Hant of the Mere-Beast

    “So child, what story do you wish to hear this night?” the elderly grandfather asked the boy on his lap.

    The young boy scrunched his nose as he thought. After a moment, his eyes lit up as he thought of the story he wanted to hear, “The one with the swamp horse!”

    The content smile drained from the grandfather’s face as he asked, “Now who told you about that story?”

    “Balli was chasing Echi saying that the swamp horse would get her, and you know all the stories grandpa so I knew that you would know it!”

    “I’ll need to have a word with your brother about saying such things to your sister,” the grandfather muttered to himself before sighing. With a bittersweet smile, he looked to his grandson and said, “Well, since you are now ten I suppose that you are old enough to hear it. But just to be sure, when your big brother was first told this story he had nightmares nearly every night for two seasons. Are you sure you want to hear this story?”

    The boy’s face lit up even more than it was as he started bouncing in excitement. Chuckling and shaking his head, the grandfather closed his eyes and breathed deeply as he thought back to the story his youngest grandson requested. Ædil was always more interested in the darker stories of their world than Balli was, perhaps the boy would be less affected.

    “Alright Ædil, this story begins in this very village fifty years ago, with a young boy not much older than yourself named Togferth. Called Tog by his friends and family,” began the grandfather.

    As his grandfather spoke, Ædil’s mind drifted, the words pulling him into the story as if he was there.

#

    Tog slowly walked through the still waters of the swamp. The bigger frogs were also the most easily spooked, and he needed a few more to fill the basket for supper tonight. His eyes slowly roamed over the banks and lily-pads, freezing when he spotted one of the biggest bullfrogs that he’d ever seen. A grin spreading across his face, he raised his frogging-spear as he inched closer through the rippling waters. Wait...

    Tog slowly turned around, fearful of what he’d find. Would a swamp witch throw him into a pot to make stew? Or would it be Old Husk, the insect hive that used a man’s body as a home and meat shell? A Fang Knee? Spear Beak? Strangler Tail? Something worse?

    What he saw was none of those things, yet terrible all the same. Reaching up out of the water was a mud-covered corpse, rusted sword in hand as it drew itself up out of the muck. Soulless white lights within empty sockets gazed out at the world that had forgotten it, a mindless, relentless fury burning brightly within. Sword raised into the air, the risen corpse took a shaky step forward, rotten strips of muscle and sinew dangling from old bones.

    With a shriek of terror, Tog ran as fast as he could away from the undead. Tripping over his own two feet, the young boy scrambled up onto the bank. As the ground beneath his feet turned from mud to solid dirt, Tog cried out for his brother, desperate to warn him, “Tustan! Mere-Dead, Mere-Dead!”

    Terror unlike any that he had known drove Tog’s legs to run faster than he knew possible, rapidly outpacing the unstable corpse. Only to come to a terrible, horrified stop as he reached where he and his brother were to meet.

    Tustan had finished frog hunting first and reached the meeting point. But something else was waiting there. From a distance, it looked to be a horse and rider, yet the rider had no head. Where a saddle would be and where a rider’s legs would guide the horse, the torso merged seamlessly to the back. The arms were long, gangly things that dragged along the ground. Most unnerving of all, the muscles, veins, and sinew were clearly visible as it lacked any skin on its malformed body.

    Tog watched in dread as the lanky arms held onto Tustan’s shoulders as the beast’s horse head bit into his neck. Tearing out chunks of flesh with a wet ripping sound, the horse head of the beast swallowed the meat it tore out of Tog’s brother.

    Fear and shock rendered Tog as still as a boulder in the field as the beast ate its way through his brother’s neck. The beast’s left arm grabbed Tustan’s hair as it ate through the last of his neck, it's right dropping his body as it lifted Tustan’s severed head up to the stump where the rider’s head would have been.

    “Tustan...” Tog whispered in horror.

    The beast’s horse head snapped up to gaze at Tog, a single eye, like a baleful, emerald gemstone, in the middle of its forehead staring out at him. As the arms finished placing Tustan’s head upon its shoulders, the long, spindly fingers grabbed at the tattered skin before it began to rip and tear the skin off of its new head.

