Tortoise

GATEWAYS: THE NEXT GENERATION [CLOSED AND CONCLUDED]

@Enigmatik

Hahaha yeah no worries, I’ll cut the jokes but it’s largely complete tbh. I was just bored and inserted too much humour into the sheet just cause the concept of talking cows is too much of a low hanging fruit. There are obviously the makings of an absolutely dystopian nation being made there, just sprinkled with too much humour

Edit: I mean, I should cut out the nuclear fission based rockets right? Right? Right?

The fun I’ll have with this nation is that they need to breed to make technological progress haha

@SgtEasy

Remember how I nicknamed your last guys the Khanapes before any one else got to it?

Well, this is the Cowllective. I gotta get that in writing before someone else says it.

GATEWAYS: THE NEXT GENERATION [CLOSED AND CONCLUDED]

I've got something else to be considered, sort of a meme yet utterly created for my fun mwahahaha

@SgtEasy

*Moohahaha

GATEWAYS: THE NEXT GENERATION [CLOSED AND CONCLUDED]

<Snipped quote by Tortoise>

If only I had the drive to continue a Khanape story. I always thought about the implications of a nation built up of uplifted cattle where only its upper echelons were aware of the extensive genocide of their predecessor species

That would be funny!

@SgtEasy

Well, without wanting to ruin the moment, I will put on my GM hat again long enough to remind you that we're always open. And since this second take on Gateways has a much slower pace than the first Gateways did, it's a very chill RP to be involved with. You can post once every two or three months and people will barely blink an eye. So, if any smol part of you is at all interested in taking up the Khanapes again, we could have fun with them ;P

GATEWAYS: THE NEXT GENERATION [CLOSED AND CONCLUDED]

Just an old AFKer and former player of the old Gateways popping by to say that it’s nice to see the new Gateways doing well:) If health issues hadn’t cropped up, I would have stayed to the end of the old one!

Good shit @Enigmatik @Tortoise

@SgtEasy

Ah! We were just talking about the Khanapes the other day, believe it or not. I can still hear the people sing, singing the song of angry men...

Caravan: An Episodic Fantasy with Worldbuilding! [Always Accepting]

Terilu

Addressing: @Enigmatik, @TimeMaster and the whole Gadricluster

Ha-ha! Here there's enough people for a party. Terilu loves crowds, he loves mingling and the noise and smell of many people. It's a thrill he knows he'll miss like a lost love if ever he reforms himself, irreversibly, into a lich. Terilu looks over at Gadri, about to smirk at his apparently very beloved guide- they must be beloved, to have gathered all these followers- and then stops still when he sees the expression on the old dwarf's face. He watches while Gadri just scowls up at the giant, shields their eyes, and mumbles something irrelevant about prayer-time... and suddenly the bat's heart flutters in a nameless emotion that's between sympathy and sudden revulsion. What, would the old man rather be taking a nap? Ugh. He thinks Gadri might be too dull to spend much time around, after all.

Terilu looks up at the giant himself and is struck with a much better idea. He lets his full wingspan stretch out, ten feet wide, gently pushing annoyed walkers-by away and momentarily covering the city street, until with a monumental batting of his wings he defies his own weight and floats off of the ground. True Eratie are never ashamed to take flight even if it's a strange sight to the skinned. He pumps himself and rises up high until he's at eye level with Galaxor.

Then he sits on Galaxor's shoulder.

With his small size compared to the mountainous stature of a Stoneclaw Giant, he fits more-or-less perfectly, like one fits in a chair. And it's convenient. Who wants to walk or fly when they can ride on the shoulders of giants? He's been getting exhausted by the overheated air in this country. "Come on, my gigantic friend," Terilu says to Galaxor, "let us go onward, somewhere! I'm sure we'll find something more interesting to do in this great city than follow this poor dwarf around. I've heard they have an arena here. Let's some of us go and bet on a fight or something!"

--- ~--( )--~ ---

Athulwin

Addressing: Eni, @Crusader Lord and @Smike

Athulwin is dreaming. He knows this because, though he could never explain why to others, or ever to himself, he's often lucid in his dreams. Not always. Most of the time, his dreams are the same parade of blissful nonsense that almost every one else reports. But in some dreams, and in this dream especially, Athulwin finds himself strangely aware of his own sleeping state. He knows that he is in a world of his own imagination, the Song Beneath the Song, and he knows that he'll remember it perfectly when he wakes. He has had this dream many, many times.

He stands in the forest. Not a forest, the forest: the one where he used to meet Alder, the vampire who feigned so long at caring about Athulwin so that he could try to turn him once he'd achieved real power. The trees in this part of the wood are tall, thick and straight-backed. They looked like a giant's fingers to him as a child and like the bars of a cage to him as an adult. On cue, without fail, Alder steps out from their long shadows. It's twilight.

This time, Alder says, "Your eyes are starting to sink in, Athulwin."

This dream doesn't put on the same performance every night that it comes. It isn't static. It keeps track with the passing of the years. Each time Athulwin dreams it, Alder remarks on his age differently. It's harsher each turn.

"You look the same," replies Athulwin. That's one thing that never changes. Lucid or no, he always, always finds himself saying it. The dream Alder looks at him with something that must be a monster's closest mimicry of pity.

"You could've been like this, too," he says. "For what did you reject me? For an oath? Or out of foolishness? Tell me."

"I loved you," says Athulwin.

"That is no answer. If you had love for me, then why didn't you take my gift?"

