Skarl

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## Geography

### Biomes

Subterranean, Wetwoods, Mountains, Grassland, Lake, River

## Meta informations

### NID / CID

96

Provinces:

* Gotter Basin: ID 560 - Level 5 - Temperate Forest Biome - 2 Skerbs
	+ A deep wet valley thick with forest, mold, and mystic herbs
* Mount Wardak: ID 150 - Level 5 - Ice Biome - 2 Elcaronite
	+ A frigid mountain rich with expensive ore
* Slickwash Wetwood: ID 1637 - Level 5 - Temperate Forest - 2 Terris
	+ A densely wooded riverland infested with fibrous, toxic fungi
* Redstone Vale: ID 1568 - Level 5 - Temperate Forest Biome - 2 Terris
	+ A dark, wooded valley at the foot of the mountains
* Clay Coast: ID 571 - Level 5 - Temperate Forest Biome - 2 Jjumba
	+ A wooded coastal region beside a large, fish-rich lake
* Humbik Marches: ID 1583 - Level 5 - Grassland Biome - 2 Terris
	+ A rolling grassland dotted with dense patches of forest
* Northwater Lakeland: ID 1115 - Level 5 - Grassland Biome - 2 Dize
	+ An open grassland adjacent to a huge lake, perfect for the growing of pigment crops to make dyes
* Farip River Basin: ID 1569 - Level 5 - Grassland Biome - 2 Terris
	+ A fertile river valley with a strange magnetic woodland
* Rathmarch: ID 1113 - Level 5 - Grassland Biome - 2 Dize
	+ A lake-adjacent grassland separated from Northwater Lakeland by an arm of the Northwater River
* Bonewallow: ID 446 - Level 5 - Grassland Biome - 2 Terris
	+ A murky bog-encrusted grassland riddled with crooked trees and ancient ruins

Cities:

* Gotter - Gotter Basin
* New Warren - Mount Wardak
* Overcast - Mount Wardak
* Slikka - Slickwash Wetwood
* Floodhaven - Slickwash Wetwood
* Bloodomen - Redstone Vale
* Avalanche - Redstone Vale
* Uzu - Clay Coast
* Tayafar - Clay Coast
* Wardak - Humbik Marches
* Sorefoot - Humbik Marches
* Northwater - Northwater Lakeland
* Chiefbridge - Northwater Lakeland
* Fari - Farip River Basin
* Picclaim - Farip River Basin
* Runoff - Farip River Basin

## Background

Skarl is peopled by the skavers of the Gotter Basin caverns, primarily known as scavengers and tunnelers. Their rat like features make them poor fighters, but highly adaptable builders. They hail from a mountainous land of heavy rainfall and tree cover, and their nocturnal society spends their nights hunting through the woods for building materials and the days tunneling ever deeper into the earth. The skavers have a wealth of ore and stone stockpiled, and occasionally trade with their neighbors when the price is right. Skavers’ lives are short and often miserable. Their families are immense, as they can have yo to a dozen pups in each litter. With not enough food to go around during flood seasons, the skavers often resort to cannibalism on their own young. This has instilled a sense of eat or be eaten in skaver society. They are a cold, scheming people: cowardly, but quick to take advantage of any weakness.

## Strains/Clans

### Pakka Strain

One of the founding clans of the Consortium Pact. Relied upon for their vast numbers and dedication to the Temple of the Warren. They work harder than the other strains, have a larger build ideal for labor, and have a simple passion for the endless digging of their people that sets them as exemplars of the Skarl people.

### Rath Strain

One of the founding clans of the Consortium Pact. Feared for their cruelty in battle. Like all skavers, the Rath are a fearful and opportunistic people, but where they lack in bravery, they make up for it with grim ingenuity. Specializing in traps, biological warfare, deception, and betrayal. The other Strains made peace with them reluctantly, recognizing that should they get on the Raths' bad sides, blood would flow freely once more in the Skarlands.

### Fuush Strain

One of the founding clans of the Consortium Pact. Famed for their wealth in the jewels and ore of the earth, and for the skill of their crafters. They are the architects where other skavers are mere blunt instruments. The Fuush designed the tunnels of the Skarlands and took to hoarding much of the riches ore veins for themselves. Due to their loss of population during the many raids by the Rath Strain, the Fuush rely on their allies in the Pakka Strain for the labor needed to fuel their economy.

