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"There are only 4 noted Necroid species residing in the Milky Way; only one of notice, however, is the lifeless Nyral Wyrm. The Necroid-Nucliods of Nyrus are a complex, caste-founded hivemind with intentions beyond any other hivemind's capability to process, and their extreme intelligence even exceeds that of the Umbral Coalition's O-council themselves. Not much else can be said about the hive, as even we do not understand their enigmatic behaviors. Additional notes: Avoid provoking at all costs" - The Umbral Coalition Intel Agency Database on the subject of Nyral Wyrms, iteration 8045
This page is for the regular wyrms if you meant to look at the Wyrms of Nyrus mod. This page is for SNAZ OS Extended Canon's Nyral Wyrms.
The Nyral Wyrms are a species of inorganic wyrms that hail from Nyrus in the Axil Galaxy. They've been commonly given a rating of 7 on the FCAS and are noted to be a Type 7 Civilization, right below Greater Powers, and right above Lesser Powers. Typically recognized by their shelled and segmented bodies, Nyral Wyrms can be found in many different color combinations, but the antennae, six major legs, and minimum of two legless (or near-legless) segments at the end of their bodies all unite this caste-organized species.
The Nyral Wyrms are the only legitimate Persistent Hivemind known in SNAZ OS. Their gestalt consciousness carries over, to some extent, into other universes.
They are SNAZ OS's last line of defense before the Originless kill the Actuality Zone and cause the Great Collapse.
First Contact Recommendations
If you have a Lesser Power that can represent you, leave the First Contact Procedure to it.
The Nyral Wyrms have a Lesser Power who represents them already, and is very agreeable towards other Lesser Powers.
The Borgi can also act as your representative, should you lack the siding of a Lesser Power. Just watch the prices of their services, as they can climb very quickly.
The Umbral Coalition wishes nothing to do with the Nyral Wyrms in diplomacy, besides opening borders and study policies. The Umbral Coalition will only provide information about the Nyral Wyrms.
We do know what the best First Contact Procedure is; and that is to hide.
Biology
Physical Structure
All wyrms follow a standard minimum of 6 limbs, though these limbs do not need multiple fingers. With a few notable exceptions (like the Queenling and Royal Grub), they all have a hard shell on their top or back sides. Wyrms have a tail with at least 2 segments, any large or advanced limbs on a segment is not a tail. Underbellies are not present in every wyrm. Drones are hollow on the inside, but some may contain specialized organs used for their specified roles within the hive.
Most wyrms, with the exception of the first 2 stages of a Queen, have at least two antennae that serve like psychic signal receivers. Tearing these tough but flexible antennae can disable a wyrm; removing all antennae kills the wyrm, alerting all surrounding wyrms to the forceful disconnect. The more antennae they have, the more signals they carry around.
Mandibles are present on every wyrm, though it is usually tiny in non-warrior caste wyrms, or located somewhere besides the mouth.
The color of Nyral Wyrms vary based on their environment and radiogenesis outcomes.
Eyes on wyrms is mostly a byproduct of bringing creatures with ocular features into their fold. Wyrms do not need sight, meaning that destroying their eyes doesn't reduce their senses at all. What it does do, however, is anger them further, causing the "poke-to-the-beehive" effect.
Despite following a form of genetic coding, no cells are present in the bodies of Nyral Wyrms. They do not have brains or minds of their own, and are suspected to just be puppeteered by the higher-up queens.
Radiobiology
Wyrms are inorganic, and are instead primarily composed of elements such as lead, radium, radon, and uranium. Their genetic code is determined by the way radioactive particles split more stable atoms, which has resulted in them being one of the most biodiverse species in the Axil Galaxy, or even the known universe.
Inside of their bodies, they feature a radioactive core of hydrogen and helium plasma, heated up to 9000K, or 8726.850°C. Their cooling mechanisms are still poorly understood, but they can safely contain this core in areas with an ambient temperature up to 353K, or interchangeably, 79.85°C or 175.73°F.
