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- 08/21/2026
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Note: While authors are asked to place warnings on their stories for some moderated content, everyone has different thresholds, and it is your responsibility as a reader to avoid stories or stop reading if something bothers you.
Of Orcs, Humans & Void Beasts - 2. The Void, Void Beasts and their Rifts
excerpts from: The World We Live In. An Introductory Text for Younger Students.
by Karl-Friedrich of Bellinghill, Scholar of the Wilderness
edited and expanded by Samuel Johannsohn
The Void is nothingness, darkness—the counterpart to the Old Mother. It is not-being, but not death. The Void and the Old Mother have been fighting each other since the beginning of their existence, and ever since the Old Mother has been sleeping beneath the mountains, the children (or soldiers) of the Void have had an easier time of it.
Or so they say.
First of all, there’s disagreement over whether the void beasts are the children or the soldiers of the Void, but ultimately it’s irrelevant.
The void beasts have the body of a cat, but in terms of size, they range from that of a large sheep to an average cow; there seem to be variations. Their fur is black, adorned with violet and purple patterns, and glistens as if it were wet. They also have large, leathery wings similar to those of a bat, two to six horns on their heads, and a long spike on their long, slender tail.
The wings do not seem designed for flight in our world, but they do enable them to make long leaps.
Teeth, claws, horns, and spikes secrete a substance that is highly venomous to humans and centaurs; orcs, on the other hand, are largely immune to it. Even a small scratch is enough to trigger the void fever. This is characterized by a high fever and increasing apathy; it is said that the mind and soul are sucked into the void. The initial wound either heals poorly or not at all; it often becomes necrotic later on and, in many cases, secretes a dark, foul-smelling essence. Due to their apathy, those infected barely consume any fluids or food; if forced to do so, their suffering is often only prolonged.
If the infected person is kept alive in this manner, a cough often develops after several weeks, characterized by violent coughing fits and heavy mucus production, similar to the Yellow Cough. In this case, however, the sputum associated with the so-called void cough is black to violet, is often accompanied by nosebleeds, and the mucus is mildly toxic. By this point at the latest, the infected person should be put out of their misery, as they otherwise pose a danger.
In centaurs, the infection progresses without any notable differences; it is not known whether harpies, stone singers, or the nyx can also contract the disease.
Orcs who come into contact with the venom usually develop severe local inflammation, which is less commonly accompanied by a high fever. The wound usually heals with significant scarring, and some report that a kind of chronic pain persists.
Orcs with weaker blood—recognizable by their smaller stature and more human-like hair and eye color—suffer significantly more and can actually fall into a state of apathy, from which about half recover only partially or not at all.
Is there a cure? The common answer is no.
However, the orc healers have actually succeeded in creating a cure. While this fact isn’t exactly a secret, due to limited availability and a tight timeframe, it’s something that rarely leaves the mountain.
Or at least that’s the official version. Anyone who gathers rumors and whispers will learn that one of the ingredients can only be found high up in the mountains and loses a great deal of its potency when dried. Another ingredient is supposedly immoral, but the whispers about this are even more vague. The few humans who have had the chance to try the medicine, however, report a metallic taste.
One should therefore assume that no cure is available and protect oneself as best as possible.
So how do the void beasts reach Earth if the sun and moon protect us?
Well, no one can say what’s really going on up there, but the onslaught against the Old Mother’s most cherished treasure must be immense. We assume that the void beasts must get close enough to pass through a void rift.
Void rifts appear like green-violet candle flames, though they’re as tall as a man and float freely in the air. They are not stationary like a tree, but move sluggishly within a certain area. This area is too large to be meaningfully walled off with a fort’s courtyard, even if the idea seems tempting. When the rift opens, one can glimpse the absolute blackness of the Void on the other side before the void beasts pour out.
The void beasts appear only at night; it is not known whether sunlight harms them or at least causes them pain, but it is likely. The scent of the silver drop bushes is keeping them at bay, though experiments have shown that it's not causing them any detectable harm. When they die, their corpses transform into a thick slime under the sunlight, which slowly evaporates. Some claim that if the corpse lies close enough to a rift, one can observe the vapor or smoke drifting toward it.
Not all void rifts can be systematically monitored by a fort, but each fort still offers enough protection that nearby settlements thrive. In addition, void rifts have what is known as an energetic signature, which is constantly monitored by one or more shamans in the fort. This signature indicates the rift’s activity—that is, how regularly it opens and how many void beasts can pass through it.
The fort’s garrison is adjusted according to this activity to conserve strength and avoid wasting resources. If the energetic signature drops below a certain threshold, the rift is considered dormant. This state lasts for about one to two cycles—roughly eight to sixteen years—and is celebrated with a Festival of Life. This Festival of Life is essentially nothing more than a banquet to which people from the surrounding settlements are invited, followed by an orgy.
After the Festival of Life, the fort is also considered dormant, and only a minimal garrison remains behind. While service in such a fort promises light duty for some, for many it is a punishment and, often enough, an unspoken form of sidelining.
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Note: While authors are asked to place warnings on their stories for some moderated content, everyone has different thresholds, and it is your responsibility as a reader to avoid stories or stop reading if something bothers you.