The monk sighs. He's so tired. Even in his sleep he is tired. His breath turns visible in the thin air of win-

Athulwin stirs and wakes up in his fabric-heavy Caravan to the smell of fire. That scent wakes him out of the dream and burns the emotion of the whole thing out of his mind in an instant. He's halfway to standing up, aching old knees and all, before he realizes that his mobile home is not actually burning down. The curtains, pillows, blankets, sheets are not ablaze. But one thing is ablaze here and Athulwin knows exactly who it came from.

"Oh," he says to the small wisp of fire hovering in front of his open door. (He'd left it open while he snoozed, not wanting to awaken to a home that had become an oven.) "I see you, creature. Knossos has sent you. I suppose this is my return for sending out the Wind to talk to him. Speak quickly: what did he tell you to say?"

The fiery wisp relays it.

"Ah," says Athulwin. "Return to Knossos, daemon, for I too can speak fire, and tell him that he should whisper into the desert wind when he wishes to speak to his Navigator, instead of sending an unholy thing. And... yes, tell him that I said we should keep on eye, magical or mundane, on the more naïve of the Caravan. There are some who have good intentions but too much passion."

The wisp seems a little offended at this whole thing, Athulwin thinks, but off it burns into the air again, carrying the message back to the old occultist who sent it. Knossos is an interesting breed. Sometimes he's Athulwin's favorite pilgrim, for the knowledge and protective power he brings. Sometimes he's one of Athulwin's least favorites, for the smell of occultism never seems to fully be gone from him. So many times Athulwin has been so close to asking him for help with the Curse. But there is a thing deep inside the monk's soul that just won't let him turn to a veritable warlock for a cure, any more than he could accept Alder's gift of vampirism. He can't chase out darkness with darkness. Evil magic begets only evil things. Of that, more than anything else in the world, more than the sun rising tomorrow, Athulwin feels certain.

His window- a wooden flap in the wall, held open with string connected to the roof- is as open as the door was, and out of it he looks, debating inside himself if he should go about outside and act his role as the Navigator. But then he stops and stares at what he sees. There's a foolish savannah dog out there, that looks like it's about to be eaten by a hyena. This wouldn't be an issue, but the hyena is a gnoll, and the dog is Malleck.

Fine.

Athulwin tries to force himself into a standing position for the second time in not enough minutes, and when he has finally worked his slow way out of the Caravan and across the open space to where the Ainok and the gnoll are staring one another down, he can just hear poor Malleck whimpering. "_{Please don't kill me.}"

"She won't," says Athulwin, in a projecting voice. He'd seen Thorzna many times, with her two years in the Caravan. "Don't be afraid, Malleck. Miss Scrapblast is a fine Pilgrim."

Caravan: An Episodic Fantasy with Worldbuilding! [Always Accepting]

Terilu

Terilu feels absurdly happy about being in a city again. It's the wrong kind of city, of course- it's not an Eratie one by any stretch of the imagination, with that sand-colored adobe and the hot air- but still it is undeniably, intrinsically, unmistakably a City. Capitalized. It smells like one. It feels like one in spirit. Terilu half-suspects he could navigate it alone, so familiar he is with the urban wilderness. But his problem is that he likes company too much; far too much, for a necromancer. He catches himself feeling nearly glad when the young half-orc (Terilu has never reasoned out what the other half must be) catches up to him and Gadri. Good. Another young person, another rare breed, has joined their little party.

Terilu wonders if, from the ancient dwarf Gadri's perspective, they're giving a tour to two children. Terilu is half-tempted to whine, "But when are we going to get something to eat?" like he used to whenever one of his fathers took him out of the nest. He doesn't, but he's tempted to. Really, Terilu is glad the orc-whatever-the-other-half-may-be is here. He has no clue what his name is, but he's seen him wandering around the camp, and Terilu always finds it a welcome sight to see someone nearly as small as himself. Then he doesn't feel so dwarfed (ha-ha!) by all the tall skinned races. He'd guess that the orc-boy is still stronger than him, and being weaker than a child is always embarrassing, but there's nothing to be done about it. Orcs are savages.

The savage child says, ""Are all holds this big?"

Terilu laughs at the question. "This isn't big," he says. "Close, but no. New Dawnlit, the capital of Tureiamú? Have you ever been there?" He looks the boy up and down. "No, no I don't think you have, but that's a big city. You learn to fly one day, and I'll give you the proper tour."

He doesn't mention that you can get around New Dawnlit pretty well by walking, so long as you stick to the streets and public areas. Older, bigger and sicker Eratie cannot be expected to fly- the Diviner himself, it's rumored, does not fly- and if foreigners like this one ever do come to Tureiamú, it's always to the gates of New Dawnlit that they come knocking. But the orc-boy doesn't need to know any of that. Terilu just likes reminding people that he can fly and they can't.

Caravan: An Episodic Fantasy with Worldbuilding! [Always Accepting]

Terilu

Addressing: @Enigmatik

Terilu feels a rush during flight. Not at first; only after he's been up in the air, letting his wings strain against the world trying to pull him back down, panting to keep himself cool up over the earth, for some time. The rush is almost identical to the way a long-distance sprinter feels halfway through their run. It's that rewarding high of intense exertion. And the 'high' is very literal, when you're soaring over rooftops.

Terilu is in flight over the parked Caravan now, feeling like a circling vulture, and he wants to never come down. His body is straight like an arrow and the shadow cast by his wingspan consumes caravans; his fellow pilgrims are ants at this height. He feels like he could step on them. But the poor thing about running or about flying is that, when the rush hits you, you're immediately on a timer. At that point you'll never really want to stop, but you only have so long before the buzz fades away and your exhaustion catches up with you far quicker than you could soar away from it. Terilu doesn't wish to burn up before he even enters the clanhold proper. Besides, he hears something down below that interests him: "Heading into the city," says the voice of Gadri, which- like many low, dwarven kinds of voices- seems to carry well even when all they're doing is mumbling. "Anyone feels like seeing what a clanhold is really like... Be happy to show you."

