Caulborn
Creature 7Telepathic prophets and historians, caulborn gather in small cabals for protection and camaraderie, using their collective brainpower to unravel cosmic conundrums. Once they've exhausted an area's secrets, they depart, seeking new homes hidden within cities, sequestering themselves within caves, or lurking in forgotten corners of the planes. From the moment an ioton absorbs especially profound thoughts and begins taking on the permanent form of a young caulborn, these ennosites' genius and toughness grow with each new discovery. Absorbing such information destabilizes their corporeal form, like when books are stacked too high, so excess knowledge seeps from a caulborn's body, causing a literal brain drain that caulborn find incredibly vexing. To avoid this occurrence, caulborn must feed on others' psychic energy to maintain themselves, which is usually a harmless process. Especially hungry caulborn even abduct prey.
Despite their need to feed, caulborn rarely care to interact with other creatures, especially beings that could react to their appearance with fear or hostility. They occasionally make exceptions for accomplished scholars or storied travelers, however, bartering their own lore for outside secrets.
The Astral Plane is a planar nexus, connecting the planes of the Inner Sphere to those of the Outer Sphere, a realm of timeless silver substance charged with mental essence drawn from throughout the Great Beyond. Most creatures on the Astral Plane are visitors-predators seeking to poach from the River of Souls, psychopomps guarding against such incursions, and aeons monitoring the flow of raw quintessence through the Antipode. Yet, this plane has spawned creatures native to its strange currents and eddies, foremost of which is the family of thought-spawned creatures known as ennosites.
An ennosite's form physically embodies of its thought and purpose. As some ideals and goals are shared, so are certain forms.