Demon

Demons are a race of spiritual liquid-based creatures that came into existence during the second age, originating from the remains of one of the 13 Blessed Children. Thriving off of the emotions that seep out of mortals, demons are extremely devious and evil in nature with their primary objective to spread their influence.

## Origins

The exact origins of demons goes back to the first age, with the old god Triialri. One of the Blessed Children, Triialri commanded an infinite army of nameless visages, granting her the title of "Daughter of the Horde". These nameless visages were her signature weapon as she commanded this massive horde to control and subjugate her enemies. These nameless visages were formed from the blood of Triialri, being controlled directly by her own thoughts: siphoning strength through the negative emotions of their victims.

Once the dust settled on the battle of the first lands: mortals began to finally explore the world that was now open to them, free of the tyranny of their oppressors. However, as this new age ushered in: many of the Blessed Children's remaining supporters were scattered to the winds, and attempted to preserve their former master's legacies. Some stood back up and fought, whilst many ran into hiding. Admist all these small conflicts, many intriguing and scared artifacts belonging to the old gods were then lost to time itself. But none more important, than the black heart of Triialri.

When Triialri was slain and slaughtered, her corpse had been set to be burnt and disposed of. But admist the many scuffles, word of her corpse's destruction had been falsified, and her heart wound up in buried deep beneath what would become modern age Ocknuun. Unbeknownst to the rest of the world, deep within the subterranean labyrinth of Ocknuun, her heart sat dormant.

Not a single thing in the world disturbed her heart, until a small tremor occured. What appeared as a minor inconvinience to the many Ocknuun citizens was the catalyst for a massive shift in the power dynamic of the world, as the remnant blood in Triialri's heart began flooding into a chasm. Ichor black as night itself, it formed an abyssal pool of pure darkness. Out of this pool, nameless visages began to rise. However, these visages soon began to undergo an interesting evolution. Their minds began to gain their own autonomy as the connection to their mother had been severed, now seperated from the hivemind of the old god.

Their bodies comprised of blood, they began to morph themselves into various shapes and sizes as they became to accustomed to their new mode of existence. As their minds began to acclimate, their primal senses kicked in. The world despite being so far removed from the dark ages of war, was still rife with conflict. The emotional chaos of this new dying world and its denizens rang like a warhorn to these new nameless visages, calling them to feed and explore. And so, out of their subterrainian prison they began to spread off into the world.

## Physiology

As demons are at their core a liquid-based lifeform, they are natural shapeshifters with various demons being extremely inconsistent in terms of appearance. More often than not, demons simply choose a form that best suits their lifestyles and allows them to indulge in their pleasures. An example would be with Quentzoth, who adopted many avian-like features such as large feathered wings, and sharp talons on their digits, in order to play the role of an ancient harpy god in Balrusha and continue sowing conflict for their own amusement.

As demons are born out of a single parent, not abiding to the typical biological rules of reproduction: they are genderless creatures, and are able to reproduce asexually. While they are able to corrupt other beings by passing them part of their essence, such as what occured with Phynara thanks to Quentzoth: new demons are created either out of the black pool, or when a demon has consumed enough emotional energy to be able to spawn a singular offspring. However, demons spawned from others do not treat the original as parents and instead as a long network of siblings, with their mother being the only noteworthy biological hierachy.

While their progeniter fueled them off of the negative emotions: demons are not bound by this same limitation, and can infact fuel themselves off of any emotion. As emotions manifest their own energy known as [[mana]]. While creatures usually have a threshold of how much emotional mana they can create, demons have a seemingly infinite appetite for the stuff, and once passing a certain threshold are able to create offspring. This mana dependancy for demon reproduction, is infinite with the black pool's demon spawn as in times of turmoil and chaos, the rate at which demons spawn increases due to Triialri’s heart being connected with the world code directly as it has grown into the soil over the ages, growing ever faster in adverse to the world code's anguish.

When demons are born, some may be too weak to hold a physical form and will instead possess vessels in order to physically interact with the world. As the majority of their blood evaporates, they could be considered similar to their mother, as she was initially just a gas-based creature. These weaker demons exist as shades, often mistaken for as ghosts and apparitions given their misty form.

## Behavior

As demons gained the advantage of full autonomy and sapience, a far cry from their origins as nameless shades: each demon has a different personality, much like one would expect from any other sapient species. Inherently curious creatures, demons are often shown to be exploring their surroundings, and the various beings inhabiting the world. They are also found to be very hedonistic, actively indulging themselves in activities, that bring them pleasure often at the expense of others.

Demons often become fixated with a specific aspect or concept that mortals, which drivers their actions as well as influencing their form.

## Trivia

* Demons have managed to spread themselves to every corner of the world, but are most common on the main continents of Suncil and Itoris.
	+ There is nothing stopping demons from inhabiting the sacred isles of Faerin, but the islands' secluded nature as well as relatively low inhabitant count makes it less desireable for demons, with the few arriving on the island deciding to adopt more subtle approaches.
	+ Cala Nath was free of demons until Zalynx intentionally brought a few over to experiment on.
* The term demon is known to the general populous, but is not properly understood by many, as the species is still relatively new also being quite difficult to study.
	+ Since the term arose many would often throw the term around, simply classify anything evil as a demon.
	+ Demonology is an exceptionally rare branch of study and as such, even many mages have little to concerete knowledge of them.