Wyrms have been observed eating anything and everything, from the tame, organic Human cuisine, to other species' starships, to even the unfortunate Rad'ion. It is safe to say that wyrms, due to their Nucloid classification, are able to digest any matter by breaking it down with nuclear fission. Because of the amount of energy released by this process, castes below Royalty only eat one meal in their entire life (with a few exceptions), and survive 100 to 400 years off of the produced energy before eventual expiration. Royalty and above are an exception, and are structured to be immortal, though this reduces the efficiency of said digestion system by 90% due to the rapid regeneration of their structures that is meant to directly combat half-life decay.
Wyrm drones create honey to feed queens, who prefer sweeter foods; but queens will otherwise eat anything. Besides preferring sweets like direct glucose, fruits, and wyrm honey; they first prefer meat, then everything else.
They do not breathe any gas, besides the radon gasses they emit as a waste product from digestion. Aquatic wyrms have been observed, and so have the elusive "voidwyrms" (including The Empress) been seen floating throughout space, On land, wyrms that convert matter into metalcombs or other substances useful to the hive produce a variety of byproducts as waste, including plutonium and lead.
Necrobiology
Royal grubs begin the life of the Nyral Wyrm Queen, or any of her Royalty. Wyrms will abduct non-wyrm creatures and feed it to a living grub, from which the grub will kill the host and begin to transmute into the host, creating the Queenling. Other royalty (such as Archives) are created through the same process, though the grub is a subtype known as the Sponsor Grub.
The Royal Grub, when given a host, bombards the host with radiation and various toxins, while administering Royal Jelly to mask the pain. All hosts die from this process, and are reanimated through assimilation. Some hosts, if the hivemind sees fit, may keep some of their original selves afterwards; other times, the host loses all free will and memories.
A few notable species groups are unable to be converted, notably including most Enigmatoids, The Corrupted, and anything else that may exist outside of the physical world. Additional subjects, including Bloodmind Victims and the Wyrmfolly, are immune to the assimilation process of Nyral Wyrms.
Mortem
Only lower castes are mortal, only living anywhere between 100 to 400 years. Despite this, wyrms as a whole are still considered an immortal species.
When a wyrm dies, it’s insides melt into a dangerous, corium-like material that mixes with their outer shell. Smaller wyrm corpses will fully melt down, while larger corpses will leave behind massive skeletons of shells that house small pools of radioactive waste.
In many cases, if a queen stumbles upon a fallen wyrm, she will eat the remains to recycle their material. There is no mourning process found within queens in any capacity.
When any wyrm dies, they lose the ability to self-regulate the elements in their bodies, resulting in the body emitting 1600% more radiation than if it were alive. This vulnerability means that wyrms can go supercritical if lit on fire when dead. For this reason alone, the Umbral Coalition Intelligence Agency has issued the following warning to all officers and agents:
Under no circumstance should you ever think about killing a wyrm with fire, or even burning one post-mortem. Doing so will immediately terminate your health, life, property, and starship insurance.
Genders
Nyral Wyrms do not have a traditional male-and-female (binary) system in their genetics. As inorganics, only two castes are reproductive: Queens and the Empress.
Many outsiders know their non-reproductive members as "drones" and/or use male pronouns when referring to them, and females for the queens and Empress.
Voidwyrms
Voidwyrms are a particularly outstanding populous within the Nyral Wyrm species as a whole. They are not hatched, but are rather entirely created from metalcombs and other wyrm-made materials. They can range anywhere from the size of a cruise ship to multiple major asteroids. These entirely artificial wyrms are built as living ships for some, if not all, of the following purposes:
- Safe carriage for Queens between planets
- Landing numerous units onto planetary surfaces
- Escorting and defending larger voidwyrms
- Megastructure material delivery and/or construction vessels
- Planetary terraforming
- Mass-destruction of Bloodmind infestations
- Invading or marking territory in other galaxies (recent development)
Voidwyrms have recently been equipped with Reverse-Singularity Bounce Drives (RSBDs) and are capable of using white holes to instantly reach the exterior bands of any galaxy. They are the second civilization to do so, with the Umbral Coalition having accomplished this 3 standard Milky Way years before the Nyral Wyrms developed such technology.
