#first bloods lore

[the-timeless-founder]

First Blood historical headcanons

"But we are the First Bloods,

Dark and beautiful and undead,

We have forever roamed these lands,

And founded a world before which all bend."

Okay so, I have a hot take here. I argue that the First Bloods aren't actually the very first of demon kind, those would be the chaotic and unruly beasts that roam the depths of Makai, sent there straight from hell itself.

The First Bloods are the first intelligent type of the demon. The first that learned how to use magic, communicate and go beyond the previously impossible to traverse borders that seperated them from the mainlands of Makai.

As the first intelligent beings to find their way to these fertile, vast lands, they wandered and observed and studied it at first, wonderous as young children would be.

Gradually, they grew stronger, smarter, and more capable. And once they had seen all of what this world had to offer, they settled in the middle regions, which would later become the prime territories of the Demon World, and started building their cities and walls.

At first, small in numbers and less egotistical than they are remembered as now, they were open to letting Ghouls that had grown sentient work alongside them. These Ghouls who'd stayed in the Makai for longer had some experience with regional benefits and detriments that were useful to the First Bloods.

But they weren't kind to them, no. They never treated the Ghouls as "their own" and viewed themselves as the benevolent ones for even letting them mingle among themselves.

These minglings of First Bloods and intelligent Ghouls later led to the birth of the four subspecies, but that is a story for another day.

A few members of these First Bloods who were leading all the efforts and were more powerful began to establish a system of rulership that would have them and their families at the top.

These people who would go down in the history of the First Bloods as the Great Ancestors are as follows:

Malahtan Tsukinami, the Dark Uniter, the first head of House Tsukinami, and the King of Makai and the First Bloods. A cruel but cunning man who united his people and led them to establish their great empire. He conquered the prime lands in the middle of the realm, and placed himself and his line at the head of this empire.

Ulrich Lunagust, the Master of Gold, and the first head of House Lunagust. He was the first among the First Bloods to show interest in the minerals of the lands and his house would go on to create the very first forms of currency and own mines of different sorts all across the lands.

Johannes Sanguine, the Diplomat and the first head of House Sanguine. He was the person who aided Malahtan closely and was essential to the establishment of the empire. He bargained with the Ghouls for their knowledge and workforce and was deeply interested in the research of the world they had landed in. He and his house would store the true, unfiltered history of the Demon World and keep secrets to cultivating ancient magic for themselves in eons to come.

Lucienne Bonnerell, the Crimson Witch and the woman who'd go on to establish the loose House of Bonnerell in the far South East of the Realm, later known as the Blood Witches. She helped build the kingdom with the persuasion of Johannes, but she did not join the empire's machinery due to major disagreements with Malahtan Tsukinami, who was seated atop the throne they were building.

The three main First Blood factions, in the beginning, held power within the realm regardless of the Tsukinamis at the top. But overtime, only House Sanguine could maintain seperate importance to the Demon World.

House Lunagust held power still, but as the four subraces appeared and began to build currencies and mines of their own, the importance and preciousness of First Blood currency became more and more reliant on the crown's stability, leading the House to become more and more dependent on the throne.

House Bonnerell eventually fully removed itself from First Blood territory and established its own faction of land in the South East. They still had deep-rooted ties to House Sanguine, who kept records of their rituals and research, but the more modern Demon Society now only knows them as the Blood Witches as they freely mingled with other kinds, even humans.

Every generation of House Tsukinami grew more influence over the world than the last, and the prospering Kings and people became blind-sighted to their shortcomings and flaws.

They begun to view themselves as superior to the four subraces, who were deformed in First Blood standards as they couldn't shift shape to all the main demonic forms.

And so will go on the legacy of the First Bloods. This was only the establishment of this realm. There is more to come.

[gobbogoo]

"It's Been A While, Morgott"

To me, this moment of tenderness all but confirms that Godfrey must have visited his Omen children in their sewer prison.

