You are one of the froglike Hypello, clammy and laidback in the extreme. So laidback in fact, that when the river decided to change its course during a routine cruise and dump you and your elephantine mount across the hump-backed sky, you didn't fret. You just hopped back up on top of your shoopuf, picked a direction, and started walking.
Wherever you go, you're sure it will all be Shmooth Shailing.
You are amphibious. You can breathe water and take no penalty to your Swim skill for item slots filled, but you are torpid and slow on dry land, moving at half the speed you otherwise would.
Addishunally, you finds it imposhibibble to loshe your akshent.
Shoopuf card from Mobius Final Fantasy
Shoopuf
SKILL: 4
STAMINA: 16
INITIATIVE: 1
ARMOUR: 2
DAMAGE: Proboscis Slap (As Large Beast)
A placid leviathan of the Moonflow, normally found wading its depths and snorkeling up food with its long trunk-like appendage. Often tamed by the Hypello and saddled with enormous howdahs befitting their great size and strength. Despite this, they are typically very gentle creatures, willing to help pilgrims cross the river free of charge- so long as no drunken Blitzballers mistake them for fiends and start swinging at their ankles.
SPECIAL
Anyone successfully hit by a Shoopuf's proboscis must Test their Luck (or Skill for Enemies) or become Grappled as it winds back up around them like a party horn.
I'm back with another piece of Troika! content for another community jam hosted by Hod Publishing and the Melsonian Arts Council. Last time was for a bestiary entry, this time it's a player character background inspired by some of my old Ivory Tower University junk.
You have done the forbidden, and ventured beyond the Axebitten Woods to hunt the corruption that squirms rotten and sickly-sweet from the depths of the Reossos Basin. Your elongated twelve-foot tall, ash-painted frame is unnerving to outsiders, as is your even taller longbow. But when the decaying monsters show up, they appreciate having you and your meters-long arrows to protect them.
You've also developed a taste for archery competitions with little folk who call your bow too huge and unwieldy to use.
Possessions
Prodigious Back Muscles.
Longfolk Bow (Damage as Fusil) & 2d6 Spear-Sized Arrows.
Ash Ritual Paint (Armour: 1 until it gets washed off).
You may challenge someone to an archery competition. The target must Test their Luck or be forced to accept. If you win, you may take their bow as a trophy and add it to your own like some kind of mismatched multi-recurve penta-bow abomination. For every trophy bow you add this way, you gain +1 to Damage rolls with your Longfolk Bow.
If you ever roll max damage with your bow (the damage die shows a natural 6), all your trophy bows explode from the force of the draw and your bonus resets to 0.
A band of mercenaries, playing with some stolen Longfolk arrows. (Image Credit: Rijksmuseum)
I had been considering making a monster for a bit, and it just so happened to line up with my friend TLN sharing the newest Troika! jam hosted by the Melsonian Arts Council. So, I decided why not?
A drawn, vaguely pellicular creature at home in the shadows like a fish in water. They are normally content to lurk in the deep caverns, ancient ruins, and neglected cellars that spawn them. The unbearable agony of being perceived is lethal to them, so they try stay hidden at all costs, swathed in onion-like layers of shadow. They are not violent by nature, but being intruded upon sends them into a panicked frenzy in which they will attempt to scare away or run away from all observers. They are named for the shriek they emit when startled.
Lukkawei! Lukkawei!
SPECIAL
Once per Round a Lukkawei may send out sheets of tepid darkness to quash all light in a 100 foot area. Anyone holding a torch, lantern, or other personal light source may Test their Luck to keep it alight.
If a Lukkawei is exposed to bright light for 3 consecutive Rounds, its Skill, Initiative, and Armour are reduced to 0 as its protective shadows peel away.
It is known how the God at the Forge created the Sun: by complete accident.
When the Trickster wished to give the smith a gift to express its love for them, it did not know how, because it could not express anything. Deceit and concealment was so ingrained in its ways that it could not even tell a truth it wanted to share. So the Trickster fell back on old habits and presented to the God at the Forge a lump of the world's worst, most impure ore. The Trickster then dared the god to create anything of beauty out of it, teasing them and doubting their abilities as a child might the person they fancy.
The God at the Forge was insulted, for pride in the craft was their insurmountable nature. So they accepted the challenge, and set straight to work. They took the lump of ore to their forge and heated it a thousand-thousand times over, in a fire a thousand times brighter and hotter than the smith had ever stoked before. So bright and hot was the forge that all the other gods and creatures of the Rift shied away and fled to the twilit places- all but the Trickster, who watched the smith work in teary-eyed awe.
The Trickster beheld as the god at their bellows began to melt away the outer layers of the ore. Molten slag flowed like rivers and cooled into mountains, yet that vexing lump of ore remained undiminished; still impure. The smith's anger burned as hot as the forge, nearly melting it to the firmament. The god finally lashed out and sent the slag crashing to their feet, before stomping away and brooding over what next to do.
The Trickster also watched as some of that discarded slag began to move. Shattered crags picked themselves up and brushed off the smaller, crumbly bits of their fellows with stumpy, blunt limbs. They looked around with eyeless heads, and soon trundled or toddled away in fear at the sound of their creator's loud grumbling.
When the ore proved too stubborn, the smith pulled it out of the forge and laid it upon their anvil in the grip of their great and immovable tongs. If all the impurities would not melt out, then they would hammer them out. The smith deliberated at length, and finally took up one of their 6,842 hammers with which to begin the Great Folding.
For a length of time that would come to be called a year, the god hammered at the lump of ore. Every swing lit the Rift with showers of sparks, and shook the gulfs to their depths. The ore was beaten and shaped, tortured and purified, until the lesser metals were dragged screaming to the surface and smote.
The Trickster watched as those flakes of hammerscale rained upon the anvil like storms-yet-to-be, only to be swept away by the calloused hand of the God at the Forge. The flakes danced and shivered like black snowflakes as they fell, twisting in the heated air currents until they landed upon spindly little arms and legs. Jagged and pointy, these diminutive creatures did not flee in fear from their creator so quickly.
But just as the smith ignored the gawking Trickster, so too did they ignore the growing audience at their feet. They seized upon the progress they made, bringing the hammer down faster and harder until their arm was a blur, and their work reached a fever pitch.
When it did, they broke their hammer upon the lump of ore and ignited something deep within it. A spark unlike any other, that grew and grew to absorb the entire sphere with a brilliance that not even the smith could withstand. So they hurled it away into the darkness, where it caught in the empty void and erupted into its full glory.
At that, the little scales yipped and fled in fear. All the gods of the Rift came to look in awe at the newborn Sun. Without a doubt, it was the greatest thing of beauty the God at the Forge had ever made. Even the dust and the dregs of the Rift thought so, and began to dance around the Sun in ever greater crowds.
But the story of how the worlds were wedded together is for another time.
For now, the God at the Forge stood and basked in the warmth of their creation, and the accolades of their fellows. They waited, proud and imperious, for the Trickster to come before them and declare its challenge met. But the Trickster did not. The Trickster could not. All it could do was conceal the ache in its heart as it stole away to darker parts, where the smith's beauty did not burn so brightly, and the laughter of gods was not so loud.
There, in the dark and quiet, the Trickster found that it was not so alone. It found there, huddled and frightened, the little bits of slag and hammerscale that the smith had cast off and forgotten in their work. They were as children without a parent, in a Rift that was no longer what it once was. Yet they were sharp and rough to look upon, beautiful like lead, cruel to the touch and clumsy in all ways. The haughty gods of the Rift would never even notice them, let alone deign to welcome them in.