Vulnerabilities
Wyrms themselves are extremely resilient life forms, but they too have notable biological disadvantages. The antennae of drones (non-queen or empress) are vital for their survival, and serve as a connection to the synaptic channels of their hive. Removing all antennae present on the wyrm results in it instantly expiring. Queens only receive a slight reduction in coordination ability from having their antennae removed, and grow it back in the period of 1-2 Earth weeks.
Certain chemical compounds (such as those found within certain nuclear warp drives and Xen-789's atmosphere) can bind to the radioactive alloys in Nyral Wyrms (queens and voidwyrms included) and cause their shells to break down, which can be fatal if the wyrm has no underlying dermal layer present due to containment failure. This results in the armor of queens and voidwyrms to be absent, making them highly vulnerable to damage.
Many wyrms feature dermal layers, but some are shell-only. Shell breaches in wyrms with no other layers can quickly become fatal for the wyrm in question, along with anything that may be near the leaking entity.
Major Genetic Lineages
Hive of the Swarm
The source of all wyrm genetics resides in the Hive of the Swarm. Lead by none other than The Empress, Californium. These wyrms focus on being well-rounded and adaptable to just about any environment that they can reasonably survive within. They have the common orange shell and white underbelly coloration.
Hive of the Blight
The Hive of the Blight values creating chaos and terror to the highest degree, and instinctively aim to create the most collateral damage when deployed in invasions. They have been consistently observed to enjoy terrorizing defenseless life forms. These wyrms are the primary spreaders of the Hive Creep, and are often nicknamed the "Gardeners of Hell" by the Normalcy Keepers. Along with spreading the Hive Creep, Hive of the Blight's wyrms have been proven to be unusually resistant against plagues, poisons, and other ailments. Gamma is the queen behind this lineage, giving the units within this lineage a purple shell, unusual number of pale purple eyes, and an orange underbelly.
Hive of the Nova
The Hive of the Nova values the complete and utter destruction of any opponents, and will not accept any other victory that doesn't involve in erasing their enemies out of the universe. This lineage has the most aggressive wyrms. Unlike all the other lineages, these wyrms are completely fireproof, the mechanisms of this immunity to extreme heat completely unknown, outside of their special plating and exclusive lack of an exposed underbelly. They appear mechanical, with a mixture of maroon-red and dark grey shelling. The queen behind this lineage is Radon.
Hive of the Deviant
The Hive of the Deviant is a unique, but rarely-deployed lineage that focuses on harnessing anomalies and adapting to corrupted worlds. They are the most potent of psionic forces, and many wyrms of this lineage are used for covert infiltration. The drones of this species have their own intelligences, giving them the name of "Deviants" and making them fit for hiding their hivemind in plain sight. Some wyrms of this lineage will pose themselves as another species entirely, and subjugate primitives by either posing as a native species, or by misleading the native sapients into thinking the Nyral Wyrms come in peace. The wyrms of this lineage have faded red shells, and can have either light-grey or de-saturated pink underbellies. The queen behind this lineage is Asue.
Hive of the Storm
The Hive of the Storm is comprised of destructive and resilient wyrms. Like the Hive of the Blight, the Hive of the Storm specializes in terror units who are designed to wreck havoc upon unsuspecting targets. Unlike the former, this lineage targets the armed first, then the unarmed and defenseless. They will recognize and break down defenses, blow themselves up, and destroy the terrain in order to collapse buildings. These wyrms come in two color sets: blue shell with white or yellow underbelly; or black shell and green or blue underbelly. The queen behind this lineage is Pluton.
Castes
The Nyral Wyrm hivemind is structured into multiple castes with a non-linear structure. Any wyrm can move between castes, though Royals and Imperials are locked in, and no wyrms below can enter those castes. Voidwyrms are not a true caste, giving their nature of creation.
