Kravopayonk

The kravopayonk are a spider-like people who inhabit the dark forests of the world of Rushil. They evolved from smaller, social spider-like creatures of their world, their arthropoda ancestors evolving from quasi-social, to eusociality, and, through the growing behaviours of tool-use and eating of cooked grain and meat, into truly sapient creatures, their bodies growing, and with them, their brains, even as their chitin thinned to accommodate their larger size.

Eventually, the arthropoda ancestors of the kravopayonk became less large spiders and more spider-like people. Their upper arm pairs began to fuse into a single, stronger, six-fingered pair. Their abdomens shortened and shrank, and their thoraxes elongated, giving them a more humanoid profile.

Biology
Kravopayonk have what is essentially a humanoid torso atop a splay of four legs, with a small, round abdomen protruding behind them. Unlike the true spiders of Earth, kravopayonk can produce silk from both their abdomens and small spinnerets on the undersides of their wrists, although the silk from their abdomens is generally more suitable for long lines, while that from their wrists tends to be produced with more force, in larger globs rather than lines.

Kravopayonk faces are largely humanoid, but lack any real external nose or ears. They instead smell through their mouths, and have small ear holes a bit further back than other humanoids. The pedipalps of their arthropoda ancestors have evolved to be held up and back when at rest, and thus greatly resemble long pointed ears at a glance, but when examined more closely, can be seen to be thick and jointed and tipped with sharp claws. Kravopayonk have eight eyes, four on each half of the forehead, with the central most eye of each grouping being large and more humanoid, but they, as a species, tend towards nearsightedness just as their arthropoda ancestors.

The most dramatic departure from humanoid facial anatomy, however, is their retention of spider chelicera, though they close very tightly and can be mistaken on first glance as a chin with a thick line down the middle and two points on the tip. Indeed, when they speak, their chelicera do move much as other humanoids’ chins do, but when eating or expressing anger or frightfulness, the chelicera will spread wide, showing the maxilla and throat below.

Kravopayonk flesh is thick and leathery, somewhere between chitin and skin, more flexible than the former but tougher than the latter. A thin, shiny layer of keratin grows over this flesh, looking much like the chitinous shells of spiders, and about as thick, which is to say, not very on a humanoid scale. Their coloration is nearly always dramatic, with stark contrasts between base and spots, stripes, and smears. Their eyes are frequently a fairly dark color with flecks of a lighter color, such as red flecks on black eyes, or gold flecks on midnight blue. They are largely hairless compared to spiders, but do commonly have sparse hairs on their limbs, which play a role in their tactile senses (especially in sensing vibration), and they grow hair on their crowns, much like other humanoids, and will style it exactly the same as others do, for practicality, ornamentation, or both.

Reproductive Biology
The Kravopayonk are monecious, each individual possessing both ovum and sperm producing organs. These organs are primarily internal, with only the very edges of the tarsi of their phallipalps visible on the undersides of their abdomens. These phallipalps are very short and thin modified legs that originally were simply limbs that placed and picked up sperm-laden globs of webbing in their arthropoda ancestors, and are now specialized sex organs in the modern quasi-humanoid kravopayonk, which broadly function similarly to those of male-sex humanoids.

Culture
Kravopayonk culture is strongly socialist and anarchist. They eschew both hierarchy and the concept of private property (though not personal property), focusing on communal contribution, benefit, and governance; working, defending, and making decisions for their communes together and as a whole. A kravopayonk is generally considered to be more or less mature when they molt their larval shell and begin to grow their adult skin. Most kravopayonk are mentally capable to understand broad concepts and make fairly informed decisions by the time their adult skin has fully toughened, and they are allowed, with approval from a majority of the commune, to take part in decision making. They’re not forced to, but the willingness to at least be a part of and listen to the process is considered a mark of maturity on its own in kravopayonk society.

To ease conflicts between the interests of the commune and outsiders, kravopayonk culture sees relationships as a sort of series of concentric and overlapping rings, often visualised as the sections of a web between viscid threads (the spiraling line which connects the threads which radiate from the center). A kravopayonk sees themselves as the center of their web, those they are most familiar and intimate with as the first set of viscid threads, their cluster (ess. neighbourhood) as the next, and so on. Family is not a meaningless term to kravopayonk, but it is seen as something of a meaningless distinction. Kravopayonk maintain large larval rookeries, where all the eggs of a colony are guarded and cared for, with all young that hatch considered to be children and siblings of the entire colony. Kravopayonk attempt to aid those who are outside of the commune as best they can, but will defend the interests of the commune above those of outsiders. They are cooperative and compassionate--not pushovers.

Kravopayonk, as a result of their socialist and anarchist philosophy, are strongly cooperative, in a manner that appears to outsiders as being extremely theft-prone. A kravopayonk is very likely to pick up the nearest tool or weapon not in use by another when they need one, which looks a lot like blatant, shameless theft to others, but in reality is just their society’s rules for use of common goods. More personal or intimate items, including personalized weapons, clothing, books and grooming items, are either always asked for before use or would never be thought of as available to such common, casual use by kravopayonks. A kravopayonk will wordlessly pick up an unused mundane sword or sewing kit if they need one, but will ask the owner before using an obviously special (magical, ornamented, or heirloom) sword, or book. Kravopayonk society does not use money internally, only when dealing with outsiders. Money is essentially useless within kravopayonk society, and thus any money an individual, or the commune, might have is considered personal property for use with the less enlightened outside world. Money held by communes is considered to be a communal good to be used with outsiders for the benefit of the colony.