And so the Trickster reached out its long arms, and gathered the slag and scales up in spindly hands that could only steal the belongings of others. And then it closed its mouth so full of lies long enough to tenderly kiss them upon their jagged little heads. And then in a voice too quiet to hear it admitted that yes, the God at the Forge had made something beautiful indeed.
That, child, is why you should always treat with respect the things we might call waste: you never know when they might hold the guarded love of the Trickster.
Or perhaps that is just another lie, meant to put fidgeting children to bed. Now go to sleep.
After incorrectly comparing Tequendria to it, I bothered to actually read through some TROIKA!, found it interesting, and decided to make a few backgrounds for it! Don't hold your breath on a full d66 table anytime soon, though. I was barely able to squeeze out enough gonzo for six.
... Side note, "squeezing out gonzo" sounds like something that should get my blog flagged as adult content.
Anyway! Enjoy. I took the custom background rules to heart and tried not to fret too much about balance, which is usually my Achilles' Heel after a lifetime of enjoying tinkering with character builds.
d6
Background
1
Derro Biomass Reaver
2
Flowerbed Troll
3
Goblin Pioneer
4
Longfolk Pruner
5
Very Lost Orc
6
Zood Knight
Derro Biomass Reaver
Your world's atmosphere drained away millennia ago, forcing you and your kind deep below the crust, where your stature and sanity both shrank in equal measure. Now, you travel the spheres seeking out the choicest flora, fauna, and stranger forms of life to bring back home for the re-terraforming effort.
Possessions
• Catabolizer (Damage as Pistolet).
• A Map of some of the Crystal Spheres.
• Oversized Goggles.
• A Tank of Unidentifiable Organic Goo.
Advanced Skills
1 Acrobatics
2 Astrology
1 Awareness
1 Catabolizer Crafting
2 Catabolizer Fighting
2 Mathology
1 Reaving Barge Pilot
2 Trapping
Special
Your signature weapon zaps at organic targets with tongues of black and green lightning, splitting cells into base elements and collecting them in a melange of goo in a tank on your back. Stamina lost to your catabolizer takes twice as many points of healing to recover, and the weapon leaves telltale fractal scars. You can repair and maintain your strange disintegration weapon with the relevant Advanced Skill. If you lose your catabolizer, you can only get a replacement from another derro.
Flowerbed Troll
Trolls are said to inhabit every climate across the hump-backed sky, including the spaces between crystal spheres. You are a placid, vacant-eyed flowerbed troll, loamy and always smelling of petrichor and sweetly rotting fruit. You still hunger for flesh, but you learned long ago that it is easiest to barter for it using the flowers and medicinal herbs which grow betwixt your sagging, mossy shoulders.
Possessions
• Ballet Shoes.
• Claws (Damage as Sword).
• Hedge Trimmers (for personal grooming).
• Homemade Fertilizer.
• A Sack of Raw Meat (d6 Rations).
Advanced Skills
4 Gardening
2 Healing
1 Poison
4 Strength
Special
Your mossy, meaty metabolism allows you to regenerate, making nasty wounds easier to bounce back from. You can eat rations to regain d6 Stamina 1 additional time per day.You can also eat raw meat and mildly rotten plant matter without suffering ill effects.You have to eat three times as many rations as a human to keep from starving, and you can't regenerate while hungry.
You can also pick d6 random herbs, flowers, berries, or lichens from your back per day without ill effects. Your verdant hide grows a new random assortment every day, unless the last batch was never picked. Unpicked plants rot away and fertilize new growth after one week.
Goblin Pioneer
The crystal sphere you hail from has grown so tightly packed with labyrinth that its surface is beginning to crack. You and countless others of your ilk took to the hidden passages between, and now seek out new spheres freshly bobbed to the surface to tame and civilize with snaking, confounding tunnels.
Possessions
• A Missive from the Goblin King.
• Bricklaying Tools.
• Broken Compass.
• Utility Knife.
Advanced Skills
1 Awareness
2 Bricklaying
2 Climb
1 Secret Signs
3 Sneak
2 Tracking
1 Trapping
Special
You can Test your Luck to become MEGA LOST. Your trailblazer's intuition points you toward someplace nearby ("nearby" being relative to your position in the entirety of the hump-backed sky) that has never been discovered. These places are often mythical, exciting, rich, and even stranger than most. A place that is so deadly that none of its would-be discoverers survive to see civilization again also counts as undiscovered.
Longfolk Pruner
You and your mirthless, elongated tribe live a hard life, burning away the carnivorous rot in the forest depths while warding away childish outsiders with ballista-sized longbows. But the corruption is running deeper than ever before, and now your distorted and rangy limbs traverse the spheres in search of a solution.
Possessions
• A Box of Ashes (3 Uses).
• Flint & Tinder.
• A Loincloth.
• Saw-Bladed Glaive (Damage as Polearm).
• A Very Large Longbow and 6 Arrows.
• Topiary Hobbyist's Kit.
Advanced Skills
4 Firemaking
1 Healing
3 Longbow Fighting
3 Poleaxe Fighting
2 Run
1 Second Sight
Special
You can paint yourself in multicolored streaks of soot and ash for protection. A full coating of ashes from multiple types of hardwood makes you Lightly Armoured for one day, or until you are exposed to heavy rain or full submersion in water.
Very Lost Orc
You were just minding your own business when that foolish apprentice wizard accidentally summoned you far from home. You couldn't even get the satisfaction of beating them senseless, since the swarm of gremlins beat you to that. Now you must find your way back to your smoky and garishly colored clan-hold before your chieftain finds you missing from your post.
Possessions
• Bone Dice.
• Light Armour.
• Tribal Totem.
• Weapon of your choice.
• Your Half-eaten Lunch.
Advanced Skills
2 in a Fighting Skill of your choice
2 Awareness
1 Run
2 Scrimshaw
3 Strength
Special
You can Test your Luck to get back on track after becoming truly, hopelessly lost. This ability only works when you have a specific destination in mind. You don't have to possess a perfect mental image of your exact destination- at least a proper place name and some major landmarks will do. This ability can't be used to bring you straight back to your clan-hold, frustratingly.
Zood Knight
Bowlegged and stocky, you sit proud atop your majestic zood. Few across the spheres have the good breeding or sense to appreciate all the fine qualities of this noble, if noisy creature. Never mind that it looks like an elephant seal-sized tardigrade, or that it is constantly flatulent.
Possessions
• Diving Bladder.
• A Firkin of Zood Blubber.
• Fishing Net & Line.
• A Saddle.
• Toggle-Headed Lance.
• Waterproof Zoodskin Clothes (Modest Armour).
Advanced Skills
1 Acrobatics
2 Climb
1 Etiquette
2 Lance Fighting
3 Resist Odor
2 Ride
1 Swim
Special
You never sink in water or other liquids unless you wish to. You can also float straight up to the surface of a body of liquid at up to twice your movement speed. Once you break the surface, this ability may or may not jettison you up high into the air like a rotund, though no less majestic, porpoise.
"The bugs, the waves, the roaring... I can't sleep like this!"
- Tabren Achek, first Pach-Pah Yul ambassador to the cyclopean city of Anqoh.
"Just try counting the thunderclaps, oh Commendable One. That is what I do when I am restless."
