Species X-10198.rk

[Dulce Donten]

Do not fear, biped. We Stryxis are no threat to you, just poor scavengers and merchants, not like yourself, biped -- with your ship and friends. They are good friends, yes? Good friends, strong and pretty. Are they for sale? We Stryxis have pretties too: deadly weapons, secrets, lies, hatreds, and joys. All of these can be yours, biped. Tell us, what is your pleasure?"

The Stryxis are a sparse, nomadic xenos species with a reputation as untrustworthy traders, wanderers, and sometimes slavers and pirates. Encountered infrequently in the Koronus Expanse on the border of the Calixis Sector in the Segmentum Obscurus, their reputation is a dark one.

The Stryxis are a truly hideous xenoform to look upon beneath swathes of ragged, bone-coloured cloth and trinkets, described variously by Human onlookers as a gangling and multi-eyed creature that resembles a Human-sized, skinned, dog embryo. Yet they communicate easily with willing Humans through a common language of greed, curiosity, and self-interest.

Scavengers and obsessive hoarders, they possess a wealth of technology stolen and bartered from countless intelligent races. They delight in trade, attaching worth only by perceived value and rarity of things they can grasp in their bony talons. They seem to care nothing for conquest or territory, abstract wealth, nor even their own species, but are driven instead by individual avarice and viperous petty intrigues.

The Stryxis are a xenos race of wanderers, traders, merchants, and keepers of secrets. Scattered throughout the region of the Koronus Expanse in bands of nomadic tribes, the Stryxis make their way across the stars trading with those they encounter. They have a reputation for being untrustworthy scoundrels, yet there are many who would deal with them, if they could only stand their hideous appearance.

The Stryxis are a truly bizarre race of xenos. No one knows where they originated, and the only home they seem to have are caravans of ramshackle and barely-operational voidships. In fact, the Stryxis are widely known for taking anything that even remotely appears to be space-worthy and converting it into a viable vessel.

They are a hierarchical species, and their government and system of laws, if they have such a social organisation, is either so complex as to be incomprehensible to Humanity, or is simply completely nonexistent.

In either case, they are a starfaring species for whom betrayal and double-dealing is the norm, especially amongst their own kind. Aside from buying and selling whatever strikes their fancy across the Koronus Expanse, the Stryxis also deal in slaves, soldiers, and vat-grown clone labour -- which they simply refer to as "meat."

One of the oddest facets of Stryxis culture is their nearly irrational hatred for the Aeldari. Stryxis will often go far out of their way to attack the aloof humanoid xenos. Failing that, they will simply avoid them at all costs.

Humanity has learned very little concerning the ways of the xenos now known to the Imperium as the Stryxis. The infrequency of encounters with these enigmatic voidfarers has lent them a nearly mythical reputation. Many believe that they are native to the Koronus Expanse, and more than one Inquisitor of the Ordo Xenos has made it their mission to discover the location of a Stryxis homeworld.

These endeavours have thus far proven fruitless. The Stryxis have baffled Mankind for Terran centuries; their odd sense of value -- and even more peculiar anatomy -- make them one of the strangest xenos known to the Imperium. Members of this inscrutable race have almost always been encountered living in fleets of oddly-constructed caravan voidships known as Xebecs, and are almost always interested in trading with those whose paths they cross.

Their mercantile ways have given them access to uncountable goods and relics. Their extensive travels have provided them with unfathomable amounts of priceless information; information that they shroud in secrecy, and do their best to protect.

These crafty, somewhat aloof creatures are experts at bartering and gathering information. They hold knowledge in high regard and are very careful about divulging anything in too much detail. Their secretive ways have led many to question if the information that they possess holds any truth, or if it is all merely fanciful tales told by unscrupulous merchants for a better return on their goods.

The Stryxis only part with information that pertains to other species or areas of the Koronus Expanse that they have little personal interest in. They are notorious for being protective of their origins and secrets; many an Imperial explorer or trader who has strayed too close to these secrets has disappeared, or been found dead. The Stryxis appear supremely self-serving and notoriously do anything in their power to preserve their own lives.

The Stryxis can be encountered anywhere within the Koronus Expanse; although they are most frequently spotted in the vicinity of The God-Emperor's Scourge or around the vast Warp anomaly known as the Cinerus Maleficum.

