Peoples, Lineages and Species
Last updated: August 21, 2026
Who exists in this Universe is answered by several distinct record types, and the distinctions are not decorative. Lineages and bloodlines trace descent. Ancestrals stand at the origin of those lines. Species and creature species classify forms of life. Classes, traits and abilities describe what a being is capable of and how that capability is categorised. The bestiary covers creatures encountered rather than peoples described, and the Primordial Compass organises the whole against the cosmological frame.
Why the split matters when reading
A single character can appear in four of those categories at once — as a member of a lineage, an instance of a species, a holder of a class and a bearer of specific traits. Lore discussions go astray when one of those facets is treated as the whole. "Descended from" is a lineage claim; "capable of" is a trait claim; the two are argued from different records and can be true simultaneously without either implying the other.
Finding a people
Start from the category index rather than a search box when you know the kind of thing you are looking for; start from the search when you have a name and no idea what kind of record it is. The Scroll of the Eternals and the Tome of Echoes are the curated volumes that read across peoples and their echoes rather than listing them by category.
Bestiary records and species records overlap but are not interchangeable: the bestiary is written from the perspective of encounter, which means it carries information a taxonomic entry deliberately leaves out.
Official source
Canonical source for this subject: the Codex category index. Checked 21 August 2026 — where this guide and the live service disagree, the service is right.
Related reading
- Peoples, Bestiary and Character Sources — The Codex categories that hold lineages, species, creatures and named individuals.
- Characters and the Wall of Echoes — Exploring character profiles through the Wall of Echoes without duplicating their records.
- Factions, Orders and Institutions — A map of the groups, orders and civic bodies that organise Xdripian society.