Draelik

Draelik

(Creature)

Type

Humanoid
(draelik)

CR

By class level

Environment

Any (Great Shadar)

Alignment

LG	NG	CG
LN	N	CN
LE	NE	CE

Adjective

draelik

Source: Alien Archive, pg(s). 36

Draeliks are a humanoid race native to the planet Great Shadar, the leaders of the Shadari Confederacy and followers of a nihilistic philosophy called Ataxxea.

Appearance

Draeliks are gaunt humanoids who average 7 feet in height. They have vestigial gills on their necks and slightly webbed hands and feet. Draeliks are hairless, instead possessing short bristles on their heads. Their skin colour is various shades of yellow. Draeliks have four-fingered hands and long limbs compared to humans.

Like all other member races of the Shadari Confederacy, draeliks have a mystical marking resembling a third eye on their forehead, marking them as followers of Ataxxea.

History

The draeliks' vestigial neck gills and webbed hands and feet hint that they might have originally been aquatic, but Great Shadar lacks large bodies of water to serve as their aquatic home. Latest rumours in the Azlanti Star Empire speak of a secret granted by the sceaduinars to the draelik rulers: the Unmaker, a grievously wounded aeon turned into a weapon of mass destruction, and the Shadari have worked for decades to pervert the aeon’s energies to unmake creation.

Society

The draelik religion pays homage to sceaduinars, the denizens of the Negative Energy Plane, and finds entropy to be the most sublime force in the universe. They do not seek to destroy, preferring to accelerate natural decay using negative energy. Many followers, once tattooed, gain powers similar to solarians who focus on the graviton aspects of their cycle.

Despite being both nihilistic, draeliks look down on and find any comparison with the Cult of the Devourer offensive. They consider their own path a dignified march towards the inevitable end, while the Devourer's followers, with their destructive tendency, are like children who want to skip to dessert rather than experience the full meal.

Draeliks that reject Ataxxea often leave their homeworld to seek their fortune in the outer galaxy, taking advantage of their people's ingrained talents and hiring themselves out as morally ambiguous operatives or mystics. Draeliks that fight for the betterment of the universe as a whole are very rare. All these draeliks have to contend with their inner demons and the temptations of sceaduinars who want to convert them back.