Tengu

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Contents

Anatomy:

Birdmen warriors.

Birdpeople, also known as Birdfolk, are bipedal monsters with bird-like characteristics including feathers, beaks, talons, hard-but-light bones, scaled bird-like hands and feet and excellent vision. Birdmen are typically very lanky and somewhat tall. Birdwomen have a more diverse sizing, ranging from very short and stocky to very tall and slight. Birdpeople come in thousands of different color combinations and feather types. Naturally strong, bird people have high jumping and climbing capability due to their light bones. While able to leap and bound for great distances they cannot actually fly. Birdpeople are only able to have three hatchlings due to their low survival rate. When Birdpeople are born they have feathers as gray as the land itself. It is said that feather color come from personality and upbringing. When they arrive at adolescence their feathers become very vibrant and bright. As Birdpeople become older their feathers become darker and deeper in color. Birdpeople live on a diet of grains and meats and jealously guard over their caches ever vigilant for thieves.

Personality:

Throughout history, Birdpeople have always been warring, be it physically, politically, or mentally. However, despite their tendencies towards war, bird people are outwardly happy, goofy, and sometimes ditzy. This is a social mechanism that allows no one to know their true motives, without disrupting social progress or political matters. Because death is so common in the Isle of Wind and Bone, Birdpeople often laugh it off as a joke, even if, internally, they are plotting a vicious vengeance. Birdpeople are narcissistic, self-hating racists. They are fairly neutral to most races, however, Birdpeople hold a special place of hatred in their hearts for other Birdpeople. This stems from the inherent belief that one's feathers are better than everyone elses. Because other races do not have feathers, Bird people pity and patronize them. For a Birdperson, life without feathers is nothing less than a living hell. Because of this Birdpeople also dislike pinkies. Pinkies somewhat resemble hideous, featherless Birdpeople and are great for killing and eating.

Lore:

Birdpeople live on a mysteriously remote island to the far west known as the Isle of Wind and Bone. It is there where nearly all Birdpeople live and die, few ever venturing from the isle. Socially, Birdpeople are seemingly kind, however, deep down every one of them contains the capacity for mindshattering violence. When insulted, Birdpeople will always retaliate with violence.

Their society is built as caste system based on the hatchling's order of birth. The firstborn hatchlings are destined to be high-class, often becoming leaders or great champions of battle. First born are also known as the Wind-bearers for it is believed that those born first hold within them the potential knowledge of everything past, present, and future. Second born are known as the Earth-bearers. The second born are often farmers, merchants, and shopkeepers. The Third born are called Bone-bearers. The third child is a living tool, often living with hundreds of other Bone-bearers in labor flocks. They make up the bulk of the labor force. Bone-bearers are seen as expendable yet valuable since they are the only once fit for hard labor in the mines and mills. Although the system is unchanging, the Birdpeople believe it is possible to change one's caste status by killing the sibling of a higher caste. It is believed that when one sibling is killed by another, their destiny is absorbed. This is why Birdpeople are instinctively fratricidal.

There is another caste in Birdfolk society, the little known and scarcely mentioned Fourth. The Fourth are Birdfolk children who have grown up parentless and alone. Their feathers never change color from the original gray and they spend their lives wandering the wastes picking a living from the barren rock. They are, for the most part, shunned completely from greater society however there are whispers of the Fourth forming a nomadic tribe out on the wastes.

The Isle of Wind and Bone:

80% of the isle is bleak, gray, and windy. The shoreline is a rocky steppe that eventually levels out into a wide plateau. The bleak landscape is devoid of color. This is why Birdpeople meticulously groom their feathers to make them shine and lend some color to the world. The climate of the Isle is between 20-65 degrees Fahrenheit depending on the season. The central part of the isle is the most fertile area and is also where most of the bird people reside.However, out in the flats there live scattered tribes of Birdpeople. These tribes are very mysterious and little is known about them.

The Isle of Wind and Bone as mapped by Sigurd Amundson.

The Isle of Wind and Bone is made mostly of volcanic rocks. The wide flats are former lava flows. Although all these volcanoes are now dormant. Generations ago, the Isle was not as it is now. Where there is nothing but gray wastes, there once were tall trees and wide grasslands. Large terrestrial birds roamed the lands while the great birds ruled the skies. Now only a few examples still thrive including the predatory terror raptors, the majestic and godlike grand eagles, and the herbivorous varieties the Birdpeople still hunt for food.

During this age there were actually two species of birdfolk: those bound to the ground and those who ruled the sky. These Sky Rulers were far smaller then their kin and were gifted with nimble hands made for tinkering and inventing. They lived in the trees in intricate homes and had a diet based on fruits and insects. Eventually though, the earth-bound Birdpeople began to cut down the trees for lumber and fuel. The Sky Rulers grew angry with their kin. Through a series of events lost to time they began a bloody war which tipped into the favor of those below due to their greater size, strenght, and population.