    As the beast continued to tear the flesh off of Tustan’s head, the wet ripping sound echoing through the mere, Tog watched as his brother’s head turned to face him. A wicked, evil grin spread across his brother’s face, no trace of the joking humor that was previously as much a part of Tustan as his hair and nose.

    The grin stretched inhumanly wide, showing far too many teeth as the beast spoke with Tustan’s voice, yet corrupted and wrong,“My dear brother, come join me for a supper of something with more meat on it than bullfrogs.”

    Hearing his brother’s voice broke Tog out of the fog that his mind was in. A scream of pain, anguish, and terror tore its way out of Tog’s chest, the beast listening and savoring it like a fine wine.

    The beast practically danced forward, darting and circling around Tog as it spoke, “Now what shall I do with you dear brother? I do so love fresh meat, so I cannot kill you now to eat later. Not while I have another meal to finish. I also cannot just let you go, you would never come back and I would be out a meal. Decisions, decisions, decisions...”

    The bloody fangs in the beast’s mouth were still painted with Tustan’s blood, the breath from within smelling of rot, of plague, of death. It made Tog’s vision swim, his mind fog, and his stomach churn. As black swept across his vision, he fell to his knees, then onto the ground as consciousness left him.

#

    The sounds of a cooking fire and a wooden spoon stirring in a metal pot greeted Tog as he awoke. The smell of stag hide, sage, and lemon crest filled his nostrils. Opening his eyes, the dim candlelight, and fire in the hearth cast flickering shadows that sparsely illuminated walls covered in skulls, furs, and herb bundles.

    In the center of the room, a woman stirred a pot nearly half as tall as her. Her stooped frame was dressed in old leathers, from what Tog could see her hair was white and stringy. A hermit woman? A witch?

    “Are you going to lie there all night, or are you going to get some food?” asked the woman, her voice raspy and rough like dry twigs.

    With nary a word, Tog pushed himself off the leather covered cot that he had been resting on. The animal skulls seemed to leer down at him from the walls as he slowly made his way towards the woman. As he approached, he noticed that a cloth bandage was wrapped around her head.

    “Would you be so kind young man and fetch me a pair of turtle shells? They last so much longer than wooden bowls around here.”

    It took a moment, but after looking around Tog spotted two turtle shells hanging on the wall to his right. Not wanting to provoke her, he quickly ran over to pick up the two shells. Turning around, he froze upon seeing the woman’s face.

    The bandage that he saw earlier was covering her right eye, a long, gagged cut above that had a greenish paste smeared over it while blood seeped from the wound. Her left arm ended at a stump halfway to the elbow, the injury long since healed over.

    “Well? Do you want to eat or not?” the woman asked, her sole remaining eye glaring at Tog.

    Slowly, he made his way over to the old woman, his whole body shaking with every step. With shaking hands, he held out the two shells. The ladle dropped a mass of boiled crawdads into the first, then the second. Placing it over the top of the pot, the woman took one of the shells and sat in a chair.

    Sitting on the cot that he awoke on, Tog picked up the first crawdad before asking a question, “What happened? How’d I get here?”

    Not stopping her eating, or to peel the shells, the woman’s response was direct; “You had a run in with Molochdes. Had I not been by you would be dead for food. You’re welcome.

    “Now, you owe me an eye and thanks to you I’d be surprised if Molochdes hasn’t figured out where I live. So the way I see it, I have two choices. First one is I let you go and regardless of whether or not you escape the mere Molochdes figures out where I am, comes here, and then eats me. As I’m sure you can imagine, I would much rather avoid that.”

    The crunching of the beast’s teeth crushing Tustan’s neck echoed in Tog’s mind. The way she worded the choice though, something about it was unsettling, not right. Tog’s grip tightened on the shell as his body tensed.

    Ignoring Tog, she continued, “The second, and much preferable to me, choice is I use a ritual to hide my hut from Molochdes. Fortunately I know such a ritual, unfortunately for you, I need your life to fuel it. So enjoy your last meal boy, tyfas.”

