The Beginning
Zezhuanth was born in a lizardfolk village to the south, known as Nightglade. On the banks of a bend in the river, Zez was hatched from an egg laid by his mother in their family home which stood on the banks of the River Kybus. His birth was shrouded in superstition by the tribe’s elders, as the week prior his mother, Sjech, who was a powerful shaman of the tribe was abducted during an orc raid. The tribe tried to track her down, including his father, Kepesk, who was an accomplished hunter and tracker of the tribe. But no one found her, and it was with great sorrow that Kepesk was present for the birth of Zez without his mate’s presence.
Zez grew up only knowing his father, his mother a figure in tales which barely seemed to matter to anyone else in the tribe, as the need to be present for survival took precedence over any historical note. The hatchling grew up very comfortably, his father was a very successful hunter which brought much foot and material to their home, all of which they could use to barter and trade for items and tools that were of a generally very good quality. Zez had a fairly normal childhood, growing up with the other hatchlings, along with the typical rivalries seen amongst lizardfolk. One rivalry in particular was with the chieftain’s son, Chathpalar, who was larger, stronger, and generally a more capable hunter than Zez. However, there was always something about Zez’ ability to blend into the wilderness when he hunted as a youngling that even Chathpalar could not match.
It seemed as though Zez’ life would continue in this way, except for a terrible incident when he was around 10. Chathpalar invited Zez to hunt with him and his hunting party. Zez knew they were not supposed to go hunting alone, they were not old enough yet, but the competitive spirit was too strong to ignore, and so the young lizardfolk joined his rival and friends on their quest for game. Traversing a great distance from their village, Zez began to voice doubts about their mission, and that perhaps they should turn back before the sky began darkening. Chathpalar saw this as a direct challenge to his authority, or perhaps he was waiting for such an opportunity.
Before an objection could be raised, Chathpalar challenged Zez to a duel for the right of continuing the hunt and determining amongst their peers which of the two of them deserved to lead their tribe. Zez had little interest in fighting Chathpalar, but his patience at being called a coward ran out in time, especially when Chathpalar began to question whether Zez’ mother had run away from the tribe, embarrassed by the egg she’d lain. Zez would not suffer a fool, and the two younglings attacked one another. The friends who also joined the hunting party surrounded the pair as they fought, yelling out words of encouragement to whoever they wished to support, but the fight became quite bloody soon enough. Chathpalar had the strength to hit hard, but Zez was agile, and his strikes were accurate if still weaker. Over time, Zez would most assuredly have won the conflict, but Chathpalar could not allow such an outcome and drew a blade during the fight, lashing out at Zez.
As the metal blade sliced upward across his scaly brow, Zez could only remember white-hot pain… and then blackness. It wasn’t the blackness that accompanied unconsciousness, that he was familiar with. This was… different. A dulling of his senses. A dulling of sound, but he could still hear the screams. He could feel his teeth biting. He could taste the blood in his mouth…
Zez awoke during the night, as he lay on the forested ground and looked around himself. There was blood… a lot of it… and none of it seemed to be his. He found himself alone in the forested area, Chathpalar, his friends, all were gone. The sound of a snapping branch behind Zez revealed the outline of his father as he approached him quickly. There was little said, just a packed bag and a scimitar, one of his father’s, sheathed and freshly maintained. His father told him he had to leave… that Chathpalar was riling up the villagers about Zez transforming into a beast, a horrible lizard, and that a curse would befall the village if Zez were not found and killed. One of Zez’ friends, Pocha, was severely injured. He was likely to survive, but… he’d lost an arm during whatever conflict transpired here. Kepesk, a lizardman of little emotion like most lizardfolk, was uncharacteristically saddened by the situation. He could not bear the thought of losing his son, his wife’s son, to a crazed mob.
Kepesk pushed his son away, and told him to flee. And so Zez left his village, emotions welling up within him as he did.
The Craft
Zezhuanth left the only home he’d ever known so that he may prevent his father from making an even more difficult choice, and one Zez wasn’t entirely certain would fall in the young lizardman’s favor. At the age of 10, not quite that of a mature adult, he was not forced to utilize all of the skills his father taught him so that he could survive on his own in the unforgiving wilderness of the South. Orcs, Goblins, Ogres, and worse were within these forests, including rival lizardfolk tribes who would have no qualms about capturing and potentially eating Zez if their food stores were lean.
Zez had learned much from his father, and more there was an innate sense, perhaps even intuition, about where Zez should sleep each night. For a long period, Zez avoided contact with anyone else, avoiding intelligent creatures as much as he could. It wasn’t for fear of his own safety, it was for fear of theirs. Zez’ blackouts were happening more frequently, and they were frightening. Dreams of hunting at night, but more primal, more vicious, and with far more bloody gorging. He would awake in the morning feeling full, with the taste of blood and offal within his mouth. Something was happening to Zez, but he could not possibly understand what. Not until a peculiar vision came to him one night. It was colder, the winter approaching the southern lands, and Zez felt secure enough that he could afford himself the luxury of a fire against the chill wind. Late in the night, as the embers were giving off the smallest of flames, Zez noticed the area of his camp becoming brighter, and glancing above the treeline he spotted the fullness of the moon shining its bright light through the tree canopy onto his small little encampment.
The embers became stoked, erupting into a bluish flame and rising to almost Zez’ height. The chill wind blew through the trees, detritus and dirt swirling into a form equal in size to the flame, but taking its place to Zez’ left. The water he’d gathered in his waterskin popped the tightly plugged cork from its opening, gushing outward, not onto the ground, but gathering into a shape reminiscent of a fluid humanoid to his right. From behind, the young lizardman could hear the churning of dirt and rocks, as from around a massive tree-trunk he could see a hulking mass take form of the earth itself, a lumbering humanoid figure slowly moving towards the campfire, and eerily making no sound as it moved forward, its steps seeming to meld into the earth.
