Conseptia
So, there were 140 of us set out from New Sulae. Lot of arguments about whether to go overland from there or to land on the Leviathan Coast, but I doubt it would have mattered much in the end. Maybe if we had paid to land in the Storm Lord's port, but no one wanted that.
Should have left after the first deaths - it was a cursed expedition. We were two weeks out from the city, still on the Sulaen Road, a couple of days before we would turn north to the Veldt. I wasn't anywhere near it, so I don't know exactly what happened, but an entire cookpot went bad. Of the twelve eating from it, four died, the rest were in bad enough shape we had to leave them behind. Didn't hear nothin' about poison, so I think it was just some bad luck and spoiled food.
Down to 128 when he turned north - not even the Veldt yet, just the grasslands. Came across a few prides of lions, but they weren't much of an issue for a group our size - they cleared out without a problem. Probably would have been better for all of us if they'd struck, cause maybe we'd have been on our toes a bit more when the first Nexu struck. That first night, we didn't even know for sure that one had attacked - the bosses said the guard must have just abandoned their post, although the ranger swore there were some signs that he was taken by an animal. The second night, though, there was blood, and the third there was chaos. I think we did some damage on the third night, as not all the blood looked like ours, but I know we didn't put the beast down. By the end of the three nights, we'd lost another nine - three dead on the scene, a total of six gone to who knows where. I hope one or two of those deserted rather than feeding the Nexu.
The first attack by the Nexu is when we could be considered in the Veldt proper - not like there was a big line on the ground marking it, so calling it the day things turned deadly works as well as anything. The nexu were the scariest things there, with striking in the night and carrying off people without us even knowing they were there, but they weren't the deadliest in the Veldt. They were the third, any way you look at it. Deadliest depends on how you look at it - the Ychen Bannog killed the most on its own, while those damned goat men combined to kill the most total.
Most don't know - I surely didn't - that the Veldt is where the Ychen Bannog come from. Hells, most people are like me and think the tales of 40-foot-tall oxen are a, well, tall tale, as it were. If they've heard the legends from before the shattering about Cyfrif Culhwich yoking them and using them to haul the dead body of the Apocalypse beast to Breconshire and fed the people for a full year, any reasonable person would think that would have to be rotten meat by the end and consider it a myth, nothing more. Well, it may be, but the damnable oxen exist, and you absolutely do not want to get in their way or think that they are a good source of meat. That's what Scorun and his group thought - an ox like that could provide meat for days and jerky for months, and they'd get their share of the hunting done in a day. All 30 died that day.
Things got a bit better after that. We lost a few more, and the cleric worked constantly to cure disease and heal minor injuries, but for the most part, we were surviving. By the time we saw the first smudges of smoke from the Wall, we were a company of 85. Losing more than a third of the group before we had reached our destination was daunting, but it had been weeks since the last death, and we'd mostly thought we'd gotten rid of the chaff. Spirits were high - find the pass between Balor and Jubilex, make it to the other side of the wall, and then a run to the coast as rich men.
Then, we ran into the goat-men. Gods above, the goat-men. The first approached as we got to the foothills - seemed to just appear out of nowhere, though we found the little cave he had been waiting in after. Had some tattered clothing hanging from his body, and carried a pretty crude weapon - a stick with a rock tied onto the end. He made some noises, bleating and beating his chest, slamming that club into the ground. The scout was with us, and he had some skill with animals, so we set him loose on it. He did some magic mumbo jumbo, and started talking in goat. At least he claims he was speaking goat, for all I know he's a crazy person who just started baaing at the animals. He made some noises, the goat man made some noises, and he drew a sword and ran the goat man through. Said the goat man was demanding tribute or our lives. 17 members of the expedition disappeared that night - I don't know if they deserted, or were taken, but I hope they saw how bad it was going and left.
Next morning, we continued up the slopes. We were closing in on the Wall, and even at that distance you could feel how much warmer the air was than fifty miles away. I was warned that it would be hotter than summer in the Children when we tried the pass, and I could believe it. It was never meant to be, though, because we'd only made it most of a day's march to the north when it all came crashing down. The sun was low in the sky to the west, and we'd be looking for a spot to camp soon enough. I happened to be on duty scouting with the ranger and Willem, which is why I'm alive. We'd swept to the east, foraging and looking for threats, when we started to hear some loud pounding sounds. The ranger found a tree and climbed it, getting a little bit of height to see out over the rolling foothills. He was up there for about 10 seconds, and then he flew down. He cursed a couple of times, then sat down and started some sort of chant. The grass, the tree, all the plants around started to respond to him, bugs crawling around his ears and eyes, a few birds winging by - it was some crazy stuff. Took him a good ten minutes are so, and the thudding sound kept getting louder. Finally, his eyes flew open, he cried, "Goats!" and he left.
And when I say he left, I mean he stood up and ran just about as quick as a person could run. He ran full tilt into a tree, and I flinched, expecting him to be hurt. He wasn't - he absorbed into that tree and was gone. Never did find out what happened to him. But I climbed that tree, and looked in the direction of the group, and saw a nightmare in daylight. The expedition was on a fairly large hill, and though they hadn't made camp, it seemed that they had likely picked where they were in order to do so. Closing in on them, quite quickly now, were thousands of the goat-men. They were already surrounded. Maybe the cleric could find their way out, but as I watched the goat-men getting closer, pounding their horns with their clubs to make that awful racket, I knew that no one else would. I climbed out of that tree a lot faster than I climbed up. Grabbed Willem and told him we're going. Willem wasn't the brightest sort, but credit where it's due - he didn't even hesitate, just followed right away.
It was a little touchy making it back to New Sulae. We had plenty of food, so we didn't need to hunt and could waste time circling wide around the larger beasts. Had a Nexu decided we were a meal, we would have been done, but our luck held and we made it back. I'm done with expeditions - it was supposed to be a way to get rich, but the money isn't worth the risk. Running a bar is both more fun and less likely to end with me dead, so this is it for me.
Geography
The major geographical areas that make up Conseptia are:
- The Eye
- Cliffs of Despair
- Giant Hills
- Kruger Clan lands
- Forêt Delégion
- Hiems' Haven
- Glacial Ridge Mountains
- Vorax's Wall
- Leonin's Veldt
- The Windlands
- Leviathan Coast
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