### Snowblind Strain

A primarily labor and religion aligned strain spawned from the former Pakka martyr Pasha Snowblind. They have claimed the tunnels of Mount Wardak for their governance, and largely back Pakka in terms of their politics.

## Crafts

Common items - Bone jewelry, hair products and dyes, metal appendages, teeth and claw care tools, and wooden chewing treats.

Art - Wall paintings, totemic wood carvings, body art, bone carvings/jewelry

Structures - Extensive tunnels, wooden hovels, cobblestone huts, and occasionally tree, hill, and mountain nests for scouting. The Duba Strain are known for tunneling into giant mushrooms to make their dens.

The number of Skaver nests in Skarl society grew on an average of 20% in the seventy years following the signing of the Consortium Pact. Materials once used predominantly by the Fuush Strain were shared with other strains, leading to greater levels of warmth for pups and increased survival rates through the neonatal stage.

Use of metallurgy in skaver architecture was largely segregated by class due to the wealth needed to access metal refineries. Consortium law dictated that the Fuush could retain their exclusive ownership of these refineries in the condition that they donate regular tributes of metal tools, weapons, wares, and armor to the Rath Strain hunters. These restrictions also limited the export of Fuush bronze sculptures due to the habit of the other strains to melt these gifts down for use in illegal weaponry.

Temples and palace-hovels were the primary structures shown to be built of stone in Skarl’s Bronze Period. Stone cutting for the use of structures outside of tunnel reinforcement was reserved for the wealthy shamans and clan leaders.

## Government

### Consortium Government

The skavers’ government was originally formed when multiple cousin tunnels intersected, and in the ensuing war, a nonaggression pact was signed on the condition that the wealthiest families share the future wealth of their new joint tunnel system. Thus, the Consortium Pact was signed.

Each Strain provided a specific type of leader that would be prominent in Skarl politics to come. The Pakka shamans were considered leaders in both spiritual and political matters, and so represented the Pakka clans in the Consortoum Government. The Rath, naturally, sent key generals as their representatives. The Fuush provided city planners, hoarders, and the wealthiest merchants who paid their way to the top of the Fuush’s list of candidates. Thus it was that the Consortium came to be known as the council of souls, spears, and schemes.

### Tri-Strain Alliance and Blood Pact

Following the Two Coups, the Consortium Government split into two sects. The Tri-Strain Alliance was ruled by representatives from the Snowblind, Pakka, and Rath Strains, (and later by the Duba, who were birthed by the Tri-Strain's efforts) in Gotter Basin, Mount Wardak, and the Slickwater Wetwoods. The Blood Pact was ruled ostensibly by a sole elected speaker and his representative council in Redstone Vale and the eastern segment of Gotter Basin. Both councils claimed Skarl as their own sovereign nation.

### Shamanist Theocracy and Grand Army

After a merging of the Blood Pact and Tri-Strain through a political union of the Rath War Chief and Pakka Chief Shaman, a new government was born and set to work arranging Skarl into a centralized governmental system. In regards to diplomacy and bureaucracy, the central temple in Gotter became the authority in Skarl, while the military might and policing efforts were headed by the Rath's War Chief. The Grand Army was formed under the War Chief in response to the threat of the Ergendir peoples on the northern border. For the duration of the Grand Army's existence, the majority of its troops served protecting the border and raiding the rival nation.

## Ideals and philosophies

    The ruling religion of Gotter is the Temple of the Warren. This temple was founded on the belief that all life and wealth comes from the deep, and it is the responsibility of the skavers to gather the wealth and divide it among the most worthy. Those who show a lack of ambition are doomed to become fodder for the Warren. Those who earn their place are blessed with their Warren Cut, a ritual in which a number of fingers and toes are severed and offered to the bone pit in the local temple. These are a sign of initiation into the Warren. A member of the Warren must never be cannibalizes, as they have shown their devotion to the temple’s future.

Warrenists believe in many gods belonging to many lands, but their chief deity is Old Warren, to whom all bones belong. He is a grotesque god with power over the dead. He consumes all, and teaches us that one day our flesh will fail us and be stripped away for good. Our true forms are pale bone, for bone alone does not lie. His shamans look to the bones for truth and power. It is in bones that the shamans draw their magic.