Consider everything we know about Godfrey. He actively venerated the Crucible and its primal manifestations. His knights wore helms decorated with horns and utilized its animalistic magic:

Even after the Crucible fell from favour, these knights were tolerated right up until Godfrey was banished. Therefore Godfrey must have been preserving them even despite Marika's decrees. This makes sense, because Godfrey was born in the ancient era when the Crucible's wild power was considered a blessing, not a curse:

"A vestige of the crucible of primordial life. Born partially of devolution, it was considered a signifier of the divine in ancient times, but is now increasingly disdained as an impurity as civilization has advanced."

To Godfrey, his Omen sons would not have been something to revile. This is supported by the fact that their horns weren't excised. I doubt it was Marika's choice, since she had turned against the Crucible by then. It MUST have been at Godfrey's behest. Likewise, who else could have commissioned THIS?

A "memorial fetish fashioned in secret" that CLEARLY depicts Morgott. Someone CARED about this secret Omen infant. Enough to memorialize their their existence at the risk of the entire Golden Order. It literally ONLY could have been Godfrey.

Lastly, there's the circumstances of Godfrey's banishment. Most people say he was simply cast aside after he ran out of enemies to fight, but this CAN'T be all there was to it, because Raya Lucaria still existed. A FAR better explanation is that Godfrey began to show signs of disobedience. Godfrey was a man of instinct and emotion. Could such a man have sat idle while his children were imprisoned and his comrades reviled by the very order HE helped build?

No. And so Godfrey began to visit his Omen children in secret, where he told them stories of their lineage and their origins. In Morgott his stories instilled a Lord's sense of duty for the Erdtree and everything it could be.

In Mohg, his stories instilled an Omen's sense of pride for the Crucible, and everything it once was.

Until Marika learned of her husband's treachery, and the Omen Twins never saw their father again.

EDITED IN EXTRA OBSERVATION:

Someone pointed out that Serosh exists to channel Godfrey's emotions, and what's the first thing we hear/see when we approach Godfrey holding his son? Serosh roaring in anger. Beneath that kingly countenance, Godfrey is a lot more distraught than he's capable of showing.

[kenchann]

dunmeshi~

[thechaoticdruid]

Astarion canonly has no body hair. He cannot grow any because 'high elves' cannot grow body hair in both DND and BG3 lore. I feel like this needs to go around because my nerd OCD goes off whenever I see Astarion drawn with armpit hair or other body hair, because he literally doesn't have it.

(No hate to people who like men with body hair, but this man physically cannot grow it.)

Edit: For people pointing out Halsin. Halsin is a WOOD elf not a high elf. (I'm not quite sure about drow cause I believe their darker complexion might make it hard to see if they have body hair.)

Edit 2: I went back and checked for myself that none of the player elf body models have body hair so it seems Halsin is a special case. But I mean he literally jokes about possibly being part half-orc so there's that. That being said the point is still Astarion has no body hair.

[phoenixcatch7]

Okay so I saw this post about dark percy (really him reaching his Limit and fighting full strength with everything he had) and I was imagining the potential fallout of that. Pretty bad, as you can guess.

The thing is a lot of percys strongest moments happen out of view of the olympians, especially in hoo. The hurricane atop the glacier in alaska, the poison scene in tartarus, bending the depression river and the one in the palace of nyx.

Stuff like the St Helens eruption got him washed up on an inescapable island literally removed from reality until calypso gave him the OK, the achillies curse he got tricked into losing by hera. Smaller moments, the minotaur, fighting ares, the stolen pirate ship, walking on water vs hyperion, freshwater sources, him knowing both Latin and Greek, they're more easily brushed off or at least mostly due to cunning, sword skills and sheer luck and grit.

But basically the olympians don't actually know the full extent of percys strength and divine power. They have hints - percy standing on the throne, winning against ares, his many victories - but what they aren't willing to brush aside in the heat of (an important) battle there have been pretty strong consequences for.

Heck, just look at Frank, he's no prodigy with weapons, he's polite and respectful, but his distant relation to two olympians letting him inherit shapeshifting earned him direct divine meddling and his life force tied to a hunk of half toasted firewood. Man is a honey bear with lactose intolerance and he was punished with a mythical death curse for being too strong.

