The people on the shore were in a panic. Some were running away, others were running from further inland to the shore, and there was lots of gesticulating and shouting as my boat inched closer and closer to land.I slowly lowered the hands I had been waving. I had no choice but to come to shore—my rudder needed fixing, I needed new oars, and I needed supplies—but it seemed I was not going to be welcomed. The reason why was apparent as I started to catalog the differences between them and myself.None of these people were Bloodied.I couldn’t spot any names marring the bodies of these people, the legacy of kills which I had grown up thinking were just tribal tattoos. Perhaps some people did have them, and they were just hidden under the clothing these people were wearing, which I was pretty exited to see. The Uli I was familiar with barely wore anything, basically just loincloths and a few wraps, but here I spotted tunics and pants.Since I was just wearing a loincloth, my own list of those whose Blood resided within me was on full display. Even if I tried to hide it, though, the more Blood I gained, the more my skin took on the darker red tone that all the adult males of my tribe had, compared to the more orange hue the children and females had. All of these people were orange, even the adults, and it was even a slightly less vivid orange. More apricot or peach than carrot.There were other physical differences, too. We were definitely of the same clade, as they had an almost identical body shape; they were upright, bipedal with four arms, and when I squinted, I saw the same three fingers and one thumb per hand that I had. But, the fingers looked a bit more delicate, as was the case for the entire frame of these people.What wasn’t quite so similar was the faces. I felt like I was looking at a bunch of oversized children. Grown Uli had a large nose with wide nostrils, with a dark rhinarium, kind of like a bear. And, like bears, (...)