- Apota Dolj, his local guide. They lost count somewhere after 186.
In the vast cosmology of the Pach-Pah Yul, there is a clear delineation between good places in the world, and evil places. The underground is feared as the underworld- not because of any malevolent spirits or gods of the dead abiding there, but because it is understood that the place is simply a natural anathema to anything with a surface-born nature, as the People of the Earth possess. The peaks of their homeland however, are pure, cleansed by their proximity to the breath of their greater gods who dwell in the space between the land and the sky.
The lowlands, meanwhile, are theoretically livable in mythological concept, and explicitly so in day-to-day life, yet they lack the protection of the spirits and ancestors. So while the rest of the world is not explicitly forbidden, it would be folly to try and dwell there, because a Pach-Mih would never truly "belong" there. This is the logic which has been used by highlanders to understand the perceived bizarre way in which Pem-Pah culture has developed over the centuries since their genesis. And it his stuck and gained cultural currency, even after years of gradually increasing contact with the Pem-Pah. Because one could be easily forgiven for mistaking the land of Khaitam-po as a cursed and forsaken place.
First, it must be understood that in the unique case of the Pach-Pah who perpetuate this idea, they are spectacularly adapted to their homeland. In addition to their generally stockier builds protecting them from the cold better than those of taller men and women from the lowlands, they are also resilient to the debilitating effects of thin air which have been reported by many a rangy-limbed traveler.
This specialization, however, seems to have a reverse side.
When traveling from high altitudes to low ones, many of the Pach-Pah have been observed to experience a prolonged period of weakness characterized by such symptoms as headaches, fatigue, dizziness, inability to sleep, loss of appetite, and even an overactive bladder. These ailments are generally worse the lower one goes, reaching their ironic peak at sea level, which is exactly where the entirety of Khaitam-po is located. To a person informed by the logic of gods-breath and discouraged or forbidden places, it is natural to believe that this weakening is a very real, very serious treat to one's health, and proof of the bond between people and land.¹ Though the Pem-Pah still visibly share many aspects of physiology and size adaptation with their cousins uphill, it can be surmised that they transitioned into lowland living over a long enough period of time in the ancient past that low-altitude sickness became nonexistent for them. Tall folk seem to lack this handicap, and their contributions to the ethnographic record have been considerable, but I don't believe that each half of these people will be able to form a full and rich appreciation of one another until this divide has been more thoroughly circumvented.
While it is known that a handful of Pach-Pah have been able to temporarily acclimatize over a period of days or weeks throughout history, few other than dignitaries, traders, mercenaries, and adventurers have done so, and virtually none of them have been bothered to do so for the sake of staying deep within Khaitam-po, thanks to the number of other oddities which the location boasts.
In addition to the air being thicker, keen-eyed outsiders have observed that it has a strange, perpetually yellowish-green tinge to it in the atmosphere. Certainly, it is more humid and salty thanks to close proximity to the sea, but many have reported less clearly discernible aspects as well. There is a stifling quality to the air, which can cause a tickle in the throat of outsiders. There is also a discreet odor to it which tends to cling to things, including the clothes on one's back. The Pem-Pah are entirely unfamiliar with these experiences, and have playfully taken to referring to outsiders as being "baby-nosed" as a result.
Flora and fauna are far more diverse in Khaitam-po than elsewhere, with an uncomfortably high percentage of both being harmful to people in some way or another. Toxic plants and venomous pests are known throughout. These things too, the Pem-Pah are adapted to, in the sense that they learn early and thoroughly from their elders how to deal with each one. It is remarkable, though also somewhat off-putting, to see a man casually handle and show to outsiders a species of horn-backed spider whose bite can kill in under five talecks.
Chief among the oddities are sea and storm, however. I have to believe that these alien phenomenons came about some time after the Pem-Pah had founded in their new homeland. Because if they willingly settled down in full view of those ominous sights, I am afraid to wonder what horrible circumstances of their migration caused them to decide that permanent lightning storms and aptly named "Killing Tides" were preferable to what laid behind them on their journey.
¹ This logic has also informed the argument by some of the more isolationist camps within the spectrum of P.A.S.C.O.P.P.Y. nationalism, that other peoples outside of their homeland should not be consorted with in any meaningful way. This has been another significant obstacle to trade and integration.
((Hey, burrowers. Does anyone here remember the year 2005? How about the lawsuit which alleged that Ford Motor Company's marketing misled drivers on how to drive and maintain their Explorer S.U.V.s? I had no idea about any of that controversy, or the tragic and preventable loss of life that spurred it, but my life was impacted by it in some way regardless.
I watched the commercial that they made as part of the year-long, $27 million USD advertising campaign for S.U.V. safety which followed. And to little twelve year-old Furt, it was pretty glorious:
This strange, lumbering beast phonetically named an Esuvee fascinated me, and I honestly wish I could have owned some kind of paraphernalia as a kid, like a plush toy version. Most other people I've spoken to about them seem to think that they're kind of creepy, and I admit their CG has not aged well, but I find the giant esuvee weirdly cute and endearing. And since I have a place in which to make my rambling ideas concrete these days, I thought why not go all the way with them and write a post? Consider this my first attempt at writing homebrew for an Ultraviolet Grasslands game.))
"Whoa, girl. Easy! Easy now! It was only a startled chrome-fox." -- Lonzo the Game Warden, to his startled mount, Stampies.
"Don't stand behind them for an hour or two after they've had their headlights on. The smell of their exhaust will make ya either pass out, or vomit somethin' fierce." -- Malgoret "Mags" Persidy, senior convoy leader to a group of children.
Far to the west, beyond the battery acid swamps and Rust-Storm Alley, there stretches a vast swath of even more untamed wilderness. Ruined hulks of technology and deposits of rare and jumbled ores break the rolling plains of jagged, saw-toothed grass. Lightning spontaneously crackles and spiderwebs through the sky even on the clearest of days. The earth itself buzzes or throbs with an almost undetectable energy that unnerves but compels human and canine alike. It's a place that no one would have any interest in, were it not located in between every other place of interest to be found in the Teal Wastes.
The grasslands are home to many bizarre animals, but none are so immediately identifiable as the esuvees- also known as lamp-heads, grill-brows, or simply iron beasts. These shaggy creatures, typically between three and four thousand pounds and eight and twelve feet tall at the hump, are the undisputed masters of their environment. Despite this, they are almost total herbivores who roam in great, placid herds known as convoys. They graze through the sharp foliage for the choices knives of grass, and break off mineral deposits with their surprisingly powerful jaws in order to gum them like a cow tonguing a salt-lick.
But they are more than simply adapted to their environment. They reflect its very nature, being an awkward fusion of organic and inorganic.
The most striking feature of an esuvee, besides its size, is its face. Its wide, flat countenance sports a pair of massive pseudo-crystalline bulbs spaced far apart, each one capable of projecting a beam of light stronger than 65 watt lamps and moving with partial independence from the other. Their eyes are connected to an intricate system of specialized nerve endings which incorporate copper particles like filaments, and which run all the way from the head down into the fifth and sixth stomachs. These stomachs are specialized less for digestion and more for fermentation, brewing up an ethanol fuel from the truly nightmarish volume of plant matter which the average esuvee consumes every day. That fuel is in turn compressed into adjacent bladders and burned, powering the esuvee's lights as well as short bursts of extreme energy, such as in fighting off or fleeing the bands of small ambush predators who have to separate an esuvee from its convoy and then harry it for several miles in order to bring it down.
