Oddfolk

Subhumans, Oddfolk,<ref name=war>I study the lost tribes, or oddfolk, or subhumans if you want to use archaic terms. People warped by a variety of factors, usually isolation- [...] -and sometimes incest," he said.
[...]
The Warzenbergs were a Lost Tribe now. Isolation from the rest of the world, incest, association with darker Others, some practices they had picked up, and some other general influences had warped them over time. Which was pronounced considering how they had been somewhat warped from the beginning. In many cases, Lost Tribes were barbaric. Cannibal ‘rednecks’, scattered families deep in the forests, or people who had moved underground and mutated to the point they were blind and were more animal than they were people. The Warzenbergs hadn’t become primitive. They had been nobility, with a castle in the deep wilderness and an adjacent village, and they’d traveled the same routes as the cannibal families, the carnie tribes, or feral swamp dwellers. They were like any noble family that inbred because it was the easiest way to ensure the family kept its noble blood, but… taken to an extreme, coupled with increasing xenophobia. They had lost touch with their humanity, but they were distinct in how they had held onto culture. Sort of.

- Excerpt from Poke 3</ref> Offspring<ref>In Long Shadows we list and explore some of the most common creatures that wear human guises and join human society. These include [...] those Offspring who have inbred to the point of edging out of humanity - Quasi, quoted in Bonus Material: Bedtime Reading.</ref>, or in more modern times the Lost Tribes<ref>Lost Tribes

Subhumans created when Isolation, either purposeful (self-segregating) or geographical, cuts off a particular family or small village from the rest of the world. Without reinforcement from the spirits, given generations, the spirits of humanity lose their grip or assert their grip in another way, and other traits and environmental factors take priority. As a general rule, this makes them exceedingly hardy and resistant to the elements. Consistency from parent to child will shift to maintaining and exaggerating some limited traits or patterns; this could be as simple as guaranteeing that every child will have deep blue eyes, a birthmark, or that son looks near-identical to father.

However, other things start to vary wildly from parent to child in a way one wouldn’t ordinarily see in nature, leading to some exceptional talents or biases toward one skillset. A boy born in a generation might have tremendous strength. His sister might be weak while being so perceptive she has a special variant of the Sight. This kind of result is not guaranteed, and a great many may be disabled for all conventional purposes. For Heroic mage purposes, the patterns tend to be much denser. - Wildbow on Reddit</ref> are directly descended from humans but are no longer fully human. These creeple peoples can pop up from any variety of factors; when a collection of feral children grow up and breed for a few generations, or when you have that small branch of the population that lives off in the middle of nowhere or on some mountaintop, left with nobody but their own family.<ref>“I didn’t tell Blake about this one, it was a subhuman, before.”

“Elaborate? I don’t know the fancy terminology you people with the books have.”

“What you get when a collection of feral children grow up and breed for a few generations, or when you have that small branch of the population that lives off in the middle of nowhere or on some mountaintop, left with nobody but their own family. Less human trappings to tie them down to reality, a lot of energy, lust, or bloodlust to stir up the spirits, and you wind up with whole families of inbred, messed up almost-humans.”

“You can summon something like that?”

“If they become Other enough, and certain conditions are met. This one is called Midge.” - Excerpt from Subordination 6.7</ref><ref name=":2">“Twist bloodlines enough, and you get subhumans. I’ve met three of these groups. A little island close to Greenland, the population center small. Toothless, wide-eyed devout worshipers of an opportunist Other they were unwittingly elevating to godhood. This is remarkably common, mind. They are often Aware, which can be fascinating, and they may resemble early practitioners. In this case, it was early worship. [...] The second was a family living in a dilapidated tenement in Europe. Afraid of the outside world, they inbred, moved in and out of various apartments, and subsisted on rats, their sickly, and their rooftop and balcony gardens. Their language had mutated as much as their features- all of them appeared eerily similar, chinless, wide-hipped, and small-eyed, their language a nonsense mishmash of nouns. Civilization found its way to them, they were split up and given care, their existence was hidden by practitioners and a city council that had ignored too many warnings about their existence. I was invited to help at a late stage, but damage had been done, their world unraveled as they were taken from one another, and they died soon after they were separated. [...] The third, I won’t elaborate much on. A group of miners found something dangerous underground. Fossils relating to practices we do not teach about at the Blue Heron Institute. They coveted them, they occupied the mine and its immediate area, contrived to hide it, and invited families to come to them. They never left. They were twisted by those fossils and by their bloodlines. The reality is that few categories we give Others are tidy. Knotted-up societies do not fit among those few. Whatever drives the knot tends to loom large and influence them. You almost never get a subhuman that is only subhuman.”

[...]

