Drow

Native Race: Yes

Species: Elven

Physiology Being very closely related to the high-elves, the Drow take second place in height among the elf races. Females tend to be bigger and a little more muscular than the males. Where males grow to be about 175 cm (5’10”), females come in at about 180 (6’0”). Although their hair is mostly white or grey, Drow with the recessive black hair gene are occasionally seen. Their skin is usually purple, ranging from dark to light and sometimes transition into a more brown hue. Eyes differ between red, white and purple with the occasional black, which too is a recessive gene. It often comes that with black hair and black eyes, lips, palms, nipples, the inside of mouths and the bottom of feet are black as well. If this is not the case, they’re usually a light violet. Like all elves, they have long pointy ears that they often pierce. Drow see well both in darkness and in bright light, but don’t see colour very well.

Lifespan: Females have a longer lifespan than males. Males reach about 500 years of age where females reach about 600.

Infants: 0-4 Toddler: 4-7 Child: 7-15 Pre-teen: 15-25 Teen: 25-50 Young Adult: 50-75 Adult: 75-200 Middle Aged: 200-400 Elder: 400-600

Diet: A high protein diet that exists mostly of insects they keep for livestock, ash fruits and vegetables, and some fish. Drow are known for having very spicy diets.

Habitat / Homeland: The Shibar Desert An isolated people, the Drow live in the black deserts of their homeland. The Drow live both above- and underground. Where the wealthy tend to live under, the poor live above. Farming of livestock takes place above ground as well.

The rich made their homes in the underground cave system. Through this system runs a river that empties out into the ocean not far from where they live. The Drow have expanded this system, making it suitable to live in and created an entire city below ground out of the rock surrounding them.

Because the underground homes are in such high demand, the poor live in houses made mostly out of mud above ground. The sand above is black due to the volcanos that rise from the rocky coastal line. The farmers use this to full advantage, growing a large variety of food.

Society

General Society The Drow society is a matriarchy in which the high priestess rules over the land alone. Females are the head of the family with the men having little to no say. Usually the men are the care-givers to the children of the women they serve. The Drow do practice polyandry in which a woman can have multiple male mates or husbands. The sons that aren’t given to other women will either stay at home and become house slaves to their mother and sisters or move out and live in what are known as bachelor homes. Bachelor homes are usually small homes above ground filled with men of both wealthy and poor backgrounds that decided to leave their homes. Though they are shunned and disowned, they are not hunted. More often than not, these men will end up back in the household of a woman as one of her slaves. It’s hard to make a decent living above ground as a male unless work is found in the farmlands.

Marriage: Trophy husbands are a very common thing among Drow ladies. Well educated men of wealthy families are very much welcomed as a husband and have more rights within the household than the male house slaves. Mothers that are wealthy enough will often try to marry off their excess sons to wealthy daughters. Dowries for trophy husbands are very much expected and the family of the son will often give jewellery, alcohol or gold. It can also happen that when in need of money, a mother will sell her son as a house slave to a wealthier family for a small amount of money. This is considered a thing for the poor and most rich women would rather marry their sons off.

Bridal showers are often held by male relatives for the young bridegroom. They will often celebrate, say goodbye and spend a good amount of time dressing the young man in traditional Drow clothing.

Marriage between a man and a woman are seen as lesser marriages, whereas marriage between two women is often seen as a greater marriage. Greater marriage is often used to improve relationships between two families. In the case of a lesbian relationship, two women don’t necessarily marry. A marriage between two men, however, is simply considered strange and has only rarely occurred. Most cases of a marriage between two men were interracial marriage.

Military forces: Existing mostly out of women, the military forces make special armour for spiders and beetles they use as mounts. Mostly based around stealth, they have rather impressive Special Forces and are known to breed fearsome assassins. Preferred weapons for the ground troupes that have mounts are long range weapons like bows, whereas foot soldiers will often use Katars or Scimitars.

Air forces are known to use fire magic, poisons and bombs, arming their wasps with disposable bombs that range from smoke to acids.

