Lashunta

Idealized by many other humanoid races and gifted with innate psychic abilities, lashuntas are at once consummate scholars and enlightened warriors, naturally divided into two specialized subraces with different abilities and societal roles.

Lashuntas are a race of humanoids native to the planet Castrovel in the Pact Worlds system. They are psychics with a unique self-determined pair of subraces, and are a prominent race in the Pact Worlds government.

Appearance

Castrovel is a world with many predators, and all lashunta evolved to adapt at puberty to one of two paths in order to help their race survive.

There are two subraces of lashuntas: the lithe, clever damaya and gregarious, muscular korasha. Damaya are taller than the stockier korasha. All lashuntas share some common traits, however, including two forehead antennae that serve as telepathic foci, colorful pigmentation patterns and raised facial markings, and nearly perfect physical symmetry.

Between their pleasingly ordered forms and natural pheromones, many other humanoid races find lashunta at least subconsciously attractive.

Both clades of species bear the same genetics, allowing them to intermarry and have children. While all lashunta children inherit complexions and certain distinguishing features from their parents, their subspecies is not one of them. Through psychic ritual and force of will techniques applied at puberty, modern lashuntas have mastered the ability to determine what subspecies a child will grow into, activating certain epigenetics and shutting down others. While some lashunta city-states attempt to steer children in particular directions, such a s via government-run aptitude tests, most lashuntas believe passionately in a child's right to choose. In ancient lashunta history, their starkly divided gender roles led to subspecies almost universally correlated with gender, but as lashunta culture has frown more egalitarian, gender balance between the two subspecies has become roughly equal.

Abilities

All lashuntas have natural psychic abilities, starting with natural telepathy and mental powers that often resemble magical spells. They are also known to be voracious learners regardless of subrace, whether through academics or trained skills.

Damaya lashuntas have an innate intellectual advantage and calmer demeanor, while korasha lashuntas have stronger and hardier bodies on average at the cost of being more boisterous and less observant.