Ahuj, as she’s known by Captain Kwajr’s brave crew, is friend to Djafaiya, the East Wind of the Sea. At a word from her lips, city gates discharge their duty to her by opening. Fair winds vacate the sails of their quarry and swell their own to overtake their prey. The Mighty City of Po invites her with gritted teeth and will see her unharmed in its rough streets and halls of intrigue.
Category: art
Emakesh and Shumal, the Dawn Flame
Two years have passed since Emakesh rounded the bend of Mother River to see the village of Adur Em burned to a smoldering cinder. He asked the boat — a simple canoe carven from the stout bowsprit of the warship whose stories you already know — to beach itself that he might look among the ashes for clue or treasure. What he found was much more than the fire-eaten remains of a village.
Nur Amegh, Holy Gladiator of the City of Guruk
Nur Amegh is the champion of the City of Guruk, which can be found in the Three-River Mountains far the the west of the center of the world.
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Mallu, Falseman Guard, General, and Lover
The Falsemen are the product of Ennueh genetic engineering. They are built for their talents, from cunning engineer to subtle mind reader and ever-so-rare mind controller, and given as gifts between the powerful who can afford to commission their crêching.
Once born, they possess at the least the faculties of the Ennueh designers who created them. Many Falsemen work to develop their kind to greater heights while they debate the philosophical merits of the arguments that declare them as people.
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The Wandering Tower
The Wandering Tower is spoken of around campfires and in the halls of the great cities, alike. It was seen by the traveler, Emish, as she crossed the Stone Sea. The army of Magish the Archer gave it wide berth when it marched toward the city of Ud.
The Tully Monster is So Weird, It’s Hard to Draw
The Tully Monster, Tullymonstrum gregarium, is an extinct creature from about 300 million years ago (That’s tens of millions of years before there were dinosaurs). It looks like a squid, has a single arm — elbow and all — and has a spinal cord, completely unlike a cephalopod.
It’s insanely weird.
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Tokarahia: a Sleek, Small Ancestor of the Largest Animal in History
The Tokarahia is a small (about 6m long), extinct ancestor of the modern baleen whales. It has a few, probably vestigial, peg teeth in the front of its jaws, but the rest of its mouth was almost certainly filled in with baleen. I love its sleek shape.
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The Ktesh: Delicious but Deadly
Any traveller will recognize that the first sounds and smells of a town are those of the settlement’s ktesh. The birds stand only as tall as the knee, but, as the saying goes, “All cities are built of the bones of the ktesh.” They hunt as a flock, consuming the rats, mice, and toka of a settlement and, in return, the people of the settlement consume the flesh of the ktesh. The color of its feathers never fade and are used for spectacular artworks, and its bones are read by namedealers to read portents of the future.
The meat has a bolder flavor than that of any other bird, but is both more delicate and more abundant than that of sheep or goats. It bears well the spices that travel the Great Road and combines well with eggplant and garlic. In most cities, it can be purchased, heavily salted and spiced, grilled on sticks.
Tschu the Allel
This is Tschu the Allel, a character from my Autumn of the Empire of the Thousand Petal Throne setting for Evan Rowland and Hannah Shaffer’s upcoming roleplaying game Noirlandia.
Captain Radish Saumet’s Spacesuit
We’ve seen Radish Saumet’s spacecraft, Happy Delivery, before! Her spacecraft doesn’t have much of an aesthetic (except for the spraypainted Jolly Roger on the side) because it’s so modular; Radish swaps parts as needed, keeping the ISp and thrust as high as she can afford.
Her spacesuit, on the other hand, is another matter. Over time, she’s swapped dozens of parts in and out to match her tiny frame and her habits. Barring repairs, though, it’s remained the way it is for the last couple of years. Continue reading “Captain Radish Saumet’s Spacesuit”