Map Thread XX
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Hey guys! This is a reworking of a Star Wars oneshot of mine, an exploration into various myths, legends and fairy tales from a number of species in the Galaxy far, far away. Huge thanks to rvbomally for the basemap. Hope you enjoy, had a lot of fun making this.
1: On the jungle planet of Kashyyyk, there have long been whispers of a short, hairless creature said to stalk the fertile plains beyond the edge of the furthest trees, a being known to the Wookiee tribal elders as Smallfoot.
2: The Bith homeworld of Clak'dor VII is surrounded by a series of thick rings, thought to be the sole remnants of a long-destroyed natural satellite. These rings are easily visible from the planet's surface, and feature prominently in Bith mythology, with different cultures from across the ages coming up with their own explanations regarding their nature and origin: some saw them as a great bridge or river connecting the mortal realm with the Great Above, the bow of some great cosmic archer waiting to smite heretics with arrows of lightning, or an ancient, slumbering serpent that will devour the world once it awakens, requiring regular blood sacrifice to keep it dormant.
3: Even in our current age of hyperdrives and artificial intelligence, superstition continues to play an important role in the daily lives of countless sentients across the Galaxy. Many Rodian parents, for instance, still subscribe to the ancient belief that it's possible to determine the sex of their unhatched child by counting whether there are an odd or an even number of speckles on the shell of its egg. In some cultures, should an egg failed to hatch, it was often claimed that the baby within had been stolen by thumbfolk (a legendary race of fairy-like creatures, so named as they are said to be no larger than an ordinary Rodian's thumb), and taken to the swamplands of the Netherworld to be raised as one of their own. Because the thumbfolk were thought to prefer males, it was not unheard of for parents to paint an extra spot on their egg in order to trick them - this has been known to backfire however, with the thumbfolk getting their revenge by causing poor harvests.
In other regions, there were stories of a monstrous figure known as Nana Jebhanye, who is the focus of a number of Rodian nursery rhymes. Nana Jebhanye is said to reside on a distant, frozen island to the far south, and her most distinctive feature is her tail, which is several times longer than the Rodian average, and ends with a third eyeball at its tip. Periodically, she travels around the world on her enchanted flying spoon, landing on rooftops and extending her long tail down house chimneys. Should her tail's eye spot an egg which has not been Marked (a Rodian ritual not unlike baptism), she will wrap her tail around it like a snake, placing it in the head of her flying spoon, and carry it back to her island to eat it in order to extend her lifespan.
4: Historically, the hog-like inhabitants of the planet Gamorr believed that nightmares were caused by a semi-historical figure known as Dormin, who served as a guard at the imperial palace in the (now-destroyed) Holy City of Quenx. One night, the city was attacked by soldiers from a rivalling kingdom, and as Dormin had fallen asleep at his post, the invaders were able to storm the palace, and murder the King and his family. The gods, outraged at Dormin's ineptitude, barred him from ever entering the afterlife, and placed a curse on him, preventing him from ever sleeping again. As a result, Dormin must now walk the planet in a state of perpetual exhaustion, sometimes attempting to alleviate his endless fatigue by stealing sleep from mortals, which he does by sitting on their chests while they sleep, causing his victims to experience paralysis, feelings of suffocation, and intense nightmares.
5: Generally, only male members of the Devaronian species possess horns, which are culturally regarded as a symbol of masculinity, and sometimes decorated with markings and fine jewelry by members of the upper classes. Due to a genetic mutation however, a small number (~0.2%) of females are also born with horns, although unfortunately, horned girls and women have a long history of discrimination in Devaronian society, often being regarded as witches and devilspawn. Over the centuries, many horned women have dressed up as men in order to evade this prosecution, and young Devaronian ladies are taught to beware of strange men, in case they are in fact a horned witch plotting to drink their blood.