Not as well known to strangers of the plains is the pair of smaller, much less luminous lights which an esuvee sports upon its rear. Studding the back of each hind leg's "knee" (actually a digitigrade ankle) is a dull, reddish bulb which consumes far less energy than those up front. These are useful to members of a convoy traveling at night, in which the bulk of the herd is able to power its night vision down to a soft glow, simply following the lights of the esuvees in front of them who lead the way with lamps at full power. And when the forerunners tire, they can simply slow down to be enveloped by the group as fresher esuvees move ahead to take their places. These rear lights do not seem to be eyes in any way however, leading experts to wonder how an esuvee's body distinguishes wire-filaments from actual optical nerves.
Between the luminous eyes is situated a large, flat space where a nose might be expected. There are in fact nostrils somewhere in there, but they're a bit difficult to find in between the thick rows of wrought metal which form a sort of protective face-plate. These "grills" fuse seamlessly to the skull bones from which they grow, almost like metal mimicry of smaller animals' horns. The grills of male esuvees tend to be larger and more pronounced than those of females, which aids them in their headbutting displays during the highly competitive annual mating period.
This time, colloquially known as "rocking season", is what causes esuvees to get such a negative reputation for aggression and single-mindedness in the wider world. This isn't helped by the fact that seeing a mated pair of esuvees a-rockin' can be quite a... scarring experience for more impressionable eyes.
I'm only partly sorry.
Regardless, the first pioneers into this land were quick to notice how the esuvee thrived, and quicker to stake their own claims in them. They followed the convoys, learning the quickest routes in between potable water sources while also hunting the beasts. Over time they learned to tame them, and a herding industry flourished among the pioneers which survives in their descendants to this day.
Even a juvenile esuvee has enough iron-rich meat on it to last a family several days, though a person with already adequate iron levels has to be careful to thoroughly drain it of blood and hemoglobin before consumption to reduce the risk of iron poisoning. Its bones are dense and heavy, owing to the rich deposits of metals intermingled with the calcium throughout. A skilled smith can purify trace amounts of several metals from every bone, slowly but reliably adding up to workable amounts in a landscape where staying in one place long enough to properly mine an ore outcropping can be dangerous business attracting of much unwanted attention from the other local fauna. The face-plate is a far more accessible piece of metal of course, and grill-metal tools or weapons have been renowned for their durability in the past. Unfortunately this has given rise to the practice of poaching esuvees solely for their grills while leaving the rest of the animal to rust and rot- a truly disgusting waste of life and resources that convoy-keepers have taken great pains to crack down upon in recent years. Their fur, though reputed to be very musky, can be perfectly clean and serviceable for clothing and shelters alike with proper treatment. Because it can be sheered from the esuvee's hide with no harm to the animal, it has become so widely available in many markets that even rabbit's fur has become a rare "luxury" by comparison. Even the animal's eyes, if extracted with their roots undamaged, can be made into lanterns when coupled with a crude electrolytic battery.
An esuvee is just as valuable alive as it is for its parts, however. When trained and cared for properly they are some of the most prolific beasts of burden known to man and several other sapient cultures. Just one harnessed cow can tow two to three thousand pounds for long distances, which has allowed the convoy-keepers to become some of the least light-traveling nomads around.
The average chieftain can carry around a solar tent, three water tanks, and a hot tub.
Less well known, but no less unusual than the esuvee's grill and headlights, are its soles. Each four-toed foot has a treaded texture somewhere in between rubber and old leather, as well as a series of tiny bladders located several inches below the surface, which travel all of the way up into the elbow. Through a hydraulic mechanism that isn't perfectly understood at this time, these bladders can engorge with air to give the lower joints of an esuvee a cushioned, almost balloon-like quality.
Their properties could revolutionize airtight technologies, if only they didn't smell so footy.
This strange adaptation helps the truly massive and heavy esuvee from damaging itself with its own weight while running at high speeds, which can be in excess of forty miles an hour when the beast is well and started up.
Strong harness-belts and a stronger neck are needed to ride at full bounce.
The air-cushioning adaptation also reduces the risk of an esuvee being injured when rolling over onto its side. Esuvees roll over with startling regularity, little-known fact. This is usually to no injury of their own, but often to the detriment of anyone unskilled in riding them. Much effort has been put into educating people beyond the Teal Wastes in the proper use of an esuvee, particularly when it comes to wealthy young men who have one imported as a way of showing off their money and virility. Top-heavy esuvees are often the first (and last) mistake those riders make.
You don't want to know where the rider ended up.
Despite all of these dangers, the esuvee is a reliable and valuable beast, known for its surprising degree of compassion and empathy with humans. It has captured the imaginations of people for generations, as centuries of folklore and oral traditions exemplify. Even as new technologies are developed or old ones rediscovered from the ancient wrecks of the Long Ago time, the convoy-keepers and their faithful esuvees seem like they won't be going anywhere anytime soon, except for everywhere they choose to.
The closest I could find to an old-school monster manual sketch.
ESUVEE by theblitz
If you read my blog even casually, you probably already know that from the amount of attention I've paid to groups like the Fokari, or the ancient Ersuunians.
Despite (but maybe not because of) it being a complete opposite in almost every way to the shut-in, sedentary life that I lead, nomadism and the people who live it have fascinated me since at least the end of my high school years.
Central to nomadism is travel from place to place for resources, and therefore survival. Home is the collapsible shelter you take with you, and your personal life can potentially fit into a saddlebag.
So when a fantasy game comes along that tries to capture the experience of travel beyond rolling on a random monster encounter table, I usually take an interest.
Of course true nomadism is a highly structured, cyclical system of migration following weather, animal patterns, and cultural traditions, while nomads as romanticized wanderers akin to adventurers are what have penetrated the tropes and tales of fiction the most in past years (when they aren't characterized as marauding hordes akin to murderhobos, of course).
Fortunately, the Ultraviolet Grasslands (UVG) by WizardThiefFighter includes both elements.
Supported by fuzzy psychedelic metal themes and the author's own distinctive art style which combines surreal blends of magic and science with an appreciation for desolate beauty, UVG is a game about traveling by caravan into the end of the world- literally.
Beyond the familiar lands of the Rainbowlanders who rule the bulk of the world, all the way at the Left End of the Right Road there is a Violet City- a massive trade hub which is a surreal melange of beings and forces all living together amid bizarre bazaars overseen by stewards who may or may not be the servants of hyper-intelligent house cats.
Beyond the Violet City, are the Ultraviolet Grasslands.
The Grasslands make up a steppe environment of inconceivable vastness stretching out into the west, studded by ruins and pieces of half-functional technology from an enigmatic "Long Ago" time.
And beyond that, long past the point where the laws of reality break down, is the Black City.
But it isn't about what your destination is- it's about the journey.
UVG is a rules-lite game which can be added in parts or as a whole to any existing game, though it works bests most similarly to OSR-type games, since the base rules assume six stats, AC, hit dice, etc.
UVG is also a Pointcrawl, which is a type of game system I only learned the existence of through this same game. For those who don't know, it's a way of organizing points of interest on a campaign map or what have you, but leaving the spaces in between those points vague and undefined. It's economical for DMs who don't have a lot of time or resources to work with, but also highly appropriate for travel across the Grasslands, where I get the sense that time and space are somewhat mutable, and the second trip through an area might not be the same as the first.
