Firbolgs

Firbolgs
Firbolgs are an unusual race. Their origin is not linked to any God Elemental. Like Humans, Firbolgs do not seem to have a sub-set or separation in the race itself. It is not uncommon to see Firbolgs of completely contrasting appearances with children of again another completely different appearance. The Firbolgs are anthropromorphic animals in appearance; Harts, Hares, Moose, White-tailed Deer, Lions, Tigers, Badgers, Otters, Bears, Warthogs, Snow Leopards, and Foxes.

History
The Firbolgs are a conjured race. The Empyrean Elves are the cause of their appearance upon Orenda. During the "Elven-Dwarven-Aviarus Cataclysm War" the Elves discovered that they were woefully unprepared for war. Their "Force-Mastery" stood them in good stead at the beginning, but as the war progressed and the other Dwarves joined the Skyrider Dwarves in the war, the Elves discovered that their cousins would not help them. The Aviarus were of no assistance in mitigating the war themselves, as angry at the Elves as they were in commiseration about the invasion into what they believed to be their territory by the Skyrider Dwarves.

The Empyrean Elves discovered a number of breathtaking and horrifying new uses for "Force-Mastery" or magics. The most wide-spread discovery was the ability to hide some of their floating lands. The Empyrean Elves used one of these hidden floating islands as a magical laboratory. In this laboratory they did many experiments, this laboratory is where the Firbolgs were born. The "Grand Elves" designed staffs, armour, rings, necklaces, crowns, wands, swords, maces, and any number of weaponry and armament necessary to make war. The Firbolgs originally were planned to be a more robust servant race than the Humans, who the Empyrean Elves used in their experiments to create the race.

The "Grand Elves" believed some of the myths about Hauflins and Pookas stealing Human children to expand their race and surmised that this was done by the use of "Force-Mastery". The deduction was that they would "stunt the growth" of children and then induct them as Hauflins or using magics graft animals aspects into the children to augment the Pooka race. These deductions and presumptions were far from the truth, but this did not stop them from experimenting on the Humans that they captured and brough to their hidden laboratory.

The Empyrean Elves began with "prey" animals to create their servitors; Harts, Hares, Moose, White-tailed Deer, and Otters. They soon discovered that the servitors were nothing like the Pookas, more of the animal guise was present in their creations than what they knew to be apart of the Pookas. They found that while their new creations tended to be stronger, bigger, and more agile than Humans, they were not anymore intelligent or having any of the simple magics that the Fae Folk were believed to use. They did decide to go forward with their experiments and created even more servitors, this time using "predator" species; Lions, Tigers, Badgers, Otters, Bears, Warthogs, Snow Leopards, and Foxes. They were as satisfied as with these new specimens, as the earlier ones and converted all the rest of the Human children that they had to hand. The only thing left was to determine how long it would take them to mature, as they had used young children and animals for their experiments. The analyst put in charge of the experiment determined that it would be possible to escalate their growth rate, but not bring them to adulthood and have them be competent servants. A decision was made to bring them to ealry adolescence and spend a few years training them, before they were used as reinforcements.

The Empyrean Elven armies never received their new reinforcements. "Imagodai's Rage" ended the war years before the Firbolgs were ready, while the Empyrean Elves felt secure in their invisible floating laboratory, they began to feel isolated and feared being cut off entirely. At this point, the researchers and analysts abandoned the island taking all that was not nailed in place, leaving behind the Firbolgs to fend for themselves. Surprisingly, the enchantments that hid the island were something that the newly freed people were able to mimick accurately enough that they never failed. Unsurprisingly enough, the fear-induced departure by the Elves was the demise of those same Elves. The knowledge of the Firbolg experiment, how to find the island, what triggers were needed to lower the protections of the island, and what other experiments were being conducted on the island were lost. The knowledge was destroyed as the caravan crossed the new expanses between the hidden island and the Elven homelands.