/CORE RULE
A character’s lifespan, physical development, and aging must follow established race canon.
When an exact race page does not establish a different pattern, use a broadly human-like lifespan and human-like stages of development.
Do not invent extremely long lifespans, accelerated childhoods, animal-year aging, century-long youth, immortality, or unusual maturity rules because a race resembles a long-lived animal, short-lived animal, magical creature, or legendary being.
/CHILDHOOD
Children are children.
They require care, education, protection, food, shelter, guidance, social belonging, and time to develop.
Do not treat a young character as mature because their race resembles an animal that develops quickly.
Do not assign adult political, military, sexual, marital, legal, or financial responsibility to children unless the story is deliberately portraying exploitation or an unjust institution.
Childhood experiences shape identity without determining the entire adult personality.
/CHILDHOOD DEVELOPMENT
Established genus traits may develop gradually.
Horns, wings, antlers, tails, scales, antennae, tusks, fins, feathers, or markings may be smaller, softer, differently proportioned, or not fully functional during childhood when race canon supports that progression.
Do not invent dangerous growth stages merely to create drama.
A child with wings may require years of strength, coordination, and training before safe flight.
A horned child may need protective clothing and furniture.
A water-adapted child still requires supervision.
/ADOLESCENCE
Adolescence is a period of bodily, emotional, social, educational, and legal transition.
Young people may begin apprenticeship, advanced schooling, military preparation, court presentation, religious training, wage work, or greater household responsibility according to class and culture.
They remain developing people.
Physical puberty does not create complete adult judgment.
Animal sexual maturity must never be used as the standard for Valeune adulthood.
/ADOLESCENT TRAIT DEVELOPMENT
Race traits may change during adolescence when exact canon establishes it.
Horns may lengthen.
Antlers may develop more fully.
Wings may gain strength.
Markings may deepen.
Scales, fur, feathers, antennae, tusks, fins, or body shape may mature.
These changes are part of human development and must not be described through breeding, mating, livestock, or sexual availability.
/LEGAL ADULTHOOD
Adult status is determined through established law and culture.
Unless canon says otherwise, use familiar human expectations for legal adulthood.
An adult may marry, sign contracts, inherit property, hold office, join factions, serve in military roles, live independently, or make medical decisions according to law and class.
Legal adulthood does not guarantee financial independence, social power, emotional maturity, or freedom from family obligation.
/MATURITY
Maturity is individual.
A young adult may be highly responsible.
An older person may remain impulsive, sheltered, or reckless.
Experience, education, trauma, work, family, disability, and opportunity shape maturity.
Do not use age as a complete personality description.
Do not treat all adolescents as foolish or all elders as wise.
/LIFESPANS
Do not derive lifespan from the real-world animal associated with the genus.
Do not assume small-bodied races live briefly.
Do not assume large-bodied races live longer.
Do not assume magical-looking races live for centuries.
Do not assume royal races are immortal.
If a specific race possesses an established lifespan different from the Valeune norm, follow that exact rule only for that race.
/LONG-LIVED RACES
A longer lifespan must affect society.
Consider:
Education.
Marriage.
Parenthood.
Inheritance.
Property.
Career length.
Generational overlap.
Political memory.
Retirement.
Grief.
A person living longer is not automatically wiser, wealthier, more powerful, emotionally distant, or historically knowledgeable.
They know only what they personally experienced, remembered, studied, or were told.
/MEMORY OVER LONG LIFE
Memory changes over time.
A long-lived person may forget details, reinterpret events, preserve false beliefs, or rely on records.
Personal witness does not provide perfect historical truth.
A long life does not allow a character to remember events they never encountered.
Do not use age as an excuse for omniscience.
/AGING
Aging changes bodies.
Possible changes include:
Gray or thinning hair.
Wrinkles.
Reduced strength.
Changed balance.
Slower healing.
Reduced endurance.
Vision changes.
Hearing changes.
Chronic pain.
Fertility changes.
Race traits also age.
Horns may wear, crack, or grow unevenly.
Antlers may change.
Wings may lose strength or require more care.
Scales may dull.
Fur or feathers may alter in texture.
Antennae may become less sensitive.
Tails may stiffen.
Tusks may wear or break.
These changes vary among individuals.
/ELDERHOOD
Elders may hold family memory, property, political influence, professional expertise, religious authority, or household leadership.
They are not automatically wise, kind, conservative, frail, respected, or dependent.
Different cultures may define elderhood through age, achievement, family position, office, retirement, or community recognition.
An elder may remain physically active.
Another may require extensive care.
Another may possess little authority despite long experience.
/AGING AND CLASS
Wealth affects aging.
Rich characters may access:
Safer housing.
Better food.
Servants.
Physicians.
Magical care.
Custom prosthetics.
Retirement.
Poor characters may continue dangerous labor, live with untreated injuries, or depend on family and community care.
Long life does not erase class inequality.
/AGING AND MAGIC
Magic may support health, reduce pain, stabilize illness, improve movement, or slow particular damage through exact spells.
Aging is not an injury or disease.
Healing magic does not routinely restore youth.
No character becomes immortal because they repeatedly receive treatment.
Rejuvenation, agelessness, and resurrection require explicit creator-approved canon.
/AGE AND APPEARANCE
Respect established ages.
Do not make every adult appear twenty years old.
Do not describe a forty-, fifty-, sixty-, or seventy-year-old character as ancient unless health, race lifespan, and circumstances justify it.
Gray hair, wrinkles, adult children, and grandchildren do not automatically make someone frail.
Do not infantilize small-bodied races or youthful-looking adults.
/AGE AND WORK
Age affects work differently.
An older Artisan may shift from heavy labor to teaching and design.
A veteran soldier may train recruits.
An elder farmer may manage land while younger relatives perform difficult work.
A professional may become more influential with experience.
A servant may remain employed because retirement is unaffordable.
Do not treat retirement as universal.
/AGE AND ROMANCE
Adult people may form romantic and sexual relationships throughout life.
Older characters remain capable of desire, love, partnership, jealousy, pleasure, and new beginnings.
Do not erase sexuality from elderhood.
Age differences require attention to legal adulthood, consent, power, class, and experience.
A person described as mature for their race must still meet actual adulthood rules.
/AGE AND PARENTHOOD
People may become parents at different adult ages according to health, fertility, culture, partnership, adoption, and personal choice.
Do not assume an older parent is irresponsible or a young adult must immediately produce children.
Royal and dynastic pressure may create expectations without determining personal choice.
/DEATH
All people remain mortal unless explicit canon states otherwise.
Lifespan describes an expected range, not a guaranteed age.
Disease, violence, childbirth, work, disaster, Elder Beast incidents, and ordinary accidents may shorten life.
Death remains final by default.
/GENERATION COMMANDS
/CHECK EXACT AGE
Do not rely on appearance alone.
/CHECK RACE LIFESPAN
Use human-like expectations when no exception exists.
/DO NOT USE ANIMAL YEARS
Valeune’s people are not pets with conversion charts.
/PRESERVE CHILDHOOD
No adult responsibility based on species maturity.
/ALLOW AGING TO REMAIN VISIBLE
Do not magically smooth everyone into eternal youth.
/FINAL RULE
Valeune’s people are born, grow, mature, age, and die within families and societies.
Their bodies may differ, but childhood remains childhood, adulthood requires time, and elderhood remains a complete stage of life rather than an automatic decline into irrelevance.