Yes, Terilu feels like seeing it. With some regret at losing flight time, he rocks his body back, lets his feet swing down into a standing-like position, and feels himself slowing and floating downwards.

He's still panting like a dog as his feet hit the sand, right beside Gadri, as if they'd been walking together the whole time. Terilu's aim is always good. A little sandstorm is kicked up by his arrival, spreading golden dust into the air; and that's something you could never get tired of. He takes an almost childlike pleasure in watching the sand twirl. If it wasn't for the heat, and the long days, and the Dinnin themselves, Terilu could get used to this world. The air is so pure. And his fur, plus his usual robe-like attire, is weirdly fit for keeping the worst of the sun off his back. He's not as natural here as he is back home, but from the sad look of all the Pilgrims now sweating in the sunlight, Terilu think he can handle desert better than the skinned races.

Minus, he supposes, the ones who have lived in these kinds of places all their lives. "So," says Terilu to Gadri. "Your home was something like this? It's... impressive. Most places I've seen since I left my home nest are so backwards, like barbarians. I think you Dinnin might be smarter."

Caravan: An Episodic Fantasy with Worldbuilding! [Always Accepting]

didnt finish porting/editing characters from first iteration, just dumping what I got here so I don't lose it
EDIT: Should have all the character stuff done, if they're reaccepted I'll start the worldbuilding stuff!

A Semi-Retired Raider...

Thozna Scrapblast-of-Norplain

Race, Age, Time in the Caravan:
Thozna is a Gnoll (or an Uplifted, as they refer to themselves), one of the hyenafolk that live in the plains, swamps, savannahs and deserts. While specific cultural practices vary from clan to clan they're a generally nomadic people, living a lifestyle of hunting, herding and raiding. Gnolls can be found in a variety of environments, their thick pelts and hardy constitutions making them well-suited for mercenary work. Indeed, it's not uncommon for a petty lord to hire a band of them for use as shock troops or terror squads.

They have a reputation for savagery and are even rumored to be demonic in origin, but these stories are not the full truth. Generally speaking Gnolls don't so much revel in violence for the sake of violence as they lack inherent respect for life. They respect people for their achievements and friends, family and pack members are considered highly important but an outsider's life is of no value on its own, and thus Gnolls have no problem snuffing it out if required. It's not too difficult for someone to be accepted by a Gnoll, however, as many of the Gnolls that roam outside their hunting grounds are working as soldiers, bandits, mercenaries, or bodyguards, and those in the packlands are living extremely communal lives. They're very much time players, they just don't care much about those outside the team.

While they can reach the age of 120 or even past that, in rare cases, they generally die far earlier to illness or violence. Scrapblast is fairly old for one still fighting, estimating herself to be somewhere past eighty. She had an earlier stint with the caravan of about four months, and her second tour has just passed the two-year mark.

Appearance:
Gnolls are much taller and much broader than humans are, and Scrapblast is no exception. She weighs in at a stocky four hundred-odd pounds of muscle and teeth, standing seven feet and eight inches tall while hunched over in the trademark Gnoll slouch. Her thick pelt is colored in a range of browns, the fur on her back having a reddish tint while that of her front lightens into a creamier shade.

While she has a range of scars across her body the vast majority of them are hidden by the tunics and capes she's taken a liking to, save for the wound running down her muzzle. The nasty gash left by a falchion strike tends to dry out and irritate her, so it's not uncommon to catch her running her long tongue up the channel.

Thozna tries to dress presentably by "civilized" standards on a day-to-day basis but feels she is under no compulsion to do so when she puts on her armor. Her war gear was designed to induce fear as much as it was to provide protection, almost deceptively crude. Harsh, rugged steel plates are layered over thick mail, her helmet hugging close to her skull while leaving her jaw free to bite people with.

History:
Thozna was born into the Norplain pack, a Gnollish tribe occupying, unsurprisingly, the Norplain region of the Ashvenkal. At that time the Norplainer gnolls had two main industries: the herding of livestock, mainly cattle and sheep, and raiding. Of course, there were other professions, such as healers to care for the sick or blacksmiths to produce tools, but by and large, they slaughtered animals and enemies. Thozna's mother was a noted warband leader while her father was somewhat infamous in the nearby settlements for his skill with a javelin, and thus her fate was decided.

Gnolls mature quickly compared to humans, becoming adults at around ten years of age. Even before then Thozna accompanied her parents in the field, scoring her first kill in a fight against a party of dog-like Ainok. Thozna likely would have gone on to an impressive but ultimately ordinary career as a warrior, save for one thing.

Gnolls believe that magic is the realm of Mus the Weaver, the mysterious many-eyed patron of seers, tacticians, and clothmakers who was the first hyena given sapience by the dragons of the Ashvenkal. Those marked by her lead auspicious lives and it's considered bad luck to not nurture her gift. Thozna first began to unconsciously levitate objects as a cub. starting with nails before moving knives and pots.

As she got older and gained more control over her magic she chose a personal name in the Gnollish tradition, Scrapblast. It reflected her preferred method of fighting: spraying the enemy with shards of jagged metal. With this power she set out to make a name for herself, battling against rival warbands and raiding the nearby Human and Ainok settlements.

As she got older Scrapblast got bigger, faster and more magically empowered. The months of experience turned into years and the years into decades, Thozna outliving her parents and many of her peers. While Gnolls are naturally long-lived the lifestyle tends to cull the pack, especially those who find themselves on the front. Scrapblast's band, formed when she was fifteen, had seen a complete turnover of members two times over by the time she was thirty.

