Mindflayer

Mindflayers are a species created by Akthos in the Dead Verse. They followed Apistoatl and the Fetchlings to the pocket dimension where the gods were hiding during the events of Refrain of the New Gods. When their plan to take the Fetchlings failed, they were exiled to the Outer Planes, where they lived for several centuries until the events of Opera for the Fairest. From 1200 TC on, mindflayers can be found in small numbers on the Material Plane.

Mindflayers formerly ate brains and reproduced by injecting tadpoles into hosts. From 1200 TC on, mindflayers feed on dreams and reproduce by harmlessly growing a tadpole within a host's dreams.

They are also called mindwalkers, sleepeaters, dreamflayers, etc., particularly after 1200 TC.

### The Dead Verse

Mindflayers were the natural predators of Fetchlings. The Fetchlings called them *kayabek* (literally, "kayal-eaters"). Not much is known about their society or culture while they were living in the Dead Verse. After the Outer Pantheon failed to kill Akthos outright, the remaining mindflayers followed Apistoatl when she opened a portal into the void.

### Refrain of the New Gods

About halfway through Chaiya's Trials, the mindflayers caught up with Apistoatl and arrived in the pocket plane. They succeeded in secretly stealing (and eating the brains of) a few Fetchlings before anyone realized they were there. Their mistake was in targeting the heroes in the pocket plane -- in particular, when Piper Elenmin was attacked, the rest of the heroes quickly figured out that something was wrong.

The heroes found a cave that the mindflayers were operating out of, and proceeded to kill most of them outright. It came down to a final standoff with only three mindflayers remaining. Piper, having been injected with a tadpole, felt sympathy for the mindflayers' situation and suggested brokering a deal. It was agreed that the three remaining mindflayers would flee to the Outer Planes, and would not attempt to eat Fetchlings, or anyone else on Musea, again.

The three remaining mindflayers left immediately. Among their number was J'yan'het, a newborn, who grew to view the heroes as overpowered bullies. When the mindflayers settled in the Astral Plane, J'yan'het grew to become their leader.

### A'gan'hel

The mindflayers succeeded in building a settlement in the Astral Plane called A'gan'hel. It was a floating island that perpetually circled the waters of the They learned of a species of misplaced humanoids living in the Astral Plane called the gith; the mindflayers successfully targeted the gith as their new food source. Before long, the vast majority of the gith population was living in A'gan'hel as something like indentured slaves.

A'gan'hel was not unlike a Roman Empire. The gith lived in the lower city, where they were given fixed rations, assigned housing, and assigned marriages for reproduction purposes. Once a gith was of a certain age, they could be selected by a mindflayer as their consort. The gith would accompany the mindflayer for a period of up to two weeks, during which time the mindflayer would decide to either eat the gith, or inject them with a tadpole to produce a new mindflayer.

The agreement with Piper -- now the goddess Palypso -- was known as Palypso's Edicts. It was forbidden for any mindflayer to travel to the Material Plane, and this law was followed without error for several hundred years.

At the peak of the empire, the gith staged a rebellion. Although both sides were fraught with losses, the gith eventually overwhelmed the mindflayers and imprisoned their previous captors. A'gan'hel was burned to rubble. The gith performed numerous experiments on the mindflayers, documenting their physiology in a series of documents about species of the Dead Verse.

As the mindflayers' numbers dwindled, several voiced the opinion that the only way to survive was through evolution. Since a mindflayer tadpole could be injected into almost anything with a brain, the mindflayers could survive extinction by radically swapping their food source -- and thus their own physiognomy. J'yan'het took over the body of a black dragon, going insane in the process. The remaining eight mindflayers imprisoned him in Heaven, and agreed to keep him a secret from the rest of the Verse.

### Opera for the Fairest

One mindflayer, Ka're'rin, believed that the correct way to "evolve" was through assimilation. She proposed that the mindflayers go to the Material Plane and seek asylum. She was laughed out of the room by every other mindflayer. She chose to move to the Material Plane anyway, disguising herself as a human nun and living in secret.

The mindflayer L'han'an took advantage of Ka're'rin's knowledge and stole a group of performers from the opening of the Resource and Relocation Centre for Displaced Peoples in Northmanni. Palypso covertly sent a group of Majority natives into the Outer Planes to rescue them. The group was led to believe that they would have to kill the mindflayers, and they did at first -- but the more they were exposed to each of the individuals, the more they began to see them as people and sought another way.

The heroes' efforts culminated in a court case: *Mindflayers v. The Pantheon*. Headed by the demon lawyer Carfax the Impersonal and his client, Camilla, the mindflayers argued that they deserved to have the gods' magic used to rewrite their physiognomy, so that they no longer had to feed under the barbaric methods forced upon them by Akthos. The gods agreed, and so the mindflayers were reborn as "dream eaters." Instead of feeding on the brains of their victims, they could feed off the psychic energy generated by the dreams of sleeping mortals. Instead of reproducing by taking over a host's body, the tadpole could harmlessly learn and grow off of the host's dreams, and then be born as a fully realized individual within the Dimension of Dreams.

Mindflayers began to slowly populate both Musea and the Dimension of Dreams over the following years. They are now considered to be denizens, and even guardians, of the Dimension of Dreams. In some places in Musea, there exists "dream therapy centres" where an individual can pay to spend the night and have their nightmares eaten by a mindflayer.