- Excerpt from Cutting Class 6.4</ref> Another way could be if groups of people are isolated from normal human circumstances, they don't eat the same food or live in the same place as regular humans for example, they have children and reproduce outside of the greater human culture.<ref name=":3">“The Knot, then, is what happens when this visceral thing or process is twisted. When incarnations such as time, death, violence, or dream run through the visceral, they have processes. Twist the process in an unnatural way, and you twist that which is solid. When you twist it enough, you get the Knots. These can be people, Others, places, and things. Isolation from the rest of the world is often a prerequisite, or the things that would knot them would be tied down by outside connections.”

[...]

“Twist bloodlines enough, and you get subhumans.
[...]

“That’s the first case. For the second, you can twist diet and environment enough, and you can get feral subspecies. Men with spirits and bodies changed by time and need. Eyeless men deep underground, those who live in shallow water. I know of a group of Russian offshoots who lived above the arctic circle. Gross distortions in sleep and isolation from society saw them sleeping for weeks at a time, waking to hunt with ravenous hunger. Again, whatever forces create the isolation needed for these things to happen without self-correcting, they will taint this rapid or distorted evolution. We rarely find feral variants on humanity who aren’t touched by other categories or other ways of becoming Other.”

He held up two fingers.

“That would be our second case. Third? We have the altered. Others target humans. Some powerful ones target groups of human. It is far less common today than it once was, but some succeed or succeeded. They take a distant or hard to reach village. On the rare occasion, they take a city. I was personally involved in one case where an Apsasû, a divine servant and protector of humanity, took it on herself to shelter a group of humans. She kept them in what you could describe as a Garden of Eden, curing all that ailed. Faith, physiology, and mind twisted and knotted despite or because of her efforts.”

“Balance is often maintained here. The knotted variations of humanity still use the same amount of material, but it is exaggerated in places, stretched thin in others. This can be messy, with subhuman groups having a large number of the weak, slow, stupid, and lesser in every respect, dotted with the periodic child who is incredible in one facet, strong or fleet of foot or keen in intelligence. It can also be ordered. The tenement group I mentioned had found an equilibrium, to the point they could be called something entirely different than the other.” - Excerpt from Cutting Class 6.4</ref> Then there are the humans that are deliberately cultivated into something else by a powerful Other, for various malevolent or benevolent pruposes.<ref name=":3"/>

Regardless they lack human trappings to tie them down to reality, a lot of energy, lust, or bloodlust to stir up the spirits, and you wind up with whole families of inbred, messed up almost-humans.<ref name=":3"/>

When they get enough Other-trappings they can be summoned. It should be noted that they are not by any means stupid, the only 'skill' that was lost were social skill and cunning is a survival instinct. Thus they can be supernaturally good with improvised weaponry.<ref>“Why can’t she be dumber?” I asked. “Why did Rose have to pick something that could be so fucking problematic when it slips the leash?”

“Subhumans aren’t stupid, they’re socially backward,” Maggie said. She thought for a second. “Really socially backward. And they’re good with improvised tools and weapons. Supernaturally good.”

“Ah. Put a broken chair in their hands, they’re going to be better at murdering you with it than if you gave them a proper gun or knife?” Fell asked.

“Yep,” Maggie said. “And the ones who do get some crazy weapon like a jackhammer or a machete become the subhuman exemplars Rose described. Ones with actual personality, trademarks, and rituals.” - Excerpt from Subordination 6.8</ref>

Known Subhumans

Midge's family<ref>Interlude 11</ref>
- Fat Mam & Rackham Thin<ref>Rose intoned, “Midge, daughter of Rackham Thin, daughter of Fat Mam, drinker of blood…” - Excerpt from Subordination 6.8</ref>
- Brother Mall (can pass as human)
- Posie
- Midge
- Biff and Jory
Warzenberg Clan<ref name=war/>
- Dame Metha
- Gisela
- Gernot
- Jörg
Worshipers by the sea<ref name=":2"/>
Those that hid in the city<ref name=":2"/>
They that dug too deep<ref name=":2"/>
Artic dwellers<ref name=":3"/>
Boob Tubers & Web Crawlers - Technomancy derived<ref>Subhumans of a specific technomancy related type. Humans that have sunken so far into the other world that their humanity has become distorted or fallen away. Summoning (as with many Technomancy related things) requires making and running the right algorithms and beating other technomancers out there to find and access them first. Then you have to wait for them to show up. Next to no grip on reality with multiple ones being able to assert a kind of 'continuity skip' where if you aren't looking they can get places where they shouldn't or faster than they should. Tubers tend to be tougher with some ability to ignore the harsher parts of reality, while Crawlers are better at working with or cooperating with ongoing technomancy practices. - Wildbow on Discord</ref>

References