Tazrae borrows a book from Reclaimed Knowledge and does a little research in her free time.
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Syka is a new settlement of primarily humans on the east coast of Falyndar opposite of Riverfall on The Suvan Sea. [Syka Codex]
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by Tazrae on May 16th, 2022, 12:08 am
From Qamurs there was a scattering of other Relic Monsters that Tazrae took note of. She shared her thoughts as she wrote, adding to the document even though she never had direct contact with others. She suspected other ‘monsters’ on the list would prove some of the creatures she knew in reality though.
The next section of the book covered Flora and Fauna. It was more clear-cut than the Qamur and Rozacapotl Relics were. Flora and Fauna were simply animals and plants that became dangerous enough to be considered monsters. These creatures tended to acquire unusual or what the author deemed ‘unsettling’ traits that evolved from their day-to-day lives. They were mutations of something called their genetics, a word Tazrae didn’t understand, or traits that were favorable for their survival and passed on to their offspring. Sometimes Wild Djed, structured magic, or even Divine Whim influenced them.
The most prominent example that happened was giantism. Evidently, there was a whole region of Taldera that was rife with it. Such ‘dire’ creatures became commonplace such as the Wind Eagles of Wind Reach, the Polar Bear Kelvics of Avanthal and the Myrian Tigers of Falyndar. Supposedly the Myrian Tigers lived with the Myrians, so that was why Tazrae had never seen them. But Jamoura, like Brosh, were also considered Talderian and originated from Taldera as well.
There was something else that made up Flora and Fauna Creatures. Hybridization happened when two different species reproduced and came up with a viable offspring that then formed its own race. Horses and donkeys reproduced together to form mules, but mules were sterile. However, that was not always the case with hybrids and the half-breeds went on to found their own bloodlines. Sometimes these bloodlines were monstrous. Humans even did it by interbreeding with the Gods and their Alvina descendants selectively bred with other powerful families and formed Dynasties. The Alahean Dynasty, the Nymkarta, was an example of this.
When that discussion was copiously copied, Taz went on to read about some of the other animals. She took notes on the Kriital which were large predatory birds commonly found in the Bronze Woods and Cobalt Mountains near Syliras. They were basically vultures with giantism. Then there were glassbeaks, a flightless colorful predatory birds found in the sea of grass.
Glassbeaks were similar to extremely vicious ostriches that hunted in packs like wolves. The book's author speculated that while they were originally thought to be fauna monsters, a recent discovery of an off-world portal location had found a world full of Glassbeak and related creatures making these creatures non-native to Mizahar and from somewhere called Shoyden. In the margins of the book, the number 0012926672185630 and the words ‘astral coordinates’ were written.
Taz noted that. Then turned to her notes to ask Talia, and wrote down the word Shoyden and Astral coordinates.
Continuing with her reading, Taz learned that the Tskanna were huge beasts of burden bred by the Myrians and used for hard labor. They were creatures such as the ashta and elephants, only blue-green and beautiful. They could grow up to eighteen feet tall and twenty feet as males and had trunks and tails. The text also noted they were pacifistic in nature.
Last edited by
Tazrae on May 16th, 2022, 1:58 am, edited 1 time in total.
"A mark of an open mind is being more committed to your curiosity than your conviction.
The goal of learning is not to shield old views against new facts, but to revise old views with new facts.
Ideas are possibilities to explore, not certainties to defend."
Garden Beach ❖ Syka ❖ The Protea Inn
"Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows."
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Tazrae - Be savage, not average.
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by Tazrae on May 16th, 2022, 12:09 am
There were other creatures listed, many in fact, but when she saw the Ta’rukahl or Moon Eagles, she was mesmerized and read on. They dwelled in Falyndar and were quite rare. Ferocious, tenacious, and beautiful, they were coveted by birdkeepers and falconers and used by only the masters of the trade. They must be stolen as eggs and raised by hand or else they were useless if captured as juveniles or adults.
