Casien

“As I watch eternity pass me by, I wonder what I have stopped knowing in all these years. My mind is wandering, always losing some of its coherence as new memories spring to life. Now, even the quiet meditation between the immense floras of this world cannot bring me the thoughts I once held dear. But I have no regrets. For I know that this new me is what I am supposed to be, To dwell on the past is to live two lives at the same time. Let some of my life be ruled by the chaos of a damaged mind, as I strive for order towards the future.”

—Jasper ‘t Jong

Swift and Alien

Tall and slender, casiens roam the forests to further nature’s existence and tend to the balance of the world. Because they vary so much in height and have a glistening blue to green skin, with exceptions ranging from brown to gold, their age is hard to determine. A 7-foot-tall casien might still be a child, being no older than 30 years, while a 5-foot-tall casien could have seen a millennium of change. But if you look closely, their wide, open eyes of lavender and emerald colors might tell you the truth.

    Casiens also vary in some of their physical aspects. While a lot of them are bald, some of them have hair. Colors almost always reflect their surroundings, with blue skinned and haired casiens living near bodies of water and green skinned ones residing in dense forests. Some even have a very short and stiff tail at the lower end of their back, although this is more a discomfort than a way to keep their balance. Because of their large eyes and broad noses, they are often associated with cats. But since the rest of the body is more like a human’s body, though the limbs are often longer, the resemblance ends there.

Born from Chaos, Raised by Order

A casien can live for a very long time, possibly for millennia. But their minds are chaos and they are not made for such longlivity. This is why from early on, a casien learns how to meditate and go on memory visions while doing so. Without really influencing the flow of time, they can still bend the narrative of their life in such a way that they can let their past become a comprehensive flow of events. They effectively make their past a story that tells them all the important parts of their lives. Some memories might still be forgotten, but the core of their being often stays about the same.

    To free their mind during the hours of the day, casiens like to run and hunt. Their clothes are simple and allow for easy movement. There is no difference in male and female clothing on the surface. During their sprints, they seldom communicate vocally, but do change glances and smiles that confer stories all together, building on a shared past to form the nuances that come from spending centuries in each other’s vicinity.

    Each day is about the same for a casien. This is so that their memories are easy to order. A casien who leaves its home often loses its sense of calm over time. And with this loss, age sets in as well. Though many casiens can stay in chaotic communities for centuries, in the end they will wither away.  They simply stop living and are often found in a pose that suggests they were doing some simple task or just relaxing. An illness might take a casien as well and they become a lot more vulnerable outside of their own communities. Not because their resilience is lowered, but because they lack the focus that is required to deal with an illness when not surrounded by the tranquil peace of their forests.

Communities and Insolitiums

Casiens build their homes in lush forests and deep groves. They use natural materials and spend decades perfecting the state of these homes. These aren’t very big, but they are comfortable and allow for a minimum of input, which helps them meditate. They do not refer to their homes as houses, but as states of solitudes.

    Their states are part of a wheel, which is something akin to a small village, but arranged in such a way that each state is connected to a spiraling road, but never to another state, not by connection or line of sight. In the center of a wheel, there are some communal houses (not states). When visitors come to a wheel, they often find an inn, some shops and other important political building here. They are seldom invited to a state.

    About ten to twenty wheels form a sientis, which is what might be called a province by other races. These sientisi have a central city, called a palosh. This palosh has no states, only residences that are shared by those who need to be in this city to govern the sientis. There is also a military presence here and each wheel has scouts and messengers in this city. These representatives of the wheels help other casiens, and possibly other races, find the well-hidden wheels that they come from. Communication between wheels in a sientis is slow, but their natural camouflage often makes it so that whole casien societies are never found anyway. They rely heavily of natural protection.

    About three to seven sientisi make up an insolitium, a country. A capital city, called a casuun, that does have permanent and more condensed housing forms the political center of the insolitium, so that relations can be maintained with bordering countries. The borders of an isolitium also have a lot of veleshi, green towers that function as border markers and points of entry to an insolitium. Casiens themselves often negate the roads that cross from these points through their insolitium towards their casuun and paloshi, which makes these roads somewhat hard to travel by when travelling by cart of wagon.

