Slivers are a feared, uncontrollable race of rapidly-evolving predators. Their species is organized into a hive structure, much like some social insects. But slivers don’t just share food and resources - terrifyingly, they also share adaptations. Whenever one sliver innovates a new mutation, that mutation spreads rapidly throughout the entire hive, so that every individual can grow, and adapt, and hunt more effectively.
Slivers are a type of communal creature with a sharp, beaked head shape, a single claw, and a long snaking body. Sliver are creatures that can share abilities. They have limited shapeshifting abilities; for instance all slivers nearby will suddenly grow wings when a winged sliver is around. A sliver’s anatomy often reflects the adaptation that it transfers to the other members of its species. In later adaptations, there have been some slivers that have even adapted the very form of other beings, as well as their abilities, such as appearing less "sliver" and more human- or beast-like. These are referred to (in this wiki) as Sliveroids.
They also share a hive mind, as if all Slivers were using a communal brain. While they are not telepathic, they can “read” other Slivers with complete accuracy. Each individual is born with certain qualities or powers, and when another Sliver "reads" this Sliver, it can share those powers. Proximity, though, is very important. As long as they were close enough to one another they could share their collective thoughts. If one Sliver, for example, knew how to shapeshift a pair of wings, every Sliver near it knew the same things and thus could fly.
A Sliver begins to show distinct physical attributes within a few days of its birth. These changes may manifest in the form of wings, armor, additional weaponry, or heightened reflexes. What makes one Sliver a flyer while another grows armor is completely unknown, but some believe that a Sliver is defined before its birth, manipulated by the hive ruler.
There have been attempts to infiltrate or control a hive of slivers by creating artificial slivers, which have succeeded... to some extent.
Slivers are typically led by a Queen or similar figure.
Sliver young are sorted into clutches according to their potential and their future role. Human scholars can only guess how those are determined.
There is one, the Sliver Hivelord, which is "the source, the line unbroken since the calamity that brought such monsters to our shores."
Noted Slivers
Species | Titles | Setting | |
---|---|---|---|
Sliver Hivelord | Sliver | Hivelord | Shandalar |
Sliver Queen | Sliver | Brood Mother | Dominia |