Creature Focus - The Giants

The Efreeti

Also called: Djinn, Ash Spirits, Ragmen

"Many years ago, I had the fortune to deal with an Efreet before they left for their desert homeland Sephar. The one I met called himself Abathr, or "one of tools" for his trade as architect. We were in a caravan wagon, traveling along the edge of the Wastes. Abathr was a giant, for even when sitting his head came to my chest. He was covered from head to toe in reddish-brown wrappings and rags trimmed in an ornate script. From the gap at his eyes I could see his skin was grey and cracked, like a burnt tree. He told me many things about his people, and how they came to Caldera."

-From Minus Militi's journal of travels

Quietly they emptied their homelands amidst the chaos of the onslaught of their cousins and mortal enemies, the Jord. Before they were silently swept out of their mystical realm, they were under near constant siege by the Giants and their frozen slaves, the Jordelfen. A cabal of powerful mages deigned to escape from the plight of the Frost Giants, and turned to forbidden sorceries. Deep under their most sacred of temples, they weaved pure magical force into a spell that plucked the Efreeti from Sephar and sent them to the mortal realm. The spell ultimately claimed the lives of half the Efreeti population, including the very souls of those who cast it. They left their home, a land of the coast, for the desolate and rocky desert of Caldera.

After they fled their ancestral home of Sephar, they quickly began recouping their losses, establishing a wondrous city of soaring towers and low alleys they named Sephar-Mehzrad, or "morning light comes again." Many of the great cities of the desert were built in this time, and the natives of the land benefited from trade with the Efreeti. They sequestered a hefty chunk of Caldera for themselves, their territory eventually stretching from Conglin to Maupai. Even still, they worked tirelessly to return to their mystical birthplace. It wouldn't be for many centuries that they were finally able to resurrect their realm from its tattered remains.

Because they lived in the middle of the desert, they required a unique method of procuring water and maintaining their food sources. The water magi of the Efreeti were, believe it or not, among the best in the mortal realms. So good, in fact, that they almost never run out of water. Their city streets were lined with large clay jugs of water, that anyone could take if they could lift them. Any time these clay jugs emptied, they were refilled by nightly patrols of water magi. In fact, there was something of a myth surrounding the water Magi, as the secrets to their methods were zealously guarded. Some believed that the Efreeti gods had taken pity on them, and gifted them with and everlasting spring that lay under Sephar.

Without a need to ration their water, they were able to supply their farmlands with more than enough water to yield usable crops. (With a little fiddling in earth magic, they were able to make the land more hospitable to farming.) This, in turn, led to agricultural surplus. With no one in Efreeti cities demanding more food or more water, they were able to devote most of their time to the research or production of useful goods, magical or otherwise. This, with their ability to swiftly traverse the deserts on magical ships that sail atop sand and not sea, made the Efreeti culture one of earliest societies to break out of a bartering economy and the first society in the history of Agartha or its mystical neighbors to mint coin. That is why, today, Efreeti coin is the most common across all of Caldera, even within Guild-controlled cities.

(Clarification: Conglin is the name for the western jungles of Caldera. It is where the Main House of the Calderan Empire rules. Maupai is the name for the eastern jungles. It is where the Branch House rules. These terms will be expanded upon in a later article)

(points to touch on)
-Physical appearance: Covered in rags and long strips of cloth. Skin like charred and cracked wood. Howling, or shrill voices and eyes of molten brass.
-History: Left Sephar for Caldera; the powers of their ancestral home could no longer protect them from the Frost Giants and their Jordelfen slaves. Came to Caldera; worked to resurrect Sephar, eventually succeeded and left. Created the elves of the wastes to defend their homes from the Jordelfen.
-Legacy: The Elves of the Wastes, the many temples situated atop powerful Fonts across the globe. Most in Caldera, others in Fyriss. Some in Midgard, amongst the middle of what is now Jordelfen territory. The struck through text above will probably all be changed...