Facial Glyphs
A lot of humanoids who have interaction with kravopayonk believe that every kravopayonk knows every other, because they unfailingly call them by name.

In truth, kravopayonks have their names inscribed over their left eye-cluster upon maturation of their adult shell. Kravopayonk society is very opposed to the idea of anonymity, because it can so frequently be used to exploit others. They understand privacy, of course, but believe that at least being able to describe and give the name of those they deal with is a basic protection against being taken advantage of.

Gender, Love and Commitment Among the Kravopayonk
The Kravopayonk are a single-sex species, all members are monecious, and any two can produce children. Even a single Kravopayonk can produce children, but this is seldom done, because it introduces vulnerabilities to disease into a community (ie, if a kravopayonk were to create a commune on their own, and give birth to a generation of children solely on their own, the commune would not have the necessary genetic diversity to withstand disease).

This is not to say they do not have gender, but their genders don't have any basis on biology as other humanoid species tend to believe gender to be based upon. Among the kravopayonk, gender is purely a matter of expression (which is true for gender for all species, but a lot of species don't like to be told that). Though, a lot of other species seem to believe that kravopayonk are all women, because kravopayonk fashion tends to align with what humans consider feminine aesthetics. Kravopayonk are by nature polyamourous. In fact, couples are rare among the kravopayonk, with relationships of three or more kravopayonk (called quite naturally a web) being far more common, and kravopayonk in multiple relationships that may not connect except through them (ie, two webs that join at a single kravopayonk in both), or which have multiple points of connection while still being separate, being slightly less common.

Commitment among kravopayonk is a thing taken with great seriousness, and there are almost no couples who are "wed" (at least by kravopayonk society, some kravopayonk couples will marry under the cultures, especially those living in those cultures), and it's more common for webs to live together without formalizing their commitment, with pretty much only webs solely comprised of people who have been in multiple previous webs deciding to do so.

A kravopayonk commitment ceremony is open to the whole community, and involves the members of a web spinning a web together with dyed threads, which then is laid over their home, signalling to the commune that they are formally committed to one another. Divorce is as simple as taking that web down and each member consuming their own line from it.

The Matryaytso
All kravopayonk communes are formed around a bundle of shining webbing wrapped around a single large egg, plucked from the cosmic web. It is the spiritual center of a kravopayonk commune, where the community meets to make decisions, where the larval rookery is (dug beneath the matryaytso), and where the crypt-web is hung (above the matryaytso).

Kravopayonk Funerary Practices
The kravopayonk believe that all life and existence is interconnected in a great cosmic web, all dependent on all. As such, when a kravopayonk dies, their head is alchemically preserved and hung in the commune's crypt-web, while their body is placed in the larval rookery, interred in webbing, to be the first meal of newly hatched kravopayonk, returning the strength they gained from the commune to its next generation.

A kravopayonk will bequeath any personal belongings of particular meaning to individuals, while the rest, mostly common and unremarkable items, are given over for those who have need to claim. Occasionally, particularly personal items with great meaning, such as any tokens given to them as emblems of personal achievement or honors, will be placed inside the preserved head of the kravopayonk.

Once a corpse is cleaned of flesh and only a skeleton remains, it is retrieved from the rookery to be animated as part of the commune's labor force, giving even the bones of the individual back to the commune that nurtured them.

Kravopayonk Communes
Kravopayonk communes are at once familiar and alien to other humanoids. They live in large forest villages, huts scattered about rising from the ground or suspended in trees, as people bustle about on their own business.

However, where other humanoids make their buildings from wood or stone, kravopayonk architecture exclusively makes use of alchemically treated webbing woven together like glistening strands of cable, giving their huts the appearance of great cocoons or bowers. Each hut is connected in a vast network of web, creating a sophisticated mass-alert system through vibration, allowing the entire commune to know of an assault almost immediately.

Another closer glimpse shows that almost all work is performed by animate skeletons, a mass of webbing filling their ribs and mounding slightly above their shoulders, with no head to be seen. All commune-benefiting work and simple, mass labor, such as laundry, is performed by these skeletons, while individual kravopayonk mostly only perform labor for their personal needs, such as building their own huts or cooking personal meals. A commune holds communal meals at regular times for all who wish to partake, and regularly host travelers who have been lost in the woods, waylaid by bandits, or simply want company and happened upon a commune. Kravopayonk are not required to take part in these meals, they are there for those who want them, and if a kravopayonk wishes to dine on their own, that's alright too.

Babcia Yedzja
Babcia Yedzja (ess. Grandmother Fury) is a quasi mythical figure of kravopayonk society who exists to enforce the social contract of their society when even enlightened self interest is not enough. Those kravopayonk won would rather horde public and communal goods for themselves, who would enslave and prey upon their siblings, are threatened with Babcia Yedzja, a grotesque crone of a kravopayonk who lives in an immense fowl mummified in webbing and animated with necromancy, its eyes burning with baleful fire and wings hanging ragged and skeletonized.

The Yedzjatyri
Yedzjatyri are essentially a piratic religious order, who, under the auspice of Babcia Yedzja, hunt those who would betray or assail kravopayonk communes, stealing from or enslaving them. They employ stealth, sabotage, and outright assassination to protect their communes, the kravopayonk people as a whole, and exploited people in general.