One of the major races in the Milky Way Galaxy, the Octopoids are also known as "Liars" since they lie about big things, like where they come from, what they believe, even the nature of the universe – you don’t ask a Liar to talk philosophy. And they’ll lie about insignificant things, like where they were yesterday, or who their friends are, or which way the bathroom is – you don’t ask a Liar for directions, either. But they like to talk about technology, and they like to tinker, and they like making deals, and they don’t usually lie about that. If you offer them something, in exchange for something else, and you make really sure the thing they’re selling you does what they claim, most of the time it works out all right.
They say the lies are translation errors, or that we talked to heretics from a doomsday religion, or that our ambassadors are mentally ill pathological liars, or that our feeble human minds can’t comprehend their truths, or that we must have followed their directions incorrectly, or that reality is a glitched simulation. A Liar will tell you the sky on Earth is green, and when you object, he’ll explain that humans just have inferior color receptors. They’re absolutely unflappable and endlessly adaptable and totally infuriating and they’ve driven generations of xenopsychologists to the brink of madness.”
They’re never violent – if trading fails, and deception fails, they shrug and move on. They seem to believe the universe is plenty big, so it’s stupid to fight over resources when they can trade for them or look elsewhere instead. Also, to be frank, we can’t offer them too much beyond raw materials, since every Liar group we’ve met is far more technologically advanced than we are. The Liars mostly settle on planets we don’t want anyway, ones with atmospheres that are a toxic soup to most species – their tendency to do body modification makes them wildly adaptable. Some live on our planets and moons and space stations, often working as technicians and engineers. It makes sense – half the technology we use came from Liars in the first place. We pay them hourly, though, and never up front. They’re unreliable as a rule, but their knowledge is an asset. They do have to be watched, though. If left to their own devices, they like to...tinker.
The Liars can generate wormholes, create artificial gravity, disassemble planets into raw materials, control inertia, and manipulate minds. Liars also live centuries, but not millennia, as far as we know. Though their ability to share memories with their offspring does let them take a long view of things.
Unlike humans, when Octopoids are born, they don’t have a long period of helplessness. They come out of birthing-pods nearly two-thirds of their adult size (barring post-birth alterations), and since Octopoids are capable of passing on collective memories, once the new borns (the kindlings) are fed the right neural buds, they know things – like how to feed themselves, sure, but also the history of the Octopoid people.