6: The planet Kinyen, home to a race of short, three-eyed humanoids known as the Gran, is the larger of two components in a double-planet system. Kinyen's smaller twin, the wet, mountainous world of Vraxang, was historically seen as the home of the gods, with local legend teaching that in antiquity, a now-vanished Gran civilization known as the Zyresians attempted to build a structure so tall it would reach Vraxang, evoking the gods' wrath. As punishment, a tsunami was sent to wipe the Zyresians from the face of the planet, and their colossal tower was reduced to dust, and scattered across the heavens as a warning to future societies, thus forming the galactic spiral arm. As a result of this myth, the first Gran missions to Vraxang were met with much religious hostility, up to and including bombs being planted aboard spacecraft.
7: According to a prominent Toydarian creation myth, the first members of their species lacked wings, and lived on a distant, now-sunken island known as the Isle of Genesis. The gods followed the Toydarians' progress closely, but were ultimately disappointed with their creations, and decided to wipe them out by flooding the Island and starting anew. As the surrounding oceans were crawling with carnivorous megashrimp and electric kraken, the Toydarians were trapped, until a kindly spirit named Chaya took pity on their plight, granting them wings, which she stole from the nocturnal amsulcras while they slept (a vicious, and fiercely territorial predator native to the planet's northern continent). Using their stolen wings, the Toydarians were able to escape their doomed island and colonize the surrounding lands. Chaya, on the other hand, was turned into a smeerp (a creature resembling a cross between a rat and a Terran rabbit) by the gods as punishment for her infraction, and forever banished to the larger of Toydaria's three moons (explaining the dark, rodent-shaped markings on its surface) - to this day, amsulcras continue to howl at the Moon, cursing the deity who robbed them of their flight. In some Toydarian cultures, it was customary for younglings to be thrown off a cliffside. While most were able to successfully fly back up to the cliff's top, a small number of weak fliers usually fell to their deaths.
8: On the Inner Rim world of Yag'dhul, it is said that there once lived a great and wise philosopher named Mixan, who is remembered for his Pyrrhic victory over death: Mixan, who had grown sick with age, spent his final years developing a magical potion, which restored his youth, and rendered him impervious to all disease. A few nights later, while out dancing and celebrating his newfound vigor, he foolishly picked a fight with a grouchy Givin twice his size, who knocked the philosopher dead with a single punch. His contemporaries note that while Mixan's elixir may have restored his vitality, so too did it bring back his youthful arrogance, and sadly cost him the wisdom and experience that comes with age, resulting in his downfall.
9: One of the more curious elements of Ewok mythology is that of the legendary fallfruits, a kind of sentient, coconut-like fruit which said only to grow in sacred areas of woodland. Should a fallfruit sense an Ewok's presence on the ground below, it will detach from its branch, and land on its victim's head, causing instant death.
10: One of the better-known legends from Brodo Asogi is the phantom island of Ezan-Throgg, which supposedly lies off the western coast of the Vomestran continent, and is shrouded by a thick mist, rendering it inaccessible to sailors. It is said that this magical fog is only ever lifted on a leap day, which occurs every five years on Brodo Asogi, and plays a role in a number of local folktales and superstitions (the magical floratch flower, which grants great fortune to any Asogian who picks it, is rumoured to only ever grow on a leap day, and in some cultures, infants born on this day are rumoured to possess supernatural healing and clairvoyance). According to one famous literary account, Ezan-Throgg was once visible all 408 days of the Asogian year, and was ruled by a fair and just king named Fonhom, who had nine beautiful daughters. One fateful day, King Fonhom returned from his hunt to find his palace had been ransacked by the Atarians (a seafaring people hailing from planet's northern regions), who had slain his guards and his daughters. With his finest soldiers dead and his people hopelessly outnumbered, Fonhom set out for a nearby nearby temple, where he prayed to Almighty Sacul, begging him for the strength to defeat the Atarian invaders. Sacul heard the young king's prayer, and stretched out a single long, glowing finger, temporarily transferring a tiny spark of divine power into his body.
