Duren

Duren are humans reworked into superhumans with the forgotten science and arcana of the pre-Unmaking world. Made in a desperate and hasty attempt to create supersoldiers to defeat the encroaching threat of the machines, the Duren stumbled into the world from their abandoned birthing labs and forged their own place in it through determination and optimism.

They are unsure of the details of their making, but the stories they tell talk of an attempt by the ancient scientists and mystics to take men and reforge them into something greater. Most Duren look like their human ancestors, but are a good deal taller and bulkier, usually growing between seven or eight feet tall, with broad, barrel chests and powerful, bulky midriffs; those whose ancestors underwent more extreme modification look significantly more alien. Their skin, hair and eye colourations are as varied as those of Atrius’ humans. Thanks to their cold home, many favour growing their hair and facial hair long, and take immense pride in carefully grooming and scenting it.

The genetic rituals undertaken to create the duren may have made them strong, but they were slapdash attempts. As a result, while the duren are immensely physically powerful and incredibly survivable, many are born with disabilities; deafness and blindness in infants are common, while others have deformed limbs or mental difficulties. Even those born without an overt disability will rarely live beyond fifty, as their organs begin to fail and cancers encroach.

This has forced Duren society to adapt to accommodate their many disabled members. Common accommodations include indented navigation posts for blind members of their homes, quiet retreats for those who suffer mental difficulties and rails and ramps to assist those with mobility issues. Duren priests and healers are expected to learn the skills needed to assist all members of their community and take pride in being adaptable when it comes to helping as many of their people as possible.

Duren are painfully aware of how short their lives are. Instead of fearing death, they accept their own mortality and work to live fulfilling lives that are worth remembering. Many of them develop a fatalistic sense of humour, and most will attempt to succeed in at least one worthy deed before they die, whether that is creating something beautiful or useful, winning a great battle, uncovering valuable knowledge or something else entirely. While the Duren originated in the north, from labs at the mountain they now call Sacred Heart, they have ranged all across Atrius.

Though Duren are human-descended, and look similar to humans, some have an ancestry related to more specialised types of supersoldier. The warhead duren are the most common of the duren people, so named for their thick skulls and recessed ears that protect them from explosions and impact trauma. Pachydermic duren were made as the next generation of duren soldiers, protected by bony growths over their thick and resilient skin. Coldblood duren were once engineered for recon in extreme environments, with a fatty layer of outer skin, transparent ocular membranes to protect them from snowblindness and a slow metabolism to let them range out for extended periods of time. The most radically altered duren are the undertow duren, humans spliced with shark DNA. Their gills let them live underwater, and they pack a fearsome bite.