The Grasslands are populated by all manner of sub-human, superhuman, energy being, robot, and ghost. Player characters are even weirder, partly because they're actually willing to go on a trip out here. There are a host of reasons offered as to why they want to go into the Grasslands, from being merchants and their guards, to fulfilling destinies or prophecies in the face of the world coming to an end, to simply returning home as one of the Lime Nomads (it's unclear if they are named for the fruit or the color).
To show how vast and empty the Grasslands are, actions are taken according to Weeks, rather than rounds, turns, minutes, etc. In these Weeks, the players can travel, forage for supplies (measured in Sacks), make discoveries, and run into misfortune (one of several reasons not to dump Charisma in this game). Making good use of your Sacks is vital to finishing your job on the Grasslandsalive and profitably, while weight allowance on the caravan is enough of a concern that you might prefer to permanently deface beautiful but heavy works of art in order to carry away a few handfuls of precious stones. Gritty realism is assumed for injury and healing, and cannibalism has a slot in the rules right on page 33. I wouldn't be surprised if a rule comes along soon for characters losing sanity from over-stimulation by the constant buzz and glow of the landscape.
I encourage you to give this weird world a shot if any of this has piqued your interest, particularly because the work-in-progress introductory book for the game is offered for free on the creator's Patreon page and through DriveThruRPG. More content pertaining to more locations in depth is available to Patrons, with even more goodies forthcoming.
"I send Hhicza with you for fourteen stalks, a good deal for a friend. What? You sail against the wind, through the Pinholes? Twenty-eight stalks, and not a grain less!"
- Tal ad-an-Perap, a savvy priest-herder known for his somewhat questionable credentials.
"You'd think with such a pampered lifestyle, they'd at least taste a little better cooked. Worst thing I ever got tried as a heretic for."
- A tattooed and prodigiously paunched man standing about ten feet behind me as I write this. Name unknown, and not about to be asked for.
For some reason which eludes my understanding, I have the thought of the maritime traditions of Nambar stuck in my head- right in between the splitting headache and the worry that this breakfast might have been spat in. At least the hunk of cheese I was given seems to be from a goat, rather than the pig dairy "delicacies" which we are treated to back up in the higher tiers of Deneroth.
Goats, as the case happens to be, also occupy a long and storied place in the history of Nambarish seamanship.
While not often considered the proudest of animals in our reckoning, goats are highly prized and symbolic in Nambar. Owing I think to the pastoral traditions of the inland folk who would eventually join with their coastal kin to form something of a (relatively) unified people, goats have ritual importance imbued with the memory of practical considerations. While they themselves might not be considered very clean, they are the cleaners of society by having such a hardy constitution and adventurous appetite. Of course the stories of goats eating one's entire pouch of tin coins for dinner are fancy, but they do help to keep the streets of towns and cities clear of refuse. They also serve as apotropaic protectors, either as a whole or in pieces, and it is frequent that those with a stronger belief in magic will keep around a lucky goat, or an amulet made from the bones of one. The unusual pupil of a goat eye is likewise imbued with power, being just unnerving enough to cause the Evil Eye to blink and avert from its target out of discomfort. Because of this, goats are associated with more than a few protective deities, and may be sacrificed or sacrificed to. More mundanely, they also serve as very effective producers of milk, fur, and meat.
All of those are reasons to bring a goat along on an uncertain voyage where supplies may run low or the waves of an angered deity might rise up high. But far more fascinating is the goat to which no harm is ever, under any circumstances, permitted. These are the Mir u'Yam, or Goats of the Sea in our language.
No voyage into uncertain waters out of red-shored Nambar is considered complete without a dedicated, multi-functional sea-goat. They tend to be specially bred and trained from a young age to be obedient, patient, observant, and above all, stately in demeanor. The responsibility of breeding them tends to fall to the devotees of one of the associated deities, such as the blue-bearded and resplendently robed figure of Hhuuzt, who also brand their goats or dye patches of hair--such as the chin--a deep blue.
Once introduced to the appropriate vessel, a sea goat's first duty is to calmly and smoothly guide the rest of the voyage's goats up the ramp and into the holding pen where they are to remain until the ship's return to port. For reasons not entirely known to outsiders, the Mir u'Yam have a particularly pacifying effect on other, less well-bred livestock. After this, and once the ship has properly departed, a crewman hefts the Mir up on his back in a specially-designed harness, which allows him to ascend the rigging of the ship's (usually solitary) mast up to its highest point.
There, the goat is placed in a small, cage-like nest which gives it a full, uninterrupted view of the sea in every direction. Provisioned with fodder and water, the goat stands placid yet alert as a lookout. Thanks to the wide vision of goats, they may see a very broad swath of the horizon at once, and have to only turn their heads a bit. Thanks to the training of their breeders, they are not utterly and totally bored to death by the job of being lookout. It is given periodic exercise breaks down on deck, both otherwise its voyage is solitary and high-altitude.
In the event that something interrupts the wine-dark waves around the ship, the Mir u'Yam produces a trained series of bleats with particular intonation conveying different messages of direction and distance. Typically, one bleat refers to sighted land, two bleats refers to another ship, and three indicates that something other has been sighted. The ocean accessible from Nambar, truthfully or not, is believed to be filled with all manner of terrifying monsters, and those daring yet superstitious types who make up the ranks of their seafarers like to have some advance warning on when they should arm themselves with lacquered bows and toggle-spears. It is said that particularly brave and battle-hearted sea-goats even adorned the masts of the long warships which sailed into battle against the Gertish proxies of the Third Trade War.¹
When at last a ship returns safely to portage, the Mir is brought down from the mast for the last time, and kissed between the lozenge-shaped eyes by every member of the crew out of gratitude, captain included. Then it leads what remains of the supply flock ashore, depending on how many needed to be eaten or sacrificed to appropriate spirits. Finally, it is either returned to its previous handlers, or given over to a comparable group for safekeeping in the new location. Rented sea goats can come at considerable expense, however, so most find their way back to their priest-herders.
In the event of the premature death of a sea goat, whether by incident or natural causes, many sailors might fall victim to utter despair at this absolute omen of impending doom. But others, at least frequently enough that anecdotal evidence of it exists in amusing tales all across Nambar and beyond, might take a more self-determined approach. More than once, the careful eye of a priest has found that a very different goat from the one they sent off has returned to them, done up in a rough approximation of the proper branding and regalia of a Mir u'Yam. As for how the ships continue to navigate without a sea goat, I presume that no decent crew would ever let their own skills as lookouts atrophy completely.
Perhaps we should consider painting one of our own mules in lucky colors before resuming our travels today.
¹ While I don't currently have access to a verifiable source on this subject, I am quite confident that the above is correct, given that I have previously studied the events and effects of the Third Trade War, specifically in the context of how it led to the creation of Hylek's Hundreds. In lieu of a better citation, I can at least provide evidence that the occurrence is well-known enough to have become a popular subject of literature, resulting in it having been featured in the second half of Tirti Naorut's Twenty Children's Bedtime Stories from the Occident, 231 A.R. ² ² What? There's nothing wrong with carrying around a token from one's childhood. And it's as lavishly illustrated as any old codex in the library, I can say that with confidence!
I hope that wherever you are, your holidays of choice are or have been bringing you spiritual fulfillment and/or really freaking neat stuff.