Immediately, King Fonhom underwent a monstrous transformation, growing five times larger and ten times stronger, his mere glance capable of inducing fatal seizures in his enemies. Fonhom single-handedly slaughtered countless waves of Atarian warriors, with the few surviving soldiers retreating to their longships, vowing to never return to the island of the demon-king. Although his domain was safe once more, Sacul's divine spark had taken its toll on the king's health: the powers of a god are not meant to reside within a mortal framework, and by the time the last Atarian longship had retreated from Ezan-Throgg's shore, King Fonhom's skin had turned pasty white, and his burning heart was visible through his chest. With his last ounce of supernatural strength, Fonhom threw his black cloak around Ezan-Throgg, and resurrected his nine daughters in the form of beautiful aurorabirds (a species named for their beautiful, rainbow-coloured feathers). Fonhom's cloak magically sealed the island from the rest of the world, although every leap year, his aurorabird daughters lift it for a single day, allowing the light of Bigsun and Littlesun to shine upon the king's subjects. One of the earliest Asogian interstellar colonies, a small, stormy moon in a trinary system some thirteen lightyears from their homeworld (coincidentally, located in the 'beak' of the Aurorabird constellation) was christened Ezan-Throgg by early settlers because of its thick cloud coverage.
Aurorabirds feature in a number of other Asogian myths. Some stories claim that aurorabirds are in fact beautiful Asogian women, who may occasionally take their feathery skins off to bathe. One story tells of a hunter who discovered an aurorabird removing her skin in order to bathe in a nearby pond. The hunter fell hopelessly in love with this maiden, and went to visit his brother to tell him of what he has seen. Naturally, his brother was skeptical, and demanded that the hunter take him to the pond as proof. As soon as the hunter's brother laid eyes on the mysterious woman, he too was smitten, and cunningly suggested that his brother steal her skin away, so that she will be unable to turn back into a bird and be forced to marry him. The gullible hunter agreed, but as soon as he touched the feathery skin, he was immediately transformed into an aurorabird, and was overcome by his animal nature, taking to the skies. When the woman finished bathing, she returned to find that her skin was nowhere to be found, and with no home to go to, the brother of the now-transformed hunter proposed to her, and the two lived happily ever after.
11: On the desert world of Tatooine, many indigenous cultures believe that their world rests upon the back of Great O'bmud, an immense bantha who uses his unusually large ears to fly through the cosmic void, and causes earthquakes whenever he sneezes.
12: On Ryloth, the native Twi'leks tell tales of a mystical melody known as the Resurrection Song, a long-lost piece of music said to be haunting in more ways than one. It is said that singing the Resurrection Song above somebody's grave can restore life to their body, provided that the corpse in question has been dead for at least a year and a day, and it is sung during a nomoons (a period where none of Ryloth's three moons are visible, often associated with bad luck and the supernatural). However, this ritual is not without its risks - it is claimed that should one falter, or miss a note while performing the spellsong, the dead person's spirit will instead return in the form of a near-indestructable, monstrously deformed creature known as a Receased. The Receased are usually described having no skin, and are stiff-moving, with glowing, bloodshot eyes dangling from pus-filled sockets (looking directly into which has been reported to cause either blindness or paralysis), and is said to let out a howl far more terrible than that of any beast. Immediately after manifesting, the Receased will attempt to murder the one who has summoned them, and devour their lekku (or head-tendrils, which is where ancient Twi'leks believed the soul to be located). Should the singer escape however, the creature will instead head for the Twi'lek nearest settlement, slaughtering and consuming any person unfortunate enough to cross its path, in a rampage that will not cease until the the one who has summoned them (or alternatively, their next of kin) is offered to them, whereupon it will consume their lekku, and return to its grave without causing any further damage. The sour, lemon-like fruit known as the Rylothic moko is said to have magical properties, which keep the Receased at bay.