And while they were not as large as Wind Eagles, the impression she got from the writeup in the tome was that they were about twice the size of normal eagles and quite unruly. They had wingspans of eight feet. Taz couldn’t imagine a raptor with a wingspan as wide as Brosh was tall. Like all the other animals, Taz left space to add in an illustration. Her art wasn’t the best, but she certainly wanted her book to be as complete as it could be in terms of a copy before she returned it.
She made notations on Tsana, which were bull-feline-crocodile-type mixtures in Eyktol that lived in herds.
It was at that point that Tazrae ran into the entry about Velispar. They were elemental fauna, with some speculation as to where they fit into the cumulative monster knowledge. The author claimed they were very common in Mizahar before the coming of man, but they did note that Velispar very well could be similar to Glassbeak in that they originated off-world. There was also a note that Velispar could be an ancient land spawn, though Taz hadn’t gotten to that section in her study yet.
It seemed they were reptiles of incredible intelligence. They lived almost immortal lives, with some of them being thousands of years old. They were born in clutches of eggs that hatched out into savage babies that ate everything in sight, including each other. Ravenous beyond belief, they continued being mindless consumers until they gained a few hundred years in which case they started to settle. The odd thing about them was that they absorbed the knowledge of whatever it was they consumed and overtime feeding on creatures and even sentient life, they themselves gained sentience. The ones that survived to old age gained the wisdom of the collected knowledge of everything they consumed.
So if a human was taken down by a Velispar, their entire memories were absorbed by that Velispar and so too were its skills and knowledge. For that fact alone, the Velispar grew incredibly powerful. And when they consumed mages, they gained magical knowledge and such things as the ability to morph.
The text was adamant that Velispar walked among humans, often in fact, mascaraing perfectly as one. And in olden times, human settlements often came into contact with ferocious juveniles and would take them into captivity and feed them criminals slated for execution or the bodies of those that had fallen to death in various ways so the Velispar would remember the life of those people.
And when the Velispar came of age and was safe to be allowed loose on its own, it was welcomed into its community as a full-fledged member and something of a wise council. They were often protective of their territories and oversaw the health and well-being of the population. In places where Velispar dwelled, there were no cemeteries and mourning of fallen relatives were curtailed because often remaining family could visit the Velispar and hold conversations with the creatures who could call forth the personalities they’d consumed.
"A mark of an open mind is being more committed to your curiosity than your conviction.
The goal of learning is not to shield old views against new facts, but to revise old views with new facts.
Ideas are possibilities to explore, not certainties to defend."
Garden Beach ❖ Syka ❖ The Protea Inn
"Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows."
-
![User avatar](./download/file.php?avatar=136711_1683823678.jpg)
Tazrae - Be savage, not average.
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- Posts: 1336
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by Tazrae on May 16th, 2022, 12:11 am
Tazrae wrote down all she could about the creatures, absorbing the material and making a record for the future in case it was needed. Talia had said there was an Earth Velispar in Pavena… and she so needed to meet him. It would be one of her planned trips when the curse was over, that much was for certain. Tazrae remembered Talia – the librarian – calling him Asai’Nav. She thought for a moment, trying to remember the whole of the conversation before she wrote it down.
”Asai’Nav is an Earth Velispar who still dwells in the Pavena Valley. He used to be instrumental in our death rituals. Velispar look a great deal like your Ixam friends – of which you carry blood from now – and he was born Pre-Valterrian and is considered young for his race. He lives in the Ateliers of Pavena which are old magical workshops. Some still survive to this day, some are flooded and need restoration, and others are sealed as if people only walked out a few bells ago. Sadly, some are also in ruin. If you find them, you will find him. Asal’Nav was a dear friend of Pavena and her residents when the city was thriving. He rarely surfaces anymore, but while Pavena thrived, he was gifted the bodies of the dead because Valispar are keepers of knowledge, and anything a person knew that was stored in their memory prior to their death, the Valispar can take on by consuming their bodies. Syka would do well to invite him to carry on this tradition.”
