Nestled between the towering cliffs of the Zorian plateau, lies a vast cavity that is wide enough to swallow an adult bull elephant with enough space to spare for a small herd of draft horses on either side. There you will find gold, an abundance of it. But what is that you say? That the natives tell you that it is a place of death and home to hideous monster that will devour you? Ignore the savages. They only seek to protect what they are too indolent to grab for themselves.

-A Khanate offical assuring a bunch of miners.

The jewel of the imperial shoal, this aquatic city is the emperor's seat of power.

There are some men who treat their wives the way they would chattel,that is,with utter control and domination,regarding their spouses not as independent beings entitled to their free will,but as mere objects of theirs,subject to the will of their lords. Such is the nature of those doomed to become the Possessive Ones,upon their death.

Large lizards about 5 feet long, nothing about them seems to stand out. As drab and colorless as the parched brown stone of the desert, these things come across as your average (admitedly huge) reptile residents. But what most wouldn't know is that these scaly things are virtually unkillable, thanks to a unique gift that they possess.

Poor little Kankos..

Spat upon by his tyrannical superiors, this pathetic little office menial slaved away like a mule for the miserable pittance thrown to him..

Until he met the one that lurked in the shadows..

‘‘We are the Lords Of The Straits, Rulers Of the Sea, and the very ocean acknowledges us as Her children! Men of Pan-Kor, nothing sails on the waters without acknowledging our might !’’

''In a world dominated by savagery and barbarism, we alone represent civilization. Is it any wonder then that we are forced to keep the horrors of the outside world at bay?''

-an anonymous Usholal

As the officer strides into the thick and oppresive pitch-black gloom of the jungle, he silently signals to his men to fan out in a classic Quarsooth battle-formation with a nervous hand-gesture. He is very tense, almost afraid. The soothing, omnipresent presence in his mind tells him that he has no reason to worry, assuring him that victory will belong to those noble warriors that carry the standard of the invincible race of Zor-Tanis.

But there is something else cutting through the easy promises offered by that pleasant, gently commanding entity in his mind, as if determined to seize all his attention and use it to torment his imagination until it begins to scream for mercy. This something he cannot define and put words to, but it makes his skin crawl nevertheless. Despite the heat of the jungle, his blazing gold body-armor had suddenly become a chill prison that raises uncomfortable goosebumps along his chest.

Woried muttering from the rear tell him that his men like him, are unsettled. Turning aound in irritation, he begins to hiss at them to remain silent, afraid of alerting the very band of murdering monstrosities they have finally tracked into this eerie wilderness. It would be a rather embarassing matter for their commander if the very quarry they had been relentlessly pursuing for the past week or so, were to suddenly turn around and massacre all of them.

Too late he feels a something slithering around his neck. Fearful that it might be a pyhton, he reackes for his massive ''fire-bow'', determined to incinerate the scaled menace before it can crush his larynx. But before his fingers even have a chance to close around the handle of the weapon hanging from his belt, another coil slithers out of the darkness and out of the darkness and pinions his arm, holding it in a painful crushing crip. As agony swamps him, he can vaguely hear a grim sound of cracking bones through the pain-filled haze that now holds him. His arm is being crushed. And then so quickly that his stunned mind has no time to register this new fact, there is no time left for more thought. The coil looped around his throat begins to squeeze, suffocating him. As the officer's head begins to swim in the final moments of his life, he finally gains an excellent look at the thing that is stealing his life.

It is not a snake, but a vine. As if in response to this discovery, a now terrifyingly familiar roar of bestial fury rings through the gloom of the jungle..

Throughly despising the intrigue and scandals of the royal court,Prince Michael has never mourned the loss of his crown and inheritance to a treacherous advisor of his father's. No,inflicting vengeance on the usurper and reclaiming his throne is too petty for him. He has a more important quest to fulfill..

Some see him as a loathesome reminder of their faliure to cow a race humanity deems unworthy of existence. Others deem him a noble hero and resistance-fighter, a beacon of hope and courage to all the downtrodden of the galaxy.

Regardless, you don't want to smell his breath. Or ever see him up close.

Lying forgotten on the ocean floor by the children of Acqua,reposes the very monument that commemorates the passing of the islands from the hands of the Old Ones into those of their ancestors who sailed out of the mists long ago to claim them for their descendents.

But in a twist of extreme irony,others have come to venerate this creation abandoned by the race of man that built it. They are the Old Ones,the very same race whose defeat this statue is supposed to represent.

A well crafted but otherwise ordinary steak knife. It makes the cutting of meat sooooooo easy.

Man, too, is a primal creature, though he binds himself with the chains named Reason and Law, locked link by link from birth. Yet, those locks can be opened, the links broken, in both the savage world of the street-slum, and in the gilded cages of nobility.

One such creature is the petty pirate, Gurad Sorgon. Unknown to those that dismiss him as being merely an ugly face among the multitude of floating scoundrels that abound on the lawless seas, this marauder conceals within him the soul of a prehistoric terror.

Just like with the sharks they so revere,a wrong or inappropriate action can provoke a lethal reaction from a Shura. As the other mer-races are so fond of saying among themselves,the only thing more unpredictable than a shark is a Shura. This is a prefered weapon, simple yet deadly.

''A thousand of the vile things we set alight, crying aloud the prayers of the Holy Redeemer as the demonic abombinations screamed in a chorus of almost human agony, utterly helpless against the flames that consumed their monstrous and deformed bodies. Never again will another human grace the banquet of these accursed fiends. But it pleases me even more to say that the gold which is so abundant in this heathen land, is now the sole propety of a nation blessed by the One God. No more will these repellent false deities lay claim to that which we have wrested from their worshippers''. -Corand Rogad, Conquerer of Tahutol

Have a family that is ever at odds with each other? Beware lest the Slurran comes for you..

‘‘There were five of them all together, these monstrous walking trees! Yep, trees that walked! By the look of those nasty things, they were probably trees that ate people as well. Tried to kill us with those giant rubber balls, they did, those hell-spawned overgrown bushes…

Cut that laughter out, damn you! We weren’t drinking salt-water when that happened! Those crazy things are real! And if you don’t believe me, sail there yourself, you lousy land lubber! Don’t tell me I didn’t say ‘‘I told you so!’‘, when those vicious monsters finally squish you with their roots’‘.

Residing in the core of this giant black megalithic structure built to resemble a crude representation of a lightning bolt, lies a Shard of the Storm.

And a lot else..

Unique among the sea monsters that infest the oceans of Acqua, this abomination is cursed with a hunger for power that can never be satisfied.

Bestowed by the pagan Godess Inar,upon the king of Silamarh in the his nation's most dire time of need,it allowed to destroy nigh single-handed,the great horde of the infamous barbarian war-chief,Hordan.

The classic sword of the incorrigible munchkin,you think? Not quite.