels, Hirk mentioned how the Monolith stood silent, but nobody was satisfied with the response, until Hirk mentioned the following words:

"***The oppressors will be eradicated! Gather your arms for the time of reckoning is upon the enemy!"***

With the crowd loudly celebrating and adoring their new leader, Nal climbed the mountain and challenged Hirk: 'Fool! the Sentinels cannot be vanquished!' In a fit of rage Hirk struck Nal and threw him out of the mountain, killing him. The Death of Nal sparked anger among its followers, which met their demise at the hands of Hirk's followers.

Before the coming of Hirk the Vy'keen cowered before the Sentinels. But the coming of Hirk heralded a new dawn. The Vy'keen became strong. Their courage knew no bounds. Hirk looked to the skies and witnessed the pitiless destruction of the Sentinels that smothered all races brought forth out unto the Outer Edge. Worlds withered and died beneath their relentless gaze. The anger of Hirk was unleashed.

And so, in the eighteenth moon of Drun'Gala, the Vy'keen engaged the Sentinels in a glorious battle. This marked the beginning of "The Aerons War". But as the war continued, Hirk only grew elderly and weaker. And as is Vy'keen tradition, Hirk ended his own life before the Great Monolith. The war raged on.

Eventually, after dozens and dozens of cycles, the Vy'keen were able to push back the Sentinels back into the dark corners of the Outer Edge, and eliminating what remained of the machines wandering in space. The Vy'keen rose in glorious victory, the songs of the victorious echoed to the edges of the galaxy.

But while the Vy'keen celebrated their victory, darkness still lured in the other corner of the galaxy, in the form of the Gek First Spawn Empire which destroyed the planet of Korvax Prime, home to the Korvax Convergence. Millions of Korvax Entities were disconnected and killed during this catastrophic event, and the ones that survived had to endure the brutal conditions of slavery only to be destroyed for their precious metals.

The Vy'keen despised this act, but there wasn't much they could do. The First Spawn had become too powerful, it spread its influence all across the cosmos. But such power attracted the shadowy automatons who were only growing stronger by the second. The victory of the Vy'keen only served as the backbone for the rise of the Gek,who in their foolishness and desire for power attracted the Sentinel Force back into the galaxy, stronger and more powerful than ever. The new sentinel swarmed the Outer Edge and into the borders of the First Spawn, the automatons had returned to claim what was theirs. The Gek had doomed the galaxy in their brutal traditions. With this new threat, the First Spawn deployed their forces to engage with the Automatons. But with this trouble new problems arised, it was the Korvax.

Trying to stop newly traitorous Gek and uprising Korvax the First Spawn collapsed under its own lust, enslaving beings they were not able to comprehend and challenging the rule of the Atlas. And with the end of the Gek Dominion the Gek Trade Federation rose to power as the new friendly yet suspicious Gek.

This did not satisfy the Vy'keen though, as they still had a deep hatred for the Sentinels that now swarmed the cosmos.

"***The Gek changed. They became peaceful. Their spawning pools bred in the name of commerce. They Vy'keen accept this peace, but we do not forget as the other beings of the Galaxy are so keen to do."***

"***Dishonor is unchanging. Crimes marked in blood do not fade. We do not forget."***