Daetrolos: The Julmurns

“During all my travels and all of my years, there are few beings in this world that worry me more than the Julmurns. These abominable, reptilian creatures have stained countless lands with blood, razed numberless homes and brutally ended untold lives. I hesitate to call these beings evil however, they are simply blinded by what can only be described as an immensely influential theocracy. Julmurns live in a church-state, one that dwarfs even that of the Human Religion of Dust of the past. The Dust is ironically integral to the Julmurn culture as well, in a far less harmful form however. The Julmurns once surged from the wastelands of the south end of Primea, intent on dominating all “inferior” beings. They sought nothing more than to bring all of Primea under their theocratical and tyrannical yolk.

The Julmurns hail from the Zyst Einode (yet another Dust Wasteland), south of the Pienna mountains in the neutral lands. They have carved something of a state out of the savage lands of the southern edge of Primea. A Julmurn is typically regarded as a savage and loathsome creature, almost universally despised in the lands of mankind. Julmurns are something of a tribal race, primitive in terms of technology yet well versed in the occult. They prefer to live in villages scattered throughout the Badlands of the south, electing to live in smaller groups rather than erect grand cities. There is one exception to this rule however. There is a place deep within the Zyst Einode that is said to be something of a sacred city-cathedral. Julmurns rarely mention it. There are few depictions of it in Julmurn texts. Mankind has never set foot there, nor has humanity even bore witness to it. It is simply referred to as the “Unseen City”. Even Julmurns that have ventured out into the world appear to know nothing of it either. I have been unable to learn anything more on this firmly mysterious place.

The Julmurns are a truly archaic race. Tribal records even predate those of humanity. They are, therefore, believed to have evolved far before humans did. It is possible that the Julmurns are more aware of where the Dust came from too. An odd theory perhaps, but the Julmurns raise some interesting parallels to Dust monsters. You see, the Julmurns are a Dust-based race, yet are not created by any form of Dust magic. They could be referred to as a “natural” Dust creature. Also, unlike Dust monsters, Julmurns haves some measure of intelligence and are undoubtedly self-aware. They are primitive, yes. Perhaps even barbaric. But they are not monsters. They are simply another fascinating, albeit terrifying, race of our world.

Unlike Humans, Julmurns are a fairly unified people. They very rarely war with each other and appear to exhibit a certain brotherhood amongst themselves. They commonly trade amongst villages, they have even been known to trade with outside powers, such as Hauteclaire or Bulrin. There are Julmurns that venture out on their own, even settling in human cities, but these are the exceptions rather than the rule. This race-wide kinship can largely be attributed to the powerful Julmurn religion. The Julmurns refer to this as the “Topisulk” or the “Way of Dust”. The Julmurns worship the Dust, it pervades their very being, their very society. They believe that all life came from the Dust and that the Julmurns were chosen by the Dust as some kind of “Prime race” Julmurns view themselves was the prime examples of life in this world.  Flux and mutation are tenets of their religion, the Julmurns embrace Dust mutation as the will of their deity. Dust monsters do not harm the Julmurns and have even been known to serve them in some of their conquests. They believe that one day the Dust will perfect their forms into demigods. But first they must demonstrate their superiority over the inferior children of Dust. Because of this belief, coupled with the Julmurns chosen habitat, they are highly subject to Dust mutation. It is common to see Julmurns with extra sets of arms, secondary jaws, extra eyes or all manner of other shocking anomalies. They embrace these changes as gifts from the Dust. They are physically beings of constant flux. A Julmurns day isn’t complete without contact with the Dust after all.

The Julmurns were first encountered by humanity in the time of Emperor Otto Bulrin, when a Julmurn raid was initiate on the neutral city of Hauteclaire. A message of requested aid was sent to the Bulrin Empire, whom answered with an army built from the folk of Ontarfeld and Emperor Otto’s personal guard. The raid became a full siege, with an estimated total of 12,000 Julmurns present. The defense forces of Hauteclaire only numbered roughly a thousand, with the Bulrin reinforcements numbering about 3000. Upon Otto’s arrival, he witness horror like no other, civilians caught outside the city walls by the Julmurns were being butchered and even eaten in some cases. The Julmurns also appeared to conduct strange rituals on living and dead captives alike, spawning horrific Dust creatures. Otto took note that the Dust monsters appeared to treat the Julmurns as kin.

