[center][color=Green][h3]The Ruhig Kingdom[/h3][/color][/center]

An ox of a man trudged through the dingy cave. His name was Borcha, and he wore the dull armor of woven and banded Yron, just like any other warrior in the gloomy hellhole that was the forest, but he was of higher station: the bear pelt that he wore as a claok over his armor revealed his status as a berserker. He was the one and only berserker for his tribe's highest chieftain, no less. It was an honorable and prestigious role, but that didn't change where he was.

[i]In a dingy cave.[/i] Well, perhaps it wasn't dingy...a few holes existed in the roof, and beneath them burned fires that kept the place warm and dry. A few rugs of animal fur or woven plant fiber decorated the floor, while hunting trophies and paintings depicting battle and glory adorned the otherwise bleak stone walls. The cave admittedly did feel homely enough once you grew used to it, but it was far from luxurious. Far from what befitted the status of a chief, even the petty chieftain that made this place his dwelling and ruled over a few dozen other folk in nearby caves or huts outside.

All the other tribes looked down on his people, the Suebi. They were the newest, they were the strangest, and not so long ago they had been independent. They had fought countless battles and wars against the Ruhigs for their independence, their land, and their very survival. Early on they realized that they shared an enemy with the Horse People of the plains and struck up an uneasy alliance. With their strength and their alliance the Suebi had won and fended off all four of the other tribes for many years, but attrition whittled their numbers down and one day their great warlord had been wounded in battle and vanished into the woods to never return. The traitorous Horse People had shown their true colors by severing the alliance and suddenly attacking both sides with overwhelming force, and so the Suebi had been forced to join with the Ruhigs that they hated and submit to the wretched King, and the Ruhigs were forced to allow their worst enemies to join as equals, all in the name of mutual survival. Of course that was all three generations ago, yet some bad blood remained and would no doubt stay forever.

The Suebi were also looked down upon because their people were the poorest. The craggy and rugged coastal hills that the Suebi lived upon were only sparsely forested. What few trees dotted the rocky hillocks were all struggling to take root in such stony land and few managed to boast an impressive size. What ironwoods were available were painstakingly hard to harvest and the lumber hard to move thanks to the rugged terrain, while the lack of fertility in the soil left the resulting Yron malnourished and considered inferior to that from the others parts of the ironwood. Game was equally scarce in these parts and farming berries and the like was difficult, forcing the Suebi to turn mostly to the nearby sea and the many rivers and streams that cut through their land for food. Indeed, they were talented fishermen and had been for many generations, so they didn't starve.

Still, the Suebi had some strengths. Their "inferior" Yron was not very hard, yet it was both more flexible and lighter which left it with some advantages. First and foremost, it made for an excellent building material for boats. It enjoyed the benefits of incredible durability, resistance to aging, and near immunity to fire, yet it was also easier to work into planks and bend and floated better in the water. The Suebi had always been decent boat builders anyways, so it was only natural that they became the tribe with by far the largest fleets and best sailors. The supposedly inferior Yron also allowed for their warriors and hunters to wear lighter armor that was more comparable to boiled leather than to iron. 

With weaker shields and armor, the Suebi favored guerrilla warfare, and they fielded almost exclusively skirmishers and ranged fighters. Their tribe had once fought by using some sort of magic to hurl stones, but they had eventually adopted the bow and arrow used by the other tribes. They still had many more magic users than the other tribes though, calling them shamans rather than druids. Their shamans were indeed different: they knew little of the nature magic used by druids, though they did have their own twisted arts. It was whispered that the shamans had strange and dark powers. Of course, Borcha knew that the superstitions had some truth to them in that the shamans indeed did had some secret magic that could rip a man in half and set him aflame. They were powerful and universally feared, but at the end of the day they simply knew other forms of magic. They didn't make pacts with devils or hold dark Sabbaths with the evil mystics of the wretched Horse People. Those were all foolish lies and rumors spread by lesser men.

His thoughts straying, Borcha at last remembered where he was. He was here as an honored guest to protect his lord and the other greatest men of his tribe while they traveled to the great meeting beneath the Father Tree. The old king was dead so all the high chieftains had to convene beneath the Father Tree, the tallest ironwood in the world and the very heart of this forest. It was there that the druids brought the lumberjacks so that a new king could be elected from amongst those candidates. But that would not be for a few days more on the road, Borcha mused as he remembered where he was: at a feast. This village had offered its hospitality to the lords of the tribe as they passed through, and it would be a grave insult if the High Chieftain's own berserker did not join the revelry.

Walking into the feast, Borcha's bear cloak was all the introduction he needed. At once he was swarmed by half a dozen of the locals, all wishing to welcome such a prestigious warrior into their village and offer him the bounty of their feast. [i]Their feast in a cave.[/i] The warrior smiled and grunted a few words before finding a table, not much for talking. He ate a few bowls of hearty stew and gladly accepted drink when offered: rather than his ale being served in a drinking horn, it came in the bowl of a human skull. The local chief honored him: it was tradition for a man to drink from the skull of the first enemy he slayed, and to allow another to drink from it was a sign of respect, almost reverence if they were not a liege and the gesture wasn't expected. Needless to say, Borcha was rather flattered.

It felt strange to be the center of attention when there were so many other powerful men in the room. Indeed, it confused Borcha until he noticed that his lord was nowhere to be seen. Noticing that the High Chieftain's son was present, he made his way over and inquired as to the whereabouts of the lord. The young man spat back that his father had felt unwell and taken his leave from the eating. No doubt the boy was in a foul mood seeing as he was heir and yet the locals still paid for heed to a mere soldier, albeit one that was something of a living legend. Still, Borcha hardly cared; one day the little one might be his master, but until then he was just another one of the little people that would rather envy another than rise up and better themselves.

Borcha returned to his seat and stayed there for most of that night, not bothering to check up on the High Chieftain. He trusted that his lord was fine and he needn't follow the man anyways. He had sworn loyalty as a champion rather than as some bodyguard or maid. It was rather late in the morning when Borcha groggily rose from his slumber, his head pounding from the past night's drinking. The Mighty Chieftain had rose early in the morning and returned back to his hall after deciding to forgo attending the moot entirely. To ensure the Suebi were still heard, the rest of the delegates would still go with the chief's pompous little son and heir leading the party. 

What had looked like a grand and powerful entourage indeed with the Mighty Chieftain at its head in all his glory now looked rather sorry, but at least Borcha's presence might be striking enough for them to be taken as seriously as the other tribes. Sighing, the Suebi's champion went out with the rest that day and made for the Grand Tree in the heart of the Black Forests.

[hider=Summary]
-Borcha is introduced. He's a part of the Suebi tribe, and the berserker of that tribe's High Chieftain.
-Long-winded exposition that fleshes out the Ruhig Kingdom somewhat.
-The Suebi are mentioned to be strange and different from most of the other tribes: rather than druids they have shamans with some form of strange magic, their Yron is inferior yet they have a powerful fleet, and in battle most of them favor guerrilla warfare or skirmishing with extensive utilization of magic and ranged weapons.[/hider]