13: Most members of the Moogan species shed their skin at least once a year, a process which begins in early childhood. Historically, Obroan warriors would buy and consume the skins of young children, as it was believed that this would bring them good luck in battle. While the consumption of shed skin became increasingly frowned upon in Moogan society, this practice inspired a legendary figure not dissimilar to a certain character from Terran lore: young children were told that if they placed their shed skin beneath their bed at nighttime, a creature known as the Skin Sprite would come to take it away, leaving a coin in its place. It was said that the Skin Sprite had no children of his own, and took these skins back to his home, where he stuffed them with magical straw, bringing them to life, and raising them as his own.
14: One of the most persistent legends originating on the frigid Outer Rim world of Orto is that of Big Bloqo. Mount Tsovum, the largest mountain in the Orto system, was said to be inhabited by a race of violent, bloodthirsty giants (who had been banished there long ago by the heroic Gorbu the Great), the smallest of which was a young boy named Bloqo, who faced much teasing and bullying from the other giant children due to his short stature. One day, in order to make himself grow larger and end his constant mockery, Bloqo consumed all of the food in his parents' house. When his hungry father came home and found only crumbs in the pantry, he threw Bloqo over the side of Mount Tsovum, who landed hard on his head a few miles from a small Ortolan settlement, and was left with amnesia as a result of his fall, forgetting he had learned on Mount Tsovum. The townsfolk , initially skeptical, adopted the smallest giant, feeding and clothing him in return for his protection (with his mighty breath, Bloqo was able to blow away any blizzards and snowstorms which might threaten their village).
Big Bloqo is said to be responsible for the creation of a number of noted landmarks - for instance, the Vikrem River is said to have been created when the smallest giant fell asleep against a hilltop, his drool forming its waters. Similarly, Bloqo is sometimes said to enjoy spitting fruit seeds at the Moon, thus causing its cratered surface. It is said that Bloqo uses tree trunks for toothpicks, and enjoys bathing in the L'fregian inland sea, where he uses a bladefish as a sponge. Because no usukalf (a common Ortolan beast of burden, rivalling banthas in size) was able to withstand the giant's weight, Bloqo made his own usukalf out of snow and pebbles, and christened it Frostbite, for its icy breath was capable of freezing foes in their tracks. One account claims that Big Bloqo would eventually marry Tiny Tovyo (another legendary figure, said to be just a few inches tall, due to a mouse crawling up her mother's trunk while she was pregnant), who lives in his navel, and knits dresses from his lint.
15: One of the most famous monsters from Sullustan folklore is The Voice-Taker, a legendary boogeyman dating back many centuries before the planet's spacefaring era. The Voice-Taker is described as a ghost or revenant, and is consistently depicted as a tall, rotting figure, wearing a beard made from flies and maggots, and dressed in tattered clothing, with a heavy sack slung over its shoulder. The creature is said to have been born with a mouth two sizes too big (a deformity which most tellings attribute to his gossiping mother), and as a result, his cries during infancy were so loud and frequent that they would regularly keep his family awake at all hours of the night. The boy's father consulted a local alchemist, who provided him with a magical elixir, which he swore by the gods would silence his son's screams until his first birthday, allowing his parents some much-needed rest. Sadly this potion proved to be far more effective than the alchemist thought - the boy's first birthday came and went, and he remained permanently mute. He was soon put to work on his family farm, until in his eighteenth year, his life was cut short after he tripped and fell down an old well. Although the boy's family searched and searched, because their son was unable to shout for help, he was never rescued, and as his body was never buried, his spirit was forced to wander the material realm for eternity.