Workers
Workers are more utility-focused and build hive structures for other wyrms. While combat-capable, they do not make good fighter units.
Often, Combatants will escort with Workers. If not forced to fight, Workers will flee dangerous situations.
Combatants
This caste features combat-oriented wyrms. They may share characteristics such as:
- Larger pincers
- Larger mandibles
- Unusually-shaped mandibles
- Double-layered shelling
- Sharp-edge claws
Scouters
This caste features wyrms often used for mapping out planetary surfaces or conducting studies of local fauna. All Scouters are in the Drone sub-caste
Artisans
Artisans are directly ahead of Workers, doing more skilled tasks such as assembling Voidwyrms or researching technologies.
Defilers
Defilers are specifically mass-produced for extremely hostile takeover missions. They are short-lived, often because of their extremely confrontational role when compared to Combatants. They are used to render planets inhospitable to organic life
- 3-5 layers of shelling
- Constant ejection of nuclear radiation
- Tailored to cause mass-scale destruction to the environment.
- Hive Creep falls under this
Dispatchers
Dispatchers are similar to defilers, but are suited better for fighting robotic and other inorganic life forms head-on. They are even more short-lived than Defilers, often being called "ticking time bombs" due to their self-destructive nature.
- 3-6 layers of shelling
- Internally overheating at all times
- Always explodes on expiration, explosion is accompanied with an EMP blast.
- Produces corium
- Vile Hive Creep falls under this
Royals
Wyrms must be hatched into this stage. Royals are reproductive units, or are assistants for the queen they serve, such as Archives.
Imperials
There is only one wyrm in this caste: The Empress.
Sub-castes
Castes are further divided by size of the wyrm in question. Unlike with castes, there is no way for a wyrm to move down to a smaller size. These are not formally used by the Hive to identify their units, and are based on Umbral Coalition Standards, which recognize sub-castes by weight and/or the radius of the nuclear explosion's fireball if killed with fire.
Drones
Drones are the smallest units within the hive. Weak, yet cheap for the hive to make. Drones may weigh around 10kg to 500kg, and be no more than 10 segments long. The blast radius is comparable to any normal explosion.
Dires
Dire wyrms are the middle-grounds that lie between Drones and Megawyrms. Sometimes, a wyrm may fall outside of this range and still be classified as Dire for any of the following reasons:
- Abnormally large Royal Grubs
- Anything hatched by Broodmother Queens
- More than 10 body segments
- Roach Queens
- Unusually large fireball radius
No other measurement is given to mark wyrms as "Dire".
Megawyrms
Megawyrms are the first level of large wyrm units, usually weighing 900kg to 3000kg. Most types of queens fall under this category. The blast radius is comparable to a 1-megaton yield in worst cases, 0.25 in best cases.
Gigawyrms
Gigawyrms are the second level of large wyrm units, weighing anything between 3000kg to 10000kg. Broodmother Queens do fall under this category. Many gigawyrms have a blast radius of a 15 megaton bomb.
Terrawyrms
Terrawyrms are the third and final level of large wyrm units, being larger than Gigawyrms. Most Walkers fall under this category, along with all Voidwyrms, should they be counted as true wyrms. Their blast radiuses can be compared with 60 megaton explosions and above.
Empress
The Empress of the Nyral Wyrm hive oversees the entire species, and commands the queens on the side. The Empress that controls every single wyrm in SNAZ OS is Californium Gamii. With Gamii representing the whole hive on a diplomatic front, the Nyral Wyrms are internally known as "The Gamii Hive" in civilization records.
The Empress is extremely massive, close to the size of a small star system. With a hollow interior, the Empress serves as a stable planetary environment until she unfurls. There's only 6 times in recorded history that Gamii has done this; and the information gathered has been valued by species that wished to make hollow worlds.
Gamii naturally feeds upon small planets and moons once every 6 billion Earth years.