## Flora

The abovelands of Skarl are dense with gnarled oaks and creeping lichen. Rumors tell that Skarl is home to tens of thousands of fungi, both above and below ground. This is advantageous, since the Skarlands belowground are barren of most vegetation. In the flood season, the skavers rely on edible mushrooms to make up the difference in food production.

## Fauna

Aboveground, the animal life is about one might expect of a swampy forest. River crocodiles dominate the waterfront, and strike fear in the hearts of the skavers who share the land with them. Belowground sports a large variety of chitinous creatures: centipedes and scorpions, cicadas and mantises, and of course the dreaded churls.

Churls are vicious insectoids with razor-sharp claws and pincers, wings that beat a sickening rhythm, and a toxic spit that corrodes flesh and bone. The skavers of the Rath Strain have a tradition of taming these beasts for war, though the process has resulted in thousands of skavers deaths. A worthwhile trade, in their estimation.

## Military Units

### Rath

* Hunter - Scouts and rangers proficient with shortbows and ambush tactics. Can set up sniper nests in trees and craft pontoons for escaping or raiding across rivers.
* Vanguard - Frontline fighter most effective in large, disciplined groups. Great at swarming enemy lines with speed and brutal ferocity, so long as the battle is going their way. Wield spears, hatchets, short blades, and shields.
* Crockiller - A heavy skirmisher equipped with durable scale armor and a churlclaw spear. These units are difficult to train and so are few, but can change the tide of battle with their presence.
* Skirge Bombadier - A flying unit on the back of a winged insectoid. Capable of skewering enemies with a dive-bomb or spewing toxins from above.

### Fuush

* Siege Engineer - A crafting unit with extensive knowledge of siege engines. Makes efficient battlefield repairs and directs attacks with long-range engines.
* Stonethrower - A siege unit built to hurl chunks of rock over long distances. Not meant for hurling at great heights, but can scatter enemy attacking lines or cause cave-ins when used in subterranean warfare.
* Cutthroat - A behind-the-lines skirmisher intended for disrupting enemy supply lines, assassinating key figures, and performing reconnaissance.
* Churler - A trainer of churls, capable of unleashing the vicious beasts on an enemy army. Churls fly, but not very far or fast. They do not stray far from their masters, so they make for short- to mid-range attackers. Their claws tear through armor and their toxic spit can panic even the most disciplined of soldiers.

### Pakka

* Shaman - Magic users capable of conjuring bone amalgams, earthquakes, and using allies as vectors for the spread of debilitating diseases.
* Bruiser - A tough, hammer-wielding unit specialized in breaking siege lines, digging tunnels, and constructing defensive positions.
* Pill Carter - A heavy cavalry unit on a cart pulled by giant pill bugs. These pill bugs can be released, and rolled into enemy lines like boulders. The carts are equipped with javelins or shortbows.

### Snowblind

* Alpine Cavalry - Fox-riding light cavalry most useful for ambushes and quick raids.
* Hawker - A bird-trainer that uses their mountain birds to carry messages and drop clumps of rock and ice on foes, or tear their at their eyes and harass their lines.
* Shredder - A skilled raiding unit equipped with gauntlets that double as climbing spikes and claw weapons.

### Duba

* Toxic Darter - An ambusher that inflicts deadly poison on lightly-armored foes. Can hide in highly toxic environments to escape reprisal.
* Flame Potter - Crafters who fix flammable tar mixtures in clay pots, then hurls them into enemy lines and on their siege engines.

### Bloodbrother

* Warlock - Deadly magic users who sap blood and vitality from foes, unleashes horrors to frighten the enemy, and bolster allies with berserk rage.
* Zealot - Swarming units that gladly sacrifice themselves to bring down enemy units. They wield crude weapons that leave enemies torn to shreds, sometimes even resorting to eating the enemy alive.

### Varak

* Ogre Rat -
* Sea Rat -

## Key Figures

- The Rotted One - The founding prophet and war chief of the Temple of Old Warren. His name is lost to history, as he is said to have sacrificed his very identity to the Old One. Before his death to fleshrot disease, he led the Pakka Strain clans to destroying hundreds of clan totems, uprooting the old totemic faith from the Pakka forever.