She was an extremely talented soldier, one with enough stolen wealth to happily retire. But Scrapblast found herself growing bored. The Norplainers had gone through a series of small disasters during her third decade, droughts and outbreaks of disease and pyrrhic victories all adding up. As quickly as they reproduced the pack was still hemorrhaging manpower and those that survived were more cautious. Why throw their lives away when people needed them at home? Scrapblast couldn't blame them for this subtle shift in sensibilities but she couldn't stand by either.

As an accomplished raid leader, she had the right to gather a small band of friends, family and various connected men-at-arms. Scrapblast sewed together her banner and led them to seek their fortunes in service of others. The various headmen and warlords of the Asvenkal always had a need for hired blades and were none too picky about where they came from. Even those whose territory Scrapblast had pillaged in the past were happy to have her on their side.

But by that point in her career, she found those battles boring. Most of the time the band was deployed against disobedient peasants and bandit gangs, only occasionally called to fight against the armies of a rival lord or an outside force that dared to intrude on the Dragon-Sultans' lands. The pay was solid enough to keep her crew interested but Scrapblast was too old to be bought by baubles alone.

Her search for excitement led to her turning to the Dragons, the largely unknowable and inhuman entities whom the Gnolls descended from. It was possible for the Uplifted to ascend to Dragon status with enough strength of spirit and a healthy amount of luck, albiet almost unheard of. There were only twelve who had ever achieved the transformation, but Scrapblast already possessed some of the Dragons' power in the form of magic and was stubborn enough not to let the infinitesimal odds of success dissuade her. A chance find of an old corpse was all the encouragement she needed, Thozna took up the eldritch bones and scales and marched off to search for the ultimate enlightenment.

So she walked out of the Ashvenkal and into wider Alwyne. Scrapblast haggled with merchants in the bustling temple-cities of Velkinir, and searched for abandoned treasures in the ghost towns of the old Costal Elf homelands. One day she was part of a hunting party high in the Ironpeaks hunting for roc eggs, the next she was a guest of a giant who dwelled in a cavern of quartz. She sought to test her mettle so that it would become unbreakable, working to prove to herself that she deserved to join the Forebears in whatever unknown dimension they battled over. When she wasn't moving she was mediating, holding the scavenged pieces of drake-corpse against her as she tried meld her consciousness to the remnants of energy contained within.

This mercenary-monkhood was freeing but still, the passage of time needled at Scrapblast. She was about fifty when she decided to return to the Norplain, having spent so long away from home that she had almost forgotten what it looked like. Her homecoming was awkward, most of those she met having been born too late to know of her save for stories from their elders.

Moreover, in her absence, the pack had elected to settle down entirely. The series of setbacks that they had suffered decades before had put them in a precarious position, forcing them to cooperate more with the nearby settlements. At some point the group stopped traveling their circuit of hunting grounds to move into the outskirts of a trading post, given a place to raise their flocks in exchange for serving as an auxiliary defense.

Once more Scrapblast found herself alienated from her people with no one to blame but poor circumstances. Her half-hearted attempts to form a new warband failed, and she said her final goodbyes.

She planned to make her way to one of the other, more traditional Gnoll tribes and seek entrance on the strength of her storied career, but each time she encountered one, she couldn't bring herself to pop the question. She had left her pack, yes, but she was still too fond of it to renounce her allegiance. So Scrapblast went back to wandering, working as a mercenary at some times and a simple brigand at others. Any battle was an opportunity to improve her sword-arm or her mage's gift, a chance to shift herself closer to her competing goals: Become a dragon, or die trying. In her eyes it would have been a disservice to her legacy to die quietly in a bed somewhere, someone as experienced as she was deserved to die with axe in hand. Her quest continued through her sixties and into her seventies, coming to a pause in a twist of fate.

A cunning, underhanded merchant had passed a tip onto her as part of her payment for services rendered: a competitor of his would be traveling through a relatively empty part of the Sheepshead Isles, and with him he'd have a good stash of gold and some valuables. If Scrapblast were to hit said competitor she'd get his loot and the merchant would have one less problem to deal with.

So hit him she did. It was a simple matter to lay an ambush, his guards merely local toughs he had equipped for that leg of the journey. What complicated matters was the fact that the trader had been accompanied by his family. He and his wife were killed in the initial charge while his eldest child was cut down when she attempted to slash Scrapblast with a razor.

That left the youngest, a boy of not more than three years. While Gnolls don't take issue with the killing of outsiders they're not actively genocidal. Thozna's raids were nearly always smash-and-grab affairs, fatalities would occur but not enough to doom a bloodline or a village to extinction. Moreover, she missed having companions and respected the toddler's now slain family for their attempt at resistance. She adopted the boy as a show of thanks for their noble display and a way to cure her loneliness.

She named him Ryt-kiltu-Sheepshead (roughly translating to "Ryt, found in Sheepshead") and raised him as her own. Scrapblast never hid Ryt's origins from him and he didn't outwardly question her actions, although as he grew up she detected some unspoken angst. Raising a boy meant settling down again, the pair moving into a small farming community named Alstow.

Scrapblast found work as a rancher, having grown up with animals as a cub in the Norplain. The humans she lived among were understandably cautious of her but she proved her good nature the first time a bear strayed too close to the village. After that she was treated with some amount of respect and allowed to raise Ryt in peace. As soon as he was old enough she placed him under the tutelage of the old 'witch' who lived just outside of Alstow.

Another decade passed, Scrapblast finding herself on the wrong side of eighty and once again plagued by restlessness. In her eyes Ryt was an adult, a young man capable of surviving life on the road. There was no need for them to stay huddled up with pigs, not anymore. So they gathered their things and set out in search of his future and her glorious death, whatever forms they would take.

