NationStates Jolt Archive

Rhunfolk- Draco Sapiens- Rhunfolk are large, stocky, humanoid reptilians. Unlike normal reptiles, they are warm blooded. Rhunholm society is divided into a semi-flexible caste system. Advancement in castes is determined by both the birth status, and the relative size of the Rhun (Rhuns continue to grow throughout their life, and the size of the young is dependent on the size of the parent. Members of the ruling and priest castes have been observed to reach up to 10 meters in height.). If a Rhun survives long enough to reach at least 2.5 meters in size, it is allowed to join the Warrior caste. Life expectancy decreases drasticly if a Rhun joins the Warriors, as they live a life of constant training, drilling, and "mock" battles with live ammunition.

The Rhun are avid technophiles, often preferring to replace almost their entire body with cybernetic replacements and enhancements. Due to the ever-growing nature of the Rhunfolk, these implants are carefully nurtured by specialized nanites to ensure that the Rhun does not outgrow his implants.

Rhunfolk also exhibit a unique low-level psychic ability, being powerful, but limited, telepaths, and what the Otagian military has dubbed "twists." This telepathic ability manifests itself as a sort of hivemind, with each Rhun being able to be in constant communication with any other Rhun in the known universe. Their ability as twists seems to be more limited. Though they are obviously skilled in their manipulation of magnetic forces, they seem to only be able to affect changes in objects they are in physical contact with. This unique ability is believed responsible for their technophilia, and the fact that most of their technology has no visible user interface. These powers, like most other facets of Rhun physiology, increase in potency with age.

Their unique government reflects their telepathic ability, as the Arbiter, the oldest known Rhun and head of their government, is effectivley an avatar of the gestalt consciousness of the entire Rhun Empire, and as such rules with a benevolent, yet iron clad fist.

Rhunfolk are universally carnivorous, preferring uncooked, warm meat. While they are perfectly capable of eating sythesized or domesticated animal meat, they prefer the taste of sentient flesh, especially humans and elves. Larder slaves are a pivotal element of Rhunate culture, with the number of slaves maintained reflecting upon the owner's social status. While slave populations are generally quite stable due to breeding programs, Rhunfolk prefer "free range" meat, and often go to great lengths to obtain it, including raids on neutral worlds.

Prince Heinrich

Heinrich was selected for the Warrior caste at a remarkably young age, and rose through the ranks at an almost unheard of speed. He tested incredibly highly for both telepathic and telekinetic (type N) potential, and showed remarkable aptitude in the entire range of training sims. Having tested so well, he was gifted with the patronage of the Chaos Lord Arioch, one of the most powerful demons of the Chaos pantheon. His latest command was the ARS Excruciator, a Glaive Cruiser. While on a routine mission to inspect an Otagian quarantine at ORS-1421, he came into contact with an aggressive xeno lifeform, now classified as Wamphyri. Though he destroyed the Wamphyri, he was left mortally wounded, and was extracted to his ship in orbit. He was not seen again in Rhun space for four years. When he returned, he was in possession of the experimental Tiamat-class power armor (see project GoS). He proceded to carve a swath of destruction through Rhun space, and out into neutral territories. Heinrich was recently captured by a team of bounty hunters and mercenaries, including Inquisitor Ezekial of Chronosia and Jason Marlin, and is en route to be delivered to the Arbiter of Ald Rhun.

It is believed that Heinrich contracted an alien parasite from the Wamphyri that he destroyed, which has severley altered his system. He has not only grown to the height of 5.4 meters (normal rhuns are 3.2 meters tall on average in the Warrior caste), but as also gained a large degree of metamorphic control over his body. He is capable of reshaping his flesh to an alarming degree, even being able to mimic a humanoid form for short periods of time (he finds the severe compression uncomfortable). The most alarming change the xenomorph has wrought however, is the marked increase in Heinrich's psionic capabilities. All Rhuns possess telepathy and telekenisis to a small degree, but Heinrich's abilities have been magnified exponentially. Formerly only able to communicate with his own species, and 'kine objects no larger than subatomic particles, he has now shown the ability to read the surface thoughts of others, and shows significant telekinetic control over his environment.


Project: God's Own Suit
Tiamat is the pinnacle of modern powered armor evolution. Featuring the latest advances in power systems, miniaturization, armor systems, and weaponry, Tiamat has been designed to be the ultimate killing machine. Along with her sister suits Kaltarak and Marduk, Tiamat is designed to be impervious to most planetary-based weaponry.

Class: Planetary Domination Battle Armor

Model: PDB-150

Designation: TIAMAT

Height: Variable, due to smart metals used in construction. Ranges from 2.5 m to 10 m without loss of structural integrity.

Mass: 150,000 kg

Armor Composition: 2 mm memory plastic seal, 3mm ruthenium alloy plating, 8 mm singularity forged steel, 3mm smart fabric coushioning. Cortosis treatment, nanite sheath.

Shielding Capabilities: CF Accumulator shields, Otagian mirror shields, plasma sheath, inertial barriers, Rhunate singularity shields, PSY shields

Sensory Capabilites: Touch, scent, taste neurolinked to surface of armor, allowing full sensory capabilities. Full-Spectrum, Warp, Gravitic, STC, PSY, and Ultrasonic vision modes built into armor. The entire skin of the suit acts as a optical sensor. Also included are flash, tactile, audio, scent and taste compensators. RADAR and other modules optional.