The Voice-Taker's experience has given him a strong appreciation for the value of speech, and an even stronger disdain for children who take theirs for granted by yelling, swearing, and being rude to their elders. Unruly children are warned that if their behaviour does not improve, the Voice-Taker will visit them in the night. Upon awakening to the pungent stench of decay, the child will inevitably scream upon catching gory glimpse of the maggot-bearded monster looming over them. The creature strikes by extending one bony arm down his victim's throat, and stealing their voice away before stuffing it into his sack. Precisely what the ghostly figure does with its stolen treasure tends to vary between interpretations. Many tellings claim that the stolen voices are hidden in locations where their owners can never retrieve them, such as down wells and deep inside caves (children sometimes being told that the echo they hear upon shouting into a cavern is in fact a young Sullustan's stolen voice, in its disembodied state, only able to repeat what is called to it). Others claim that they are given as presents to good children who were born mute, or fed to baby birds in the spring, giving them their morning song. Some variations maintain that once nine years have passed, the Voice-Taker may decide to return a voice to its owner (provided they have been well-behaved), although as the creature has a tendency towards carelessness, this often results in embarrassing situations where boys are mistakenly given girls voices, and vice versa.
16: One of the Twelve Wonders of the Planet Ojom, homeworld of the four-armed Besalisks, is Painted Caverns, a series of expansive caves containing countless works of ancient art (some dating as far back as 40,000 BBY), featuring unusually well-preserved depictions of everything from storm gods and fierce warriors to prehistoric plants and livestock. Of course, later generations of Besalisk had no way of knowing just how unfathomably ancient the drawings found therein truly were, with one myth ascribing a much more recent origin for Painted Caverns: it is said that long ago, there lived a poor artist of unparalleled skill named Othobludge, who produced magnificent portraits for every noble man and woman in the land. Once the cruel and rich Emperor caught wind of Othobludge's wide body of work, he demanding an audience with the artist, insisting that Othobludge paint him a portrait to rival all others. However, as soon as Othobludge saw how poorly the Emperor treated his servants, he decided to create a rather different portrait to what the Emperor had in mind, and painted a picture of the wealthy tyrant standing naked, which he presented for all his friends and servants to see. The Emperor was so enraged at this act of treachery that he demanded Othobludge's entire body of work be incinerated, and banished the artist from his kingdom, forcing him to take refuge in the caves that would one day be called Painted Caverns. Othobludge spent the remainder of his life in these caves, where he continued to perfect his craft, decorating the caves' walls and ceilings using berries and charcoal in place of paintbrushes.
17: The low-gravity world of Froz is home to a civilization of furry, odd-looking marsupial bipeds. Thanks to its unusually rich hydrium reserves, airships and dirigibles remained a common mode of transportation well into the Frozians' spaceflight era, with a number of aerial myths and superstitions emerging as a result. One of the most famous of these so-called 'airmen's tales' is that of Rainbow Cove, a legendary afterlife for pilots and aviators who die in the line of duty, which is described as a verdant island floating amongst the clouds, inhabited by a race of beautiful women with bird-like features. There were also widespread concerns about gremlin-like creatures, which are feared to wreck havoc on airships by stealing food and cigarettes, tampering with machinery, damaging parachutes, and even singing hypnotic lullabies, causing pilots to fall asleep mid-air, before fleeing. A force much more threatening than gremlins are the huge, tentacled abominations which were said to dwell in the so-called 'sky-jungles' of the upper stratosphere, never venturing any lower than forty thousand feet above ground, and destroying any vessel which flies too high up (in spite of a number of grainy photographs, these gaseous monstrosities were ultimately disproven when the Frozians developed satellite technology). Another, more minor threat to Frozian aircraft were the sully-gullies, a fictitious species of seabirds, which were typically abandoned by their partners after mating, subsequently becoming incredibly depressed, and would supposedly fly intentionally into the propellers of planes and dirigibles, causing them to crash.