If Percy's true strength came out, he would risk losing everything. His freedom, most certainly. If he wasn't straight up executed he might wind up in a Greek myth style imprisonment, the way of atlas, prometheus, calypso, or something like the myriad of ways Greek heroes met their end. Good scenario he survives a dozen curses and gets on with life with a dozen new disabilities, best case scenario he's stripped of every inch of divine power and dropped back to the mortal world, not even clear sighted. Total separation from the Greeks and Romans. Oh, annabeth would marry him either way, and his friends would hardly abandon him despite the gods wishes, but they'd hardly be able to see him, and no long range contact without the ability to IM him or vice versa.

All of that to say Percy is hiding his true strength from the gods themselves - maybe not consciously, and it's not even power he particularly wants - but if they ever find out?

It's game over.

But why is he so strong? I don't know. What I do know is that the half bloods of the books are so much stronger than the ones of myth. Used to be that divine blood would get you divine favour and a great fate whether you liked it or not. Maybe some cunning and bow skills. A spot of spell casting if you were really lucky. Achillies got his curse after he was born, Perseus had a dozen magic artifacts, orpheus had something going on but hercules is to my knowledge an outlier. Now? Everyone in camp has some special power. Flight, fire, necromancy, hypnotism, dream walking etc. However it's happening, half bloods are slowly but surely getting a lot, lot stronger every century that passes. Meta? I mean I guess. But.

What no one has done before is something that their godly parent couldn't.

Except.

Except Percy.

Except Percy, in tartarus, at his mental, emotional and physical limit, controlling poison with his mind, overpowering the goddess of poison in her home, making misery choke on misery. Feeling something in his chest crack. Doing something poseidon could not, and doing it better than the person who could.

Down there, hidden away from the gods, he evolved. For that brief moment, he did something, was something new.

And that was how the gods overthrew the titans.

And that's why they must never find out.

[meadowsofmay]

i am getting into the xhorhas arc now but — i still can't fucking believe that the mighty nein stole a pirate ship by accidentally killing its crew (except for one guy) because they just wanted to talk to this one guy (they abducted said guy), decided to go fuck where and engage in relationship with the powerful pirate who has an obsession with a god, became full fledged pirates for a while, docked on the pirate island, got banned from said pirate island after a day, barely surviving, and then renamed a famous pirate ship that they've kept as the balleater.

what a fucking arc that was, holy shit

[mattodore]

delphi, bitten pack member, mate

[mel-loly]

-(click for a better quality!)

[coyoteclan]

oops

big win for everyone who wanted Dancingheart to be a med cat all along but at the cost of more death :(

trying out some art stuff so let me know what you think for this moon lol, I did this all in one night

[half-a-life-left]

LOYALTY (PART 6/?)

[the-timeless-founder]

Why is Saeclus' nickname the Timeless / the Eternal? Is it because of how old he is or did he do something that's went down in history as timeless? 👀

A combination of both! He's known as the Timeless primarily though. Both because of his weird aging and also because of a past """deed of glory""".

Okay so, first about Demons and Aging.

They have a much slower aging compared to Humans and even regular Angels in most cases. Shu mentions that a regular Vampire would begin to decay past two thousand years. It can be extended using the power of magic, as we have Vampires that have lived beyond two thousand retaining most of their power.

Think Karl Heinz or Dong Hwa Kang.

Now, comparing the races and the respective animals representing them, I have the following headcanons for the three other subraces and then the First Bloods:

The Adlers live the longest - they are wealthy, have high living standards and their relatively small population is well provided for by their mines and society. Because of this, Adlers have an average life expectancy of 3000.

The Vibora are very similar to the Vampire regarding the aging matter - but it heavily depends which region they have been born in. They have the most fluctuating life expectancy because of their different branches, but the years usually fly between 1500 to 2500 years for them.

The Wolves would have a life expectancy of around the same as the Vibora if they had a stable economy. Because of the famine and wars and their culture heavily being stapled in violence, it's hard to say how long a Wolf would live on average. However, their most powerful Lords could live up to 2000 and then some.

At last, the First Bloods. If we view them as the humans among these beings, aka being really generous, they would have a life expectancy of around ten thousand years.