Women tend to do the fighting, while men will often be found at the camps as medics. Because men are often alchemists, they also make the poisons but will also restore broken armour and can be recruited to fight as a last resort.

The armour for foot soldiers is usually of medium weight and the Drow are known for making fast, devastating attacks. Alternatively, longer battles are fought with the mounts and centipedes.

Animals: The desert they live in is known for having a population of large insects. The Drow have learned over time to breed and train these insects for various usages.

The more aggressive spider and beetle breeds are armoured and used as mounts for the military ground forces. Wasps are used for aerial attacks and giant centipedes are used more as weapons rather than mounted.

The more docile, herbivorous beetles are used as livestock along with goats and wasp larvae, crickets and atlas beetle grubs.

Non-aggressive, non-venomous spiders are often found as pets or mounts for people that can afford them along with large moth caterpillars that are used for pulling carriages.

Export: Drow are known for alchemy and have special schools to teach this. Most of them are exclusively for ‘privileged’ boys, but like everything else in this society, are run by women. Teachers are both men and women. Alchemy is mostly used to make drugs, which is widely available to the people and not illegal. Because the ingredients for potions and drugs are in such high supply, most of their medicine and drugs are being exported to the rest of Nova. Alcohol is less available and mostly for the rich as it’s often seen as something very fancy.

Fashion: Drow women are known to wear thin and exposing clothing, mostly because Drow women are not ashamed to show their bodies as well as making the heat more bearable. Because they don’t see colour very well, they are often seen in very bright, mismatched colours when wealthy enough.

Men are usually a little more covered, but they too wear thin fabric to keep them from heat stroke.

Pierced ears are not uncommon and a lot of Drow, both rich and common, are often seen with rings through both ears. Overall they are very fond of gold in necklaces, bracelets, anklets and anywhere else they can pierce. They use real gold to show off wealth and fake gold to create the illusion of it. Brightly coloured gems are also in high demand.

Religion: Followers of Elenia

Elenia is known in the rest of Nova as Helena, the Goddess of the soul. The lore is a little different, but they are essentially the same god. They have built temples dedicated to this goddess and streets are littered with statues of Elenia. Male deities do not exist in their religion and rather than Zepon and Mylee, they have one goddess for both death and life called Tasapain. She is Elenia’s mother and has her own temples

Another goddess that is worshipped is Passie. Known in the rest of Nova as Vanessa, Passie is a mildly altered version, mainly that she too is a Drow, much like the rest of the gods they worship.

Reproduction: Drow are born singularly, or occasionally as twins. The men raise boys that might not even be theirs. There is no jealousy between the men because they often don’t know whether a child is theirs or not. Sex is more often than not, is not a sign of love.

Lesbian couples often have male mates and share them. Relationships among the men of the household are often encouraged to avoid conflicts.

Halfbreeds: Like all elves, breeding with orks, other elves and humans is possible, but because they tend to keep to themselves, it’s not very common.

Magical Abilities: Drow are known for their talents in the dark arts. Necromancy is completely legal and often seen as a legit form of magic. Often used in combat when at war, necromancy is used to keep foot soldiers at a certain number.

As they live in the desert, they are somewhat resistant to fire and heat. This is also one of the first things they learn to do with magic as children. Making and controlling fire is used to help them build up their magical abilities. When children get older, fire magic transitions into electricity magic, which they can advance if they want to make elemental magic their main denomination. Magic based around ice or water is only for those who decided to make elemental magic their main denomination and costs a lot of training and effort. It is highly praised within their society and a lot of mothers will often push daughters to advance in elemental magic.

Healing magic is, in and of itself, not very popular among women. The only women that learn it will later become doctors and advance in it. This too is more of a masculine thing to learn rather than a feminine thing. However, most men will only be taught the basics unless they’re either from a wealthy family or at war.

The last form of magic that is very popular among Drow is illusion magic. Illusion magic is used mostly for either entertainment or combat. As most boys that are born in a family with female siblings often don’t learn destructive magic beyond the basics, they often learn the entertaining side of illusion magic, using it to help out in the upbringing of the children. Most performers advance in illusion magic and it is thoroughly used by the military.