Tazrae wrote the words down as Talia had told her so she wouldn’t forget. Talia…. had even said she was more akin to these creatures now than she might have known, and different than humans. The Innkeeper tilted her head and wondered at that thought, wanting to skip ahead and see if there was something in here that fit her current form. It was hard to think of things in terms of being different. She’d always strove to be equal and felt like she fell short.
But there was more to read about and more notes to take, so rather than dwell on herself, she worked on expanding her knowledge so she’d be ready to face whatever might be out there in the jungle.
Velispar indeed.
They did look like larger more elegant Ixam with wings and fins and all sorts of added perks. Her Ixam… for she thought of the lounges as hers now, were equally at home in the sea and climbing.
Was it so far-fetched if someone gave them the ability to swim through the earth or sail the skies they wouldn’t? Of course, they would. They were smart, fearless, and loved adventure. Those traits, in fact, played into her deeper nature themselves.
"A mark of an open mind is being more committed to your curiosity than your conviction.
The goal of learning is not to shield old views against new facts, but to revise old views with new facts.
Ideas are possibilities to explore, not certainties to defend."
Garden Beach ❖ Syka ❖ The Protea Inn
"Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows."
-
![User avatar](./download/file.php?avatar=136711_1683823678.jpg)
Tazrae - Be savage, not average.
-
- Posts: 1336
- Words: 1917699
- Joined roleplay: May 3rd, 2020, 2:02 pm
- Location: Syka
- Race: Human
- Character sheet
- Storyteller secrets
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- Medals: 5
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by Tazrae on May 16th, 2022, 12:15 am
Velispar came in four types… representing the four elementals.
They were earth, air, fire, and water types. They resembled, in their natural form, four-legged reptiles. Taz saw the resemblance to Ixam in them, though the Velispar reportedly grew huge. Earth Velispar could swim through the bedrock as if it were nothing and came in earth tones and greens.
Air Velispar seemed thin and lithe with wings and silvery blue and white coloring. Fire Velispar often dwelled in volcanos and were reds and oranges and yellows. They too could fly, though they looked like fire in the sky. Water Velispar were rich colors of blue, green, turquoise, and silver. They had fins instead of wings and were fish-like in their adaptations.
There were other categories for sure.
Landspawns was the next the book went into.
It seemed there were places beneath the earth and even on it where nutrients built up or other forces humans weren’t aware of and instead of violent eruptions of magma in the form of volcanos, the earth spit forth life. At first, Tazrae thought this might be slightly miraculous, but reading on, dread filled the pit of her stomach. These creatures were the opposite of life. Instead, they were like locusts on the land, destroying all life and actually restoring the balance in their destruction.
Taz had kept hearing this word; balance. But it didn’t always make sense to her. Balance of what?
She read on, hoping to find the answer, as she took notes on what she read, adding her own logic and her own thoughts to the text she’d borrowed. It seemed that places that were once colonized or filled with life and later abandoned were especially prone to spawning monsters. These monsters weren’t usually powerful on their own, but they spawned often in large numbers and could organize and reign destruction down on civilization.
There were two examples. One was a yukman and one was a vinumia. The Vinumia section was so small that Taz copied it word for word.
“Vinumia (pl. Vinumae) is a landspawn composed entirely of vines and flora found in select few swamps of Mizahar. They are solitary creature with a normally docile nature unless readily provoked and are territorial to the point that if any harm comes to its habitat it will charge. If they are forced into combat, they are vicious, and will not stop their pursuit of an intruder until it’s dead. They can disperse their bodies in the water and reform, and even on land they are very hard to kill."
"The Vinumae are strange creatures with limited intelligence that generally revolve around an animalistic need for survival and an innate desire to protect. They are capable of producing seeds and giving birth to more Vinumae by placing the beating seeds they produce (almost like a heart) in the essence infused mud and waters of the swamp.”
Since the book was pre-valterrian, Taz took a few moments to review some of the stories she knew or had heard from people passing through her father’s Inn in Riverfall.