But that's not the case 😭 because a lot of them usually die a lot younger than that. Why? Because of war, accidents and troubles of society. Their Lords are the only ones who might get to live that much, but they usually won't.

So, with all that in mind, Saeclus is considered a relatively experienced person even by First Blood standards. That means he's old but also not that old 😭 he stopped counting the years when he passed 500 so he has no idea how old he is either. He doesn't even remember his birthdate anymore.

Which means by all the other standards in this realm, he's hecking old. He should look like he's in his mid-thirties. And yet here he is, looking freshly past his early twenties. And it's even more odd because he's looked like this for the past thousand years.

It's weird. Karl Heinz, however, theorizes that the rare life magic essence that he possesses makes his lifespan surpass that of any ordinary Demon.

So guess what! He thought the best way to remedy it would be to kill him instead! Isn't he a darling? <333

But now for the """deed of glory""" I mentioned - which was a battle of course, that's why it's in heavy quotations. (tw for violence!)

Context is that in the war of the Founders against the Hell Beasts that broke loose from beyond the Black Mountains - also known as the Scarlet Age because the many places the Hell Beasts ravaged and most of the battlefields would always be painted red with blood - Saeclus' oldest brother, Nocsis, was murdered by the Mhyris.

The Mhyris were a large group of people who were bound to no social rules and no morals - they'd commit any sort of crime on a person of any race and did not care at all. It's rumored the group was founded by people that were shunned by Founder society for their crimes - turns out ignoring your problems instead of solving them leads to disaster.

Saeclus had just lost his father in a scheme set up by Odissa's sister, Odette, and now they tell him his brother has also been slaughtered in cold blood. And being in the middle of a war meant that he didn't even have time to grieve properly.

So he turned to the only other viable option - fury.

He had his men lead the Hell Beasts to the Mhyris most recent hiding spot, and then proceeded to absolutely decimate both the Mhyris and the Hell Beasts in a surprise attack as they'd engaged with each other.

The attack was vicious - Saeclus used his affinity with Hell Fire to roast the Beasts and Mhyris alike, some say that the Earth split open and spat out fire, only to devour those that would fall into the gaps in its fiery chasms.

Later, his soldiers and historians nicknamed the whole thing "the Battle of a Thousand and One Fires", because of the many beings that were burnt to nothing in it. And Saeclus received the official dub of The Timeless because of this glorious victory that ended the war and disbanded the Mhyris.

He does not look back on this event with any pride - if anything, he recalls it as one of his personal weakest moments. It's an odd sort of paradox - this was and is his greatest display of physical strength, but he fails to find a single thing to feel good about in it.

[gordon-freeman-phd]

It's time to suit up, Gordon.

[raiiny-bay]

monster boyz, but like, as an RPG

[starfreak]

Random Elden Ring Rant (Contains Spoilers, VERY LONG)

So, the Numen. We can choose it as a character preset, which tells us they come from another world, or another land. I say "or another land" because historically, America is referred to as the "New World," but it's not a separate planet. However, translations from the Japanese version of the game suggest that the world they come from is one of spirits, the dead, etc., so it could definitely be a Literal other world.

Marika is (rumored to be) a Numen, as are the Black Knife Assassins that participated in the Night of Black Knives.

If Marika is Numen, then it stands to reason so is Radagon, since they are the same person in the same body. This means their children together, Malenia and Miquella (and now presumably Messmer since he has red hair like Radagon, but Miyazaki said that he's the child of Marika, so unless there's another red-haired hottie running around the Lands Between, Radagon is the father), are also Numen. This also means that other children of Marika/Radagon are half-Numen.

It seems Numen are not a single ethnicity, but a whole race of people, with various different contradicting skin tones and hair colors. The template in the character creator has medium-dark skin and brown hair. Marika has pale skin and golden hair (possibly changed to be gold from the Greater Will's influence) and Radagon has the same skin with fiery red hair. We know from the Giant's Red Braid item description (below) that Radagon was either cursed by the Fire Giants or simply born with red hair. I mean...no item descriptions suggest he was born with it...but if I was born with hair I hated, I would blame it on a curse too. Though, to be fair, it IS the same color as the Fire Giants' hair.

