Editing Nobledark Imperium Member States (section)

== Kinebrach ==

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The Kinebrach are a heavy-set, simian-like species of Xenos. Native to the Segmentum Pacificus, it is thought that many of the fortress worlds scattered around the segmentum were originally built by them. In many ways, Kinebrach appear very similar to Old Earth gorillas. Like gorillas, the Kinebrach are ape-like, have mostly herbivorous diets (though biologically speaking they are omnivorous, often moreso than gorillas), and prefer to live in humid swamps and jungles. Unlike gorillas, Kinebrach are bipedal and walk with their spines erect, though their extremely long arms (which extend below their knees) betray their tree-dwelling habits.
 
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Kinebrach have a tripartite jaw with well-developed grinding plates, which they use to grind vegetation and crush fruits and nuts. A deep slit between the two upper jaw plates contains the Kinebrach’s oral olfactory organ, which lies at the front of the roof of their mouth. Kinebrach will sometimes flare the two flaps of their upper “hare-lip” apart, to better smell an unfamiliar individual or object. A Kinebrach’s skin resembles a hippopotamus' or wild hog's — thick, dark blue-black skin covered by a thin layer of wiry-brown or russet fur.
 
The Kinebrach are most famous throughout the galaxy for their skill as metalworkers. Metalworkers occupy an almost legendary status in Kinebrach society, to the point that the Kinebrach are actually led by a Council of Warsmiths. To the Kinebrach, to be a decent leader you must also be a good blacksmith, as a good metalworker exhibits all the traits that must be present in a good leader. They must have vision, in order to be able to shape the metal to their liking. They must have patience, in order to be able to perfect their work into the form that they desire. And they must have strength of spirit, in order to endure the heat of the forge and the physical toil of hammering the metal into shape. Disputes between major Kinebrach political figures are often settled by forge-offs, with each party trying to forge a superior work to demonstrate the righteousness of their belief or grievance.
 
This obsession with metalworking even extends into the Kinebrach’s method for dealing with daemons. Like many sentient species, the Kinebrach have figured out that a daemon is bound to one place can be easily accounted for and thus cannot roam freely to corrupt others. As a race of metalworkers, it seemed natural to the Kinebrach to bind troublesome daemons within forged weapons, as opposed to ordinary objects or living beings. These cursed weapons, as the Kinebrach call them, are then sealed in such a way that none can access them or be tempted by the daemon sealed inside. Such cursed blades include Drach’nyen and the cursed blade stolen by Erebus during the chaos of the War of the Beast, which was later broken by the Dark Prophet and forged into the eight Anathame, the so-called “Splinters in the Eye of Reality” that plague the Imperium to this day.
 
There is some evidence to suggest that a number of Kinebrach have gone rogue and joined the Chaos-worshipping Davinite warrior lodges, bringing an unholy armory of cursed weapons with them. The Kinebrach are not happy to hear this news.
 
Kinebrach names are written as a series of hyphenated syllables and spoken in a steady cadence, almost like a drumbeat. This is apparent even in Kinebrach writing, where individual names are written in a distinctly different script than the words that surround them. This appears to be due to the modern Kinebrach writing style being resultant from a fusion of two previously distinct Kinebrach cultures many millennia ago. Although the Kinebrach seem like a monolithic culture now, evidently their customs and traditions were considerably more heterogenous before the Age of Strife.
 
Like all sentient life in the galaxy, the Kinebrach were hit hard by the Age of Strife. After the end of the Age of Strife and the birth of Slaanesh, the Kinebrach believed themselves to be a dying species. This fear was only magnified when they encountered their nearest neighbors, the Interex. Communications broke down between the two species soon after first contact, and the two empires went to war. This war would prove devastating to the Kinebrach, who feared that the conflict merely confirmed their imminent extinction. However, after about a century of conflict, the Kinebrach were contacted by diplomats from the Interex. The Interex claimed that the breakdown in communications was due to imperfect translation technology on the Interex’s part, and they had never wanted to exterminate the Kinebrach in the first place. The Interex thus wished to end the conflict, and proposed the following conditions; in exchange for a complete cessation of hostilities, the Kinebrach would become a protectorate of the Interex, providing the Interex with their advanced technology and metalworking in exchange for the Interex’s military protection, and the Kinebrach would demilitarize and be forbidden from raising armed forces of their own in perpetuity unless specifically levied by the Interex in times of war.
 