The Pilgrim's Caravan was a natural fit for them, Scrapblast had in fact traveled with it in the past. Rejoining was as simple as falling into line.

Personality:
Scrapblast is old in a profession and species that generally die young, so she likes to think that she has a handle on things. Age has tempered her aggression into something more akin to a dry, morbid sense of humor. While she isn't interested in bloodshed for its own sake she is hardly opposed to it either. She's honorable in the Gnoll sense of the word, where practicality is valued as much as bravery. There is a time and place for single combat, just as there is ambushes and sabotage.

Thozna misses the vivid storytelling of her people and thus is drawn to bards, griots, and poets of all types. This love of story extends to art in all its forms, a good painting or interesting sculpture being quick ways to grab her attention.

She has no time for cowards and, despite her being one herself, doesn't care much for mercenaries. In her eyes most sellswords are people who lack purpose, else they would be fighting for a lord or cause they believed in.

Also, she eats corpses. Gnolls are scavengers to the extreme; as far as Thozna is concerned, a dead person is basically the same as a dead pig. She isn't dumb enough to hunt two-legged game for the sake of it but if someone happens to cross her and she's left with a body? Snack time.

While she has the good grace to keep from just ripping into a freshly slain stranger while others are watching sometimes it's best not to question what sort of meat she's eating.

Motivation:
Boredom. Scrapblast has lived long enough to watch the rest of the Norplain Gnolls die or become sedentary, giving up pillaging for farming and laboring in the burgeoning human settlements nearby. While she can hardly blame her people for choosing a safer path she does find it dreadfully uninteresting. The Caravan represents an opportunity to keep moving until she finds her final battle, whatever form that takes. If she has to die then she is determined to die fighting, as is proper for a warrior of her stature and experience.

Power. While she knows that death through violence is her likely fate, she is not content to sit and wait for it to come to her. She will fight until she cannot fight, and in doing so seeks salvation in the Gnollish tradition: ascending to Dragonhood. Thozna has no way of knowing if she can ever reach this goal but being dissuaded by improbablity only guarantees that she doesn't deserve the honor, so she'll continue building up her physical and magical
prowess and studying the draconic artifacts she's managed to collect over the years.

Skills, Strengths and Weaknesses, and Tools:
Gnolls are as intelligent as any other sapient species, capable of building tools and making art. But physically and culturally they are still very much wild animals, capable of running down game and stripping hides from their flesh with claws alone. They're built to survive harsh environments and are quite content to trudge through blazing deserts or frozen tundras.

Her relatively long life has also given her plenty of time to develop skills suiting a professional ravager. Like pretty much every "wild" Gnoll out there she was trained to fight since birth, mastering the use of simple one-handed weapons like hammers, axes and knives. Where she differs from her spear-throwing peers is her training with heavy armor and shields. She can track prey and navigate by the stars, has enough first aid knowledge to keep herself from bleeding to death after a fight and has a keen eye for the value of items she comes across in her travels. In addition to the skills she's gained through practice, her age gives her a distinct physical advantage; as the older Gnolls get, the more their bodies harden. She's notably faster and stronger than the already impressive baseline of her species, able to outrun a horse in a short sprint and then hoist said horse and throw it.

This is something of a mixed blessing, at least among other Gnolls. The general cultural trend of looking for chances to prove one's strength makes elders like Thozna a tempting target for young up-and-comers looking to win duels or achieve fame in battle. Being considered one of the best means that while most Gnolls won't risk challenging her those that do are assuredly just as dangerous, if not more so.

While Scrapblast has a lifetime of experience in the field she's never spent a day in any classroom. She is, by the standards of the civilized world, entirely uneducated. While she can read the common tongue if given time and is capable of the basic arithmetic required for cash transactions don't expect her to chew through epic poems or perform complex calculations. While this wasn't a problem when she's roaming through arid plains and rundown city slums she does suffer a great deal when she has to admit her lack of schooling. She has yet to really understand the civilized world, and she doesn't really care to. She grew up robbing trespassers and forming raiding parties, spent her adult life seeking bigger and bigger bounties and is now expecting a bloody death so that her corpse can feed the carrion birds and other scavengers.

This unrepentant might make right mentality is reigned in for the most part when entering occupied territory but it can lead her to conflict with those who take offense. Similarly, Thozna is nearly entirely incapable of handling accusations of dishonesty, disloyalty, or cowardice. If someone were to call her any of the above her first instinct is to handle it the Gnoll way: knocking them over and stomping their face in. While she can temper this aggressive reaction doing so is never guaranteed.

Magic

Her real talent is the magical gift she's worked to nurture throughout her career. Her chosen name of "Scrapblast" reflects her chosen arcane art: the manipulation of magnetic fields. She naturally manipulates objects to her will, pulling them closer to her or launching them away. In combat she makes use of this by disarming opponents and using their own weapons against them, ripping swords out of the enemy's hands before plunging them into their necks.

While such magic isn't strictly limited to ferrous metals that sort of material is much easier to work with. She can lift a few hundred pounds of steel or pig iron without much difficulty and could conceivably lift up a couple tons of the same (provided it was all one solid object, and with great strain) but her capacity is limited with non-magnetic metals such as lead or copper. Scrapblast can even shift non-metal or even organic objects as all things have a magnetic field, but she can only move a tenth of what she could a ferrous metal.