Homeworld
Many in the universal community have agreed upon the fact that the Empress is Nyrus, developed through a process of gradual assimilation and consumption of their original homeworld, and all of the planets around it. This has finalized Nyrus's categorization as a Living Planet, with it's core being it's now-dim star, Nyral. The terrain of Nyrus constantly shifts, vents gasses, and opens up, causing it to earn the rare terrain hazard classification of "Absolutely Hostile". The terrain, being the entire hive as a result of billions of years of assimilation, purposefully tries to kill any beings that dare to step foot within the hive's capital. This is always successful, to add salt to the wound; 100% of beings that walk the surfaces of Nyrus die immediately upon landing, and their ships are torn apart with ease.
Many who die to the terrain have later turned up as new queens in the hive. Surface visits are absolutely an undeath sentence.
Nyrus's atmosphere is entirely composed of radon gasses exerted by both the wyrms and Nyrus itself. Exposure to the atmosphere often results in immediately lethal dosages of radiation. The gases settle on parts that haven't moved in a while, turning into dust, and wyrms have collected the settled dust and used it for lighting.
All of Nyrus's surface is artificial structures, liquids, and plants. No feature is naturally-occurring. Seas of wyrm honey change shape every single day, due to shifts in the terrain.
There is no weather cycle on Nyrus. Average temperatures are extremely cold, close to -153.15 °C. Toxicity is at a score of 6,503. No ship AI, even mindless ships, will take a route to Nyrus, unless if given a manual override via either threatening the ship AI, or by physically hot-wiring the navigation systems. For legal reasons (and comply with the UC-SoD 500), the SNAZpedia does not recommend spacefarers doing either of these actions just to give the Nyral Wyrms a visit. Observation at a distance is the best type of observation.
Diplomatic Relationships
The Gamii Hive is universally feared by all, even by the UC, because it is a layer of the SNAZ OS antivirus and originated from the Bloodmind. The Gamii Hive can never be eradicated, and SNAZ OS forbids even the Greater Powers from destroying it.
The hive has gained many enemies, and only a few allies.
Diplomatic Alignment
This hivemind is usually open for cooperation with other species and civilizations, and prefers diplomatic moves that could bolster their technocracy.
| Cooperative | O | O | Pacifist | O | O | Religious |
| O | O | |||||
| O | X | O | ||||
| Capital | X | Collective | ||||
| O | X | O | ||||
| O | X | O | ||||
| Technological | O | O | Militant | O | O | Isolationist |
Allies
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| The Umbral Coalition | The Umbral Coalition is, by proxy, the creator of the Nyral Wyrms. |
| The Bloodhive | The Bloodmind is the direct ancestor of the Nyral Wyrms, and the two have always been working together in secrecy up until now. Despite their cooperation now being revealed to the public sphere, the Nyral Wyrms are still allies with their even more invasive cousins. |
| The Rad'ion | Allies due to their association with the Umbral Coalition and being part of The Core 3. |
Warring
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| Normalcy Keepers (Normalic Federation) | The NK and NF have declared the Umbral Coalition and all of its allies as threats to the continued existence of reality as we know it. |
| Maidonus States of Harmony | The MSH and Gamii Hive fight over the ownership of star systems on a regular basis. The MSH has recently sided with the Normalic Federation, increasing tensions. |
| The Fallen Falconian Empire | The Hive is still attacking the Falco people, even after felling their entire empire. The conflict first started with the Falco trying to develop a de-wyrmer -type weapon for eradicating wyrms from occupied planets, along with removing their Creep. The whole weapon was developed for the Falco's religious intentions. |
| Shibunii Terras | The Shibunii have somehow caused all the heads of all Nyral-Shibunii to violently explode in order to break ties, and have regretted siding with the Nyral Wyrms in the first place. They are advancing in technologies to mind-control the Nyral Wyrm drones and turn them against the queens. Breaking away from being a vassal of the hive has caused the two civilizations to erupt in a war. |
| The Guardiox | The Guardiox have assassinated the one Sartex the Nyral Wyrms had managed to assimilate, and are now defending organics from wyrm invasions. |
| The OmniSolac Federation | The OmniSolac Federation initiated the conflict by invading the outermost planets, systems, and galaxies controlled by the Wyrms. The Conflict quickly escalated in intensity. |
Origins
Many Bloodmind incursions had taken place before Vetpetmon, herself, had strangled a few Bloodmind Archies and banished them to the depths of Nyrus for their crimes, having converted their physiology to follow the rules of SNAZ OS's programming, stripping all of their powers besides the Exploit as a result. She did not forget to tear the original antennae off of these Archies, forcing them to live through the pain of separation from the Originless Hive as eternal punishment.