- Rik the Red - The Rath war leader who gave his life in the First Contact Battle, the first battle of the Three Strains War. When Rath and Pakka tunnelers encountered one another by chance, the fearsome red-mohawked Rath general Rik led an incursion of Pakka territory to seize the advantage against the new rival. In the ferocious fighting that followed, Rath hunters killed ten thousand Pakka and lost only three thousand of their own, Rik the Red included. With his decisive blow, Rik guaranteed the Rath would not be overrun by the greater numbers of their foe.

- Gnarl son of Garl - The wealthiest Fuush architect during the Three Strains War. He was instrumental in establishing the alliance between Fuush and Pakka, without which the Consortium may have never been born.

- Magga the Younger - Chief shaman of the Pakka elected midway through the Three Strains War to replace the three previous Chiefs executed by the Rath. She brought about key reforms to the Temple that served to seize power from the worker clans. In years previous, the less centralized governance of Pakka clans had given the Rath free reign to dominate the battlefield against their perennial foe. Magga’s influence turned the tide of war, and her partnership with Gnarl son of Garl spawned hundreds of children who would eventually serve in the Consortium Government.

- Pasha Snowblind - An ambitious Pakka digger intent to be the first to dig a tunnel to the icy peaks of the Wardak Range. He lost his life in a cave-in before he could reach the peak, but his children finished the mission in his name. Snowblind would thereafter be the name of the Strain that populated the icy mountain.

- Trekk Crockiller - The ferocious general in charge of the Consortium forces above ground. Feared as a mad rat for hunting the river crocodiles in the Gotter Basin. Advocates to the council the building of a grand barracks to house a central army with conscripts from across the clans to enforce obedience. Of course, this barracks would be under his enforcement, and would make him and his clan the chief military power in Skarl. Loathe as the Consortium might be to give away such power, the alternative is a weaker military force in the face of any clan uprisings. General in charge of the topside hunters during the discovery of the Amiae people. Died of a heart attack at the age of fifty-two.

- Reek Two-Fingers - A prominent Fuush architect advocating for construction projects in Gotter. He aspires to make the unified tunnel system a permanent home with a strong central government body and economy controlled by the Consortium. Despite his famous stench, he is well-loved by his fellow councilors, though not much by the clans who favor independent action over central power. His agenda is held back from decisive victory in council due to the other councilors being in disagreement as to which project to focus on first. Reek’s ambition far outstretches the realities of the Consortium’s capabilities. Passed in his sleep with his head buried in a sketch of the grand market he never saw built. His body was fed to his pet churl Eviscerator, as was his last will.

- Pashir Snowblind - Pasha Snowblind’s granddaughter. A shaman of notable magical power and well-loved by the common laborers of Pakka and Snowblind Strains. Founding member of the Tri-Strain Council. Passed away while visiting the Amiae Domain. Rumor has it she was found in bed with an Amias and was cut down by a jealous wife, but this is likely a fabrication by the Blood Pact to tarnish her family name.

- Graff Scruffisor - General of the topside hunters. Intent on building the grand barracks his mentor Trekk Crockiller wished for. Has a fierce distrust of the Amiae people. He answered the Amiae's first parley with Skarl, in which he warned them against settling in skaver territory. Founding member of the Tri-Strain Council. Died under suspicious circumstances, allegedly choking on a gator bone. Poison was widely suspected, but his surviving friends could not decide who was the most likely culprit.

- Fausha - Chief shaman of Old Warren's Temple. Famed for prophesying the coming of the One Bearing the Rot of Faith. Her preaching encouraged a wave of claims to godhood by parents of newborns in the Pakka Strain, and increased clan violence between Pakka and the Strains of Rath and Fuush. Founding member of the Tri-Strain Council. Died in the collapse of the original Consortium Council chambers. Her body was found at prayer in the bone pit.

- General Parasha Snowblind - The general of the Snowblind cavalry who led the fight against the Blood Pact, then lost the fight at Crackle Tor. For fleeing from battle and failing his people, Parasha was removed from office and publicly shamed. He drank himself to death within the year.

- Brother Yaz - One of the chief warlocks in Deeprot's council. He led the zealots in battle against Crackle Tor, chosen for the command due to his ferocity and strength of magic. He was slain by Rath rangers, leading to his army's rout.

- Credulis Dydrik - A professor of medicines at the First Skaz University. During a research mission in Slickwater, he discovered a cure for fleshrot. He is immortalized as a pioneer of medical research in Skarl.

