Midnighters Trilogy - Darklings and Slithers

Darklings and Slithers

The darklings and slithers are ancient creatures that were once the dominant species on the planet. Darklings come in many shapes and forms, and have the power to change their physical form at will, whereas slithers are generally serpentine in nature. As humans began to grow in intelligence they hunted the darklings and slithers by exploiting their weakness to new concepts, such as mathematics and language (particularly the number "13" and words with 13 letters), light and heat, and new "technology". This technology consisted of anything crafted by humans. Stone spearheads were effective weapons against the Darklings, but as time progressed the Darklings adapted and grew immune to the effects of simpler technology. However humans continued to advance and began to forge weapons of other materials such as bronze and iron. As the balance of power began to shift in favour of humans, the Darklings created the Blue Hour to escape to by collapsing the twenty-fifth hour of the day.

At the time the novel begins, steel and other alloys, particularly newer and more advanced alloys, are the most common and effective tools used by Midnighters to combat darklings. The Midnighters use those things to defend themselves against the darklings. However, the metals they use must be untouched by darklings or slithers for them to be effective. To maximise the effectiveness of the Midnighters' weapons, they are often given names with 13 letters, or names with a number of letters equal to a multiple of 13, and are sometimes inscribed with certain patterns representing mathematical concepts. The names given to objects can only be used once, but the metal can be used several times, depending on how strong a darkling it was used against.