    The last word was spoken with an echoing reverb of power, and at the front of the room plants and grasses grew to cover and block the doorway. The wooden frame of the cot warped, twisted holding Tog in place. The witch stood up, finishing her last crawdad as she took a stick and started drawing a circle on the floor.

    Shell and crawdads ignored, Tog scrambled, he scratched, he clawed at the wood bindings holding him in place. He had to escape, the witch was going to kill him, use him for a foul ritual that would condemn his soul! Being eaten by the beast would have been a kinder fate.

    A loud, evil laughter echoed into the hut, causing both occupants to still in fear. Tog recovered first, fighting to free himself with renewed vigor. The witch’s eye seemed glazed over as she whispered to herself, “It’s too early, how could he have found me so soon?”

    Tog ignored the witch, he had managed to get a leg loose; just a little more and he’d be free. Seeing her victim struggling, the witch renewed her preparations. Seeing her resume drawing in the dirt, Tog struggled harder. Seeing him struggle, she sped up her preparations.

    Both were interrupted as the walls shook, the roof rattled, and laughter echoed. The roots and grasses blocking the doorway splintered and wilted as the beast bit, clawed, and slammed.

    “Dear brother, has this old hag stolen you away?” the beast called in a sing-song voice, sounding like an older, gruffer Tustan.

    “Begone Molochdes! This home is not yours, you are not welcome here!” the witch shouted at the beast as she finished her ritual circle.

    The beast’s laughter was punctuated by the splintering of wood, “My dear, dear Wuldara, is that any way to treat your husband? It has taken me fifteen years, but I have returned after you cast me away!”

    Tog’s eyes widened in horror, the witch was the beast’s wife?! Now he really had to get out of here! As the witch began chanting, Tog managed to get his foot free. Jumping up on top of the cot, he took a moment to get his bearings. The witch was in front of him chanting, behind her was the still bubbling pot, and beyond was the beast trying to break in.

    As he tried to think of a plan, Tog felt a sudden weakness in his leg. A glance down showed muscles withering, skin graying. He didn’t have the time to plan. Praying to make it through this, Tog jumped down from the cot and rushed the witch.

    Her hand reached out to grab him, but Tog managed to duck under her reaching fingers and shove her backward. Put off balance, the witch stumbled back into the pot. It tipped back before the weight caused it to rock forwards, dumping the boiling water onto the witch.

    As she screamed in agony, Tog ran out of the hut, racing under the stamping legs of the beast. A lashing claw left a deep gash, from the edge of his eye to the back of his head, taking part of his ear. The wound burned, undoubtedly already infected from the foul magic of the beast.

    The beast considered chasing the boy, it could easily catch up to a half-grown, hobbling human, but its true prey was within.

#

    “Tog made it back to the village, where the priest managed to work a miracle and save his life. The cut that he received from the mere-beast left a terrible scar that he carried for the rest of his days. His leg never regained its full strength, but he managed to live a full life. Thus the story ends,” the grandfather finished his tale.

    Ædil stared up at his grandfather with sleepy eyes, fighting back a yawn. As he got off of his grandfather’s lap to go to bed, he had a realization, “Grandpa you have the same scar as Tog!”

Bloody Tides

     Enough was enough, "Does anyone wanna explain why we’re standing on the beach, at night, with three crates of meat, staring out into the ocean?"

     The orc-blooded merchant glanced back at the hired guard, surprised that an elf would be so impatient at a five-minute wait, before he answered, "T’was in the contract you signed, you read it, did you not?"

     "Course I read it, but I don’t recall anything about standing out in the cold not a hundred yards from the biggest glacier in the world, at night," he snapped, neglecting to mention that he was drunk when he signed the contract and was still suffering from the hangover.