    - Puck Pickory - An albino Snowblind skaver, born to the lesser branch of Clan Pickory called the Snowmelt-Pickories. His entire clan was butchered in raid by Bloodbrothers, leaving him as the sole survivor. Soon after, Puck led raids into Redstone Vale to enact revenge upon those that ordered his clan dead. He was known to wear two bronze claws as his weapons, replacing the stumps of his fingers he lost digging out his clans' tunnel. His ferocity earned him the title Shredder Puck. He won many victories in battle against the Blood Pact, but in the end was taken captive by Rath hunters and made a gift of to Bloodbrother Deeprot. He was tortured for months on end until at last he expired, staring into the light of a candle. His bones were used to decorate the archway into Deeprot's famed Blood Dome.
- Ishi of the Dawn - An explorer and tradeswoman who made first contact with Wrockingmar Isle, and died defending the isle from the invaders of Etharis.

    - Bloodbrother Deeprot - A warlock of the Fuush Strain, of a fearsome reputation. It is whispered that he has skavers kidnapped out of the tunnels to be slaughtered in the bowle of the warlocks' obsidian Dread Hovel. Deeprot is said to drink the blood and gawn the bones of these captives to claim the residual magics hidden within. Following the death of Reed Two-Fingers, Deeprot rose to prominence within Fuush high society. Used his agents to place Sulk Three-Fingers under house arrest, then forced the chief speaker to command the Fuush to take control of the Consortium council. Thus, he founded the Blood Council. Achieved unnatural long life through the use of blood magic.

    - Sulk Three-Fingers - Great-grandson of Reek Two-Fingers and chief speaker for the Consortium Council as his predecessor once was. Despite winning the election to his position with a landslide victory, he is perhaps the least popular speaker to ever hold the office. This begs the question whether he earned this position, or merely bribed his way into power using his family’s wealth. Unlike his ancestor, Sulk retained three fingers after his devotion ceremony so as not to try and outdo or dishonor Reek. Taken captive in his own home to be made the figurehead leader of the Fuush Blood Council. The Blood Council regularly made announcements in his name, though if he were still alive in his imprisonment he would have been well into his seventies. His mummified corpse was used as a binding agent for a massive flesh golem which rampaged across Bloodomen following Deeprot's death.

- Finnus Givers - A Duba adventurer and explorer. Famed for charting the western coastline of Idaros and acting as envoy to the Vendari.

- General Lorgen Coalheart - The Rath general who led the army to the field at Crackle Tor. His aggressive tactics both on the battlefield and in the council chamber made him a force to be reckoned with.

- General Reebus - Fuush general and master of siege engines. He led half of the Blood Pact army at Crackle Tor, but was defeated by Shredder Puck and forced to flee the field.

- Hill Speks - A Fuush-born lawyer who serves as a shadowy spymistress and legal champion against the Bloodbrother Strain and the Pact. She endeavors to avenge her father, Grigg Speks, who died arguing against the Bloodbrothers' violent stranglehold on the borderlands in Gotter Basin.

## History

### Totemic Era

At the dawn of time as recounted by the shamans, skavers first delved into the mysteries of the soul. In fear, they learned to be subservient to their departed ancestors, just as they went in fear of their own parents. If in life we must serve or be eaten, why would the afterlife be any different? So it was that skavers developed the belief in totemism.

Each skaver clan was formed around an ancestral totem, crafted and carved of ancestral bones. The totem was said to carry the souls of the departed. These souls would frighten off the living who came to rape and plunder and kill, and so preserving the totem became tantamount to preserving the very clan itself.

Yet clans intermarried and formed alliances as well. These unions were founded on strategic needs, but also beget similarities in philosophy. In time, clans began to prune their young in an effort to achieve some ideal form. Some wanted clever children, capable of winkling out precious ore from the earth. Others desired large, strong young who could defend the clan in time. And some observed the most terrifying mystery of them all: the magic of earth, bone, and flesh.

### Founding of Old Warren's Temple

It was the collection of clans intent on birthing magic offspring that rose to greatest prominence in time. A cult was founded by a collection of powerful shamans. They crafted their own totem, but as their prophet decreed, it was a totem crafted of other clans' bones. The prophet's name is lost to history, as it is said he fed it to the rot of his grim god. So to did he feed his own body, and declare his undying loyalty to Old Warren.