I am at least distantly observant of the Yulesmas, if only because I can't fit any evergreen larger than a shrub through the front door of my burrow. But I do have my own rituals. I can't say that it's a goblin holiday, since I haven't really met any others of my kind- probably because I'm usually hiding. Then again, if there are any other goblins in the Upstate mountain valleys, I can't help but imagine that they must celebrate it as well.
After all, our lives depend on it.
You see, a goblin is not the most secure creature in its environment. The rivers we enjoy living next to can flood, or the weather can trap us indoors with snow, ice, or mud. The mountain-folk can occasionally make sport of hunting us down with their brand new Weatherby hunting rifles, or accidentally run us over when we attempt to cross a street. And any pet larger than a large mouse is a natural predator to us, in sufficient numbers and with the necessary viciousness of course.
But all of those pale in comparison to the danger of the squirrels.
Masters of the trees overhead, possessed of an unnatural speed and jerkiness of movement, and obsessed with gathering food in these trying months, squirrels have spelled the doom of many a hapless goblin. Either by ravaging our food stores, or attacking us directly in their rush for supplies, only woe betides one who sees those black eyes and massive incisors during the first ghost of winter.
Or so I like to imagine, to make my ideas make more sense. Like I said, I've never seen another goblin.
At any rate, a great deal of trial and error went into developing the perfect response to the hostilities of nature's most godless nibbling-machine. The answer, it turns out, is appeasement. It required cutting almost all of the acorns out of my diet, but by leaving a trail of them leading away from my territory, deep into the woods where a mighty cache of the nuts can be found, a goblin can live in peace for the most trying of weeks before the beginning of the long cold. You just have to get used to the sounds of savage fighting, if more than one squirrel followed the trail to the distraction.
That time of huddling in one's burrow is an excellent opportunity in which to try brewing any new tea recipes you've discovered on the backs of recycled boxes that year, or to finish stitching patches into the heels of your decade-old socks. Or, if you're feeling particularly daring, try taking just one or two of those acorns you secreted into your person, and roasting them in your oven made from discarded terracotta pots and votive candles.
But in the end, the sounds of chittering, narbling, and rapid munching comes to an abrupt snard of an end, and the quiet of winter can set in at last. This is Narblesnard, and it is a moment for collective sighs and relief among all goblinkind.
Of course the bushy-tailed devils don't actually hibernate, so it's back to basics every week when they wake back up to forage some more. But the spirit of the holiday is to remind us all that we can survive. That the future brings with it new potential for good, as well as for terror. This feeling is reinforced by the fact that, after the day of Narblesnard, the hundreds of convenience stores in town finally stop playing those infernal songs about jingling bells and unwheeled chariots drawn by mutant snow-deer.
So, Blessed Narblesnard to all!
May you survive the New Year, so that we can do it all again next time.
"He does not punish. He does not reward. He doesn't judge at all. He simply is; a withered hand to hold on the last, long journey." - A literal translation out of Esgodarran prose taken from Nares Saton's Elegies.
"Don't fear Death- fear where he's taking you." - A prominent graffito scrawled over the threshold of a funerary home in the Lower-East Tier of Deneroth. "Relish the sting! It means the Horned One hasn't yet claimed you." - Hital, elated as always to be performing burn debridement without any anesthesia handy.
When death comes, not everyone has a tribe to cut them apart, or a bird-spirit to whisk them away to the sky. For many, the only company to be had in death is silent and solitary Ergil.
As his epithet "Ergil-Who-Is-Death" suggests, Ergil is the state of death, and everything which is dead is entered into his being, at least temporarily. He is not a god, at least not the kind which needs worship and sacrifice, though he does receive both on occasion. He is somewhat closer to a force of nature, in a restrained and creeping sort of fashion. But he is also an individual, acting separate from or within himself in a manner surprisingly personal to each lost soul.
Upon death, the individual is commonly believed to be lost for a time without time ranging from hours to years, in which the soul is tossed back and forth upon the currents of some roiling sea of unbeing. But this transient phase ends, and then the dead "wakes up". They are greeted with a place not too vastly different from the location in which they died, with certain marked differences. In some stories this is a pallid mirror of the world of the living, while others hold it to be the actual, physical world through different means of seeing. Without the veil of mortal eyes, the spirit can see the world quite differently- perhaps, as it truly is.
Regardless of what the nature of this place is where the dead find themselves, it is somewhat of a dreary place. The sky remains perpetually overcast, and though the constant wind can feel quite damp, no rain ever falls. The world stretches out in all directions, silent and dead but for the wind in the grass or the flowing of stagnant-smelling water. Geography wears thin the farther away from one's site of death one goes, and beyond that, space itself begins to deteriorate, until a truly alien landscape stretches out before one's unveiled eyes. If this is the land of the dead, it can give the impression that one is the only dead thing anywhere, ever, for not a single other soul is ever to be seen. Black-feathered birds or small flies can occasionally be seen, as well as brief and distant views of dark shapes shifting about, but nothing pays the dead any heed. None but Ergil.
He appears sometime after the dead's wakening, typically from a great distance at first, no different from the other furtive black spots on the horizon. But though he moves slowly, he advances inexorably toward the spirit. Some flee what they see as this approaching apparition of doom, and beat a hasty retreat through the weird land which now keeps them. And because the spirit needs no sleep, nor food or water, the chase can last indefinitely. But Ergil's slow and steady approach never leaves him farther away than the horizon, a constant reminder of the inevitability of death.
Some remain quite ignorant of their own death, while others refuse acceptance, traveling through as many stages of grief as the living they left behind might feel. Though countless ages and trackless wastes may separate the dead soul from where they began, the time always comes when they stand in silent acceptance, and the master of that self-same domain comes to rest before them.
The avatar of death is quite featureless. He stands immensely tall, twelve feet or more at times, perpetually enveloped by a cloak of frayed black feathers and scraps of fur. His arms and legs, when visible, are as black as his garment, long and gangling, and terminating in gnarled claws. Contrasting with these dark hues is the dingy whiteness of bandages wrapped haphazardly around his body, stained with blood or antiseptic here and there- some believe these to be the remnants of dressings stripped from the bodies of those who died in agony under the ministrations of physicians, who finally came to know release from Najis the Healer. A more bleached shade of white is his head. Or, what passes for one.
Ergil has no visible face, for the head which caps his eerily long neck is mounted by the immense skull of a bovid shaped into a mask. Because of this, plus the large wooden staff or crook he is sometimes depicted with, he is known as the Horned One, or the Moldering Shepherd. His gender is inferred as male only due to the large and impressive horns which adorn the skull, suggesting that it had once belonged to a great steer. Either Death cannot speak, or he does not care how any including his newest guests refer to him. All he will do, is extend his hand.
He does not force the spirit to take his gesture, and will even continue to follow the dead on their aimless journey across the vast and empty vistas of that place, ever a silent companion walking a few paces behind and beside, as tireless as his charge.
When the hand is at last taken, he will not take initiative even then. Rather, the land seems to reorient itself and regain some measure of coherence around the two, and the correct path reveals itself. And so it is that Ergil and the spirit walk together, hand in hand, neither leading the other, until the destination is reached. Other times, if in life one was too young or old to walk, or some disability gripped them, Ergil effortlessly carries them in his musty yet gentle embrace, going where the dead would go as if they themselves were walking that way.