The Jord

Also called: Winter Spirits, Frost Giants, Ogres

"[Isne, or the world and its neighbors] is ours to keep, ours to master. All of its beauty is ours to behold, and ours to drink of deeply. It is not greed that compels us to guard it with such stead vigil. Cowards, charlatans and fools, deserved only of a poor death, they are our enemies. They are all those without Yodr's thirst, his ambition and power. They would poison this sacred land, and rob Yodr's bones of their majesty. The meager worlds they cut for themselves are insults, great stains on a great earth. Sad, hollow tombs they erect in a vain attempt to display power they do not own. Power they have yet to witness. Power, the might of Yodr, that, with a glance, levels their pitiable existence to dust. The least of ours is their greater; such is our strength. Such is our duty, to put these miserable creatures into miserable graves."

-Writings found within a Frost Giant temple, erected on a slab of volcanic glass 8 cubits high.

The Jord (pronounced with a short "y" sound) are the masters of the wintry peaks of the Otna Rim, an otherworldly mountain range that circles all other realms. In a way, they see themselves as gatekeepers and watchmen of the entirety of Agartha and its neighbors. Theirs is a society of rigid control, dominated by the powerful among these already fearsome creatures. Yodr and his siblings are their chief gods, though they have no strict religion save that they worship physical and magical strength above everything else. They place a great deal of value in courage, as well. When they meet opposition that does not shrink at the sight of them, they are on some levels pleased at seeing some of Yodr's spirit in other peoples. On the other side, the most despicable trait in all of Jorden culture is cowardice, or a meager spirit. Even their own are not safe from a terrible and painful end if they show signs of a failing heart.

Most of their history is told orally, and very few translatable texts survive today that could give modern Agarthans insight into Jorden culture. Their writing system is a series of runic symbols, each with deep symbolic meaning as well as a phonetic presentation. When the symbols are placed into a word, it is hard for non-native readers to realize the full meaning. Most of what is known about them and their culture is gathered through centuries of shared history, created through frequent wars and, rarely, trade (in the incredibly unlikely event that the Jord see a particular people as mighty or courageous, they sometimes do not look to murder every last one of them.) Their language is full of short, harsh words, shortened further in several seperate dialects by confusing glottal stops, operating alongside mixtures of several words making it extremely onerous for an historian to understand what they say. Whenever they speak to other cultures, they use a pidgin composed of rough, odd sounding phrases that mostly convey their meaning, say in trade. Often, however, their intent is muddled through this mistranslation, prompting frustration and inevitable murder.

They war with any who upset the order they seek to overt, dealing out such swift and terrible justice that the mere mention of the Jord can quiet a rowdy hall. They stand at a terrifying 10 feet high, holding sunken eyes that glow dimly with a malevolent hue, and blue or green-tinged skin that freezes water at a touch. Their clothing is cut from woolen cloth, dyed with various pigments of browns, reds and oranges and covered in dozens of lines of runic words, meant to grant various benefits. They wield gigantic weapons (even in their proportions) of wood, ice and metal, and decorate their armor with various trophies plucked from any corner of Isne.

The Jord, along with their elven slaves, are vampiric. While they do eat from their herds of sheep, cattle and elk, they favor a much more savory delicacy: souls. Jorden warriors and sorcerors have been known, from survivors of raids and battles with the terrifying giants, to be seen siphoning the souls of the dead out of their still warm corpses and are reborn with new vigor because of it.

(still more I need to edit and finish...)

The Dryads

Ack. I apologize for the lack of an update. I've been trying like hell to get over myself and post what I've been writing. For this article I still need to "finish" two sections; one for the Dryads and the other for the Frost Giants. To say the least, this has been nerve-wracking and wholly depressing. I'll write a lot, then immediately delete it. I think I'll put this article on hold for a bit, and then come back to it when I've had time to come to terms with everything I hate about the things I write.

I think for the next ones I'll be doing more specific topics so I can write it, post it and get feedback a hell of a lot quicker.

Next Article

1. Finish this one!
2. Famous Mana Beasts
3. Dynamics of Magic - Melee and why it's still a viable choice
4. A Unique Island Culture (one in Fyriss)