Equipment

-Armor and Shield: She doesn't actually adorn herself with grisly trophies...usually.
-Weapons: Has her axe and a variety of knives for skinning people and animals alike. In addition to proper blades, she likes to carry a grab bag of metal shards and a pair of solid iron ingots to pelt the enemy with.
-Net: A blanket of steel rings that she can launch at someone to disable them, now more commonly used for mundane fishing.
-Bedding
-Mess Kit
-Money: A variety of coins, most of them looted or stolen.
-Moron: A riding moose, a magically-produced breed originating with the druids of the Tildretti forest. At twenty hands tall he's pretty much the only thing big enough for Scrapblast to ride and he's as smart as any donkey. The problem is that he's just as stubborn to boot, thus the name.

The Reliquary

Reliquary: A small box of lacquered wood, lined with lead and treated with magic so that it's stronger than steel. The container itself is purely functional, but the shards of bone and scale within carry personal and religious significance for Thozna. They're pieces of an Ashvenkal dragon, extremely rare and extremely dangerous. Just looking at them can cause those unfamiliar to suffer nausea and a lingering, almost nihilistic dread as the alien energies still suffusing the remains leak into the world. Thozna mediates with these pieces clenched in her hands and jaws, working to overcome the weakness of her current self by communing with the echoes of the now-dead beast.

The reliquary can be used as a focus for her magic and in doing so changes the nature of it from focusing on magnetism to decay. Scrapblast drains the soul from her foes, feeding off their strength to revitalize herself. However, this is an extremely risky maneuver as trying to harness the Dragon's remains can backfire. If she's not careful she'll end up being consumed from the inside out.

It is chained to her at all times.

Optional: Extra Details

What They Most Want:: For Ryt to find purpose before she achieves her own.

If They Had a DnD Alignment, It Would Be: Chaotic Neutral

Three Likes:Stories, strong drink, those who are bold

Three Dislikes: Being bored, coffee, cowards

Do They Follow Their Heart or Their Mind?: Her heart

Worst Fear: Dying peacefully

Favorite Color: Brown

Most Like The Animal: Unsurprisingly, hyenas
_{That is, which animal they are most like- not which one they like the most.}

Favorite Time of Day: Dawn and dusk, Gnolls are naturally crepuscular.

How They Dress: Practically

Favorite Season: Summer

What Gods/Spirits/Whatevers They Worship (If Any): Primarily Mus the Weaver and Tel the Hunter, the Ashvenkal Dragons as a whole

...And Her Stolen Son

Ryt-kiltu-Sheepshead

Race, Age, Time in the Caravan:
Ryt's actual age is unknown, his best guess is somewhere between 12 and 14. He's a half-Orc, a somewhat rare and not always liked crossbreed. He's been traveling with the caravan with his 'mother' for the last two years.

Appearance:
Ryt's mother was an Orc but his father was a Halfing, and it shows. He's only four feet tall, barely weighing above sixty pounds soaking wet. He looks young for his age, much to his chagrin as he tries to grow up into a proper man.

History:
Ryt doesn't know his parents' names. He doesn't know where they lived, how they met one another, if they had any family or close friends nearby. He couldn't even tell you if has any surviving relatives. All the information he has is what Thozna gave him: they were merchants who threatened the local monopoly of some rich trader, and the trader had her take them out. His mother, father, and older sister all died within minutes of each other, and she adopted him. The sole survivor.

Wherever he was from originally, his home was Alstow. A quaint farming town, the vast majority of which was human. While there were some Halflings and the odd Dwarf here and there a Gnoll and her Orcish charge stood out. Ryt's earliest memories are of being the Other, not shunned by his peers but regarded with curiosity.

Despite his odd circumstances, Ryt did have a relatively normal childhood. His adoptive caretaker was employed as a ranch hand on one of the larger farmsteads and he helped her with her chores, namely feeding the chickens and mucking out the stalls. When Thozna allowed him to knock off from work early (which was often) he played with his peers, his strangeness not enough to exclude him from circles.

The interesting part of his upbringing was his education. Thozna, embarrassed by her lack of book smarts and wanting better for her charge, arranged for him to be educated by the white witch who lived on the outskirts of Alstow. Old Lady Moira, or Miss Moi as she preferred, was a druid and alchemist. She was the town's healer in addition to providing blessings for the crops, a well-liked if not quite understood figure.

Ryt learned mundane skills like reading and herbalism but was also given instruction in Miss Moi's brand of magic, a subtler, kinder art than that which Thozna practiced. Most of Ryt's lessons were based on working with the flow of magic as opposed to muscling it into doing what he wanted, gently coaxing it into closing small wounds or invigorating sickly animals.

He was a quick study, almost too quick. He was only eleven or twelve when he had learned all that Moi could teach him, the rest he would have to pick up from more experienced teachers and practice in the field. Thozna, already anxious to be on the move, packed up their things without a second thought.

Since joining the caravan Ryt has continued to work on nurturing his gift, supported by an approving Thozna. But as he gets older he chafes under her guardianship. Now a man by the old Gnoll's standards he can't help but feel bitter over his circumstances. Time will tell what, if anything he does about it.

Personality:
For a boy raised by a crusty old mercenary with few qualms or compunctions, Ryt turned out remarkably well. He's soft-spoken and polite as can be, greeting most people with a smile. He's mature for his age, level-headed and very careful to avoid confrontation.

He's actually too careful for Thozna's liking which is a point of contention simmering between them. She's never once apologized or even acknowledged wrongdoing in slaying Ryt's family, and he's grown to quietly resent her for it. Thozna knows he does, he knows she knows he does, but she refuses to give him what he wants without him demanding it of her. This attempt to make him man up has failed thus far, only serving to slowly poison their still-loving relationship.

All this to say, he clings to friends. Whether or not he can say it aloud Ryt desperately wants a family of his choosing, not one that's forced on him. Being snatched away from his peers in Alstow had a profound effect on him so any new friends he makes can expect to be doted on.