From the Journals of Gronk, Frontier Goblin Wizard Extraordinaire

1097 of the Age of Northern Expansion
Mythday, 5 of Chazron

There are times when I wonder what my life would have been like had I stayed with my birth clan. Then I remember how miserable I was. No one respected the knowledge that writing could give, and the fire...the less said the better. No, my life with Garrek and Mathias, my friends and mentors, is better than any I could have imagined before I was cast out of the clan.

Oh life in the old barn was as bad as I feared at first, the townsfolk would come periodically to chase me out of town, I'd get cold and sneak back to the barn only to be chased out again in a week's time. Then one day I snuck back to the barn only to see tables set up with a myriad of odd plants and animal parts. The back stables also had two bedrolls and some pots and pans.

At the time I was terrified, I knew the common language of humans in these parts and knew that the town was having trouble making enough money ever since the copper mine went dry. It seemed like the barn I was calling home was given to some newcomers. I didn't dare hope that the new residents of the barn would let me stay, and some part of me just broke. I was tired, my life was an unending cycle of eating what roaches and rodents I could catch, sleeping in a dilapidated barn followed by running for my life out into the cold. I just wanted it to end.

After a few hours of standing in the middle of the barn, they showed up. A big guy with a sword that looked like a long piece of metal with an edge and a halfling with a belt and bandoleer filled with tiny clay pots. Garrek and Mathais, the half-orc and halfling business partners. And the greatest alchemists I've ever had the fortune of knowing.

I expected that they would chase me out or kill me. Instead, they asked who I was and why I was in their barn. I told them my name and that I slept there. I don't think that they knew quite what to do with me, they bought the barn to turn it into an alchemy shop and found a goblin squatting in their new property. Instead of chasing the goblin squatter out or killing him, they gave him a job and put him to work.

Oh sure, I have a bit of fun at their expense now and then, the first time I wold told to sweep I went to where he pointed and swept that spot for hours. The look on Garrek's face would make for one of my most entertaining memories for years.

Truely, the greatest gift that they gave me was a spellbook they took off of a dead wizard. Well, they gave it to me after they were done with it to get potion ideas. While I had no training in the arcane, I was a smart little goblin, and after two months of studying the book managed to produce an orb of light.

