Balktan

* Bust
* Emblem
* Shorthand

Dartakaqumado (Draconic True Name)

## Symbolisms

### Symbol

His two heads curled around facing the right, forming a circular symbol. Both snouts are curled up into aggressive snarls.

### Color(s)

Yellow (Primary)Grey, Black, Green (Secondary)

### Portfolio

Yellow dragons, chaotic evil dragons, destruction, isolation, exile

### Favored Weapon(s)

Harpoon guns

**Balktan** (baulk-tahn) is one of the six Dragon-Gods of Halintar, the first Yellow Dragon and (debatably) the patron god/protector of the Sea of Salt. He is the final of the six created, the third child of Tiamat and a universally despised force on all accounts of the original lore and within public opinion.

His reputation reflects his chaotic, brutal personality, one that pushes him and his followers to sow destruction and despair wherever they may venture. So feared and hated is he for his actions, that any that carry the blood of his descendants are cursed with the social stigma of being related to him for the rest of their lives.

## Description

No dragon is more feared than the remorseless twin-headed god of destruction, Balktan. His winding form stretches out through the seas, and even a mere glimpse at his form is said to bring a lifetime of bad luck unless you throw salt over your shoulder and run from him as fast as you can. The stare from his eyes can drain the courage from the bravest of men, and his roar can incite any being to faint out of pure fear.

As all yellow dragons are, Balktan has a sinuous, eel-like body. His heads are identical, tall and narrow with a permanently furrowed brow and bulbous end to his snouts. A curved purple horn crowns each bulb, and on their sides are long narrow nostril slits. As yellow dragons have retractable teeth, his are typically hidden away, unsheathed primarily for combat. His eyes are a violent magenta with sharp vertical yellow-green pupils and a set of dense green scales crest each brow. A thin upright mane of dark green bristles lines his spine, splitting to trail to the peaks of both heads. Minuscule yellow scales, like a layer of coral, roughly coat his body, with patches of white salt peeking through them like triangular polka-dots. His gills, trailing behind his jawlines, flare as he breathes, speaks, and spews out his salty breath.

The origin of Balktan's two heads are a source of polarizing debate between Dragon-God scholars and the few worshipers of his who are coherent enough to be engaged with in discussion. The original texts of the creation myth say that he was born with "multiple heads", split in twain as the salt of the sea rushed through Tiamat's claws. The exact number of heads was never specified- later editions of the text translated the tome as "twinned heads", but some argue that he may have had more at conception that were shed by the claws of his fellow Gods as he frenzied, until he was left with the two most intelligent minds that afforded him the common sense to return to the sea he was birthed from.

## Personality

An agent of chaos that hates virtually all life, Balktan does anything he can to snuff out any semblance of organized society or mortal livelihood wherever he roams. In his eyes the only proper way to live is by survival of the fittest, actively encouraging his followers to kill the weak and serve the strong until you're strong enough to kill the strong. Trust is a farce and relationships are a vulnerability to be exploited. And yet, he spends most of his time seething in his salty home deep within the sea, unable to traverse beyond its boundaries lest he be countered viciously by his fellow gods. Paranoia regarding the presence of his siblings is always at the forefront of his mind. Frustrated with is place in life as a deity that's widely hated, he takes his wrath out on whatever civilizations dare make their home anywhere near where he can access without risk of being punished.

Though he has two fully developed heads, it seems their consciousness is of one being, as they always speak in sync. He is much more animalistic than the other deities, usually not defaulting to speaking or reasoning with others, but given a show of strength or being forced to cease an assault will cause him to reveal that he has the capacity to do so.

Curiously enough, when the ancestors of the Salt Dwarves began to adapt to living in the Sea of Salt, Balktan did not seek out and destroy them. Some theorize that deep within his dark heart he felt a pang of guilt or consciousness towards the dwarves as he watched them get hunted to near extinction by the other deities; others believe they bested him in some feat of strength or skill. Regardless, they take a similar attitude as the yellow deity, attacking whatever they can to salvage things required for their continued survival.

## Homestead

The location of Balktan’s lair within the Sea of Salt is unknown- the area itself is surrounded by a radius of life-killing salty waters of which no one knows the range of. Even if someone who is unaffected by the salt attempts to approach via boat or underwater, they’re attacked by the yellow dragon’s brood, whose exact numbers are also unknown.

### **Brood**

It's unknown how vast or sparse the yellow deity's brood is. The only means of telling that the brood is growing is that nearly two dozen are slain a year for attacking cities and towns, the flow of which doesn't seem to cease. Many children of Balktan couldn't leave even if they wanted to, given the rest of the continent's typical attack-on-sight attitude towards the bloodline.

### **Hoard**

The few adventurers brave enough to try and seek out Balktan's home are washed away by billowing waves of salt or chased off by the god's enraged children. Wives' tales and fables say he hoards bones bleached white by the salty waters and gnawing teeth of his brood. Skeletons of sunken ships and submarines are also famed to be there, some of which may still hold the treasures they had tried to sail through the dangerous waters. A more far-fetched claim is that the deity is, oddly enough, a big fan of collecting various antiques, taking them deep into the ocean to preserve their beauty.