Motivation:
Purpose. He's still hanging around Scrapblast because, as complicated and unhealthy as their relationship is, she's the only constant in his life. Until he finds something else to devote himself to he'll just keep tagging along.

Skills, Strengths and Weaknesses, and Tools:
He's a pretty good herbalist and a remarkably talented druid, for his age. While he can't get detailed information out of them he's able to communicate basic thoughts and feelings with animals, a useful trick since he's small enough to look like a snack to a wolf.

He's also extremely tricky to find when he doesn't want to be. His halfling blood has given him near-silent steps and an eye for hidey-holes while his orcish endurance means that he can probably outrun whoever's chasing him if stealth fails.

But being nimble and sneaky means little when you can be hoisted with little trouble. Ryt has all the strength of a particularly ornery kitten, just about capable of carrying small creatures that aren't struggling too much. He'd lose a wrestling match against any reasonably healthy child his age, and if it's an adult grabbing him he's done. Being in his early teens at the oldest also means that he lacks life experience, his worldview still fairly naïve.

Sometimes in situations of extreme stress, he can regress into the primal fury used by Orc berserkers, lashing out like a cornered animal. This can be a good or bad thing depending on the circumstances. Best case scenario the mugger or whoever is warded off by a flurry of scratches and bites. Worst case, they get angry and smash his head against the nearest wall.

Magic

The druid-in-training can't perform much in the way of big, showy spells yet, instead relying on more mundane but still useful magic tricks. With a little bit of focus he can restore life to failing crops or sick creatures, giving them some extra strength with which to fight on. Small cuts and gashes can be healed with a quiet song, and he knows how to produce a number of useful tinctures and tonics.

In dangerous situations he can instinctively call upon nature to defend him, although he has little control over the shape it takes. A cloud of flies might suddenly buzz out of nowhere to blind an attack, a shower of sparks might singe their hair or they might find the solid ground they walk on is now a quagmire.

And while he's not hurling around armored knights like Ol' Scrapblast he is really good at skipping rocks. Like, magically good. Sometimes he can bounce one ten times in a row. That counts for something, right?

Equipment

-Buford: Ryt's pet and almost-familiar, a very friendly and slightly stupid dog. Buford is still a bit too obstinate to be an assistant but his connection with Ryt does make the boy's magic a little more potent when he's around.
-Knife: Designed for pruning plants and sawing through small branches as opposed to fighting but Thozna makes him wear it on his belt anyway.
-Druid's Kit: Put together by Miss Moi as a parting gift. Contains a mortar, pestle, measuring spoons, vials for samples, seeds and various other bits and pieces.
-Money: Thozna gives him a little pocket change here and there.
-Trelawney: Thozna's giant horse-moose thing is too smart and stubborn to pull the cart so it falls on the smaller, stupider mule to do so. Sometimes carries Ryt in addition to a million other bits and pieces.

Optional: Extra Details

What They Most Want: A family of some kind.

If They Had a DnD Alignment, It Would Be: Chaotic Good

Three Likes: Animals, fresh air, Thozna

Three Dislikes: Cruelty, bullies, Thozna (it's complicated)

Do They Follow Their Heart or Their Mind?: Mind

Worst Fear: Depending on the day, Thozna being disappointed or proud of what direction he takes.

Favorite Color: Purple

Most Like The Animal: Badger
_{That is, which animal they are most like- not which one they like the most.}

Favorite Time of Day: Twilight

How They Dress: In simple, loose peasant's clothes

Favorite Season: Spring

What Gods/Spirits/Whatevers They Worship (If Any): A variety of nature spirits and Mus the Weaver
_{No, M., Jesus isn't an option}

@Smike

Approved! I really like Scrapblast and I find myself legit looking forward to interacting with her. Feel free to start posting whenevers

Caravan: An Episodic Fantasy with Worldbuilding! [Always Accepting]

Destination: The Hold of Clan Buraq

Destination Description written by @Enigmatik

The land out here is peculiar and sunbaked, and that is about all that can be said from it. The sand seethes, claws and scratches at the soil and grass that juts up in uneven patches across the parched scrubland. The road beneath the caravan though is strong and well-trodden, hewn with stone and made straight and even across the landscape, belting across to the horizon, where the caravan’s next destination sits.

There’s little else to obscure it after all, with the crowded foliage and verdant greens of the Emerald Forest left so far behind. Instead, there are the mountains that mark out the centre of Clan Busaq’s power. Vast, imposing things that form part of a scattered chain that stretch deep into the desert, all the way to the sacred Jabal Ilah and beyond. As the caravan has pressed closer though, the staggering scale of the hold has become clearer and clearer.

A colossal ochre stone wall bars easy entrance to the hold itself, but even where wall ends and mountain begins, the defences continue. Cut into the rock itself are structures and fortifications – guard posts, murder holes and even springalds, all manned by tiny figures only distinguishable from the mountains themselves thanks to the glints of light from their broad shields and scaled armour.

But this is only the beginning of it. Just outside of the walls, stretched out in the no-mans land between farming estates and the city itself is a sea of tents, wagons, temporary structures and perhaps most astounding of all are the rolling towers and citadels, and the humongous beasts that have been hitched near them.

They stand nearly ten men tall to their shoulders alone, with tremendously long noses that curl and twist like vast snakes. Massive tusks jut from either side of these trunks, banded with steel and affixed with vicious looking blades or vast metal rams at their ends. Mûmakils – Oliphaunts. Their lesser brethren, the elephants, live in Alwyne’s warmer climes, but these are alike them in shape alone: these creatures are the largest warbeasts seen on this continent – indeed, perhaps anywhere on Alwyne.

