Fairies were created by the Artisans in the distant past to serve as moderators of the ecosystems they created.
Fairies, although diverse, share many anatomical features. They are generally composed of the same segments: head, legs, wings and antenna. The head is usually the largest segment and tends to be rounded; it also always bears a pair of eyes. The legs, if present, always number six and are used to move around. The wings are typically used primarily for flight. The antenna is usually a sensory organ that lets the fairy feel its surroundings and evaluate ecosystemic health.
Most fairies have a few magical abilities to help them. All have the ability to use somnifer compounds to set others to sleep. This alchemical power tends to be weaker on creatures larger than 10 kilos, but a large group of fairies may be able to set a ningen or kraken to sleep, if needed.
Fairies have efficient ways of keeping themselves alive. As all other beings, they require an energy intake. Each fairy clan has at least a few ways of doing that. Many are able to execute photosynthesis through their wings, while thermosynthesis is also done by a few.
There are 18 fairy clans, each with an Awaken and a Dreamy division.
Temperate Forest Fairies were made to look like the forests they inhabit. These may change colours with the passing of seasons, however. Using a complex hormonal system that matches the cycle of the stars, they can be of all colours, respecting their divisions. Anatomically, they bear all the common appendages and their wings are leaf shaped. They also have leafy growths on their heads.
Their flower-shaped antenna can be of many colours and detects a variety of smells, as well as temperature and humidity. These fairies often munch on soil to test its quality.
Rainforest Fairies have a dark, moist skin on their heads and feet. Their wings resemble paradise bird flowers and may be red or yellow (Awaken) or up or charm (Dreamy). Their antenna seems like a sprout and is fenced by a structure mimicking a bromeliad.
They are able to, with their antennae, feel humidity and temperature levels. They also often taste the soil to measure ionity and mineral contents.
Field Fairies are round. Their heads are mostly either pink or orange with white accents, while their legs are wholly white. Their wings are green and photosynthetic. They also possess a collection of leafy blades on their heads around their antenna, which seems like a dandelion.
A Field Fairy's antenna is able to sense wind direction and smell a large variety of elements and compounds.
Desert Fairies are cactus-like balls covered in spikes. Their whole skin is photosynthetic. They walk over 6 short legs or fly using 3-fold wings that are pink or white in colour. Their antennae seem are protected by a large flower-like organ whose petals are the same color as the wings. The antennae themselves range from 3 to 5 and are stamen-like.
Desert Fairies can smell water, unlike most other fairies or animals in general. They also often bleed out their own water contents, if rain becomes overtly scarse.
Milky Fairies live near the Milky Firmament. Their heads are unusually ring-shaped and metallic. Their skin is in fact covered by a thin layer of a copper alloy in the Awaken division and a bismuth alloy in the Dreamy one. Their 3 legs spread radially while the spherical antenna floats above their ring head. The wings are thin and bear 3 fake eyes each.
Each segment appears to be detached from the rest, but they are actually connected by a highly transparent cotton bind. They use radiation to execute their metabolic process through radiotrophy.
Their antenna is able to measure electricity and radiation levels in the air. Their legs are also sensorial and can detect sound more precisely.
Sky Fairies are change colour through the day to match the sky. At noon they are of a soft blue (for Awaken) or truth (for Dreamy), while their skin fills with melanin at night. During dawn or dusk, they are actually black too, but secrete a highly reflective and orangish or downish mucilage bind. They actually execute most of their photosynthesis at night.
Unlike most fairies, they lack legs altogether. Their wings are large, however, and transparent. They also possess a cloud-like growth on their heads, which swells when the air is moist and darkens with electricity.
A Sky Fairy's antenna is very long and ribbon-like. This transparent strip is able to sense air currents with a keenness unmatched. It can also smell many odours and feel radiation levels.
The Tundra Fairies' heads look like ice cubes. At low temperatures, they produce no pigmentation and therefore their fluffy wings are snow white. But if the air gets hot enough, they redden as to look like plants, and the "ice" darkens, looking more like soil. Their legs can change shape from pointy, as to grip on ice, or to flat pads that allow them to walk over snow.
The antenna, which seems like a transparent reverse icicle, can sense temperature very finely. It can also perceive humidity levels and odours.
Cave Fairies have the tradition of covering their rugose skin with powder, being able to match the rocks of whatever environment they live in. Their eyes are very large, enabling them to see in dim light. Their legs are long and point, allowing them to climb on walls adeptly. Their wings are pale and transparent, and on them grow roots. Their antenna also seems like a long tapping root.