There were great swamps both north and south and even here in Falyndar in the form of the Gyvaka. Taz knew she’d heard of these creatures before and wondered if the Valterrian and its excess wild djed increased these occurrences. It would be something else to ask Talia, though she knew her collection was outdated in terms of modern doings. But the Reclaimed Library knowledge was invaluable for someone interested in the past.
"A mark of an open mind is being more committed to your curiosity than your conviction.
The goal of learning is not to shield old views against new facts, but to revise old views with new facts.
Ideas are possibilities to explore, not certainties to defend."
Garden Beach ❖ Syka ❖ The Protea Inn
"Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows."
-
![User avatar](./download/file.php?avatar=136711_1683823678.jpg)
Tazrae - Be savage, not average.
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- Posts: 1336
- Words: 1917699
- Joined roleplay: May 3rd, 2020, 2:02 pm
- Location: Syka
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by Tazrae on May 16th, 2022, 12:17 am
The second type of landspawn the book mentioned was Yukman, and Taz had actually heard of these. She’d had no clarity of what they were, but fortunately the tome went into great detail. Yukman were the most common form of landspawn and could take on the appearance of any sentient race they spawned near to.
That meant they could look human, jamouran, dhani… anything really… in the most general form. They differed though in that they appeared made of mud, cracked earth, and often had sticks or stones embedded in their skin. They were intelligent… somewhere on par with monkeys or humans that were on the lower end of the intelligence spectrum.
They were violent but incredibly strong and often sought destruction. Taz was disturbed to read that Yukman were often sought out and captured as slave labor that could be trained and sometimes the most violent were fought against each other in sporting events that humans and other wages would then bet upon.
The whole thing sickened her.
The interesting part about Yukman was they were some of the first monsters that arose when Mankind populated Mizahar. The tome speculated that yukman was Mizahar’s response to population controls. However, someone…. Taz didn’t know who… had written in the margin of the book that yukman was more prominent after the Valterrian than before so that the theory of Mizahar fighting the dense pre-valterrian populations with yukman couldn’t be true.
Taz ran her hands over the obvious defacement in the book and wondered who the individual was that had read the book and made that notation. She speculated that a post-Valterrian individual would not be aware of the yukman numbers pre-Valterrian so it had to be a long-lived creature that had been present for both periods of time.
She added this note to her own notes, indicating her speculation on its origin, and moved ahead with her study. The tome said the Yukman spawned in clusters of ten to five hundred. She paused at that number, blinking, wondering what in the world Syka would do if five hundred yukman spawned on their doorstep. It would be like an army spawning out of the blue and looking for something to kill. Yukman came in male and female, though they did not reproduce. They were herd animals, often following a leader. If a leader did something the rest would. And if one was killed, and the body not burned, a new yukman was likely to be spawned from that specific piece of ground sooner than later.
Taz felt sick to her stomach. For something so dangerous, there was no real knowledge of why they spawned or how to prevent them. They could be killed, but they were very violent and very driven. They didn’t settle down well but moved on consuming meals raw and destroying everything in their paths.
Tazrae paused at that point, took a deep breath, and shook her head. “Legendary Monsters of Mizahar” was a lot to take in.
Words: 2685
"A mark of an open mind is being more committed to your curiosity than your conviction.
The goal of learning is not to shield old views against new facts, but to revise old views with new facts.
Ideas are possibilities to explore, not certainties to defend."
Garden Beach ❖ Syka ❖ The Protea Inn
"Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows."
-
![User avatar](./download/file.php?avatar=136711_1683823678.jpg)
Tazrae - Be savage, not average.
-
- Posts: 1336
- Words: 1917699
- Joined roleplay: May 3rd, 2020, 2:02 pm
- Location: Syka
- Race: Human
- Character sheet
- Storyteller secrets
- Journal
- Plotnotes
- Medals: 5
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by Tazrae on September 4th, 2022, 7:38 pm
Grading!