The caravan is stopped just outside the army encampment and directed to park themselves in a wide-open space, a few other, smaller caravans already circled. With the return of the army, the city is filled to capacity, but travellers are free to come and go as they always have… So long as they follow the Clan’s laws.

--- ~--( )--~ ---

Athulwin

Athulwin believes that deserts are the most naturally spiritual kind of environment. As the Caravan meandered over the smooth road that led them to this great city of a hold, during those bright noontides when old Athulwin would sit in his Caravan watching the world outside from a safely darker place, he kept thinking thoughts about the universe. The wide open-ness of the landscape pulled such thoughts out of him, willingly or otherwise. The vastness of these dry lands makes you think of your place in it all, as the harsh, the unrelenting sunlight seems to preach sermons.

It's no wonder they're fanatics here, Athulwin thinks. He doesn't use the term lightly. Many have called him such, to his face or behind his back. But sometimes a label fits. Athulwin has met only a few followers of the Light-and-Flame, but he's read some of their texts. They are filled with the same breed of fire he sometimes caught in the eyes of the most intense monks back home. A passion to burn the world.

Athulwin is resting now, trying to think philosophically no more for the day. It's only mid-morning; the sun is still rising. He knows it will not have finished its climb towards noon before he has to work again. Sometimes he hates his life. "A mother's work is never done," a silly old saying goes. Athulwin must be a mother, then. The Caravan can never go more than a few breaths without direction from its Navigator.

Athulwin has spent the day, such as there's been of it so far, listening to the Wind. That's another reason to try not to be philosphical. It's the wrong mindset for hearing from Wind. The Stars are philosophical. Even Fire, in a savage way, carries a philosophy of strength. But the Wind is a gossiper, not a thinker. It does things and it talks. Here's the gossip it has brought him today:

There's slaves here, in the Hold of Clan Baraq. Many of them. Not even far from the Caravan- this desert land practices slavery, and does it openly, not as an ashamed secret. The slaves are kept in pens, within the city walls and under supervision of the army. Athulwin has heard that this Clan Basaq the Caravan is visiting has recently won a small war. From the sounds that the Wind carries him, its becoming more and more uncomfortably obvious that the reason there's so many slaves in this city is because many of them are those that the Baraq clan has just conquered. They were defeated in war, taken captive, and now they're learning what it is to be slaves for the first time. Some of them weep.

The Wind says, also, that they're being auctioned off. Stands have been set up for the army to sell excess slaves out to the populace. These people are being treated as wares for the marketplace.

Athulwin already fears certain names in the Caravan- Mergoux, for sure, and possibly Ilyana as well- are going to take issue with that. They know what chains feel like. Will they be able to keep to themselves about it? Athulwin doubts.

But there's also much merchandise of the more normal kind here. The Wind carries the voices of so many merchants to him. Most people here are human, a few dwarves, a few dog-like Ainok like Malleck and more. The city is a hub of trade for all kinds, and it will welcome the travellers from the Caravan in. At last, something for Gru to do beside whine about a lack of milk. You can buy plenty here.

There's also some traders of another race. Not even far from the Caravan has now parked itself, there's a traveling assortment of Baraka. The snake-people. What a diverse land this desert is. The snakes, he senses, have something dangerous to sell, something very valuable, but even the Wind cannot tell him what it is. Perhaps some of the more enterprise-minded of the Caravan will reach out to these fellow travellers and find out what it is.

Regardless.

Athulwin toys with the idea of sending wind-borne messages out to his fellow Caravaneers to try to push them in the right direction, as he did when they first entered the Emerald Forest. To tell Mergoux and Ilyana, "No, leave the slavers alone." Or to tell the others that this is there chance to restock on needful things before the Caravan goes journeying again. But ultimately, Athulwin realizes, these stand-outs in the Caravan are adults, whether they always act like it or not, and they should be able to take care of themselves without the advice from their proverbial mother...

And, with that thought, the aging monk finds himself falling into a nap.

Caravan: An Episodic Fantasy with Worldbuilding! [Always Accepting]

Athulwin

Oh, by Frowen, there are two of them. Athulwin can't keep the grimace from his face when a second fox-human eases his way out into the open. They come from a fallen star, Athulwin's internal monologue thinks in a tone of awe. How many others fell with them? He manages to keep the word 'invasion' out of his mind, but only just. They look too shaken for that. She- the woman- looks too upset.

This is... what, a horrible accident? Athulwin does not know what sort of obscene travel there must be between the stars for such a thing to happen. The universe feels seems suddenly larger than before, at that thought, and Athulwin feels strangely smaller.

The other fox-human has less tails, down to the thankfully normal number of just one. He's a he. He's, to Athulwin's eyes, attractive. Athulwin finds that irrationally annoying. He won't let his thoughts become so muddled now.

The woman looks back at the other fox, too, who is standing behind her now, and something silent seems to pass between them. Encouragement? They truly are worried. "Fu-mi-ko," she speaks, motioning at herself.

Athulwin gets it. He returns in kind. "Ath-ul-win." His hand to his chest. Almost by instinct he wants to introduce himself as 'Navigator,' that title that's morphed into part of his name through the years, but he knows that would be quite silly.

The fox, Fumiko, signs frustration at the fallen star. Her hands thrown up into the air, just like a pilgrim whose caravan has a broken wagon wheel trying to let everyone else know that he's as upset about the hold-up as they are. He guesses it to have the same meaning. They're stuck.

Athulwin sighs. He took an oath. He won't allow himself to defy it even for whatever insane, unknowable circumstances brought these two creatures to his doorstep. If they are drifters, if they need help and have no other place...

He tells Malleck and the others, in the common tongue, to let the strangers come along with them. He signs to 'Fumiko' and the other to follow him. The not-Beyonders will be brought back to the Caravan.