He was called the Rotted One by his followers, this prophet. And to his cause rallied dozens of clans, all fearful of what would happen should they not come to their call as allies. This occult band spread, smashing clans and their totems in the dozens, and eventually hundreds. Before the Prophet lost his life to the rot, he oversaw the destruction or submission of near a thousand clans.

His followers turned the cult into a temple. Old Warren's will was that the skavers spread and multiply beneath the surface of the earth, and so the temple clans did. But this time, they sought to preserve their unified genetic identity. Not as disparate clans, but as one mighty Strain. The Pakka.

### Exile and Resistance

Not all skavers succumbed to the temple's will, however. A great many chose to band together in resistance to the destruction of their sacred totems. These clans united under a combined ambition of cleverness, construction, and the finding of valuable resources. They waged many small-scale wars against the Pakka, every time learning a bit more about their foe's tactics. To the horror of the shamans, the new Strain had begun birthing mages of their own: dreaded blood-drinking warlocks. The resistance clans named themselves the Fuush.

Another group formed another Strain in time. This gathering of clans shared the common fate of exile after their clan totems were smashed by the fledgling cult of Old Warren. These exiles fled to the surface world above the tunnels: a terrifying place for any skaver. The vast majority of these exiles died painful, gruesome deaths by the various predators and pernicious raiders of the surface. But those that survived birthed a powerful Strain: the largest and most physically imposing of skavers. The Rath.

### The Three Strains War

With the Pakka and Fuush locked in stalemate, the Rath saw their opportunity to return to the tunnels that birthed them. They began with raids, hitting both of their counterpart strains fast and hard, probing their tunnels for weaknesses. They discovered that the Pakka were disorganized and complacent, the Fuush rich but over-reliant on their specialized knowledge of Pakka tactics. Neither strain had ever seen anything like the Rath.

The time came for the Rath to make their full push. They attacked the Pakka first, scattering their feeble defenders, until their numbers forced the Rath vanguard to slow, and their shamans collapsed the tunnels they used to invade. The Rath were far from efficient tunnelers, and so it took them a long while before they could continue their invasion.

In the meantime, there was more plunder to be had elsewhere. The Fuush had stayed out of the fighting, happy to wait until both foes bled the other dry. They were sorely unprepared for the slaughter that followed. The Rath descended into the Fuush tunnels, and the caverns ran red with blood. Tens of thousands of skavers were slain, and more left homeless, or defiled, or robbed. The Fuush retreated to a central position, just barely managing to halt the Rath advance.

Both Fuush and Pakka were unable to best the Rath directly, so they turned to subterfuge. A long campaign of guerrilla war followed, weakening the Rath bit by bit. But to prevent inevitable defeat, the two defending strains began to meet in secret to plan an alliance. With a unified effort, the Pakka and Fuush retaliated, reaping the same bloody coin against the Rath as they had brought to the tunnels. Key Rath generals were assassinated, disrupting the famed discipline of the Rath. The Rath began to realize they could not win the war. Not without their own clans tearing each other apart in the unrest.

A peace was signed, after long months of negotiations.

### The Consortium Government

The three strains agreed to share power in the form of a representative chiefdom. Each clan would send a chief to speak on their behalf, and these chiefs would select key speakers for the council. The idea behind it was a sharing of resources. The reason the Rath attacked in the first place was a fair share. The surface held little to no ore. Their weapons were made of bone and stone, where their tunneling cousins learned to smelt metal. And while the Pakka knew the rudiments of such furnace work, it was the Fuush who truly delved deep into the arts of craft.

This is but one of many things agreed to be shared. All things a clan needs to survive and thrive would be shared, so that a unified society could emerge from the ashes of war. The government that followed was built on business arrangements, and so was called the Consortium.

The Consortiom's initial territorial claim was confined to the tunnels and woods of the Gotter Basin, and it was Gotter that the first city of Skarl bore as its name. A booming city in terms of population, poverty, and crime. So it was the Consortium's first task to enforcing the peace between the clans. The Rath hunters served this purpose best, practically speaking. Setting them in charge of enforcement did little for their already low reputation. Their hunters were also divided into parties dedicated to scouting and hunting in the woodlands above ground. The Skarl people knew well the risk of not having eyes on the surface, after all.