The Bloodwyrms
The harsh conditions of Primeval Nyrus's surface killed every living organism that dared to brave the never-ending radioactive storm that sweep Nyrus clean of anything but the grains of uranium and plutonium sand that the storms would pick up and blow around. The archies were forced to abandon their sense of sight and psionic locomotion in the caverns, and began to use clicks and chirps to echolocate objects in their environment. Soon, the cave environment and reproduction began to take the wheel of their evolution, causing future generations to develop shells to survive cave-ins and falls while the lack of light slowly took the red pigmentation away from their skin, turning it into a pale, milky white. These were known as the Bloodwyrms for 60,000 orbits, and their hivemind structure was fractured into separate queens.
Heading to the surface
By NyO #50,441,002 (Nyrus Orbit), the radiation storms cleared up due to a freezing of the planet's surface after a rogue planet passed and modified the orbital path of Nyrus. With the heavy metals dropping down to the ground and staying there for the first time, electricity and wind were no longer threats. One brave Bloodwyrm drone had traveled to the surface, and came back alive to deliver the news to its queen, Kerekii Gamii. While the drone that visited the surface had died quickly afterwards, it had provided valuable information, and many more drones were sacrificed to gather some of the fine dust.
The first reactor
In NyO #50,441,016, the very first nuclear energy source was created; the Thorral Core. Standing at 400ft tall and weighing 200 tons, the original creator hive had gone extinct as soon as the queen had placed the last glued-together chunk of the core.
The Thorral Core was used as a beacon that produced light, even throughout the long nights, and gave the Bloodwyrms some visibility during the clouded days.
Like all early technologies, the good did come to an end, when a thunderstorm struck the core, causing a nuclear explosion that left only 6 hives remaning.
Teccarus (Natural War)
In competition for resources that were destroyed swiftly in the nuclear blast, the Bloodwyrms had gone back underground and waged a resource war known as Teccarus. New hives split off, deviating with the idea that famished drones would be better off forming their own hive. Bioengineering began to show up at this time, and the very first drone specializations came into light.
Teccarus became a Natural War shortly after, lasting for thousands of orbits as the Bloodwyrms began to modify themselves away from their cell-based origins, eventually adopting the Nucloid biology seen today.
The Primitive Nyral Wyrms
40,000 orbits after the beginning of Teccarus, the Nucloid Bloodwyrms returned to the surface to find it teeming with life and new resources, amplifying the intensity of Teccarus as it became a race to conquer the surface. At this stage, they are now named the Nyral Wyrms as their concrete biology is set upon the discovery of other non-wyrm animals.
The resources required to create queens was too great, and many weak hives vanished in the first waves of battles. Stronger hives eventually developed the Royal Grubs, which converted the matter of hosts into new queens with great efficiency.
Unification
The first wyrm philosopher was created. Willu Ixokii, an archive, collected all the knowledge of his mind and developed the first ever Mutual Survivus Palosc. In it, he questions their existence, meaning, and place, showing the first signs of true abstract thinking and intelligence.
[Translated] "The battles waged by Us are for naught. We fight each that thinks different. But We, at the core, are not different. Each mind is still Us, sharing the same land, shell, and flub. To fight even one wyrm, is to end Our existence. Our titans, Our warriors, are the true problems of Our resource crisis. Let Us put away Our claws and fangs, and instead focus on better uses for what the world gives us."