There have also been stories of ghost airships, perhaps the most famous of which is that of the legendary Black Rolyat[1], a cargo zeppelin which became hopelessly lost in a vast mountain range after encountering a fierce storm. Its crew, hungry and tired, were visited by the Frozian Devil, who offered them a route home, in exchange for the first soul aboard to set foot back on land. The ship's cunning captain agreed to this deal, and the Devil created a great path through the clouds, leading back to the crew's homeland. After hours of travel, the Wyvern had arrived back in its own airspace, and the Devil returned, eagerly awaiting his prize, but the captain, refusing to sacrifice one of his men, instead grabbed the ship's jonzi (a furry, cat-like critter often carried aboard Frozian air vessels, believed to frighten gremlins) by the tail, and threw it over the edge of the vessel. Angry at being outwitted by a mere airman, the Devil placed a terrible curse aboard the Black Rolyat and its crew, condemning them to sail the skies for all eternity, never able to make a landing. It is often claimed that the Rolyat can still be seen flying during terrible storms, and catching a glimpse of this ghostly craft is regarded as very bad luck.
18: With some notable exceptions, such as the fungi inhabitants of the planet Tsalal Prime in the Firefist Galaxy, the practice of cannibalism is regarded as highly taboo in most races, and has long been the subject of cautionary folk tales. One popular legend from the Inner Rim world of Cona tells of a character named Myar, an Arcona who lived during a time of severe famine. Growing tired of his diet of nuts and seeds, one night, while the town slept, Myar decided to butcher and eat his imbecilic son, Narbo. Sleeping off his full belly, Myar awoke in the early morning to a sharp pain in his left hand, and noticed that a fang-rat had chewed off two of his fingers. To his horror, Myar found that his body was no longer of flesh and bone, but of sweet, sugary dough, and tried to make a quick escape before any of his hungry neighbors awakened.
Unfortunately for Myar, the entire village had smelt the delicious aroma, and had surrounded his house. The confectionary cannibal narrowly escaped with his life (losing one of his arms to the starving masses) and fled into a nearby forest, where he was pursued by a hungry creature known as a daggerlip (a pack animal found primarily on Cona's northern hemisphere). The creature bit off one of Myar's legs, forcing him to took refuge high up in a tree, where he was forced to fend off the birds using its branches, while the ravenous daggerlip waited patiently at the bottom. After remaining in the tree for a day and a night, with the daggerlip showing no signs of leaving anytime soon, Myar, growing hungrier and hungrier, noticed how tasty he smelled, and ate his arms, legs, torso, and finally, (somehow) his own head. The story of Myar proved so popular that Arcona-shaped cookies (known as Myar biscuits) became incredibly popular on the planet Cona in future years, and are an especially common treat during local holidays, such as St. Frike's Day and Conese New Year.
19: Some of the strangest mythical animals dreamt up by denizens of the Galaxy can be found in the folk tales of the Snivvians, a humanoid race native to the Outer Rim world of Cadomai Prime. Perhaps one of the weirdest Snivvian monsters of all are that of the oilcows, a legendary animal-machine hybrid which is claimed to exist on the planet's westernmost continent. The oilcows are similar in appearence to dwarf banthas or Terran cattle, and appear to fly in the face of Krambulian evolution[2], being creatures made not of flesh and bone, but from rubber and metal. Oilcows move about on four wheels in place of legs, leaving thin tracks behind them as they traverse the endless plains of the planet's western continent, and possess small lightbulbs for eyes. Instead of milk, the oilcows (as their name suggests) produce oil for their young, and are said to defecate coal, making them incredibly valuable. However, no farmer has been able to catch them, only catching quick glimpses as they speed across the grasslands, and occasionally finding the rusty remains of deceased specimens. Some accounts claim that the oilcows are capable of firing bullets from their horns when threatened, and their long, metal tails are able to extend, and fold out into umbrellas to protect them from rainfall. Being made of metal, the mechanical cattle are said to have a weakness for magnets, which some have used to try and catch them.