Meanwhile, the Pakka kept tunneling and expanding the temple's word to all and sundry. Soon enough, totemism was vastly absorbed into the faith of Old Warren. The Consortium agreed to mandate Warrenism as the official religion of Skarl. The Fuush, on the other hand, fixed their eyes on the run-down, poorly planned tunnels of old and saw the potential they offered. Hundreds of architects set about to planning and executing the building of Gotter into a home for the skavers as a people, not merely a collection of clans.

### Snowblind's Ambition

The fledgling council found themselves beset at every meeting with requests from the clans to expand the tunnels into new territory. The foremost territory looked to by these clans was the mountain range running along the southern border of the city-state. The Wardak Range's highest peak was the eponymous Mount Wardak, and was taken as a personal challenge by one Pasha, who took the clan name Snowblind to match his fixation.

Pasha swayed the council to back his efforts financially. The council had reached a deadlock on how best to spend their funds, and this course offered advancement for all the strains. Tunneling to the peak was a long and brutal process, and claimed many of those who endeavored to reach the top, Pasha included.

But the work was completed in the end. The skavers reached the peak, and promptly built a temple to Old Warren, called New Temple. Those who had adapted to the harsh climate and icy tunnels of the mountains founded a new strain, the Snowblind Strain.

After founding the New Temple of Warren upon the mountain's peak, the Snowblind Strain branched out their tunnels and the Rath sent scouts south to oversee topside constructions such as escape tunnels, air holes, and watchtowers in case of aboveground invaders. During these efforts, the Rath spotted the first of Skarl's great neighbors: the Amiae Domain.

Reltions between Amiae and Skarl began shyly at first, each watching the other warily before finally daring to approach. The Amiae sent envoys to make first official contact, and were greeted by the cautious and suspicious Graff Scruffisor, who warned them of encroaching on Skarl territory. The Consortium council officially made no answer to the Amiae, a decision (or lack thereof) that incited much criticism from the southern clans who continued to watch the strange fishfolk.

### Two Coups

The clans became more disillusioned with the council's decisions as resources became more consolidated and siphoned into Fuush pockets. Meanwhile, a warlock coven led by Bloodbrother Deeprot began to sway Fuush councilors away from the popular policy makers at the time, a development that came to a head when the weak-willed Fuush speaker Sulk was elected. The first of two coups was led by the Bloodbrothers, who imprisoned Sulk in his own palace-hovel and began making decrees on his behalf. The first of these decrees was to insist upon the Consortium Council making an official central military and marching it south against the Amiae Domain.

The other Strains hastened to meet in secret, where they decreed that the Fuush Strain would no longer be welcome in council meetings. Thus the second coup was carried out. Snowblind, Rath, and Pakka Strains came together to found the Tri-Strain Alliance. In reponse, the Fuush Strain, (in this case Bloodbrother Deeprot speaking on behalf of Chief Speaker Sulk), announced the binding of the Blood Pact between Sulk's "loyal councilors." Both sides quickly began funding dissident clans on the opposing side to cause mischief for their rivals, and a sort of economic war began, a cold war where neither side dared make the first move, lest a repeat of the Three Strains War be staged.

### Birth of the Duba and Bloodbrother

As part of the efforts to outstrip one another, both Blood Pact and Tri-Strain Alliance sought to increase their populations. Both expanded in opposite directions, founding new cities and instructing their people to be fruitful and multiply greatly. The Blood Pact, however, had an even more devious plan. Deeprot enacted a law by which all mating females in the Fuush clans must have their first litter with a male warlock of the Bloodbrother Coven, thus ensuring a new strain would be born, one blessed with a much greater rate of magic. They called it the Bloodbrother Strain.

The Tri-Strain could not take this sitting down. They began a voluntary program of selective breeding to craft a new strain of their own, this one specially altered to settle on the surface in the wetwoods infested by toxic fungi. The Duba Strain came to be after three generations of careful breeding, and populated the wetwoods enterprisingly.

During this expansion, the Duba came into contact with Tayurzu, the westerly neighbor to Skarl. The inquisitive skavers took a great liking to the Tayurzu people's writing and language, and began importing the language in return for gifts left in and around the clay people's villages. The Duba clan chiefs agreed to build a school dedicated to teaching language and writing. It was named the First Skaz University. The Temple shamans declared this fascination with written language blasphemy, driving a wedge between Duba and Pakka, educator and faithful.

