Inari

Introduction

Tricksters who stole Seeming from the Boggarts, Inari survive by eating the livers of other races. They a troubled people who rarely reveal themselves to outsiders, feared the world over yet present and undetected within every city on Antarok. You must expend a Minor Merit to play an Inari.

Fast Facts

• Population: 20,000+
• Lifespan: Indefinite
• Height: Between 3 ft and 5 ft.
• Weight: Between 40 lbs and 80 lbs.

Note: Inari must eat livers from the living races which contain Saol to survive. You must spend a Minor Merit to play as an Inari, and then another Minor Merit should you wish to Incite its Glamour.

Racial Abilities:

Seeming

Inari are born with the Glamour of Seeming which grows slowly until the Inari is ready to Incite it sometime between the age of thirteen and twenty. To Incite it, you must expend another Minor Merit.

Liver Predation

Inari can achieve another cast of up to Expert-tier Saol-powered Arcana when eating the liver of another living being with a soul. However, they will eventually wither away and die if they do not, and must eat a liver once every month to survive. The compulsion to eat a liver is magically profound, leading to salivation and hunger pangs when thinking about the act of predation.

Inari's Ball

Inari are born with a small, white, and bouncy ball in their mouths that feels rubbery, but glows like Alkahest. An Inari will always know roughly where to find this ball, but cannot bring themselves to directly harm any who hold on to it. Over time their emotions will begin to soften towards this individual, and they will not feel a compulsion to eat the liver of whomever holds it - they use this to their advantage if they worry they cannot control themselves. Often Inari will play with children and their own kin using these natural toys they are born with. They always keep this ball nearby, usually on their person, buried, or stashed in some bushes.

An Inari will pay to have someone killed if they do not give them back this ball, or ruin their life in other ways until they do.

Ten-Tail Ascendancy

Inari possess a remnant of Beast Magic within themselves that can now be thought of as closer to a variant of Seeming. When achieving expert or Ascending in a form of Personal Arcana, or else reaching 100 XP in a Minor Merited Wild Glamour, an Inari will grow an additional tail. Each tail provides further benefits.

• Two Tails: The two-tailed Inari can Syphon anyone they kiss or wrap in their tails.
• Three Tails: The tails of a three-tail become prehensile and as strong as a limb, capable of picking things up or performing acrobatic feats.
• Three Tails: The three-tail Inari may Apparate into Miasmata.
• Four Tails: A four-tail Inari can Incite the Beast Magic belonging to an animal or person they've eaten the liver of.
• Five Tails: The five-tail may thread Apparated Tendrils through their tails, which now have the same properties as their Tendril Frequency. They also gain the ability to retract and extend tails as if they were Tendrils, stretching them to a maximum length of their Tendrils. They pull Tendrils out of their tails, pushing them back into others to manipulate them should they have more tails than Tendrils.
• Six Tails: The Inari can attempt to Apparate into and Possess anyone they have their tail wrapped around.
• Seven Tails: With seven tails, an Inari can now speak their thoughts into the minds of others by locking eyes with them.
• Eight Tails: The eight-tail Inari may begin to learn Remnant.
• Nine Tails: The Inari may now wield Foxfire, creating orbs of light that instantly transfix and hypnotize the minds of those who stare directly at them - they will walk towards these orbs without realizing it, unless they possess Mastery in Meditation.
• Ten Tails: After mastering their ninth Personal Arcana, an Inari may spend a Major Merit to attain their tenth tail, wielding half again as much Miasmata as another.

Biology

Inari are small, bipedal semi-humanoid foxes standing on two legs. They are between three and five feet tall, rarely growing taller than this on their own. They have poseable thumbs on their paws, and their tails are laced with a subtle magic. How they appear varies, as every Inari possesses Seeming; most of them use it to look like the race they are talking to, and others prefer to frolic on all fours in the forest until they hunger again for mortal liver.

Aging & Reproduction

Inari are entirely immortal and youthful. By their eighteenth year, they appear as they will for the rest of their lives. However, they may appear as any age thanks to their Seeming.

Sex & Gender

Inari may be male, female or intersex. This is an equal distribution, meaning one third of Inari eventually become intersex in some way. This is due to being able to change their gender with Seeming, leading to dissonance with their own gender.

With few differences between the sexes, Inari tend to be rather androgynous. Males often have lilting, effeminate voices while females might have brux, growled tones - it all depends on the individual.

Inari go into estrus for a few weeks once each year in June or July. During this time, a female can reproduce with any other living race with a soul. The offspring will always be an Inari, even if the other parent is a Dryad or Gnoll. Similarly, male Inari will leave other races to bare Inari children; however, the child will resemble its mother until one day it suddenly shifts back into its true form sometime between the thirteenth and twentieth year of life. They will not be able to Incite their Seeming during this time, as the organ has not formed by this point.

Psychology

Dodecagonic Days

Like most Fae, the Inari are rarely in a rush to do anything at all, and when they sleep it can feel to mortals as if the they are sleeping for days at a time; the Inari by consequence see their mortal friends taking little naps throughout the day. This warped sense of time means that they tend to get stuck on a subject for far longer than a mortal might - even the most shy of Fae have a habit of droning on about inconsequential things without end, as this is a normal aspect of their society.

Sexuality

Attraction is not usually experienced by Inari in the common sense - they experience adult pleasure less through physical stimulation, and more through a deviant reverence of emotional highs. While they still derive satisfaction from a true union, this is usually an expression of control rather than infatuation, and very few of them would prefer mutualism or sexual stimulation when compared to the aggrandizement of themselves; gender rarely has any say on compatibility. If labels must be given, they can be thought of as autosexual or grey-asexual, only rarely demisexual.

Normal attraction is still possible for Inari, but rare; you are welcome to be one of those rare few. Those who do tend to conflate desire with hunger, and many of them begin to hate themselves for eating their love interests.

History

While quite old, the Inari are young compared to the other Fae. Their tale began just four thousand years ago. Those who survive to this day have memories stretching back to at least this far, so while their history might be lost to the other races, they themselves know well their own story.

Origin

The Inari were once a primitive race of intelligent vulpine people, not unlike they are today. However, they only had Beast Magic, and their tribe longed to have Glamour that might rival the Fae. Capturing throngs of Boggarts, Inari Maltricians implanted their males with Seeming, and this interaction overwrote their Beast Magic, causing them to hunger for the Saol present within the liver of another being.

This caused the Inari to eat those without Seeming over time, and within a few generations, nearly all Inari had been born with Seeming. They could not survive by staying in their tribal communities, and so they scattered across the globe in search of sustenance.

Society

Magic

Innately gifted with Seeming and fully aware that mastering Arcana of any sort will yield them another tail, the Inari are universally talented. Seducing magi for their secrets, Inari have an easier time than most at collecting magic. However, their thirst for Arcana can be equated to a moth to flame - very few of them survive to their eighth initiation and master each of them.

Language

Inari learn to speak the language of the people they prey upon. If they prefer to hunt human liver in Dullahan, then they will speak Common.

Notable Settlements

None

Inari roam freely across Ælphyne and all of Antarok, blending in with the living. Their nature necessitates small numbers; they rarely expand beyond singular family units that might operate within a town to cover their tracks.

Related Articles

• Ælphyne
• Seeming
• Faefolk