“Deviants don’t start wars. They finish them,” – Old Deviant Saying
Deviants are actually horned beings, but they were born without horns. This is how they got their name, as horned beings called them “deviants.”
They can often have the appearance of humans. However, like horned beings, the colors of their eyes and hair are more diverse. They are also undoubtedly spirits, as they cannot physically touch humans without getting shocked and are known to use magic.
Deviants were enslaved by the horned beings, as the horned beings saw them as lesser for being born without horns. Soon though, they discovered a secret to great power: guardian blood.
They began to hunt the guardians of enchanted lands and drink their blood for power. It’s taught in deviant school that the guardians freely gave their blood to the deviants out of pity. However the high ranks of deviant society know that is only a fairytale.
The deviant to discover the use of guardian blood, Rumor, led a revolution against the horned beings and won. She was crowned the first queen of the deviants. They made a strict set of laws in the use of guardian blood, the biggest one being that only one member of the royal family was allowed to drink guardian blood to protect the people. That way, guardians will not be hunted to extinction and the deviants will not be burdened with magical inner fighting. The law worked out well, as only a ruler has enough resources to manage hunting a guardian. To hunt a guardian is to find a fleeing needle in an enchanted haystack.
The horned beings still troubled them on their borders and deviants soon learned that revolution for equality was not enough. They had to prove they were stronger. Rumor used a power that the royal family would become famous for: mind control, to push the horned beings back. However the mind control had it’s limitations and they made the horned beings more hostile than ever.
Many agree that it’s the war with the horned beings that made the deviants what they are today. Eventually Rumor decided her people won’t fight, and she will win the war with mind control alone. And she did. She turned an entire nation against itself.
What many do not agree on is why genocide became the deviants answer to settling a war. Some think that the horned beings struck Rumor on some emotional level and caused her to be unstable. Others say that guardian blood corrupts whoever drinks it to go insane. Whatever the reason, the deviants grew to believe that wars are not finished until every member of the opposing race perishes.
With the war won, the ruler got her first Arm.
The Arms of a deviant ruler is a mind controlled puppet that is used for protection of the deviant people. They are called “Arms” because they are seen as extensions of the ruler, so she can be in multiple places at once. The first arm was the princess of the horned beings, Red, taken as a living prize when the war was won to serve as a reminder of the victory.
Besides mind control, deviant rulers were miracle healers. They could heal any wound, mental or physical. However they only did this for their own people. They also created a rule where the ruler could not use mind control on other deviants without written consent. Through the generations of deviant rulers, they are groomed to obey these rules no matter what.
Hundreds of years after war with the horned beings was a war against shadows, the shapeshifting race of Awei. They were the opposite of the deviants, not set in rules or any directions. They did not even have a governing body or property, but that’s part of what started the war. They kept taking from deviant lands and shapeshifting to join their people. The rulers threatened war if they did not stop. However the shadows believed themselves invincible and did not stop. Thanks to mind-control, the deviants won yet again and wiped a spirit race off of Awei’s map and gained their second Arm.
Then came the more recent war with the winged beings. It was an emotional war, as a ruler, her husband, and baby son were murdered during a visit to the winged queens. The daughter, Aura, took over and like all deviants wars, won and gained another Arm.
Now the deviants are at war with the humans.