The Blaize came out of the same flood that made the pixies, and out of a hungrier part of it. When Ezz poured into the world, the feeling it carried did not all gather into thick, settled places. Some of it caught at the thin edges, in the spaces of want and lack, and what condensed there came into being already needing more than it had. A Blaize cannot make feeling of its own. It draws feeling off the people around it, the way a cold room draws heat off a body, and without that draw it weakens and fails. The need is the whole reason they exist, set in at the first moment, and it runs in a closed loop: a creature that visibly feeds on emotion unsettles people, and an unsettled person throws off exactly the fear and suspicion the Blaize feeds on. They are fed best by the reaction their own nature provokes.
They existed long before anyone thought to own them. When the western kingdoms learned what the Blaize were, they bred the ones they had caught, selecting down the generations for the single trait worth selling. A Blaize runs faster than anything on two legs. As bonded messengers and scouts they were worth a great deal, and were used as such, and worse. The race is free now in law, but the mark of that long servitude remains. Blaize are pathologically suggestible, barely able to refuse a direct command or a strong suggestion, and a people who feed on emotion and cannot say no make uneasy neighbors wherever they settle.
Feed them or fear them, it makes no difference to a Blaize. The fear is the meal. — a saying in the western free-towns
The speed is real and strange. A running Blaize moves its feet fast enough that the surface of water holds it like ground, and it can cross a river without sinking. Under threat or excitement its blue-tinged skin flickers harder, stuttering between one moment and the next until the eye cannot hold it, and a person who stares too long goes queasy trying.
Aspects
- Too fast to catch, too weak to resist
- I need your emotions to survive
Vitals
- Size: Medium
- Height: 5-6 feet
- Weight: 80-120 pounds
Game mechanics
Flicker Speed
Passive ability.
Your body exists in a state of constant motion, flickering between moments. Your movement speed increases by 40 feet. You can run across liquid surfaces as if they were solid ground, and you may continue moving on liquid for up to 10 feet after you stop moving before falling in.
Additionally, your flickering nature makes you difficult to pin down. You have advantage on saving throws against being restrained or grappled, and creatures have disadvantage on opportunity attacks against you.
Emotional Parasite
Passive ability. You sustain yourself on the ambient emotional energy of others. Once per day, you must feed on emotions in one of the following ways:
- Spend at least 1 hour within 30 feet of 5 or more people
- Remain within 30 feet of someone experiencing emotional extremes (fear, rage, grief, or ecstasy) for at least 10 minutes
- Make physical contact with a willing creature and share in their emotional state for 5 minutes, gaining one level of any mental condition they have (this feeds you but doesn't remove their condition)
If you fail to feed for a day, you gain one level of weakened and one level of mental vulnerability. For each additional day without feeding, both conditions increase by one level. These conditions are removed one hour after feeding.
Suggestible Nature
Passive ability.
You must make a CN 8 presence saving throw against any direct command or strong suggestion made to you. You may spend DP up to your highest aspect rank and add that to your roll. If you fail, you feel compelled to follow the suggestion for the next minute unless it would directly harm you.