Armaments: Plasma sheat w/precision directional pulse controls, micro-singularity generator (AKA "Popper"), wrist mounted retractable power blades, retractable joint power blades, micro-missile launchers, assorted hand-held heavy weapons...

Integral Systems: PSY enhancement module, gravitic positioning system, full com-tac system, full comm suite, full gravitics suite (prevents suit from falling to core of planet due to density, and allows "flight" capabilities at theoretically infinite speeds (limited by maximum acceleration endurable to pilot)

Power source: one Zero Point Energy module

Tiamat was last seen in the possession of Prince Heinrich, but was not found upon his person when he was captured. Current whereabouts of this potent artifact are unknown.

Tiamat's sister suits are in the hands of Otagia (Marduk) and Arizona Nova (Kaltarak).

Technology of the Empire
Ald Rhun generally eschews the classical "high tech" weapons of lasers, plasma, etc; instead focusing on rail gun technology, and a subsect of gravitics: singularity manipulation. Combined, these seperate technologies make Rhunate vessels a force to be reckoned with.

Controlled singularities are used both as one method of shielding (absorbing material projectiles, and helping avoid beam and energy weapons by means of gravitic pull), a weapon system (compressing sections of an enemies hull into a point, and then releasing the singularity, causing a massive explosing; and to make Ald Rhun's signature armor and armament material: singularity forged steel, or SFS.

SFS is created by feeding garbage into an artificial singularity, compressing huge amounts of mass to a miniscule volume. While not quite as strong as neutronium, it has the benefit of still maintaining a solid forum, allowing it to be used as traditional armor, and also in projectiles. Due to it's lowly method of construction, it is also relativley cheap. Also due to the construction method, Ald Rhun maintains one of the largest waste management industries in the sector.

Rhunate railguns often fire massive slugs of SFS, capable of penetrating the thickest hulls. They can also be adapted to fire SFS shells with a core of suspended antimatter, throwing off ultra-dense shrapnel on impact; Sai class teleportation boarding pods for ship to ship combat and landing; and pure antimatter blasts.

The preferred method of shielding on Rhunate ships is the Rhunate Accumulator Shield. Initially pure black when activated, as the shield absorbs energy, it moves through the spectrum of color. When the shield reaches white, it collapses, realeasing the stored energy as massive amounts of gamma radiation both inward and outwards. Recent upgrades allow the shield to expand as it takes on energy, allowing the stored energy to dissapate more efficiently, lowering mortality rates on blowback. However these shields are less efficient in some circumstances, as the increased surface area means that when the shield is engulfed by an energy source (such as being inside a star), energy absorbed increases slowly, but exponentially. These shields absorb all incoming energy, including sunlight and RADAR, effectivley stealthing the craft against many means of detection. However, this also means that these shields can only be sustained for a limited time (although it is still a long time under non-combat situations, specifically several months, less if stationed inside a sun), and that Ansible communications and sensors are the only way to communicate through the shield.

Factions of the Empire

The Empire of Ald Rhun does not occupy worlds like lesser xeno nations, instead travelling the vast gulfs between the stars in their great Tradeships. These vessels are unimaginably vast, varying in size between that of a small moon, and that of a small planet. These vessels slowly move across the universe, and across the so-called empires of lesser nations, harvesting stock for their larders as they go.

The Arbiter and Ald Rhun Proper

The realm of the Arbiter is ruled with an iron fist from the Throneship Rhunholm. The Arbiter opposes any forces that may bring change to his demense. He seeks to preserve the status quo, continuing the piratical dominance of the Rhun empire. In doing thus, he opposes the Blood Lord Heinrich, and the demense he has carved out for himself.

High Lord Heinrich and the Council of Princes

The self-styled Blood Lord Heinrich has carved an empire of his own from the stagnant hulk of the Empire. Having attacked an infected several isolated Tradeworlds with his contagion, he has brought their assorted Lords under his heel as his new Council of Princes. These Blood Princes exert total authority over their Tradeworlds, transformed from their previously hellish state into a nighmare out of the most twisted dreams of the Lords of Chaos by the Wamphyrii parasites.

Following Arioch, First of the Lords of Chaos, these rebels seek to bring more power to themselves at any cost. They will betray anyone, sacrifice anything, destroy anything they hold dear, obliterate worlds, even sacrifice their eternal soul to accumulate power approaching that of their High Lord, Heinrich the Scourge, so that they may usurp his power for their own.

The Council ruthlessly raids worlds, abandoning the Rhun doctrines of Decimation and instead wiping the surfaces of planets clean to provide fuel for their spawning pits. These worlds that are destroyed are the lucky ones. Planets where the Fleet of Worlds, as Heinrich's armada of Tradeships has come to be called, merely stop to sate their endless hunger suffer a far worse fate. Heinrich and his brethren particularly prize the warriors of a planet for their spawning pits, and will target military and police installations first, leaving the planet defenseless for the scourge to come. As the Rhuns leave the planet, the corpses of any victims left on the planet will rise again, reanimated by the parasite transmitted by the bite of their slayers. Fueled with an unholy hunger for blood, and increased strength, vigor, and mutability of the flesh, these lesser "vampires" swiftly become the new dominant life form on the planet, and will seek to spread their "gift" across the stars.

Heinrich, however, has only one goal. To return to the throne which was denied him, and take it for himself by the only means possible. Invading Rhunholm. Slaying the Arbiter. And taking his title for himself.



OOC: This is related to my upcoming (technically already over chronologically. Yay fluid time) civil war. Will be working on it more, and doing the RP proper, as soon as I get more free time.