Lurnak

"At first, I was going to dive and save him, but my father stopped me with a hand on my shoulder. Look closer, he said. Look at the water - it's not right. I looked at the water around the thrashing man, and the color was wrong, it was lighter than the rest of the sea. And there was a shadow in the water, somewhere deep below the surface. Something big. It's a Lurnak, said my father. Anything that touches that will sink. He called out to my uncles, and they got us away from the body still thrashing in the water. As soon as it was clear we were moving away, it stilled and dropped beneath the surface like it had been tied to an anchor." - an encounter with the Lurnak, as described by Datu, a Tau Dilaut fisherman.

The Lurnak is the the mysterious 'sinking man' of Tau Dilaut mythology. It appears as a body floating on the surface of the water. Sometimes it is struggling, and other times it is still, or only moving weakly. It can appear to be of any gender or age, despite being known as the 'sinking man'. In all cases, it mimics a drowning person, or someone in great distress in the water. But any attempts to rescue the Lurnak will end in disaster.

Anything or anyone who touches a Lurnak immediately loses the ability to float, and sinks into the sea as if it were air. People, ships, fish - they all lose whatever bouyancy they possess and sink straight down. The Lurnak is accompanied by an enormous shadow that lurks in the depths beneath it, and it is presumed that whatever is sunk by the Lurnak is consumed by the creature underneath.

There are a few ways to see through the deception of the Lurnak. One way is to look at the water around the body. It will be unusually colored, as any sediment, fish, or other detritus that should be floating in the ocean will be gone, making it clearer than the area further from the body. Another telling detail is the Lurnak will not yell, nor will it show its face. Some people report that the Lurnak has no face, just a smooth expanse of blank skin where it should be.

The Lurnak appears mostly in the waters of the Southwestern Region of the Great Ring. usually in waters closer to the Middlesea, but occasional reports have come from the Southern and Southeastern regions as well. It does not appear in the waters further north - or at least, nobody reports encountering it there. When ships go missing in the waters north of Lahat, the Tau Dilaut will often attribute it to an encounter with the Lurnak.

Related Articles