To this day

~~~~~~

"WAIT A MINUTE, YOU PRANKED ME?!"

The goblin nearly leapt out of his skin at the bellow just above and behind him. Face pale, Gronk turned around to see the furious half orc that had been reading over his shoulder.

"Ah-w-w-well...um...the thing is...Gronk," he started, trying to think of a way to talk himself out of Garrek's fury.

"I know full well you know how first person works, Gronk. Now what do you have to say for yourself for pranking me in that way all those times over the years?"

"Y-y-you see...it-was-Mathais's-idea-bye!"

A slow grin spread across Garrek's face as he looked out at the goblin running down main street. His business partner walked up from in back and looked at the amused half-orc.

"You figured out that he was pranking you two months in, why'd you wait more than ten years to bring it up with him?" the halfling asked.

"The last two times Gronk wasn't doing it because it was funny, he was doing it because it was routine. This way he'll find something new to entertain himself. Perhaps it'll be at your expense this time Tablespoon."

"Don't start that again," Mathais groaned as he went back inside, though Garrek managed to overhear the halfling mutter the old material under his breath, "A dash is not a unit of measurement."


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you like my work and want to support me, check out my homebrew race book here.

Brief Essay on Djnosa Antjom - by Gabron Lyeshield at the Gnomish University of Ephemeral and Supernatural Studies

Discovered by Octevio Mescus Cresius during the archaeological rush early in Chor Kolav's history, the Djnosa Antjom is a seven foot obelisk with intricate carvings on each face. Unique among artifacts from the site, each of the faces appears to be written in a different language. Of the four languages, the only one known to scholars is unfortunately the most damaged with only the very top preserved.

The small surviving text was translated by Rinivor Swiftquill, the royal scribe of Chor Kolav at the time. Based on the translation, which according to later translators cut out much of the flowery language for a more simplified format, Scribe Swiftquill stated that the complete text was in part, if not entirely, a religious prophecy. Specifically, a prophecy about the end of the world.

On the Beast-Men of Sylvanor: Rantar

When going through the office of my predecessor, the late Professor Vergilius, I stumbled across materials from around the rise of the hobgoblin empire detailing a curiosity from an excavation in Sylvanor. The earliest piece was by now famed scholar Professor Brunton, a letter from his days as a field researcher:

A Letter to Admiral Tarath Longinus

To Admiral Tarath Longinus,

     Per your request, I have located a member of one of the many zang clans that is willing to speak with a surfacer. Finding one was much more difficult than I originally anticipated, and I am now writing to you from a mostly sunken city called, assuming that the translation potions are working correctly, Akkardon. From what I can tell it serves a similar role as Argoport, a hub of trade for the whole region. I’ve even seen two sea gnome ships meeting and exchanging goods.

Blood in the Water

     The nervous seaman looked over to his captain at the front of the boat, before cautiously asking the question that was at the forefront of his mind, "Cap'n, ya sure this is a good idea?"
     Turning his head so that his steely gaze locked eyes with the question asker, index finger pointedly stroking the hilt of his sword. The lone blue eye, like chips of ice for all the warmth they held, stared into the mud colored eyes of the ship hand, the only other acknowledgement of his question being a single raised eyebrow.

Far From Home

     He hit the ground with a loud grunt. Growling deep in his throat, Ragnoth pushed himself to his feet as his opponent tried to collect her breath. Tightening his grip on his polearm, Ragnoth rushed at the woman that had attacked him with the rest of the bandits she was with. Was.

     Out of a small group of three bandits, only the woman was left. That is not to say that they died easily. Ragnoth, their intended prey, was badly injured. Cuts covered his arms, one over his left eye effectively left him blind in that eye, three teeth had been knocked out of his mouth, his chest would be a mass of bruises in the morning, and from the feel of it at least one rib was cracked if not broken.

     The bandit woman raised her shield to intercept the point of Ragnoth’s war-scythe. Shifting his grip, Ragnoth changed the angle of his attack. Instead of striking at her chest, he targeted her legs. The tip of his blade bit deeply into muscle and nicked bone, causing a veritable fountain of blood to weep from the wound.

     Dropping to the ground with a scream of agony, the bandit woman tried in vain to staunch the blood seeping from her thigh. With a glare, Ragnoth pushed himself upright and wiped off the blood from his scythe using the tunic of the crying, panicking woman.

     “You thought three were enough to kill me. You were wrong,” Ragnoth growled at the soon to be dead woman as he hobbled further down the road; from the way his hip flared in pain with each step he must have twisted it one of the times that he was knocked down.

     If there was one thing that Ragnoth was good at, it was getting up when he was knocked down. He’d been doing it his entire life. First in the ring against his full blood peers, and then amongst the lowlanders in the southern lands.