The final destination may be an opening into a vault in the earth. It may be a craggy pinnacle enveloped in a shaft of light piercing the ever-present clouds. Whatever it is, the immediate and profound sense of belonging which takes over the wandering spirit ends all travel. Ergil acts as final witness to the departed and their departure, and then he vanishes again over the horizon.
Ergil-Who-Is-Death has accumulated a great deal of frightening iconography over the ages, making him appear sinister and even violent in nature. The addition of a cruel-looking harvesting scythe in some depictions contaminated by a certain grain-god has not helped matters. But to those who pray to him and officiate funerary rites and interment, his even-handedness and gentleness are emphasized.
He is no one's enemy. Only another step to be taken.
"My expulsion from the township surrounding Serminwurth is at present still a point of annoyance for me- truly, how could I have known that surgical paralysis as a cure for C.S.D. had been outlawed for a century and a half? My patient was happy for it, and would have offered his signed consent, were he literate, and had his hands not have sooner stabbed me in the throat with that same pen. Regardless, I have resolved to make the most of my new situation, rather than simply make due. I have met a somewhat like-minded fellow in my flight from home, though his practice and interest in discovery has something a theistic bent to it. He is a devotee of the god of healing, and thus his familiarity with anatomy and patience with the agonized will both come in handy as we embark upon this new project together. He is one Hital, of the village Ferrith." - Personal Journal Entry #1
"My companion and I have found the distant and, to be perfectly honest, forgotten town of Uiten in our hasty travels east after certain unfortunate occurrences manifested themselves around Hital's latest rendering of services as a barber-surgeon. He seems to have taken a hint, and no longer offers me a shave. Uiten was apparently forgotten by the rest of the region just as much as it was by the geographic archives back home, because the area is in a state of advanced disrepair and administrative neglect. We have received word that the local prison has recently overflowed- yet another negative side effect of the peculiar practice in this region of using imprisonment as a punishment in and of itself, rather than as a brief interlude to proper financial or corporeal discipline. But, one man's rot is another man's fertilizer. We will contact the local authorities in the morning." - Journal Entry #4
"We make a surprisingly effective team of negotiators, Hital and I. His forwardness and bombasticity make an excellent entry-point, while my comparatively more reserved nature and technical language "seals the deal" so to speak, where his energy might otherwise turn toward less-than-appealing quirkiness, or reveal something of his "fixations". The pouch of gold which we passed to the magistrate and chief bailiff also seemed to turn them around toward our cause. Regardless, our methods have earned us a signed and sealed certificate which transfers to us the responsibility and authority over one of the prison's condemned inmates. We have assured his former keepers that there is no end more ethical and just than one which serves the progress of human knowledge." - Journal Entry #5
"The prisoner, whose name I cannot recall being spoken, does not seem to be so fortunate as to be bilingual. This tells me that he belonged to the somewhat plebeian majority back home, and likely would not be a terribly good source of intellectual stimulation in conversation. This is just as well, since he seems more concerned with fruitlessly pulling at his restraints and causing Hital to have to use the bullwhip which he inexplicably carried around all of this time. Still, we are making adequate time on our way to the facility." - Journal Entry #6
"The buzzing of alert activity was almost deafening four miles from our secondary destination, forcing us to stop and thoroughly hide and veil the horses and our friend before progressing on foot with suits and earplugs donned. It could not mute the pounding of our hearts in our heads as we progressed into Blood Wasp territory. Our target was the smallest functional hive which we could access at the edge of the zone of infestation, but unfortunately for us they happened to be quite closely packed this season. By the time we found a suitable hive which vaguely resembled the shape of a waxy, prismatic squirrel, the thumb-sized colony drones were boring holes into our protective clothing and barbing at our skin. We carefully cut the structure open and harvested a trio of galls from within before beating a hasty retreat. The left side of Hital's face was bloated from an envenomed sting, but it only dragged half of his ever-present smile even farther up toward his pronounced cheekbones. He seemed quite pleased with everything." - Entry #10
"The "facility" of which Hital spoke so highly has failed to live up to my expectations. At one point, it was supposedly a quite refined retreat for the priests of Najis in the region. But it has since fallen into ruin, and the wooden portions of the structure have rotted and collapsed. The stone structure which superficially resembles a gatehouse shall act as our domicile as well as staging grounds, and so I am grateful that I kept a hold on my earplugs, though they have become quite nasty, waxy things in the summer humidity. The nights will be loud for some time." - Entry #12
"Fortunately for Hital, the operating room is marvelously more preserved and clean. The heavy external locks on all doors and windows leading to the chamber kept the elements from spoiling the instruments and facilities within, to the point that we believe even the wooden operating table will suffice. After two days of sitting and stewing, our prisoner has become increasingly paranoid. Perhaps he has an inkling of what is in store for him. Certainly, he has noticed that we are feeding him significantly more than in the past week. Hital believes he has worked out some of the rudiments of the man's language, and has conducted a handful of halting conversations with him up to this point. I was unable to transcribe them, but the end result seems to be that he is more distressed now that the "Smiling Man" has taken such an interest in him. The uncanny nickname has, incidentally, reminded me to begin a separate and more disciplined log for what is to follow. Were this to be read by anyone but myself, I would apologize for my subsequent dryness." - Entry #13
"Observation Log Day One. The subject was transferred to the operating room after the inclusion of a sufficient dose of remphanth extract to his food. My associate and I agree that we should have tightened his restraints, as the constant rattle of chains upon the table is growing already so tiresome. We have placed a low-hanging mesh net above him containing the galls, which have shown signs of greater activity over the past eighteen hours. My associate tells me that the subject insists that he can hear them humming. We both confirm that there is perfect silence in the facility other than his own exclamations. Perhaps they are already growing acquainted." ---
"Day Two. A reflected light aimed to shine through each of the galls confirms that the larva are highly active and in a more advanced state of development than we had hoped. The subject continues to rant and rave, alternating insisting that he had not committed his crimes, and begging forgiveness for them. He simply wishes for the humming to stop. My associate agreed to contribute his own plugs, and for the moment the subject is pacified."
[...]
"Day Four. The galls are beginning to rupture. I began to mix several doses of anesthetic which I believe necessary to the process, but my associate insists that the procedure will have a much higher rate of success if the subject is conscious and able to provide the larvae with the needed levels of aural stimulation. I am skeptical, but will defer to his greater experience in this field, for his treatment of several cases following the Festering River Blight was what allowed for this all to happen. Fortunately he does not dare to call me his assistant, in jest or otherwise." ---
"Day Five. I have invaginated the subject's navel with a metal rod and spaced out the entryway using a specially-treated hollow reed, pointed upward at the rupturing galls. One has already begun to drip effluvia upon the table. Addendum to Day Five. By the marked increase in yelling, the subject seems to have finally come in direct contact with one or more larvae. The reed's effectiveness as a channel made from the material of the wasp's native habitat is noted for future research."
[...]
"Day Twelve. All three galls have ruptured and emptied fully, though several offspring died or were insufficiently developed to migrate to the host. Perhaps they were damaged in the direct handling of their galls, or perhaps it is the result of improper incubator formation. Future cross-referencing will hopefully illuminate this issue. The subject is behaving very erratically, fighting against his restraints until his wrists and ankles bleed and significant bruising across his limbs indicates the separation of muscle tissue from bone. The influence of adrenaline on the human body is remarkable, but must wait for another time in order to receive full study."
[...]
"Day Fifteen. The subject has stopped screaming."
[...]
