World: Midgard
Diet: None
Height: Varies
Lifespan: Less than a month
Habitat: Anywhere
Activity Cycle: Do not Sleep
Blood magic has many uses, with the most complex being the sculpting of entirely new life. Making a functioning, living being is a difficult task that most commonly requires the addition of many other forms of magic and multiple experts working together. Homunculi are the exception, as the very simplest of artificial creatures that can function in combat. The sewers of Leontide and Harthell hide many pathetic slimes forced into being by practicing biomancers, but on the battlefields, the homunculus is the mark of the most rudementary practitioner of the flesh-shaping arts.
So simple are they that two cultures have convergently come across the process of creating these creatures independently, each making their own take upon them. Both are shaped from the remnants of dead bodies, whether human or animal, and each form a lowly but important role in the militaries of their empires.
Leontide:
The donestre have an ancient history of biomancy, thanks largely to the viruna people and their advances in medicine. Due to a conservative, careful culture, new artificial creatures are rare, but proven products like the homunculi are still readily created. Their construction is based on an outdated theory of health, no longer used except in the production of Homunculi. While ineffectual on their own, they provide numbers and support for the elite Headhunter Knights.
Yellow Bile, Black Bile, Blood, Phlegm.
Yellow Bile (Choleros)- Choleros are short-lived even for homunculi, burning with a fever that causes them to spontaneously combust within a week. Aggressive and frenzied, they thankfully don’t mind immolating as long as they take something else down with them. With their ability to glide on their extended ribs, they are sometimes catapulted into besieged cities to ignite structures within.
Black Bile (Melancolos)- Longer-lived than most other homunculi, a melancolos can live up to 3 months, due to greater durability and rarely if ever moving. With sludgy flesh embedded with nodules of bone and sucker on their base, melancolos are used as attachable armor for larger animals or structures who simply need a bit of extra durability in a pinch. They spend the majority of their time deep asleep and rarely move under their own power.
Blood (Sanguos)- As the most personable of the Leontide homunculi, sanguos are the most likely to work as a team, whether with more of their own kind or warriors. With cartilaginous skeletons and tubular limbs, sanguos can stretch and bend to squeeze through tight gaps, or entangle foes for stronger allies to finish off. Excitable and curious, they often end up in places they aren’t supposed to be, and often form strange little tribes with their own bizarre, rapidly-changing customs.
Phlegm (Phlegmos)- Cold and unemotional, phelgmos are willing to stay in one spot for as long as it takes to spring an ambush. Made mostly of slime, they must be kept in damp areas. Like all homunculi, they are best used as support. They can spray a stream of sticky mucus that pins down and immobilizes enemies, but lack any true form of attack, necessitating another to take advantage of the temporary weakness.
Harthell:
Harthell’s theories of biomancy developed entirely separately from Leontide’s, and the first type of homunculus discovered was the sanguos. Instead of discovering the others, research was put into diversifying the base creature, ending up with an entirely different set of possible morphs. Each is based on a mysterious property of the blood, so an individual will only produce one type of homunculi.
A- By far the most common type of homunculus, both because they are the most common type of blood and because one body can make as many as 5 individuals, all about a foot tall. These rubbery, egg-shaped creatures have stubby, clumsy hands that can’t hold tools and aren’t intelligent enough to use them anyway, but swarms cooperate to carry objects, working as assistants for menial tasks. They have a natural tendency to want to help their creators, and their attempts are considered humorous by some and irritating by others.
B- Usually born in pairs, type B homunculi are disposable ambushers and assassins. They are incredibly simple creatures, essentially taut bags of acid with strong legs for leaping. With their low profiles, they hide in tall grass, on shelves, behind boxes, anywhere they can lurk unnoticed. When approached, they leap out and pop, splashing their acidic innards onto the unfortunate target. They are independent and indiscriminate, usually attacking a random rabbit or bird. Whether they are spiteful or just can’t tell the difference between valuable targets and random animals is unknown.
O- Rarer than A or B, only one type O can be made from an elf-sized body. They are incapable of moving on their own, with their entire torso encased in a leathery carapace and a single leg growing from their head that can only keep them standing. Lacking any real physical abilities, their real purpose is acting as a psychic node coordinating type As. With their help, the incompetent hordes can display a surprising amount of coordination and creativity. Type Os constantly hum strange tunes, and any type A under their influence will hum along.
AB- By far the rarest and most mysterious of Harthell’s homunculus types, ABs are rarely seen on the battlefield, finding more work as research assistants due to their greater intellect and a secret trick that allows their experience to last despite their short lifespans. ABs are created with a mastery of blue magic, allowing them to copy their minds into others of their kinds (or even into their masters, according to disturbing rumors). While they only live two months at maximum, many ABs have collective decades of experience and truly alien mindsets. It has been claimed that these abilities were derived from the despised wormbloods of the deep, but the notes of the Professor of Creation who invented them have long been lost.