     Admittedly, he thought to himself, not all the lowlanders were soft. The alfar Jadra is lethal with that curved blade of hers, and her mixed blood companion utilized a shield like it was a part of his body.

     The half-orc had encountered the two travelers on a road much like the one he hobbled down, nearly a year ago. He had been newly arrived in the Green Coast, having stowed away on a ship leaving Eszath for Argoport, and happened upon the camp that the elf and half-elf had made shortly after dark.

     The two companions offered to share their campfire, an offer which Ragnoth could scarcely refuse. Offering to share the tubers and root vegetables that they had scavenged, he in turn offered to share the brace of rabbits that he had shot just before stumbling upon their camp.

     While normally using one of his clan’s war bows would be deemed excessive to hunt rabbits, it was the only means of hunting the speedy animals. When he explained this to his dinner companions as the half-elven man stirred the meat and vegetables into a stew, Jadra asked to see his clan’s war bow.

     After carefully handing the bow to her, Jadra almost immediately concluded that the draw weight was impractically heavy for more than exceptional individuals. She was barely able to pull the arms close enough together to string the bow, and while she had the strength to draw the string back, her arm shook and her fingers were numb after releasing the string.

     Ragnoth decided not to tell her that he sometimes had difficulty with the draw weight himself. He did tell her that amongst the orcs in Sylvanor, being able to string and draw back the bow is a common, widespread rite of passage for both men and women. You were considered a child until you had the strength to make use of the bow. You weren’t considered an adult until you killed something like a bear or a caribou on a hunt with it.

     Shaking his head to chase away the memories, Ragnoth squinted his eyes to try to get a better look at the building off in the distance. It was getting late and he needed a place to either stay or camp for the night. It looked to be a farmhouse, so he could probably trade manual labor for a roof over his head while he slept. A plan in mind, Ragnoth picked up his pace to the farmhouse.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you like my work and want to support me, check out my homebrew race book here.

From the Journals of Algren Twinbraid

My name is Professor Algren Twinbraid, a researcher and archaeologist from the University of History in Eszath. I do not know if anyone on the surface will ever read these entries, but I still feel the necessity of recording my thoughts and experiences.

An Introduction to the Planes

Pay attention apprentice, today we will begin your studies into the Art of Conjuration. No, you will not be summoning an Archdevil or a Solar, though I understand the excitement. My master Tobias caught me sneaking into the Summoning Chamber more than once. Oh the lectures I received.

     I digress, we will begin with an overview of the planes of existence. Seeing as how I recruited you from a farming village, I would assume that you are not familiar with the term? Calm yourself apprentice, that was not an insult. Allow me to fill you in on a secret: I was raised born to a blacksmith. I understand entering a world so different than what you are used to.

Scholarly Theories: Sylvanor Minotaur

To the Esteemed Mage-Scholar Annuwyl Aethlyn of the Wainryn Royal Academy of The Art,

I write to you, this seventh day of Aesto, to document my findings thus far on what some of our colleagues have dubbed "the Sylvanor Minotaur." I can understand why some would call it that, though this northern variety of the breed is far more horrible to behold than the ones further south.

Picture, if you will, a creature that, were it to stretch itself upright, stands nearly thirteen feet tall from the top of its skull to the bottom of its hooves. If you add the antlers, then it stands closer to sixteen feet tall. Despite its height, which normally is around ten feet due to a stooped posture, I would be surprised if it weighed more than two hundred twenty pounds! The thing looks to be positively starving, despite eating an entire cow, bones and all, in the span of ten minutes!

I digress, the anatomy of this creature is astounding! Despite seeming to be skin and bone, it possesses strength similar to it's Green Coast cousins and is much more agile. In addition, its hands possess a mere three digits: two fingers and a thumb. Each is topped with a vicious claw, which I have seen rend boiled leather like it were parchment. A certain kind of low-quality steel seems to work best at stopping its claws for some reason, perhaps it doesn't like the feel of the metal?

Its head is long, perhaps two and a half feet, and for all intents and purposes looks like the skull of a stag. The biggest difference is in its eyes, white glowing specks of light surrounded by pits of darkness. While not the most obvious difference, that distinction belongs to the rows and rows of sharp, shearing teeth, something within those eyes...I can only describe it a torturous, maddening hunger. If you were to walk down the back allies of Argoport and look into the eyes of the homeless that hadn't eaten in a week, you would not see even a fraction of the hunger contained within those otherworldly eyes.

Your friend and colleague,
Mage-Scholar Rhydian Llewelyn of the University of Eszath

Reports of Heretics

