Name: Far Aways/Levifin
World: Black
Material: Flesh
Thought Type: Untethered
Species Type: Marine Reptile
Habitat: East and West Oceans

The Oceans are some of the most mysterious places on the planet. The West Ocean is so vast that no attempts at terraforming were made even in the Times of Myth, and modern attempts by the Ocean Maker clans to expand the Green Ocean have proven ineffective. Whilst many human voyages across the smaller East Ocean have occurred, the lack of Green Life makes restocking food and water on such voyages impossible, and the West Ocean remains uncrossed.  

The oceans are also inaccessible to Drids, as their host-trees cannot tolerate being submerged in salt water. Still, many Forests do grow near the East Ocean, and Drid-style Rainforests have been found on the Far Continent, although no known Drids have been found. The challenging geography of the West Coast of Continent Prime however makes the West Ocean as unfathomable to Dridkind as it does to Humankind. Even the Ai-ey Towers of Knowledge, who claim to have eyes in the sky, cannot piece through the depths of this ocean.

This lack of knowledge makes all Black World ocean creatures – especially those of the West Ocean – mysterious and hard to study. Reliable information on even the existence on most reported ocean creatures is hard to come by, and there will be few entries on even creatures confirmed to exist in this book. There is however one Black World Ocean creature whose existence is undeniable, and whose behaviour is observable. It is known as the levifin to Humankind, and the far away to Dridkind.

Levifins are theorized to be the largest creatures amongst both worlds. Levifin skulls are as long as an adult Human, and it is claimed that a telepathy tendril owned by the leader of the Keepers of the Empty Forest is said to stretch between her garden to her mate on the other side of the hill that separates them¹. They are fat creatures with long necks, decent-sized tails, six paddle-finned legs and a single horn that ends in long, flexible telepathy tendrils with bioluminescent bulbs at the end. They cannot leave the ocean without dying, but they are reptiles rather than fish, and most come to the surface for air.

It is thought that levifins are extremely intelligent, as they often torment Ocean Makers and try to sabotage Green Ocean expansion. The females and young travel in groups, whilst the males tend to swim the oceans alone, only meeting up with the female pods at certain times in the migration path, thought to be timed so the females will hit swarms of their prey around the time they give birth.

They tend to travel in a circle around Prime Continent, going North along the West Ocean for half the year, and travelling South along the East Ocean for the next season, proving the claims by the Towers of Knowledge that Prime Continent and Far Continent are not directly connected in the Unknowable North. Drid naturalists report that levifins use their telepathy to communicate over long distances between pods, and that their thoughts sometimes go astray and get picked up by Drids near the coast. Such thoughts are describes as being similar to dreams², all of swimming, diving, playing and hunting from a levifin perspective.

As any naturalist will know, our planet goes through great changes during the Season of Darkness³, especially in the oceans. During this time millions of creatures from the depths rise to the surface, in such number that levifins and other migratory sea creatures abandon their traditional routes and instead roam the oceans in a free-for-all feeding frenzy. During this time, it is common for levifin pods to be scattered on either side of Prime Continent, and according to reports from Drids, their thoughts can travel even this great distance. Even Drids as far inland as the Stalax River have been reported to have experienced what they call ‘thoughts of the far away’ during this season.

This is about all the confirmed knowledge we have about levifins currently, though there are plenty of unbelievable tales from Dridkind and the Ocean Makers about encounters with these creatures. We can only hope some change to the planet’s terraforming or new technological innovation will provide better opportunities to study them. Until then, levifin remains are amongst the most valuable and highly sought items amongst both Human and Drid naturalists and collectors.         

¹ No data on the size of the hill has been provided.

² Note that Drids do not sleep in the same way as Humans, causing the author of this text to consider any description of phenomena by a Drid being ‘dream-like’ as suspect.

³ Given that this book is being written at the mid-point between Seasons of Darkness and it is unlikely that any from this current generation shall see one, I have been encouraged to describe the event. However, I refuse to waste words describing the most dramatic and well-known natural event on the planet.