This has led to the genesis of many myths pertaining to the origins of the Stryxis. Some even speculate that their homeworld was on the coreward edge of the spectacular Warp anomaly known as The Cauldron, and that the planet was swallowed by that Warp Storm many millennia ago. Others believe that it was possibly destroyed by the Aeldari, a xenos species that the Stryxis are known to violently avoid dealing with. Most Imperial researchers surmise that these two xenos species share a hatred for one another, but none truly understand this perceived enmity.

Others postulate that the strange creatures are but an advanced scouting or surveying wave of Stryxis and that their origins lie beyond the Rifts of Hecaton out on the farthest rim of the galaxy. Whatever the truths behind these stories, the only clear things about the Stryxis are that they remain completely inscrutable, completely untrustworthy, and yet, despite all of this, they often prove extremely profitable as trading partners.

To Humanity, the Stryxis appear truly hideous. They are often described as gangling, multi-eyed creatures that resemble a Human-sized, skinned dog embryo -- an evocative, if somewhat inaccurate, portrayal. All Stryxis encountered seem to have the same general appearance.

One of the oddities of the race is that there appears to be no gender variations and no young have been encountered by outsiders. No one outside the race itself knows how they continue to breed, and the Stryxis avoid discussing the topic.

The Imperium has never had reason to believe that the Stryxis possess gender traits. They do not exhibit any clearly definable gender specifying features and there is no recorded evidence pertaining to their mode of reproduction. Such physiological hypotheses are nearly impossible to prove, however, due to the shortage of Imperial autopsies of viable Stryxis corpses.

Stryxis have a pugnacious face, with an upturned nose faintly reminiscent of a Terran bulldog and four small, beady eyes. Many believe these to be their most defining feature. The Stryxis' eyes scan and blink individually which gives them an even greater alien appearance. It is thought by many that their understanding of light and even their knowledge of Warp travel is a result of their extremely unusual ocular capabilities.

Imperial xenobiologists theorise the Stryxis have a terrible sense of smell, but make up for this with greater visual and spatial acuity. The Stryxis have two arms ending in three-clawed grasping appendages, and two canine-like feet.

They have a stooped posture and a bobbing gait when they walk, meaning they often seem shorter than their 1.8 metres. Although the Stryxis seem to weigh very little, it is unlikely that one weighs less than 90 kilograms.

A Stryxis is able to fully rotate its hands and arms, swivelling its joints within their sockets. However, their physical anatomy is not readily apparent, as the aliens almost always swathe themselves in stinking, ragged clothes and voluminous robes.

The Stryxis are wanderers and nomads who skirt across the Koronus Expanse in rickety fleets of starships. Their dark reputation as double-dealing backstabbers, shiftless grifters, pirates, and slavers mean many avoid them. Yet there are Rogue Traders who deal with these bizarre xenos, as they possess a wealth of hoarded technology and information about many of the goings-on within the Expanse. While they care little for conquest and territory, or petty wealth, they have a unique understanding of concepts such as avarice and treachery.

It is considered a point of pride within Stryxis culture to be able to wrap subtle lies within the truth. Those who are lauded as masters of this technique are able to spin webs of falsehood and deception within a foundation of truth to the point that the two are inseparable. The Stryxis hold no loyalty for those they deal with, and the aliens will not hesitate to betray an erstwhile "partner" in search of a greater gain.

As many have noted, the Stryxis have very little concept of value as it pertains to items of worth, and will as gladly buy worthless baubles as they would platinum ingots, and oftentimes for amounts that have little to do with the item's actual worth in the eyes of other legitimate traders.

Ancient Thulean records are said to contain many possible interpretations of Stryxis culture. These records state that the groups of Stryxis who nomadically wander the void are known as "Pacts"; and that these Pacts are led by what are referred to as "Masters." These sparse records hint that the most revered and powerful of the Stryxis are known as "Slave Masters" -- though many believe this to be a misnomer.

Whatever the case may be, these shrouded leaders have vast convoys of spacefaring craft, asteroid hives, and armies of slaves and genetically-crafted labourers at their disposal. However, no Imperial researchers claim a definite comprehension of the minute complexities of Stryxis society.

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