Kakator

## History

Kakator has long been the subject of sailor’s legend, known primarily from word of mouth and hastily drawn sketches, or through the ravings of scholars of the Elder Mythos, though much of its history has been lost to time and myth. What is known, mostly passed along by the few remaining Advanced Serpentfolk on the island, is that it had been inhabited by their kind since the beginning of the Age of Ancients, when they split with their more evil-minded kin on the mainland of Northeastern Ithel. These Serpentfolk used powerful magics to tame portions of the island, which had been inhabited by great beasts long since extinct in most corners of the world, and built a great city which they called S’thon R’llon, in hopes of gaining legitimacy and alliance with the other races of Ithel. Their actions did not go unchallenged however, as the main bodies of Serpentfolk within the region and Deep Ones native to the Southern oceans made war on them. For a time they held fast against this two-fronted war, but eventually their enemies would join to bring them to ruin.

The mainland Serpentfolk joined their great wizards with those of the Deep Ones to agitate the island’s already unstable geological status, and in an instant in the Year 630 of the Age of Ancients, over a fifth of Kakator’s landmass sank into the ocean with a great earthquake, destroying the walls of S’thon R’llon and allowing the monstrous fauna to lay waste to its inhabitants. Today only a small fraction of the Kakator Serpentfolk remain, split between Degenerate and Advanced with a slight lean toward the Degenerates in population, though they are cared for and kept from harming explorers by their more intelligent kin. More of the island sinks into the ocean by the decade, and now only a third of the original landmass remains.

## Geography & Ecology

Katakor is described by most as competing with Anathis as the most hellish natural place in the world. Rough and uneven describes most of the terrain of the island, and only the lowlands and valleys provide relief from hard hiking. The coasts of the island have been picked clean of vegetation, and most is surrounded by jagged rocks that make landing by anything larger than a rowboat impossible. These coasts are home to a bewildering variety of sealife attracted by the nutrient upwellings from subduction trenches and well-mixed, turbid waters, and more mundane wildlife such as fur seals, gulls, sea turtles, cetaceans and huge schools of fish are common sights here. They are also home to strange dinosaurs and reptiles adapted to coastal life, from fish-eating raptors and small, squat megalosaurs adapted to feeding on hard-shelled sealife to hulking crocodilians that eat all they can catch.

The coast is also home to home to the only semi-permanent settlement on the island, in the form of a small, and rather crude jetty constructed by the Kakator Serpentfolk and explorers to the island. It has no name, and is little more than the jetty itself and a few huts and tents built along with the ruins of the old outposts of former civilization. Deep Ones have also laid claim to some pockets of the coasts and outposts beneath the water, and regularly attack explorers and the Kakator Serpentfolk in these rocky formations.

The rainforest is rough and uneven to say the least, home to dense foliage and mighty beasts. The edges often lead into massive valleys and deep crevices that play host to thermal vents, which might explain how the dinosaurs continued to survive and evolve. Interspersed are the ruins of the old city of S’thon R’llon, where most of the Katakor Serpentfolk continue to dwell in rude camps and, toward the interior, even a small village host to the closest thing they have to a central leader, S’thaco the White. They are also home to the most famous, and dangerous of the island’s fauna, Vastatosaurus Rex, descended from the great Tyrannosaurus Rex, slightly larger and more lithe to cope with their home’s terrain.

The rainforest and its crevices are also home to a number of strange, otherworldly aberrations, most connected to the Elder Mythos and the Kakator Serpentfolk’s pantheon of deities (Yig being the chief focus of their worship, though they also pay homage to Bokrug, Tsathoggua, and Mordiggian). Formless Spawn, Gibbering Mouthers, strange snake-like creatures and worse dwell here, ready to take advantage of the unwary.

The lowlands are home to the largest of the island’s inhabitants, with herds of ceratopsians and sauropods roaming in search of food and clearing the ever-encroaching rainforest. It is also the preferred hunting ground for the raptor packs, and the game trails have been the deaths of many a foolish explorer. These lowlands also lead into the swamps, where danger lurks underneath the waters in the form of both more crocodilians and the gigantic Piranhadon, 20-50ft long fish that specialize in taking prey from the riverbanks as they come to drink.

The hills make up the center of the island, and are home to the island’s flying fauna, as well as more of the Kakator Serpentfolk. Dinosaurs and strange reptiles adapted to living among the almost-mountainous hills are in abundance, though they tend to be on the smaller scale compared to the giants living below.