Upon witnessing this travesty, Otto ordered an attack. The Bulrin forces battle tooth and claw against primitive (though effective) Julmurn melee weaponry, Dust monsters and destructive Dust magic. Unfortunately in an unforeseen flanking charge, Otto was slain by an unusually large Julmurn with four arms. However the typical Bulrin discipline won out in the end, with the Bulrins successfully managing to meet up with the beleaguered Hauteclaire forces. Reinforcements from the Nordfeld 2nd legion and a detachment from the Kingdom of Riefe border forces arrived at this time and together the Humans managed to push the Julmurns back south to a previously unknown pass in the Pienna mountains, evidently where the Julmurn horde had initially poured from. Here, the Julmurns began to flee en masse, cursing as they went. The day was won. From that day onward the pass, which is now known as Union Pass (in honor of the Bulrins, Hauteclairians and Riefans who fought there), is kept under close guard and watch by neutral forces, in case of future attacks. There would be further, yet smaller, raids from the south but these were always beaten back by the staunch defenders of Union Pass.

Perhaps you now see why Julmurns are almost universally hated and reviled where ever they go, almost treated in the same way those innocents at Hauteclaire were treated by the Julmurn horde. However, as mentioned before, not all Julmurns are like those butchers. Not all Julmurns follow the Topisulk and indeed not all are savages. There are Julmurns within Human and Demien circles, often hidden, taking employment as guards or strongmen. These same Julmurns ofttimes find a form of kinship in the criminal underworld, utilizing their strong bodies as leg-breakers or robbers.

The average Julmurn is roughly 7ft for males and 6”5ft for females, dwarfing any average Human. They have roughly humanoid bodies, sporting two arms and walking on two legs. The head is always lizard-like, oft even complete with crests. Their bodies are hairless and instead are scaled. Julmurn skin tones can range from grey to a fleshy/pink color (like a Human) to near greens. They have a tendency to slouch, which tends to mask their true height somewhat. It is a scientifically agreed fact that almost every Julmurn is something of a physical powerhouse, musclebound and durable. Unfortunately, they suffer for this strength in the mental department. Though often cunning, Julmurns are naturally dim-witted and notoriously stupid. They struggle with Human speech, electing instead to speak in their native tongues. It has, however, been known for Dust to give to give individual Julmurns unnatural intellect. I even once heard a story of a Julmurn inventor. Take that with a grain of salt though.

Julmurns who follow the Topisulk view all other non-Dust based creatures as inferior and unworthy of existing. Theirs is a traditional and superstitious race, with countless traditions and customs, from war-dances to mating rites. Their entire culture revolves around the Dust or “Konigcyste”. Their creation story, which is well known to scholars all over, is a strange tale of an intergalactic being, Dust, a lost people and something that the Julmurns call the “Pilczar” or “Weak God”. It is unknown whether this Pilczar is the intergalactic being or the lost people however. It is a mysterious story, even the Julmurns are ignorant of its true meaning.

It would not be unreasonable to think that the Julmurn culture may hold clues into the nature and creation of the Dust. Let us hope it is not our doom…”

From the memoirs of Hermann Maestra.

 

Daetrolos: The Religion Of Dust

“Nobody knows where the taint came from. Nobody knows who or what created it. Nobody knows why it exists. Nobody even knows what it truly is. Amazingly, a little over 2000 years ago (during an era of time known as the “Olden Days”) our ancestors worshiped the taint. Seeing it as a means to greater power. Indeed, the “Dust” as it is known IS a means to a greater power. The power of magic.

Those who learn to manipulate the Dust can give rise to horrifically powerful magics. They can create fire from thin air, they can transmute one object into another, they can slow their own aging, they can even raise the dead to serve them. These are just grains of sand in an immense desert of possibilities. Magic is raw power. A “Dust Mage” can do anything, given practice and patience. This power comes at a tremendous cost though. The Dust will destroy your mind. Maybe tomorrow, maybe many decades from now. But it will.

You see, the Dust is like an invisible poison. It is almost everywhere, sailing around in the atmosphere. It seeps in and out of everything, corrupting and distorting. It behaves erratically. Impossibly. As a Dust Mage can do anything, so too can the Dust itself. Dust breeds madness it all life it touches. Minds shatter and bodies mutate. It even breaths disturbing life into abominable creatures. Beasts of Dust come seemingly from the aether.

Dust monsters, as we call them, can look like almost anything you can imagine and some things you cannot. I saw a Dust abomination once that appeared almost indistinguishable from a child, save for green glowing eyes and a second enormous gluttonous maw on its abdomen. I saw a Dust monster that resembled a regal knight of old, but sprouting from its back was what can only be described as a set of gallows with a maiden hanging low from them. These beasts of Dust appear to represent concepts that the Dust has corrupted. It corrupts the very concepts the world relies upon. They are happiness turned to gleeful murder, they are the family of twisted amalgamations of flesh, they are faith turned to obsession, they are love turned to bondage. Dust simply creates living nightmares.