Tazrae –
Research +5, Writing +5, Anthropology +5, Planning +1, Psychology +1, History +5, Investigation +5
Flora Monsters: Appearance & Biology, Fauna Monsters: Appearance & Biology, Flora & Fauna Monsters: Acquire Unsettling Traits, F&FM: Mutants – Traits Favorable For Their Survival & Pass Them On To Their Offspring, F&FM: Wild Djed, Structured Magic, Divine Whim Influenced, F&FM: Giantism in Talderian Animals, F&FM: Talderian ‘Dire’ Creatures – Whole Region Of Them, F&FM: Myrian Tigers, F&FM: Brosh & The Jamoura, F&FM: Hybridization – When Have Viable Offspring That Form Own Bloodlines, F&FM: Dynasties Like Alahean Dynasty, F&FM: The Nymkarta Is Technically A F&FM, F&FM: The Kriital – Large Predatory Birds W/In Bronze Woods & Cobalt Mts of Syliras, F&FM: Glassbeaks In Sea Of Grass, Shoyden’s Astral Coordinates: 0012926672185630, F&FM: Tskanna – Huge Elephants Myrian’s Bred, F&FM: Ta’rukahl/Moon Eagles, F&FM: Tsana – Bull/Felie/Croc Monsters in Eyktol, F&FM: Velispar – Elemental Fauna (Perhaps Ancient Land Spawn), Velispar: Reptiles of Incredible Intelligence, Velispar: Almost Immortal – Thousands Of Years Old, Velispar: Born In Clutches Of Eggs That Hatched Savage Babies That Ate Everything In Sight, Including Each Other, Velispar: Absorbed The Knowledge Of The Creatures They Consumed, Velispar: Gained Sentience With Age, Velispar: Old Ones Gained Wisdom And Were Mostly Peaceful, Velispar: Walk Among Humans Disguised As Humans, Velispar: Babies Kept In Captivity By Humans And fed Criminals For Execution Or The Dying – Would Come Into Its Sentience And Be Welcomed Into The Community As A Keeper Of Memories, Velispar: Elemental In Nature (Earth, Air, Fire, Water), Velispar: Asai’Nav – Dweller In The Pavena Valley, Velispar: Appear Like Ixam, Asai’Nav – Guardian of Pavena/Old One, Velispar: Air Velispar Have Wings – Silvery Blue/White. Velispar: Earth Velispar Can Swim Through Earth – Green/Earthtones, Velispar: Fire Velispar Dwell In Volcanos – Red/Orange/Yellow, Water Velispar – Blue/Green, Turquoise & Silver – Fins Instead Of Wings – Fish like, Landspawns: What They Are/How They Happen, Landspawns: Burst From The Earth Fully Formed, Landspawn: Often Not Powerful On Their Own, But Spawned In Large Numbers, Landspawn: Yukman – Appearance & Mannerisms, Landspawn: Vinumia – Vines And Floral Creatures, Territorial, Vicious When Forced Into Combat, Hard To Kill, Falyndar: Gyvaka Swamp, Yukman: Appearance & Mannerism, Yukman: Look Human Though Made Of Mud, Cracked Earth W/Embedded Sticks/Stones, Yukman: Intelligent – On Par With Smart Dogs/Monkeys, Yukman: Strong/Violent/Destructive, Yukman: Captured And Used As Sport, Yukman: Spawned In Clusters of Ten to Five Hundred
"A mark of an open mind is being more committed to your curiosity than your conviction.
The goal of learning is not to shield old views against new facts, but to revise old views with new facts.
Ideas are possibilities to explore, not certainties to defend."
Garden Beach ❖ Syka ❖ The Protea Inn
"Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows."
-
![User avatar](./download/file.php?avatar=136711_1683823678.jpg)
Tazrae - Be savage, not average.
-
- Posts: 1336
- Words: 1917699
- Joined roleplay: May 3rd, 2020, 2:02 pm
- Location: Syka
- Race: Human
- Character sheet
- Storyteller secrets
- Journal
- Plotnotes
- Medals: 5
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