Amorphous Heteromorph

**Amorphous Heteromorphs** (不定形の異形たち) is the tentative name for a species of slimes native to the New World in Mass for the Dead.

## Background

These heteromorphs hail from a region in the New World totally unknown to humanity. In the game continuity, before the emergence of the Cracks, these heteromorphs had never heard of or seen humans before. When a Crack formed near the homeland of this race, they were assaulted by hordes of Chaos Beasts. Of a hundred tribe members, only a paltry five managed to escape the genocide. The quintet against the orders of their kind, used teleportation magic to escape.

Due to the Cracks interference their destination was off the mark and they found themselves in an unknown land. Though the survivors believed that they escaped the monsters that attacked them, they soon found that the Chaos Beasts also plagued the new land they were in. However before they could be killed, they were inadvertently saved by Blue Roses who were passing through the area to their next job.

The creatures hid themselves and were undetected by the adventurers. From their hiding place they watched the adventurers defeat the Chaos Beasts with relative ease. After Blue Roses left the area, the heteromorphs used observations of the adventurers in combination with their abilities to copy their appearances to better infiltrate the nearby communities. The group tired and starving, headed in the opposite direction that Blue Roses took, towards E-Rantel. As they approached the city, night was fast approaching and the moon was nearly in the sky. To avoid being turned into feral monsters, the group used their last sacred treasure, the Fake Sun, to block the moon's rays.

Once in the city, in their disguises, the heteromorphs were mistaken for Blue Roses by Saint Clementine who offered them a meal. The imposters accepted the meal with gratitude, but soon after eating they were pulled into the Adventurer's Guild to discuss with the guildmaster and members of Darkness of the new sun that was above the land. The imposters had no choice but to play along and pretend to be the adamantite adventurers they impersonated. Their disguises were almost perfect, save for the appearances of Lakyus Alvein Dale Aindra and Evileye, both who were wearing bunny girl costumes for a job that the originals were asked to handle.

However the protagonist and his comrades took notice of the odd behavior of the adventurers, coupled with a so-called prophecy of invaders from the moon, began to investigate the group. After contacting Princess Renner Theiere Chardelon Ryle Vaiself it was confirmed that Blue Roses was no where near E-Rantel and that the people who were present were actually imposters. Outside the city, the protagonist and his team confronted the heteromorphs, tricking them into revealing their true nature. The heteromorphs were forced to drop their guises after they began to suffer from a poison that they unknowingly were given by Soi through a drink. The heteromorphs despite putting up a fight were defeated and they explained the circumstances of their deception. The five heteromorphs were then gathered up by the protagonist and given sanctuary in the Great Tomb of Nazarick in the 1st Floor of the dungeon.

## Appearance

Overall these heteromorphs look similar to slimes yet not quite, and more akin to dark undefined formless creatures.

## Abilities

The species is noted to be weak, which the heteromorphs admit they are the most vulnerable race in their homeland. Though they are not without some strengths such as possessing powerful specialized illusion abilities. The heteromorphs have illusion abilities that were not just used mislead people's vision but they were able to borrow the strength of those they copied to some extent. Even the damage they inflict using these illusions would be akin to phantom pain. The pain would seem real enough that those damaged by it could even potentially die.

The illusions that these heteromorphs imitated were lesser copies of the originals. There were various restrictions, such as if the opponent were too strong, at most 10% or 20% of the original's strength would be reflected. In addition their illusion abilities were also not effective to species that didn’t rely on vision.

There was also another aspect of the species that was potentially dangerous. It seems that the heteromorphs had a really adverse reaction to the moon. The mere sight of it or being exposed to its rays could induce members of the race to fall into a state of madness and become irrational beasts with no way to return to sanity until the moon vanished.

## Culture

The heteromorphs were organized as a tribe, but were not were not at the social development to recognize cities. The race was a relative peaceful one that lived quietly in their land.

The tribe possessed two secret treasures:

* Sealing Crystal
* Fake Sun

## Trivia

* Currently the species is near-extinct following the continuous attacks by the Chaos Beasts.
* Their ability to change during the appearance of the moon, is similar to lycanthropes or werewolves.
* Having never encountered humans before, the heteromorphs assumed humans were a type of undead.

## References

1. ↑ *Mass for the Dead Special Event: Moon, Rabbit And Prophecy*