Not certain whether this was a dream or not, Zez’ did the only thing he could do in the face of four elemental forces: he stood still and silent, and awaited his fate to be determined. Sound emanated from each primal force, each distinct, but with similar inflections, and Zez’ realized he could understand the chorus, both harmonizing and dissonant, but together all the same. These elemental forces were speaking to him.
Zezhuanth learned he was different. He was like his mother, but not. He was like his father, but not. The voices spoke to him of primal energies which he could harness if he accepted the energy within his body, spoke of a bloodline which was ancient, nearly forgotten by all except the forces of creation: not the gods, but the chaos which existed prior, which sprung life unchecked, and which countered the attempts to control, constrain, and conquer the primordial titans which existed in conflict with the deities in the origin of this world.
That was time past, there is little point in conflict with the gods, for one must adapt and flow with the course time takes and history checks. No being, not even gods or primordials, could alter the flow of time, both chaotic in its results, and paragon in order for its adherence to a single law for all living beings in this world: time flows forward.
It was merely time for Zez to understand what was happening to him, so that he may guide the passions bubbling within his soul, and make better use of them for whatever purpose fate may have for him. The four elementals, as Zez came to understand them, were Pyra, Zephyr, Sluice, and Terrok. Over the years they would come to teach Zez about how to run with nature, how to borrow power from the elemental planes when they touched this world briefly, and perhaps most importantly, what his “dreams” meant.
Zez’ fears were confirmed, for he learned that they were not dreams, but transformations into beasts not seen on this world for millennia, where a dormant connection within his own blood manifested with the power from his mother, the instinct of his father, and the elemental coalescence during his conception. Zez understood he was exceedingly rare. He understood the elementals came to him so he may be instructed, and informed enough to make decisions of his own choosing. So that he could flow with the chaotic passions of the surrounding planes, and not become a discordant note in a world in which the chaos of the Primordials no longer belongs.
The World at Large
It was nearly four years of isolation and training in the harsh wilderness, but it honed Zez’ senses and abilities to a degree where there were no more blackouts, no more fear at what he was, or had done. He gained an understanding of his role in the world for balance, for flowing with the chaos that existed within him, and not to ignore or suppress what made him unique, or himself. That included the emotions that roiled within him, which were foreign to most lizardfolk, but made perfect sense for Zez himself.
At 14, the age where he’d typically be considered an adult in his village, he decided to end his isolation and ventured to what pockets of civilization could be found in the South. City-States, villages, towns, and fortresses across the land. He offered his services as a healer, as a mercenary and guide, occasionally as an entertainment act in the Orc Battle Pits. All of this built up his reputation within the Southlands as a dependable, no-********, wild-sage of sorts.
Around the age of 17, he was hearing some disturbing rumors about Ogre attacks. It wasn’t anything too unusual, as these giantkin would often raid much like many races in the Southlands did… but from what he was gathering there was more of strategic purpose to their raids. Asking questions and viewing where the many attacks were taking place, Zez was horrified to determine a high chance his village would be attacked imminently. Wasting little time he rushed off to make his way back home as quickly as his beast forms could take him.
It wasn’t fast enough.
Arriving to find his village in flames, homes demolished, bodies lying broken and unmoving, Zez rushed to his childhood home to search for his father. What used to be a very large log cabin now laid in ruin, and quickly searching through the wreckage, Zez came upon the barely breathing form of his father. Fallen logs had pinned the lizardman’s body against the floorboards, and Zez could see his father was only being kept alive this long by the pinching pressure of the logs, which if moved would cause him to bleed out immediately, far quicker than even his healing magics could stem, but if left in place would gradually suffocate the lizardman, especially from internal bleeding: Kepesk was on borrowed time.
Aware enough to glance at this stranger, only to recognize him as no stranger at all, Kepesk shared some rare words of emotion; regret of the past, shame at his inaction, and pride in Zezhuanth. With tears and fury in his eyes, and an agreement between the two, Zez took the scimitar gifted to him by his father, and quickly, as painlessly as he could manage, ended his father’s life so his suffering would cease.
The loss of the moment bubbled into anger, and the scimitar within his hand erupted into a gout of flame which spread across the remains of his childhood home, the fire burning everything, including his father, into a funeral pyre.
Zez’ anger released, he reasserted some measure of control, and searched the village for survivors. Those on death’s door he brought back from the brink with his magic, and rescued all he could. By the middle of the night, the village still illuminated by flames, Zez managed to gather all the survivors he could within what used to be the village’s square. He’d learned that Chathpalar had survived, declaring himself chieftain after his father’s passing from the Ogre attack, and picked warriors and females who were loyal, or easily cowed, to follow him away from the village. Those left behind were younglings, surviving clutches, the injured, and the elderly. Chathpalar’s actions disgusted Zez.
Gathering those who remained, Zezhuanth led these refugees from the ruins of Nightglade and brought them back to the city-state he’d just left, Krak’tor, an Orcish city. He’d done enough work there over the years that he had some goodwill with the Orcish rangers charged with protecting the city, and negotiated with their Chieftain to accept the surviving Lizardfolk of the Nightglade tribe into their own city. Once this was done, Zezhuanth set off on his own mission.
Zez suspected Chathpalar’s ambition was perhaps greater than anyone in their tribe believed, and that there may have been a role he played in the Ogre’s attack. Regardless, his focus was to determine the Ogre’s motivations in attacking the villages, track down those responsible, and exact his primal vengeance upon them. After that… he’d find Chathpalar, and he would have words with the “Chieftain” of the Nightglade tribe.
Mar 30th, 2015, 10:27 AM
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