The Divided Grifix Camp

✦✦DESCRIPTION

The Divided Grifix are a subspecies of the grifix that live in the Ghastly Gorge near the Everfree Forest. They first settled there around the time the Forgotten Queen was crowned, and their presence caused a lot of disturbances during her reign. However, with time they completely lost touch with the grifix Village and now the Village doesn’t know anything about their existence.

Back in the days before the two alicorn sisters, there were six unicorns (those that trapped Arka): one of them was Starswirl and another was Enchanted Waters, but this story is about another one, Andromeda. Still, the story starts somewhere after the birth of the two sisters, little after the defeat of Discord and Cosmos. The Grifix had just settled in the Everfree Forest back then. This unicorn I’m talking about was a sorcerer who was fascinated by all sorts of magic, predominantly other creatures’ magic. They spent their life studying magic that unicorns could not perform, trying to find a way to be able to perform it. Magic was the only thing they lived for, and nothing else mattered. They even found a spell to stay young, agains their advanced age.

One time, they met the Grifix and due to their magic knowledge they were able to see and interact with them. They even befriended a grifix female, named Milky Way. Fascinated by the grifix’s magic, they asked that grifix to help them with study, and so they spent a lot of time together. Not long after that, Milky Way fell in love with the unicorn, and thought the unicorn was in love with her too. One day, she sighed:

“If only we were of the same species, and could have a baby together…”

The unicorn was struck by the idea: that would have been the peak of grifix magic understanding. All species breeded the same way, but the Grifix breeded through magic: could they manage to find a spell to make their magic compatible with the Grifix magic, and create a functional egg?

The idea became to obsess them. They spent days and nights trying to find a way. The only thing that did to the Grifix was make her even more convinced that the unicorn loved her. And she started loving the unicorn more and more. She was convinced that the unicorn did that for her. And if they made all that effort for her… it meant that she was the only thing Andromeda cared for.

One day, the unicorn came to the Grifix with a spell. It seemed to be all perfect. The magic looked exactly like the grifix’s, and so they managed to form a perfect, seemingly healthy egg. The Grifix was overjoyed, and her love for the unicorn grew even bigger. There was no doubt that the unicorn loved her more than anything in the world - she thought.

But her joy was soon to be crushed, as the egg hatched. The baby inside it was deformed, hardly resembling the traits of a grifix. It was sick and his gems were cracked. The Grifix stared in shock at her baby, hugging it desperately.

But the unicorn looked at it emotionlessly.

“What could’ve gone wrong… well… I guess not all experiments come out perfect from the first try. I’ll have to review the spell, we’ll try again later.”

The grifix’s eyes emptied as she heard those words. The whole world around her was crushed.

“E… experiments?” She whispered, waiting for a comforting answer from the unicorn, but the unicorn just walked away, sunk in their thoughts, without hearing a thing.

That night, the Grifix left the pony settlement, returning to the Grifix village, the first time after a couple years in which she lived with the unicorn. She realized that there was no love in the unicorn’s heart. They had no heart. They never cared for her. She, as well as her baby, were nothing but experiments for the unicorn.

Back in the village, she raised her baby alone. She could never love again, after the way she’d been crushed. The baby grew up pretty stable, his life was not threatened by his condition. But his sphirix was divided, and his soul was unstable. All grifix feared him, and the parents didn’t let their children play with him. He was always bullied. His mother didn’t offer him any support, for she was too broken for that. She was clingy and obsessed with him. She only did him more bad with her sickening obsessions.

When he grew up, a sweet grifix female fell in love with him. And the two had a baby, but the baby was the same as his father. Their family was always outcast and rejected by the other grifix, and he felt sorry for his wife, for she was perfect and had nothing to do with them. She didn’t want her to be bullied because of him and his broken child. But she loved him and their child regardless of everything. Hoping it would work out, she asked for another child, and this time it was a girl. At the beginning the baby seemed fine, but she soon turned out to be in a worse condition than her father and brother. She had branches growing out of her eyes and was completely blind. She was in endless pain all of the time. When she reached the age of twelve, she killed herself. Her father soon couldn’t take it anymore - having the Grifix he cared for suffered so much because of him, giving birth to broken children that would suffer all of their lives, it was all his fault. One night, he took his son and left. He hoped that his wife could live a normal life without them. He and his son headed south west, trying to leave the forest.