Cave fairies are able to smell water and to feel vibrations and heat levels. Through lithothophy, they are able to produce oxygen, and they may also breath to produce ashgas. They frequently test the stones and metals present in rocks.
Mycelium Fairies are tall in shape, as their antenna is very fused with their head. The antenna is shaped like a mushroom and actually has scarce sensorial abilities, only being able to reliably smell. Their way of measuring the ecosystem is through their 6 legs, which can connect to mycelium and exchange nutrients and information. This is also their method of feeding.
Mycelium Fairies lack wings entirely. They are well able to climb walls, however.
Volcanoes are not frequented by many lifeforms, but these are still moderated by a clan of fairies. Their heads and legs appear like recently solidified basalt, while their wings and antennae are covered in a highly efficient fuel that may burn for a whole day. As such, they are often on fire. They sustain themselves through thermosynthesis.
Volcano Fairies are able to sense temperature keenly, and are also extremely sensible to vibrations, being able to predict eruptions and earthquakes. They also live deep in magma chambers underground.
Abyss Fairies are very dark, covered in almost black scales. Their legs are long and very flexible, much like tentacles, while their wings are essentially fins. Their antenna resembles a thin charniomorph, and the end can also light up.
Their antenna, besides being used to communicate in silence or to herd aquatic creatures, can sense odours, electricity and heat levels in the water. Their ways of self-nourishment is through thermosynthesis near volcanic vents or through photosynthesis. For the later, they need to travel to the surface, but they do this anyways as to bring oxygen and nutrients to the abyss.
Awaken Reef Fairies would be the most conspicuous of them if it wasn't for their ecosystems' natural vibrancy. Their legs are like short tentacles while their wings bear flamboyant one-of-a-kind patterns of mottled colors. Their 2 antennae seem like algae. Dreamy ones are pale and have horn-shaped, however.
Their antennae can feel all major aspects of water quality, like acidity, temperature and nutrient rates.
Open Sea Fairies are silvery and shiny as to blend in with the water. Their wings and legs bear rays and membranes, acting as 8 translucid fins. Its antenna is also rather fin or sail-like. Much like the other aquatic fairies, these can sense acidity, temperature, etc.
River Fairies have earthy and colours and small moss-like growths on their heads. They lack wings, but their legs are elongated and end in waterproof pads which allow them to glide over the surfaces of rivers. Their antenna is shaped like a reed and can feel odours, temperature, current intensity and acidity.
Mountain Fairies have a conical body formed by well fused head and antenna. They are rocky, and indeed eat stone as sustenance, as lithotrophes. Their legs are stout and relatively wide, enabling them to carry their bulk. Their wings are green to beige or white and can be compressed into the body as to assist on camouflage. Otherwise, they photosynthesize and help them soar through the peaks.
These fairies are able to feel temperature and air quality with their antennae. By tasting the rocks they feed on, they not only are able to better blend in with their surroundings, but also test soil nutrients. They can also feel minute vibrations and predict earthquakes. Their larvae are often conspicuous with their white skin.
The more machinal creations of the Artisans are also moderated by fairies, although these never needed to camouflage from wild beasts. Their skin is black and salty, while their feet end wings are brassen. The wings are decorated with a gear-like ornament and are threefold and membranous. Unlike all other fairy clans, those in this one have a single glowing eye.
Their antenna of a Machine Fairy is a usually brass cone with a lead core that can detect radiation, heat and electricity. A few "alpha fairies", however, have smooth chalk antennae that can be used to write.
They used to fix, clean and administrate the machines. They are able to shed the salt in their skin and bind it to the metal of their bits to form copper salts, which are disinfectants. They are part of the reason many of the ancient machines of the Artisans still work, although it must be said most machine fairies have abandoned their original duty.
Fairies are all female and parthenogenic. They lay discrete eggs within their communities. Larvae develop gradually over the course of some 5 years until somatic maturity. They finish neural development at the age of 20, however. Until that point, they are usually taught culture by their community.
Fairy communities can vary widely in terms of architecture. More traditional fairies live in burrows, trees or other available, natural dens. More progressive ones may build rather conspicuous yet small cities.
They can expect to live some 150 years, and they technically never stop growing, although this process slows geometrically after they fifth year of age. Those in most clans never surpass the head diameter of 10 centimetres.