The war came to its climax and bloody conclusion on the Day of Night. The armies were gathering when the Isle began to shake and suddenly a great column of smoke rose from the mountain top and ash fell like rain across the Isle. Great fires spread across the grassland and through the forests. But still the armies clashed. A song is sung about this last flight of the Sky Rulers, it has been translated by Sigurd Amundson below:

During the day of night The winged brood took to the skies Wings bent in their last flight To battle went calling war cries Ash fell, they fell, bodies wrent. Battle songs shrill, blood they spilled. Until the last each died. Bodies crumpled, broken, 'neath the skies.

After the war's conclusion the remaining Birdpeople had a chance to rebuild. They lived in a age of relative peace for some time. After all those years the land grew tired. The hills were over-farmed and the land was stripped of trees. Wood and lumber have become the most valuable commodity on the Isle. The constant struggle for resources has led the Birdfolk tribes to more wars and in-fighting increasing their already deep distrust for their own kind.

Birdfolk Tribes

Talons The Talons are a tribe who focus primarily on hunting. They are skilled in the uses of leather slings and can kill with a well placed stone to the temple. No prey item is safe from the terrestrial birds to those in the skies. They reside mostly on the Flats and have some cities on Cape Talon. They are reclusive creatures. They like to make flutes from the hallow bones of their pray. In the dark nights you can hear their music carried by the wind over the hills.

Hawkbeaks Hawkbeaks live in coastal dwellings along the eastern coast of the Isle. They have one major mecca in the jaws of Hawkbeak Bay. The only major building is a stone gladiator pit where young Hawkbeaks test their skills of war. From a young age they are taught how to fight using spear and knife. Once they reach manhood, Wind-Bearers of this tribe are given a hatchling terror raptor to raise. Once the raptor reaches adulthood itself it becomes a terrifying mount which Hawkbeaks ride into battle.

Divers Divers are generally peaceful and skittish tribe. They keep to the southern coasts and inlets. Divers are the most skilled fisherman. They practice incredible patience sometimes standing along the shore, in waist deep water, or atop a rock watching the waters carefully choosing their moment to dive in and catch their pray. Some use spears but most enjoy the thrill of catching the fish in their beak.

Water Riders Otherwise known as the Shells. These outcast Birdpeople live on the Shell islands on the west side of the Isle. They once built incredible ships that could fly across the waters and would raid the Bright Feathers and Eagle's Sons for food and valuables. As wood is now in short supply, they are "shells of themselves" scratching a living off rocks. They are still the finest swimmers of all the tribes.

Bright Feathers' As their name implies, these Birdpeople have the grandest plumage. Even though well endowed at birth, they still feel the need to highlight their superior grooming with fine gems which they mine from the Eyrie Mountains. They can be found living in cave dwellings all throughout those mountains although they are most common on High Feather Point. Naturally, due to this material wealth and life style, the Bright Feather's are thought to be rather snobbish and pretentious (although this may just be a stereotype).

Eagle's Sons The last tribe closely resemble the Sky Rulers of the ages past. Just like them, Eagle's Sons are slightly of smaller stature and have a knack for invention but they are flightless. Despite this Eagle's Sons build their homes in the last trees of the Isle which they guard and tend for with their lives. They make the strongest weapons and construct devilish traps. Eagle's Sons are also very fast and nimble, able to outmaneuver all opponents. They worship the large eagles that live in the Valley of Bones (the place where they leave their dead to rot and decay - it is a holy place for all the Birdpeople to dispose of the dead and is so a honored place of peace).


List of Known Birdpeople

Cyrano

Birdpeople trivia:


-When one Birdperson defeats another in battle it is a common ritual to skin and wear their pelt to show their strength.

-Because of their love of their own feathers, a common punishment for breaking the law is to remove a number of feathers from the criminal based on the severity of the crime.

-Birdpeople take great stock in sweets, meats, feathers, and dead birdpeople. So much that they will go to war to obtain them.

-All Birdpeople have a two part name. Their first name is a given name by their parents and their second name is a physical attribute unique to them. Some second name examples include: Long-Beak, Strong-Song, Loud-Screech etc.

-When aroused, Birdpeople's legs turn red.

-Birdpeople's feces makes a fine pancake batter.

-Birdmen's beaks are a known aphrodisiac. If a beak is ground into a fine powder and consumed with tea or another liquid, it stimulates sexual prowess for hours on end. If the powder is consumed in a greater concentration (like inhaling) it can cause explosive results in the genitalia of the consumer (i.e. detachment in a rocket-like manner). Alternatively, a Birdwomen's beak is a equally powerful laxative when consumed in a similar way. Again, if consumed improperly, the results are explosive causing complete intestinal ejection. The Birdpeople are hunted and prized for their beaks.

-Because of constant danger Birdpeople have become more and more hostile, often preemptively attacking and raiding others for both safety and sheer joy.

-When preparing for battle birdpeople will often envison the enemy as giant cuts of meat(A.K.A Pinkies) or other birdpeople in order to have maximum killing mentality.

-Birdpeople have many reasons for killing pinkies, but the biggest one is because its fun. Other reasons include flavor, texture, revenge, and arousal.

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