Lorath Physiology

The lorath are a humanoid monotreme species notable for their white hair, grey skin, black feathered wings on their back, and golden eyes.

This page serves as a compendium of physiological traits which are universal for the lorath species. For information pertaining to the specific castes will be present in the caste pages:

• fyunen
• lmnl
• occh

• Impregnation leads to the formation of one or more egg which is laid by the female and incubated until the child hatches.
• Lorath develop quickly (iirc the turlista twins could speak fluently within a year of hatching).
• Lorath live to approx 250¹⁾.

All lorath have a humanoid body type with a general vertical symmetry. Their body is designed to stand with an upright posture their head sitting upon a neck connected to their wide-hipped torso which is flanked by two arms transitions into a pair of muscular legs. A secondary pair of limbs is anchored to their upper back hinting at their avian evolutionary heritage taking the form of, typically small, wings.

Naturally every lorath possesses two arms, each one starting at a shoulder connected to the torso, a single elbow and wrist connecting to a hand which features four fingers and a thumb.

The two legs of the lorath body start at the pelvis and travel down to a forward facing knee forming the thigh. Past this point the lower leg connects to an ankle attached to a plantigrade foot with five toes of descending size from the inner most to outermost. The leg muscles of a lorath are notably well developed and are almost universally quite large compared to the arms.

The final set of limbs consists of a pair of black feathered wings which are anchored to a ball and socket joint present in the back of the lorath's rib cage near the smaller shoulder blade structures which attach to the arms. Each wing features a skeletal structure comparable to the arms with an 'elbow' and 'wrist' joint. Long fused 'fingers' form support for the wings. It is notable that in most lorath individuals the wings are much too small to provide flight, as well as the density of the bone material providing too much weight leading to the wings being safely be considered vestigial.

While the specific ranges of lorath height vary between the three castes the species is noted as having adults ranging between 4' and 9' on average giving the lorath species a large variety of physical form in height alone. The average weights of an individual range from 100lbs for the smallest adults to 800lbs for the largest with some variances for different dietary practices and varying levels of physical fitness.

It is notable that in the Lorath species the female is typically larger than the male both in height and muscle mass.

Lorath naturally have smooth nearly hairless pale grey skin. Due to their prolonged time spent beneath the surface of their planet all lorath are born with a sensitivity to sunlight which irritates their skin in direct contact, as well as leaving them prone to damage from UV radiation with extensive exposure.

Most lorath have hair which grows on in abundance on the the tops, sides, and back of a lorath's head, keeping off of their ears and the majority of their face save for their eyebrows and eyelashes. Male lorath like male humans are capable of growing full beards. As a result of five millennia spent underground the lorath species has lost natural pigment in their hair and as such all lorath have naturally white hair.

Lorath have two evenly spaced eyes on the front of their head flanking a bridge which leads down to their nose, a structure with two downward oriented nostrils. Beneath this is a single horizontally oriented mouth typically sealed by lips with a pink cast due to the thinner skin. The mouth proper contains a mirrored set of teeth on the top and bottom jaw surrounding a short prehensile tongue. On the left and right side of the head slightly below lorath eye level is an ear the exact shape of which is determined by the individual's caste.

Lorath have fairly good sight, with three color receptors and a separate set of cells for low light monochromatic vision. Their eyes have an iris which is most often golden in coloration restricts the light allowed to pass through the lens to be interpreted by the retina of the eye.

The dentition of the lorath is composed of sixteen molars, four canine, and eight incisors split between the upper and lower jaw evenly and cradled by gums. The interior of the mouth features a short prehensile tongue, salivary glands, and mucous membranes covering the interior surfaces of the lips, cheeks, and palate.

The lorath species is capable of a wide range of nuanced taste comparable to that of humans, however they are unable to detect capsaicin and it does not interact to any great effect with their physiology.

Vocalizations made by lorath are produced by running air past a structure designed to resonate at varying frequencies as dictated by muscular action, this sound is then modified by the position of the tongue, jaw, and lips to produce a wide range of sounds in a variety of registers.

As a whole Lorath sensory perception is comparable to that of humans, the primary difference being the Lorath's inability to taste capcaisin.

The Lorath skeleton is notable for its composition having formerly been a hollow light weight structure comparable to that of avian species, however over time the density and composition of their bones has changed making them incredibly durable relative to bones of a comparable weight. The most obvious deviations in the Lorath skeletal structure however are visible in their pelvis, and femoral bones which are larger than human counterparts, and the additional limb structures of their wings.

Anything of note here?

Lorath brains are located in their skulls. Notably Lorath learn incredibly quickly and remain mentally flexible throughout the course of their lifespan with an extremely small population of defects and illness as a result of the Lorath eugenics and medical programs. Lorath brains are better able to deal with psychoactive compounds than most species and can tolerate doses of many compounds which would be lethal for humans.

Lorath are omnivorous eating a wide variety of organic matter sourced from plants and animals as well as select mineral compounds²⁾. Metabolism is comparable to humans? Lorath due to the presence of high quantities of psychoactive compounds present in almost all flora and fauna on their planet have an impressive tolerance for such substances.

Resistance to viral, bacterial, parasitic, and foreign material exposure was emphasized in the Lorath breeding program making the Lorath hardy against both diseases native to Lor as well as those which are compatible with their biological chemistry that is encountered on foreign worlds.

Lorath are as a whole a relatively intelligent species with a cultural emphasis on understanding lending to millenia of schollarly development in conjunction with their species wide eugenics program which has cultivated the species to be capable of rapidly assimilating, understanding, and applying new knowledge. This is most apparent in the rapid technological advancement of the Lorath from an information age society to an interstellar superpower in only half a decade of their time.

As a whole Lorath have a community-centric outlook working toward the betterment of the Lorath people as a whole and taking pride in their work knowing that they build a better future not only for themselves but more importantly for the future generations to come. This leads to the Lorath being a very tight knit and self-inclusive species, seeing themselves as being part of a while rather than individuals.

Interactions with other sentient species in their history however has bred a distrust into the Lorath that causes them to display a cooly polite front toward other species.

Magic has been a large part of the Lorath's society since it's early conception, being viewed as one of the Goddess' gifts and carefully cultivated, studied, and maintained. As such magic is fairly prevalent in Lorath society and is experiencing a renaissance after a brief 'drought' in which the Lorath people were cut off from magic.

Due to the eugenics program of the Lorath ensuring physiological consistency, only the Occhestian caste are capable of naturally manifesting psionic abilities, however Lorath medical science is fully capable of enabling psionic capability in those not born to it.

Mutations in the Lorath population are extremely uncommon due to the species wide eugenics program, medical screening during gestation, and widely available gene therapy. In the unlikely even a mutation occurred and was identified the Lorath would most likely correct it with medical procedures and corrective gene therapy.