Also the Black Knife Assassins have no physical form, so we can't discern their hair or skin colors.

So skin tone seems like a non-factor, but Hair is much harder to parse, due to half the Numen in the game having fiery hair and pronouns. The game says nothing about Marika's hair changing to gold, so it may have always been that color, leading me to believe that indeed, Numen are just...magic humans from a land far away...she's just blonde.

WELP.

That's all cool, but what is the culture of the Numen like? Well we can see that they have a very strong affinity for women and femininity. Not only is Marika, the most powerful Numen we know, a woman...all of the Black Knives are women. Additionally, if we choose to believe that Malenia and Miquella are Numen, this fact is further evidenced by Malenia's being a strong warrior woman (she is literally a Valkyrie) and Miquella's own complex gender identity. Miquella was (supposedly) born male, but presented as rather feminine/androgynous all his life. While Malenia is a masculine woman and reflects Radagon, Miquella is a feminine boy reflecting Marika. Not to mention that Miquella is ALMOST DEFINITELY Saint Trina, who is exclusively referred to as feminine.

In addition to the stong feminine aspects of Numen society apparent in the overabundance of strong fem-presenting characters, the description of Marika's Hammer suggests that women in Numen society (like Marika) have a role as destroyers and warriors, while men (Radagon) have a role of construction and repair.

"Queen Marika shattered the Elden Ring and Radagon attempted to repair it."

Again, this is just speculation, and the mythological actions of Radagon/Marika are likely motivated by a mutlitude of things (namely, the Greater Will constantly looming over them, the presence of the Elden Beast constantly lurking just under the surface), but I'm making do with what I have.

Also, back to genetics of the Numen again for a second, of all Radagon and Marika's children outside of the ones they had together (Messmer and the Twin Empyreans), most of them seem to inherit Radagon/Marika's hair.

Radagon and Rennala's kids, Radahn, Rykard, and Ranni, (presumably) have red hair. We never actually see Ranni's hair pre-doll form, so I'm assuming it's red lkke her brothers'.

Marika and Godfrey's kids, Godwyn, Mohg, and Morgott, all have either pale hair or no hair (Mohg has no hair visible on account of all the omen horns).

So it seems like the genes of Numen are incredibly dominant, even dominating the gene pool multiple generations after the first. Godwyn's kids, Godrick and Godefroy, have the same hair color as he does. Malenia's "daughters," although not genetically related to her, all seem to have gained her red hair through exposure to her Scarlet Aeonia. This may also be true of the Cleanrot Knights, but they could also have plucked the red hairs from Fire Giants or Leonine Misbegotten and used them as decor for their armor.

Even merely interacting with a Numen as powerful as Marika, or her direct children, can change one's appearance irreversably. Sure, this could all likely be from her status as a God, but who knows how powerful the average Numen could become if granted the strength? We become Elden Lord after all.

[scrimblyscrorblo]

Giving Yuzuka a gf when she was human, just for you @tobytoon. The lyrics are from Melanie Martinez’s Play date

I havnt given her gf a name yet but I kinda have an ending for her planned out. And the pattern on her kimono is Fukiyose - dead leaves in the wind. ✨Symbolism✨ Yuzu’s pattern is the Belladonna plant <3

Their songs?

- I Bet On Losing Dogs -> Mitsuki

- Me and Mr Wolf -> The Real Tuesday Weld

- Monster -> Dev

- Too Sweet -> Hozier

- Fear & Delight -> The Correspodents (one of my fav songs tbh)

Yuzuka has always been a more self-centered person but with the demands of her work environment she’s become very apathetic and vengeful, she’s not really close with her parents either

If you have name suggestions for her gf please lemme know. They liked each other a lot, she seemed like something good in Yuzuka’s life that she didn’t want to lose. But alas, thinking of others isn’t her strong suit at all - given the chance at revenge on her employer she took it almost without hesitation.

They’re kinda cute ngl I couldn’t the damn marker for Yuzuka until like after I finished drawing her and the balding orange is killing me TT it’s meant to be more yellow toned and slightly less saturated

Alas

I’ll do better art of them later lol