The Nyrus Wyrms had established a philosophy known as "Mutual Benefit." Should one wyrm decide to wage war, all wyrms, even those not directly involved, would suffer greatly due to wasted resources. With the hiveminds accepting this new ideology, work was made to ditch the instinctual desire to fight over resources, creating the first modern Nyrus Wyrms. Radiux, Great Archive of the Gamii Hive, proposed a new, and rather bizarre insight on how to restructure the divided hiveminds into one whole.
[Translated] "Many queens living under separate flags pose a risk of great deviancy away from the common good of wyrmkind. Should we ever come to a war against another queen, our next one will be fought within the shrouds of the synapsespace that our dead bodies can't do anything but watch over. The only way to truly unite us is to fill in the holes between our queens; a source mind, focused on the survival and continued existence of our kin."
Radiux's insight highlighted the flaws of the polyhive structure of the species, giving way to the Empress Theory. The only way for the wyrms to ascend into the void was to combine all the minds into one true gestalt.
The process was fairly slow, slow enough to allow for yet another War of Deviancy, when the Islov Hive wanted to expand into other hives and try to assimilate the other queen's drones into the Islov collective. With it being clear that collecting all the minds together this way wouldn't be acceptable, the Gamii Hive, in secret, made a second queen inherit the collective's throne, and faked the death of the original queen. In reality, the old queen had buried deep underground, and the new queen had hid this from all the other hives of Nyrus. Gamii drones focused on agriculture research, which was odd to all the other onlooking queens, but Rexka Gamii, the 2nd queen, successfully dealt with their suspicions by exporting some of the excess produce. This historical action, as a whole, defined that the wyrms were naturally poor at trusting queens, and those that could fool the best by making outside hives trust them would survive in the end.
Shortly afterwards, Californium Gamii had awakened, and forcefully overridden the synapstiod cortiis of all the queens on the planet, bringing the entire Nyral Wyrm species into the Gamii Hive's fold, achieving the unification of their species that would later unlock the key to their space age.
Military
All wyrm spacecraft and structures contain some form of weaponry, and no wyrm of any caste is considered a civilian at any time due to the gestalt nature of the hivemind, which itself promotes the destruction of threats and the assimilation of other worlds.
All wyrm spacecraft feature a military logo for this reason alone.
Weaponry
Wyrm weaponry is mostly comprised of wyrms themselves, such as their mandibles, claws, horns, spit, fangs, and so forth; they're often considered a barbaric species due to this direct combat approach. This does not mean wyrms don't have external weaponry in their armories, however. Technologies such as explosives, plasma weaponry and biological weapons have often been seen in use. While their war philosophy is to convert (preserve) as much matter as possible, they do have Colossi and Leviathan-class vessels in their fleet, capable of decimating worlds, or even destroying entire planets at a moment's notice.
Only three cases of Total Destruction Weapon usages under the Nyral Wyrm flag have been recorded:
- A Leviathan wyrm equipped with a Celestial Tow had dragged Ebbius-II directly into the star to destroy the planet, which had been overridden by their own bioengineered Centi-X plague, in order to protect both the wyrms and the rest of the universe from the outbreak.
- A Colossus-class wyrm ship was observed cracking open Yukoo Prime during a Bloodmind incursion; An ally called for any ship with a "No-Other-Option" protocol, the wyrm ship was the one who responded.
- The Empress herself was called to demolish the void-bound city of Alaban when Originless forces (including the Bloodmind) occupied and exploited all of the industry in attempt to construct a gigastructure in an attempt to obliterate the Chaos Standard.
Hive Creep
The Creep, also known as Hive Creep, is the questionably plant-like bioweapon found in the Nyral Wyrms' arsenal. Every invasion they attempt, they bring the Creep along with them. It can spread on both organic and inorganic material, converting the original matter into more Hive Creep.
Hive Creep appears as yellow goo on surfaces, brown hexagonal structures, and orange shell-like structures. It bears a striking 80% similarity to its' creators, the Nyral Wyrms themselves.