But when his wife woke up without him, and she realized what had happened, she ran after them. She caught up to them in Ghastly Gorge, and when she saw them she started running. But the cliff she stood on broke, and she fell. In the fall she hit her wing, and couldn’t stop falling. She crashed to the bottom of the gorge and died. Desperate, the father and son jumped after her, but they couldn’t do anything. The two of them settled their camp there, mourning the death of their beloved one. He planned to leave at some point, but his heart couldn’t take it so they remained there by the grave of his wife. And there is where the next generations remained, and still live up till now.

The place was near a cave, which was full of blue crystals. The ponies couldn’t reach there due to the dangerous wildlife surrounding the Gorge, but the place seemed safe for them. They buried the Mother in front of the cave, and started living inside. The Father told his son to not go back to the village for if someone would fall in love with him they would all suffer, cause he could only bring misfortune. Still, the son went back after the death of his father and found a lover, but they went to live in the cave after being outcast by the other grifix. Their kids found lovers in the village too, and it was like that for a few generations, before they started losing touch with the Village and eventually being completely separated.

✦✦TRAITS

What differs the divided grifix from the normal grifix is that they are extremely unstable. What does this instability consist of? Well, basically, when Andromeda and Mikky Way made the egg, Andromeda’s pony genes mixed with the Grifix ones and being incompatible, the two types of genes constantly crash, making the body, magic and mind unstable. The instability differs from grifix to grifix, but it mostly causes crises now and then. Those crises threaten the life of the Grifix dangerously. Physical crises manifest through strong accesses of pain that can be caused by even the smallest thing, such as tripping on a rock. Magical crises are strong magic oscillations that can crack the gems or cause magic leaks through the corrupted areas. They also cause strong pain. The mental crises are mostly similar to panic attacks. Strong crises can cause permanent damage in their bodies and sphirix, and as a result, on their mind.

Due to the chaos going on in their bodies, these grifix can have some really strange traits, such as crystals growing on their bodies, horns and other stuff.

✦✦HIERARCHY

✦✦Camp-Chief

Currently Ice.

On top of the Divided Grifix Camp's hierarchy is the Camp Chief, which is a grifix chosen from the most stable ones by the rest of the grifix. 

✦✦the second

Currently Growl.

He is the helper of the Chief, being the second most stable in the camp. Can take on any of the chief's responsibilities if needed.

✦✦the prophet

There is a strange grifix living deep in the in the Divided Grifix Camp. Grifix normally don't walk that far into the cave, so they don't interract with him. They sometimes bring him food but he seems uninterested in it. He doesn't seem to need that food to survive. They call him the Prophet, but truth is he never gave any prophecies or anything. In fact, he never talks. He is blind, but seems to be able to see sphirix. The Divided grifix bring their new hatched babies to him, and he names their sphirix by writing the name on the ground with a stick.

✦✦stable grifix

They mostly do anything that needs to be done, from taking care of the sick and organizing, to hunting and fighting if needed.

✦✦preychasers

Grifix that are relatively stable physically and can run around chasing prey and gather plants from high places. 

Usually the Second of the Camp assigns patrols every morning, sending a group of preychasers to hunt and naming the patrol leader. Usually all patrols contain at least one Stable Grifix so he can run back in case of emergency and get help.

✦✦helpers

Grifix that are relatively stable mentally. They help take care of the sick grifix and do chores around the camp. They have small amounts of medicine and herbs knowledge. 

They are provided with medicinal plants by the Preychasers patrols. If needed to find a more special plant, a preychaser patrol is organized to accompay them to find the plant, but usualy preychasers can recognize and gather plants by themselves when on hunting patrols.

✦✦the forsaken

They are grifix that are too sick to move around much and do work. Most of them lie around in the cave all of the time. They are always taken care of. Most of them die soon, but they are never abandoned for being “useless”. Any grifix from the camp can one day have a bad crisis and end up like them.

Most of them aren't born like this, they just end up in that condition after a bad crisis. Some, however, have been like this all of their life.

✦✦HISTORY

There are still things yet to be uncovered about them, so stay tuned!

✦✦CULTURE

The Camp Grifix, unlike the other two grifix settlements, don’t have a strong relation with the divinity. Even though they worship gods, there is no communication with them. That is because none of their ancestors were healers, they didn’t pass down any traditions. Also, the camp grifix’s sphirix have mostly a fixed shape from birth. They may change shape, but only on very rare occasions during their lives, which depend on radical changes in their life. A normal grifix will have the same sphirix shape from the day they were born until the day they die, therefore they never needed the sphirix shape ceremony.