    Casiens adopt no titles, but they do distribute functions. For easy reference, the leader of a country is called the ruler and military ranks often follow those of societies outside of their borders. Who does what might change every other week. It might also stay the same for centuries. Wealth is measured internally by how comfortable a thing is, and externally by what can be bought with it. Their main produce is comfort, and they often trade for things made out of metal and useful items that their mostly natural, agricultural and hunter-based society does not produce.

Casius, God of Nature

Casiens worship their creator, Casius. The God of All that is Nature, the Keeper, the Preserver of Life cares greatly for his children. Or so he did. Since the Gods have grown distant, the casiens have felt less and less of his warm touch. The druids and clerics that follow him know that he is still around, but their connection is tentive at best and it has been ages since they have heard a direct command.

    But still, the casien way of life is very much in line with what Casius stands for, and so an easy balance is maintained.

Hidden Away

Casiens care little for the other races. But they still need them for commerce and quality of life improvements that they cannot provide themselves.   Urturian Halflings and Koirasi. They, however, despise the halflings and koirasi. They are either too chaotic or to evil for their liking. The fire wielding koirasi are a danger to their forests while the cannibalistic halflings simply do not make any sense to them.   Dwarves. Of all the other races, they like dwarves the most. Though their way of understanding order is very different from their own, they like how the dwarves deal with them: they never lie and always produce what is needed.   Gnomes, Humans and Orcs. Casiens deal a lot with humans and since gnomish and orcish societies are often intertwined with those of humans, they accept these races as well. They do dislike the bartering communities that form around these races. Even though orcs always speak in terms of fairness and gnomes really know how to present their stuff, together with the tendency of humans to simply get the best out of every deal, the have formed an opinion about these races that keeps them skeptical.   Godal and Vadi. These races are simply too far apart from casien lands. The vadi dwell under the surface of the big lakes and godal live in their clans deep in the caverns of the mountain ranges. They aren’t necessarily opposed to their ways of life. They just do not meet very often. Also, they do not like how vadi tend to bend the law to always be in their favor.

Casien Names

Casien names often present a feeling, a sound that nature makes, or the tjirp of a bird. Sometimes, they do not. Most casiens have a second name. This can be a family name, other times it reflects an interest, a rank or something… Something. The bonds of family aren’t as strong as the bond of friendship, so those who become vast friends can adapt the name of a friend just as easily as one’s significant other. Names are not dictated by sex.

Names: Castellian, Devos, Kirr, Lustlian, Radoshi, Rrommm, Tjirti.

Casien Traits

Your casien character comes with some chaotic and orderly abilities that reflect its nature.

Ability Score Increase. Your Dexterity increases by 2, and your Constitution score increases by 1.

Age. Casiens reach adulthood at the age of 24, but they are considered mature at an age of around 150 years. At this point, meditation had become a prominent part of a casien’s life and their history slowly transforming into a story about their lives. When not living in casien society, they can live around 450 years, but in casien society their lives can encompass millennia.

Alignment. Casiens are chaotic by nature, but their lifelong quest for retaining their sanity has made them appear orderly. They prefer the brighter side of life, defending nature against the forces that would destroy it.

Size. Casiens range from around 5 to 7 feet and have a dexterous muscular body. Your size is medium.

Speed. Your base walking speed is 35 feet.

Born from Chaos. You can seemingly rewind time for a few seconds and redo your turn just as you end your turn. You must use the results of the new turn. You remember the previous turn and can use information gained for your new turn. Once you use this ability, you can’t do so again until you finish a long rest. You cannot use this ability if you are dying, petrified, or unconscious.

Casien Weapon Training. You have proficiency with daggers, rapiers, javelins, shortswords, and shortbows.

Fey Ancestry. You have advantage on saving throws against being charmed, and magic can’t put you to sleep.

Raised by Order. You have trained your mind to resist any psychic influence. You have resistance to psychic damage.

Languages. You can speak, read, and write casien and common.