Apocalypse classes for Hive Creep fall within Hostile Terraforming and Grey Goo.
Hostile Terraforming
The Creep is capable of absorbing gasses out of the atmosphere, turning it into solid mass wyrms can eat and turn back into gasses such as radon. In small amounts, Hive Creep is only dangerous in small, enclosed spaces; in the case of it taking over 400 cubic miles of forest, it can quickly wipe out 80% of all native life on the surface.
Grey Goo
Hive Creep is considered a grey goo, because due to it's mechanical nature (similar to its' creators), it is self-replicating and uncontrollable. Unlike most GG scenarios, the creep is capable of converting any form of solid matter, not just biomass. Unlike in 99.8% cases of this scenario, this "grey" goo is purposefully designed this way.
Vile Creep
Vile Hive Creep is a hyperactive variant of itself, and instead of persisting when growing, it grows outwards in a "shockwave" pattern, leaving behind molten corium in it's wake. It is rarely used due to the Hive's war philosophy, with almost all known cases of its use being against the Bloodmind. In this case, it is a Mutually Guaranteed Annihilation-class apocalypse, for all ends on the battlefield.
Economy
Nyral Wyrms do not use a traditional economic system, and instead use a bartering system for outside trades, and a Royal Jelly ranking system for queens.
Standards of living
All members within the hive are given the same vital and necessary resources to live, there is no class imbalance or incentive to "move up the ladder." Royal caste members, however, get bonus resources as part of their role in the hive, along with their slight independence allowing for them to make their own choices to benefit the hive as a whole.
Bartering
The hive barters with outside markets on occasion, trading wyrm products, such as metalcombs, for organic matter or raw materials. One of their most valued raw materials they will trade for is plutonium and uranium.
Royal Jelly Ranking
Queens engage in a friendly competition to collect and earn as much royal jelly as possible. This competition incentivizes hive growth and propagation, while also giving queens a chance to earn status and recognition. Ranks give queens new ships, castes, and weapons to play with.
Queens earn RJR by partaking or doing any of the following:
- Converting aliens into more queens (creating new RJR loops in the process)
- Terraforming planets into more superorganisms
- Destroying other aliens' military ships
- Building hexes
- Creating more lower-caste wyrms
Culture
Nyral Wyrms are materialists, and do not occupy themselves with any form of religion (though they have been spotted indoctrinating primitive and a few space-faring species into worshiping the wyrms) or morality. They have often been described to be "more cruel and cold than the Jorx or Sartex," or "as soulless as they are lifeless." The hivemind is focused on securing resources for expansion, and often said expansion requires new resources. Due to their ways of living, they have evolved and genetically modified themselves to be as efficient as possible, even to the point of rendering lower castes prone to aging in order to reduce their overall resource drain. Wyrms are not capable of feeling remorse for the victims of their invasions.
The original culture of assimilated lifeforms are completely lost to time, besides what information The Empress finds of interest, such as any weakness in an outside species that can be exploited.
Architecture
Wyrms build their hives out of metalcombs, and build in an organized hexagonal structure, much like Sol-III's bees. Individual buildings are called "hexes", and are connected close together through a series of tunnels. Some hexes are structured for specific purposes, making them distinct from the otherwise unremarkable hexescape.
Diplomacy
Some queens are left culturally recognizable as their original hosts, for means of living amongst the Galactic Community. These queens are considered "semi-deviant" from the rest of wyrm kin, and can process emotions to some extent. These queens have their own artisan-caste wyrms to act as the full interface to the civilized world.
Artisan wyrm products are extremely valued for their strength, legitimacy, and material value. Many Artisan Queens are often considered to be the "civilians" of the wyrm population, as they do NOT make fight-capable wyrms, excluding weapon smiths and whatever the queen herself has.
Media
Wyrms themselves do not make media of any kind, but artisan queens have been invited to work on many artistic projects, such as holofilms, comics, and statues. For the rest, all media with wyrms in it are just other species writing stories or composing media about them.