"Day Twenty-Eight. After a significant period of unresponsiveness in which the subject was deemed to be expired, its extremities appear now to twitch and flex randomly. My associate has explained that this marks the point where the larva has transitioned from feeding on gut fauna and internal organs to engaging directly with the central nervous system. The relative lack of innards explains the surprising lack of foul odor- I was incorrect in believing that the subject's tissues were somehow being preserved by the process of incorporation."
[...]
"Day Thirty. After one month of observation and gentle goading, we have confirmed the presence of wasp nymphs in and around what remains of the subject's respiratory and digestive tract. The entry-point is now a far cry from a human torso meanwhile, having been sufficiently converted into hive structures that it resembles in crude shape some of the larger, dome-like colonies which I glimpsed at the heart of the Blood Wasp infestation during our brief foray. Soon, the entire subject--blood, tissue, and bones--will become the strange, uniform substance which houses a hive. It is with cautious celebration that we confirm that the process of hive conversion may be duplicated in a controlled environment. This will effectively pave the way to a greater understanding of the ecology of parasitic colonial insects, assuming we ever find a publisher willing to stamp its name upon our soon-to-be compiled reports."
[...]
"Day Forty-Two. Thus far we have met with very limited success in obtaining a professional audience for our discoveries. Measures have been taken to keep the hive contained as more advanced wasps lay claim to the host's surroundings. A thick, soupy atmosphere has begun to take hold in the operating room, accompanied by a sickeningly sweet smell which even manages to seep through our more air-tight seals. My associate has explained to me that this is a byproduct of the process, used to nurture and sustain more advanced forms of the wasp which quickly molt the teeth and enlarged stomach found in larvae. It is reportedly used as a highly effective yet highly addictive painkiller and recreational drug in the river delta towns to the south."
"We have officially deemed the project to be completed, though Hital and I will continue to make careful observations on the growth and development of the hive- the appearance of a queen would be a spectacular event neither of us would want to miss. Additionally, standards of safety must be kept at an all-time high, lest the facility and surrounding area become a new infestation zone. I would be deeply grieved if undue ecological damage and loss of life followed this momentous success. I have proposed that in the interim while we seek for scholastic partnership, we harvest and process some of this "crimson honey" and make a few minor business arrangements with the locals.
Hital is in strong disagreement with this, citing his religious disinclination toward the use or, indeed, even the existence of anesthesia. I have assured him that the proceeds would allow us to do much more good than ill, offering us a fast track to publication. I have also reminded him--perhaps somewhat manipulatively--of the severe withdrawal symptoms known to manifest from honey abuse, and of the subsequent need for trained medical professionals which would be sure to follow.
He is beginning to come around." - Journal Entry #14 Beyond this point, no other journal entries are legible through the thickly-caked dirt and grime of nature, though there did appear to be many more pages written. Given the eventual publication of one very polarizing academic journal within Deneroth and select associated cities which contained elements of the above as well as both names, the pair met with some success. But the article which began this new wave of study was published without followup just shy of a decade ago at this time, and these journals were found among several other hastily-abandoned personal effects amid the effective ground-zero of the recently exterminated northern Blood Wasp infestation. No recently-parasitized human remains could be found on location, leaving the fates of the forested hilltop building's occupants uncertain.
"Most fascinating about the Khokhantipa natives is, in my opinion, their ancestors' willingness to settle a land which they could not possibly have seen any appeal in, yet they did so anyway. The reckless and indomitable spirit of humanity, all in one squat, vaguely fishy-smelling package!" - Ossonyel of Old Miccime, travel literature author and self-proclaimed scholar. "... It's like a pig mated with an eel, and then their descendants had long and sordid affairs with eyeless moles and lampreys." - Ut-luush Tabd, trader and first-time visitor to the mudflat border towns.
Separated from the rest of the continent by the small but steep Tampiir Mountain chain, the Khokhantipa Mudflats are an anomaly of size and staying power. It is unknown how long ago they formed, because recorded history of the region does not begin until very recently. But no matter how young it may be, it tends to feel to an outsider like a terribly time-lost and ancient place. The flats were once separated by lengths of proper continental land, it is believed, but over time these eroded into nothing more than prominent sandbars which may be seen as large hills during the lengthy low tide, or as small islands during shallow high tide. Taken all together, the mudflats cover an area several leagues deep and several dozens in length.
According to the rarely-consulted histories kept by the natives themselves, their people have been inhabiting the flats for "thirty-by-thirty" lifetimes, or well over one thousand generations. It was at this location that the earth first met sea, for the sky had once been filled with parched earth until the trickster god of their pantheon kicked its stilts away and sent the whole thing crashing down into the gods' primordial soup of creation. Life flooded the earth for the first time, and so the mudflats are the first frontier of terrestrial life, and the soggy cradle of all. The autonym of the Khokhantipan people is notoriously difficult to transcribe, combining several glottal stops with a nasalized series of vowels and an upper-left-side tongue click for good measure. "Khokhantipa", the name ascribed to the area by early mariners and then applied to its people, finds general acceptance among outsiders and border towns, partly due to the fact that approximations of the correct name with imprecise tonal consonance results instead in an insult being directed at the listener's second male cousin.
The most popular image of mudflat life to the outside world is, naturally, the Zood. The Zood is an immense creature nearly sixteen feet in length for bulls and sometimes almost twenty for cows, dull pink in color, covered in a dense blubbery hide, and possessed of some of the strangest appendages seen on life outside of some volcanic sea-trench. The Zood's lumpy, segmented body is supported by eight legs which end in stubby little extremities somewhere between flippers, claws, and hooves, and they are well-suited to the variable terrain of the flats and surrounding territory. It lacks any shoulders, and its head is formed by the tapering of the front of its body into what could almost be mistaken for a raised ninth foot, if not for the semicircle of whiskered skin adorned with a myriad of eyes, perched above a cavernous mouth which can rapidly invert to form a rubbery pseudo-proboscis. The name "Zood" is supposedly derived from the humming sound which the creature makes while filter-feeding or tasting the air, or while at rest among their herds. Other names given to them by spectacularly uninspired outsiders include Mud-Pig, Slow-Stepper, and Sea-Bear.
Zoods are herded by the Khokhantipans, who are able to produce a stunning array of versatile, if pungent, clothing and fuel out of the hide and thin blubber of the animal. But more often, they are kept alive as mounts and companions, which give them a high vantage point during the low tide from which to look for beached food, and a comfortably buoyant ride during high tide. Food for the Zoods consists mostly of small animals and algae or plankton which it is almost perpetually filtering out of the mud underfoot. Food for their riders is in bulk large catches of sea fish, as well as seaweeds and the broad ranges of mollusks, crustaceans, and gastropods which wash up on the flats or are found nearly year-round in the immense tidal pools closer to the open sea.
Home for these strange strand-riders most often takes the form of the rigid hide huts accessed from the roof and anchored to the mudflat floor by tethers of water-treated gut, sinew, and specially-made rope attached to stones embedded in the earth. They are designed so that when the tides rise and fall, the hut remains upright and moves up and down with it with the family within mostly undisturbed. Visitors to the region tend to prefer the more static borderland villages, or the few "island" towns which dot the flats, as these are far less prone to making one violently seasick. In the event of broken tethers and a family set adrift, such as in a storm, they simply set about rowing back to home territory from atop their house, sometimes while enlisting the services of the remarkably docile wild Zoods who float back and forth with the tides like undulating, methane-scented fat balloons.
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