High Justicar Varain read through the reports on his desk after a day of purifying the corrupt and the heretical. Several inquisitors had managed to purge a cult masquerading as followers of The Lady. Good, the priests of the other gods may be sloppy in purging the heretic from their ranks, but the servants of The Lady would not be so lax.

Crazy Drink!

     Yorin sat in the galley with the ship’s non-gnome crew as they ate hunks of cut bread smeared with some kind of foul smelling butter. The crew were for the most part ignoring the professor, sitting in an out of the way corner nursing a mug of a sweet tasting wine that the crew were drinking. Occasionally one would glance his way before turning back to his fellows.

NPCs: Captain Evergrin

“I’m no man of honor/Myself is my true king/But somewhere deep within me/The bells of conscience ring.”

— Halfman’s Song, by Miracle of Sound

Playing Evergrin

Despite the crude, cocky façade he portrays, Evergrin is at his core a broken individual. He uses crude humor and a display of arrogance to keep people at arm’s length, trying to prevent anyone from getting close enough to slip a knife between his ribs. His childhood as a slave left scars deeper than the ones that give him his name. Ultimately, though his only loyalty is to himself and he wants to believe that he is a selfish and self-serving individual, some kernel of goodness still resides within him.

NPCs: Ghoran Karzin Zorthak

“If all I was interested in was killing, I would have stayed in the academy as a boy. What motivates me isn’t killing, it’s killing with style.”

— Ghoran Karzin Zorthak to a young hobgoblin boy

Using Ghoran

Above all else, Ghoran is a showman. Everything he does is done with panache and style. He regularly takes insults, verbal jabs, and such with a returning volley of quips intended to mock in such a way that the target is unsure if they have been insulted.

The Coliseum of Zrukal-az Bashzith

Though gladiatorial combat is a staple source of entertainment throughout the hobgoblin empire, the largest and most extravagant arena is easily the Coliseum in the empire’s capital. Construction began five years after the ancient city was conquered by the hobgoblins, and even with slaves working on construction nonstop it still took six years to complete.

The Viridian Mere, Home of Old Black

A massive swamp to the south of the forest that houses the last elven city-states, the Viridian Mere was central in the founding of modern elven society. Today it is home to countless tribes of lizardfolk and hundreds of human villages. The Viridian Mere’s entire history is in the shadow of a great wyrm black dragon named Bastovexigarriv.

Korrin, the Iconic Psychic

Playing Korrin

     While more intelligent than nearly everyone around you, you don’t rub it into their faces. A life on the streets showed you that people like that didn’t live for very long. Allies are a requirement for survival, but you know that today’s ally could become tomorrow’s enemy.

A Psychic in Argoport

Dark laughter echoed in Korrin’s head as he awoke. Another dream, another nightmare. The least that Nirrok could do was let him have a peaceful sleep every now and then. Still, it was early morning, and a rumbling stomach told him that it was time to scrounge up some breakfast.

     Aethrin should be setting up his market stall, and he had just enough silver pieces to buy a piece of beef that he could trade for some oysters from Paakiga. After he finished breakfast he needed to find some more work, all while avoiding Karn and Varto.

Dreams of Empire: Hobgoblins in the Green Coast

We’ve danced around them up to this point, but now we’re biting the crossbow bolt and talking about the hobgoblins and boy is it a big one.

Hobgoblins have resided in the northern plains and north-eastern mountains for longer than any can remember. Raiding, pillaging, and worse in their nomadic warbands, every so often a leader would arise that had the potential to unify the disparate tribes. In the past, these leaders suffered the fate of all hobgoblin leaders: assassination.

     The traditional means of promotion amongst hobgoblin warbands was to kill and replace their superior. As a result, most attempts to unify into a group larger than a warband have collapsed upon themselves due to infighting. This changed with the rise of Imbatur Thraz.

     A charismatic youth, Imbatur Thraz left his warband seeking out answers to questions of faith that plagued his mind. Where he went no one knows, what is known is that upon his return he was covered in ritual scars and carrying a spear with a charred, blackened haft and a head made from a black stone that glowed with an inner crimson light.

    His and other warbands listened as he told them of the trials he endured, weeks without food and water, slaying beasts with nothing but a sharp stone as a knife, before he found a cave. Within this cave was a boulder, upon which his spear was imbedded. Silver light from Zrukal, the elder and larger of the twin moons, shined through a hole in the ceiling, illuminating the spear. As he approached the spear, a voice whispered to him.

     Take the spear, unite all the land under my light. Be my Herald, and none shall stand against your will.

     The voice could be none other than Zrukal himself, guiding the young hobgoblin. How could any refuse the orders of a god? Thus, he pulled the spear from the stone and returned, to forge the bickering warbands into an empire that would cover the world. Beginning with the Green Coast.