The Kinebrach, for their part, did not care. They had been more concerned about the survival of their species than their ability to bear arms. Indeed, despite being led by a Council of Warsmiths, the Kinebrach were a rather peaceable people and did not mind if another, more vibrant species went to war on their behalf. What’s more, the conflict had become so heated that some of the Council Warsmiths had almost been tempted to take up the cursed weapons out of desperation, something that the rest of the Kinebrach knew could have easily destroyed both civilizations. The Kinebrach were glad that such a worst-case scenario had not come to pass.
 
Like the Watchers in the Dark, the Kinebrach came under the aegis of the Imperium much earlier than other minor Xenos races, entering as a protectorate of the Interex. However, with the official admission of minor Xenos races into the Imperium in M36, the Kinebrach became an officially recognized independent member state of the Imperium, albeit one with close political and economic ties to the Interex.
 
Today, the Kinebrach are highly respected throughout the Imperium for their ability as metalworkers, representing one of the Imperium’s few non-Adeptus Mechanicus sources of technology, along with squats and Earth Caste Tau. However, unlike the Adeptus Mechanicus, the Kinebrach are first and foremost artisans and metallurgists, rather than manufacturers; the Kinebrach are more interested in making new alloys and crafting new masterpieces than in mass-production. Although the Kinebrach have the knowledge to build starships, most find the intricacies of large-scale machines less interesting. Your average Kinebrach would be more interested in a wall made of rare, high-quality, or particularly well-crafted metal than a highly-complex machine.

Given their similarities, many have wondered if the Kinebrach are somehow related to the [[Jokaero]], another simian-like race with an affinity for crafting and technology. Some have even gone so far as to suggest that the Jokaero are a subspecies derived from the long-lost descendants of the Kinebrach that existed outside the Segmentum Pacificus. However, genetic testing has shown that the Kinebrach and Jokaero are two completely unrelated species, and their ape-like similarities evolved completely independently — a galactic-scale example of convergent evolution. When asked about this, the Kinebrach replied that they had once wondered the same thing regarding Eldar and humanity.

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=== Kinebrach Blades ===

The Kinebrach’s main contributions to the Imperium, and its long war against [[Chaos]], are not the soldiers they send to the front lines — although the Kinebrach can be quite physically formidable when pressed, by weight of numbers they are insignificant on their own — but rather the weapons they can forge; specifically, it is Kinebrach blades that the Imperium craves from them.

The Kinebrach have tendency to put a great deal of themselves into their work — and the description is not entirely figurative. The Kinebrach as a species are all latent psykers, but their ability is limited to what they can do with crafting and metalwork. [[Dwarfs_(Warhammer_Fantasy)#Runesmithing |In some ways this is a good thing, as it allows for the expression of psychic abilities in a more stable, controlled fashion, and if a daemon does possess a Kinebrach what the daemon can do with its host is limited.]]

There is a lot of ceremony and ritual to the forging of a blade, but a master Kinebrach smith can beat a blade to contain parts of their very self — their hate, their anger, their sorrow — and the finished blade will carry a portion of its maker's soul as power, hungering for war and vengeance on their behalf. The Inquisition is always willing to pay vast sums for a genuine Kinebrach work, as such swords make for unrivalled weapons in vanquishing daemons; even for all their Chaos god-granted power, a daemon skewered with a Kinebrach blade will suffer for it.

But there is a price.

Strands of fate twist through the metal, binding the blades' destinies to war and bloodshed — and its wielder bound along with it. Even an inanimate object has a minuscule reflection in the Warp, and Kinebrach blades take this to extremes; the histories that empower the blades are impressed upon the present in turn — a vicious cycle of fighting and death. This makes little difference in the Dark Millennium, for all who wield one of these blades are already on the warpath. Perhaps, in some distant future, the powers of the Kinebrach blades will be regarded as curses rather than blessings. For now, though, there is the war.