## Powers

Two heads are better than one, giving Balktan the minds to use his overwhelming power for whatever nefarious purpose he may scheme up. No one but the other Dragon-Gods daring to get in his way.

#### ***Breath Weapon***

Balktan's stinging breath can be shot from both heads at once, or one or the other, giving him versatility and range in how he attacks.

His ***Salt Breath*** kills all natural life it touches, absorbing all moisture and burning away everything but bleached bones. Land touched by it is rendered fruitless for hundreds of years, and sea becomes tainted for hundreds of miles beyond where it's used. Some people theorize that the oceans of the stretch were once all fresh water, until Balktan's birth turned the salinity up all over the world.

#### ***Surprising Side Effects***

When harvested after being expelled, the pure mineral value of Balktan's salt can have surprising effects on humanoids who use it for medicine. It will kill anyone who uses it for seasoning food directly; however, when used as a smelling salt it can invigorate and awaken the faint of heart instantly, even emboldening them to fight more bravely in combat than normal. It can also be used as a cleaning agent, purifying water when boiled and cleaning and strengthening rusted metal artifacts.

#### ***Gale Summoner***

The whipping of the despised deity's winding body can cause sharp winds to be summoned, slicing through the air with complete disregard to the current weather or landscape. Sometimes one can tell when Balktan plans to shore by the sight of seagull and fish corpses sliced clean in half, killed by the environmental impact of his basic movements.

#### ***Sensory Overload***

Aside from the sheer dissolving power of his salty breath, the shrill screech of Balktan's two heads in sync can cause a total sensory overload, blinding and deafening any living creature in its range and alerting the world to his presence. More sensitive individuals such as children and the elderly can die simply from being overwhelmed by the sound.

### *Born to Be Wild*

According to the religious texts of the Dragon-Gods, Balktan was the final of the six to be created, using the last sliver of Tiamat's creation powers to do so. He came out far more eel-like than dragon-like, and to add insult to injury he had multiple heads just like the chromatic goddess that created him. Though she tried to get rid of the newborn god, he was far too nimble, wriggling away like a pest into the depths of the sea. What little evidence can be claimed from his territory suggests there were some form of merfolk or other undersea humanoid living in the now-polluted Sea of Salt that has long since been destroyed by his arrival and salty aura. His immediate attacks on the cities and towns on the coast also earned him ire with the rest of the continent's residents as well, even before they unified with the Gods.

### *Unified Through Evil*

For ages after his creation Balktan sewed death and destruction alongside his brood whenever he could make his way to land. There were several times where the other Dragon-Gods had to halt their own personal wars to specifically put the yellow deity back in his place, his mere existence giving them a reason to stop fighting one another and by extension creating a perverse short-term peace amongst his peers, something he reviles greatly.

At some point during his tortured existence the dwarves that lived under Ester Pyx chose to betray her in an event called the Insurrection. They were largely persecuted and slain for their treachery, but there were few who managed to make their way all the way to the Sea of Salt, building rudimentary mechanical contraptions that allowed them to survive in the same depths that Balktan himself hid from the gods within. Rather than slaughtering them, he chose instead to let them live, and they soon took on his neurotic and bloodthirsty mannerisms.

### *Pillaging With Purpose*

Thrown into the woes of Dragonsbane panic and without the assistance of their cousins in the Mantle, the Northeastern Badlands have been fighting a losing battle against Balktan's most recent advances upon their territory. Gainabi has been completely evacuated, and it looks as if the yellow dragon's forces are slowly eating up the south almost completely uncontested. Those who are fortunate enough to survive his assault claim that he is acting strange, spewing strange prophecies about the Dragon-Gods and their purpose, but the information is so strange and incomprehensible that it's dismissed as some new sort of psychological warfare the deity is using against his victims of war.

## Relationships

### **Other Dragon-Gods**

#### *Ester Pyx,* Dinante, Tephra, & *Karomatzu'*

All the other deities show a high disregard and hatred for Balktan, whose largest contribution to society is destroying it however he can. They often have to halt their more "noble" battles against each other to unify against him, pushing him back into the depths of the sea and restoring the damage he's done to the land he's advanced upon.

#### *Paradoxie*

Though Paradoxie does hate Balktan as the other gods do, her reputation does show her as the kindest of the deities as well. She shows no mercy towards the chaos god himself, but extends her welcome to those of his brood who wish to escape the life of destruction his brood enforces. Those who can reach the High North and prove themselves worthy are given a home in the remote landscapes of her territory, where they may live in peace so long as they can stand the isolation.

### **Worshipers**

*(See: Dukes of the Salt)*

Actual dedicated worshipers of Balktan are few and far between. It's fabled that he has a troupe of followers called the Dukes of the Salt, though it's unknown if they are humanoids (most likely Salt Dwarves), yellow dragons, a mix of the two, or something else entirely. Interaction with them is the mark of their guild left on smouldering pillaged ruins they leave behind.