Daimalko

Daimalko

(Cosmos)

Type

Terrestrial planet

Diameter

1/4

Mass

1/16

Gravity

×1

Atmosphere

Normal

Year length (PST)

3 years

Day length (PST)

48 hours

Inhabitants

Colossi
Damais

Source: Core Rulebook, pg(s). 464

Daimalko is a once-civilised planet devastated by gargantuan rampaging monsters known as colossi, while the descendants of these civilisations struggle for a living underground.

Geography

Daimalko is a rocky world of rocky mountains, steep basins, and the ruins of two once-great civilisations. Sea beds have long desiccated into cliffs and valleys. Petrified tree trunks are all that remains of once-lush forests. Megacities and villages alike have been devastated by the colossi.

History

Long ago, the colossi existed as mere legends, and daily life focused on the war between two empires: Volkaria, a psychic confederacy, and Ykarth, which claimed divine mandate from the empyreal lord Duellona. Two centuries ago, the war was halted by a month-long global calamity called the Awakening: earthquakes reverberated, oceans evaporated, plants withered and the colossi awakened. Most Daimalkans died during the Awakening or were killed by rampaging colossi afterwards.

The survivors of the cataclysm were forced underground into caverns called the Refuge. Volkarians and Ykarthans alike had to put aside nationalism for survival. As the refugee settlements grew, a group of leaders calling themselves the Guardians emerged and claimed to be able to magically steer colossi. They have led small groups aboveground to found villages on the surface for the past 50 years.

In 422 AG, a week after the Drift Crash, an enigmatic capital ship fused with unstable planar material crash-landed in a dry seabed. No one has been able to identify it or explain why tekenkis seem to be defending the ship from other colossi that approach it.

Inhabitants

The colossi that have continued to rampage across Daimalko since the Awakening are gargantuan, horrific beasts. Although most of the gray-skinned damais have been forced underground, there continue to be Volkarian and Ykarthan holdouts that threaten to destabilise the Refuge. Orbiting ships sometimes receive distress calls from the ruins of cities, but they are never answered planetside. Underground settlements have also reported attacks by skinless, eyeless creatures, causing some damais to oppose all contact with outsiders in fear of triggering a second Awakening. In addition to the native damais, Daimalko has also been settled by aasimars, elves, lashuntas, ryphorians and humans, whose ancestors either survived the Awakening or sought fortune on the planet and subsequently fell in love with its culture. In some seas and freshwater lakes, tenacious lifeforms like lichens, carnivorous vines, giant mountain eagles, two-headed griffons, six-legged goats and hairless, psychic yetis continue to endure.