### Desolation of Clan Pickory and The Clan Wars

The Bloodbrothers began a campaign of raids against the border clans in the mountains. One such clan attacked was the submissive clan of Snowmelt-Pickory. The entire clan was butchered, leaving only one lone sentry alive to tell the tale. This sentry was named Puck, and despite his youth, he would lead a warband of frustrated skavers of victimized clans on a retaliatory raid upon Redstone Vale, the center of Blood Pact control.

During the raids in the mountains, the Blood Pact set fires throughout the forest that would thereafter be called the Ashwood. The fires spread south into the Amiae Domain slew many of the fishsfolk and defiled their corpses. The Amiae demanded an explanation, and reparations. They met with the clans led by Puck, now called the Shredder by his allies and enemies alike, who lay the blame of the killings at the Blood Pact's door. Thereafter the Amiae pushed the Tri-Strain Alliance to bring the Blood Pact in hand...or they would have to act themselves.

The threat of incursion from the south sent a ripple of fear through the Skarl clans. Yet the councilors could not agree on how to act. After intense disagreements between the Tri-Strain speakers, the Snowblind and Duba Strains split from the Alliance. Snowblind declared war on the Blood Pact and requested aid from the Amiae. The Blood Pact declared them traitors for siding with outsiders against their own kind, and requested the Rath Strain act in defense of Skarl: to leave the Pakka behind and form a militia to counter the Snowblind warbands.

During this time, the Pakka Strain began a mass exodus of their swelling population northward into the Marches. There, they ran across The Erkendhal for the first time, and were most perturbed by their appearance. The Duba as well explored along the west coast of Idaros until they encounetered Vendari, greeted with celebration and showering the new friendly neighbor with gifts.

The Clan Wars essentially ended at the Battle of Crackle Tor. The Rath Strain stepped in as Snowblind and Blood Pact fought fiercely, ensuring they would get a strong position as partner in the Pact. Shredder Puck was taken captive and sold to Bloodbrother Deeprot as part of the deal between Rath and Pact.

Following the defeat at Crackle Tor, the Snowblind expanded their trading efforts southward and across the sea lanes to make up for their inability to move goods north. They encountered both the Wrockingmen and the Valika of Etharis in an unfortunate encounter during a slave raid by the latter against the former.

## Misc.

### Traditions

Washing of the bones, a communal service in which the dead are stripped clean and interred beneath the local temple. Takes place once per season.

Earthbreaking, in which a new tunnel system is started. The local community throws a feast to inspire the workers to glory.

Buryrot, a ceremony of euthanasia for those who fall victim to fleshrot. The skaver inflicted is set upon the bonepit in the local temple and given a draught of nightshade specially mixed to bring sleep, followed by painless death. Family and clansfolk honor the fallen by casting flesh-eating pests onto the corpse. These critters quickly clean the bones for Old Warren to claim.

### Cuisine

Skavers are omnivorous, and Skarl culture presents a variety of dishes both flora- and fauna-based. The staples of the skaver diet are protein-rich fungi and calorie-heavy legumes. To flavor their meals, they cultivate herbs and mosses in their dens. Stock and sauces are developed from carcasses butchered for choice meat and bone marrow. Wealthy skavers supplement their diets with sweet fruits gathered from the surface. Meat from hunted creatures is common for Rath Strain clansfolk, but only reserved as luxury food for those dwelling below ground.

### Storytelling

Skavers are little likely to put themselves in the limelight. Theater and presentation present themselves but little in their public spaces. Tales of past glories, frightful stories of monsters sent as punishment, and tunneling songs are all shared between clans in the comforting confines of dens and hovels.

### Magic

Those few amongst them proficient at magic are idolized and raised to the Consortium’s shamans, showered with wealth and given largely ceremonial positions until such time as they are needed to avert disasters and fight wars. These shaman are most deeply associated with earth, disease, and poison elements. The most powerful of all are the necromancers, the chief shamans of Warrenism. They alone can speak to the dead, and it is said that their morbid whispers bring death to all the living who hear it.

### Location

Skarl was first dug in the Gotter Basin, a wet woodland area cradled against the southern mountains of Idaros. The nation expanded first into the mountains to the south, the Wardak Range