Their religion is centered around gods, unlike the other Grifix societies that have religions centered around their ancestors. The Camp Grifix’s gods are based on their ancestors, but they are not related to their souls. They are personas built on top of their ancestors’ characters. The two main gods are Milky Way and Mother (or Nebula, but they usually call her Mother). Milky Way is the goddess of life, and Mother is the goddess of death. Mother is the main goddess. Due to the camp grifix living a miserable life, they see death in a bright light. They do enjoy their life, they live to love and enjoy every moment, but all to one day meet the sweet end and reunite with Mother. It’s a bittersweet way of living, but it gets them through it and they may actually enjoy life more than other species.

Their camp is built around the Mother’s grave, which they worship. The Cave behind the grave is a place mostly used for the sick, because it is colder and calms them. The other Grifix mostly live in poorly built tents outside of the cave.

The residents are split between the more stable mentally and the more stable physically. The more stable mentally ones spend most of their time in the camp, taking care of those that are sick. They could be called healers, but they are far from what the healers in the Village and Tribe are. The more stable physically spend their time hunting and collecting materials for the camp or herbs. There are also those who are stable in both ways, but they are very few and they usually do any work that needs to be done. The most stable of all is named chief of the camp. Currently the chief is Ice.

Their names are mostly formed out of a single word, such as Ice, Growl, Wolf, Bear, Thunder etc. The names of the sphirix are slightly more complicated, due to the fact that a divided grifix may have more than one sphirix (it is one sphirix formed of more animals).

There is a strange grifix living deep in the in the Divided Grifix Camp. Grifix normally don't walk that far into the cave, so they don't interract with him. They sometimes bring him food but he seems uninterested in it. He doesn't seem to need that food to survive. They call him the Prophet, but truth is he never gave any prophecies or anything. In fact, he never talks. He is blind, but seems to be able to see sphirix. The Divided grifix bring their new hatched babies to him, and he names their sphirix by writing the name on the ground with a stick.

Now you may think that since they live in so much suffering they’d be pretty sad and depressed, but it’s not really like that. It’s the hardships in their life that make them enjoy every moment. The danger of their life ending at any moment leaves them no room for sadness. They’re just happy to live and be with each other, trying to help each other when in need.

✦✦The camp's appearance

The Camp is mostly a round area, surrounded by tall cliffs. Some areas are climbable, allowing the grifix to go up the cliffs (reminder that a lot of divided Grifix don’t have wings, so they aren’t all capable of flying). On one side, the cliffs don’t close, leaving a part where they can easily walk out. On the opposite side, there’s a cave. The cave entrance goes somehow laterally, and it’s not very big. Exactly opposite of the cliff opening there is Nebula’s tombstone, close to the cave entrance, small colorful flag garlands hanging over it. From the cave there is a small spring flowing out. It’s really small, you can easily step over it and it doesn’t even have to be a big step. It flows from the cave out the wall opening, cutting the camp in two. It’s a good source of water, and it flows throughout the year, rarely ever drying out. The spring was probably once a biggerwater flow that carved out the cave and the camp's area. On the walls of the cave there are cave paintings, done by Grifix throughout the ages. Most of them are paintings of Mother, but there are also paintings of Milky Way, Andromeda, Thunder and sometimes Wolf. Mother is portrayed as the main goddess, of death, Milky Way the secondary goddess, of life. Andromeda is the main antagonist of their mythology, but Milky Way is also often portrayed as a negative character. Thunder is a secondary goddess, her persona being connected to the tree of the universe, being somehow a goddess of faith and destiny, but that doesn’t play a very big role in their culture. Wolf is pretty forgotten in their mythology. He does exist, but his persona is mainly ignored and rarely drawn on the walls. All the stories and paintings originated from Wolf, who decided to paint images of Nebula on the cave walls, and then his son, who decided to paint all his family. However, the stories got altered with the generations, even forgotten sometimes. The Grifix tried to come up with an explanation for the images, so they godified the characters in the pictures, thus creating their own mythology.

PS: there are also crystals deeper in the cave!

✦✦RELATION WITH OTHER SETTLEMENTS

✦ The Everfree Village - the Camp knows of their existence, but they haven’t interacted for over one thousand years, though there is no particular reason for that.

✦ The City of Thicket - they don’t interact, but the Camp grifix probably do know of its existence.

✦ The Lost Tribe - the Camp grifix know nothing of it

✦ Ponyville and other pony settlements - they don’t interact with them