With all this said, why would anyone choose to walk the lonely path of Dust? The raw power of course! A Dust Mage can outdo any normal man. Magic is the great conqueror, I’m afraid. My word, i seem to have gone on something of a tangent. Forgive me!

Our ancestors founded the “Religion of Dust”, the worship of Dust and all of its manifestations. Madness, true, but magic is also the great persuader. How were they to know it was the Dust causing men to go insane? How were they to know that it was the Dust causing their fields to wither? How were they to know it was the Dust creating the horrific beasts that ravaged their travelers? Perhaps they were too blinded by the sermons and commandments of the so-called Dust clergy. The Dust Mages were the ones who held the power, they were the ones who fooled the frightened populace. They fashioned themselves into priests and clerics. The Confederacy of Dust was founded.

Those were dark times indeed, when those zealous or made enough to undertake the rites of Dust to join the religion proper were turned into mindless, heartless servants of the priests of Dust. Anyone who didn’t show their faith were exiled, killed or worse. The so-called “Army” of the Confederacy was a horde of zealots and maniacs, nothing like the disciplined military of today. Our ancestors were xenophobic to the extreme, slaying outsiders who did not show fervor on sight. The economy too was a shambles, it was a truly corrupt system controlled by the bigots of the church. Education was heavily dictated and controlled by the priests, creating new generations of believers.

You may wonder how our great Bulrin Empire came to be from such a state of zealous idiocy. When the Religion of Dust was founded, it was small scale as you would expect. It was simply a sect of Dust magi who sought true power. Despite all of their wisdom, even they could not see the corruption in their souls and on the their bodies, the corruption of the Dust. Greatest among them was the Primarch, Garin Moldavic. A mage of extreme power, he claimed to have journeyed from a land far to the west, across the sea. A land were Dust was common and easily wielded. He led the mages to silently and effortlessly murder the previous chiefs and leaders, regardless of their devotion to the Dust. Then the Primarch declared himself and the other magi the true leaders of the land.

Oddly, the people willingly fell to their whims, perhaps out of fear or maybe out of genuine curiosity. Over time the small kingdom of the old chiefs became a great empire. The Confederacy of Dust was growing. At this point, it was close to the size of our modern day Bulrin Empire. The Primarch and his clergy ruled the people with an iron fist. Utter faith was absolutely required of everyone in the empire. But in every dictatorship, there will be mavericks…

There was a group of soldiers who had endured enough. Their families butchered and friends either dead or insane, this group rebelled against the magi. They declared war upon their own masters. Records of this rebellion are few and far between I’m afraid. All i know is that the soldiers were cunning in the extreme. One by one, the magi were cut down, until only the Primarch remained.

The people were joining the soldiers in droves, they were to be slaves no more. The Primarch fled to his grand temple in the capital. He surrounded himself with the few truly zealous guards and various fanatics. The rebellious soldiers, led by the man known as Conrad Bulrin and aided by the peasantry, fought their way through the fanatical tide. Up the mammoth stairs of the grand temple they fought, cutting down legions of Dust worshipers. As his soldiers held the worshipers off, Conrad Bulrin and give of his closest officers charged the temple itself. Tragically, two of the officers were killed in the charge. Conrad led the remaining officers into the prayer chamber where the Primarch awaited.

As soon as the group had entered the chamber and set their eyes upon the cornered Primarch, the entire chamber became a swirling vortex of Dust and created a barrier between Conrad and the Primarch himself. Helplessly, he watched as the mage vanished into thin air. The storm subsided, along with the fury of the battle outside between the soldiers and the fanatics. The fanatics lost the will the fight upon learning of their lords disappearance. Conrad and his men claimed victory. Conrad reclaimed the country back from the Confederacy of Dust in the name of the people. He ended up becoming their new ruler, ironically.

He took to the role enthusiastically, by all accounts. He began to reform the country, into what is today the Bulrin Empire. The went through a large scale transformation as the Religion of Dust (and to some extent, its followers) was abolished and removed. The Confederacy of Dust became Bulrin, the land named after its liberating hero. It was not until Conrad’s son, Ulrich, took over from his father that Bulrin became the Bulrin Empire as under his leadership surrounding regions were brought under its yolk. The Empire was split into four provinces, each partly named after the officers who fought at Conrads side. It was a time of great change, but also great joy.

And so, the Religion of Dust was crushed. But alas, its taint was never completely expelled, the wastelands created by the magics the Dust magi had used remained. Also, even to this day it is a mystery what became of Garin Moldavic and there are always whispers of secret covens of Dust worshipers all around the continent. Dust itself remains, as it always has. Perhaps the Religion of Dust isn’t as dead as we think…”

From the memoirs of Hermann Maestra.