20: Magical weapons and armour play an important role in the mythologies of many species across the Galaxy, and the Ryn are no exception. Arguably, the most famous weapon in Ryn folklore is Clurabexi, an indestructible sword crafted by the gods, and possessed by King Ofar (the semi-legendary first ruler of Brentisk, possibly based on one or more real-life figures). Clurabexi is described as being capable of inflicting wounds that never heal, and never misses its target, although cannot be removed from its sheath without being used to kill. Although Clurabexi allowed King Ofar to unite the Six Provinces of Brentisk, it would also ultimately cause his downfall. One day, a black vergat (a small, raven-like creature) perched itself on the window of King Ofar's palace, seen as a potent warning of doom, and that very afternoon, the King's wife, Queen Durvica, was kidnapped by the dark wizard Nagmor while picking flowers in the royal garden. She was brought back to Nagmor's castle, where the evil magician kept her as his slave, forcing her to wash his clothes and cook his meals. Fortunately, while preparing Nagmor's dinner, the young queen remembered that she still had a shemflower (a very pretty, but also very poisonous plant) from her garden, and placed it in her captor's broth. Upon finishing his meal, the dark wizard noticed the petals at the bottom of his bowl, and attempted to kill the queen, before quickly succumbing to the shemflower's effects. Queen Durvica then stole Nagmor's cloak, and embarked on a long and perilous journey back home.
The day after the Queen's disappearance, a second vergat landed on a window of the royal palace, heralding still more misfortune yet to come. That night, during a fierce thunderstorm King Ofar, who was in a deep depression following his wife's capture, heard three loud knocks at the castle door, and looked out to see a figure dressed in a long black cloak. Certain that this was Nagmor returning to kill him, and the castle's guards all out in search of the missing queen, the king drew his sword, and demanded the visitor present themselves, whereupon Queen Durvica removed her cloak. Although overjoyed to see his wife was unharmed, King Ofar recalled that Clurabexi could not be unsheathed without being used to kill, and refusing to take his beloved queen's life, dug the sword deep into his belly. After her husband's sacrifice, Queen Durvica became very sick, and died of grief. Before she passed, she demanded that the sword Clurabexi be hidden deep in a cave where it could never be found by mortal hands again. Many explorers and generals alike have tried to find this magical weapon across the centuries, to no avail.
Another legend relating to Ryn royalty is the supposed curse of Queen Malisa. Unlike King Ofar and Queen Durvica, there is little doubt that Malisa was a real historical figure, who served as the final Queen of Brentisk after marrying King Borch VI. Although not an especially popular queen (being seen as too 'common' for the Royal Family), Malisa was known to be incredibly devoted and the King's five children, whom she once declared that she loved 'more than Frith himself'[3], causing much controversy. This is said to be the source of the family's alleged curse, with each of Malisa's five children outliving their parents. Just a few weeks after the short-sighted remark, the King's eldest child, Princess Lymba, succumbed to the dreaded purple fever, while their son, Prince Jast (one of the first sons of a Brentese monarch to attend public school, where he struggled to fit in) would later die after cracking his skull during a fisticuffs with an ill-mannered classmate. The heir to the Brentese throne, the flying ace Prince Ofar (nicknamed 'Clurabexi', for it was said that any time he took to the skies, three enemy planes would come crashing down) was accidentally downed by friendly fire towards the end of the Third Great War, while his younger brother, Prince Flosk, was left totally paralyzed after getting stung by a poisonous beetlefrog while honeymooning in the tropical Sargolish Isles. That same day, Flosk's wife, Princess Emala, suffered a miscarriage, which she attributed to the shock of her husband's sudden illness. Several years later, Princess Emala rekindled her relationship with her old boyfriend, her husband's younger brother, Prince Vudo, who she had dated for several months prior to her meeting Prince Flosk. As divorce was illegal throughout the Six Provinces at that time, Emala was forbidden from parting ways with her immobile spouse, and Prince Vudo, head over tail in love with a woman he could never wed, ultimately decided to take own life via poisonous shemflower.
On the tenth anniversary of Prince Vudo's suicide, King Borch died in his sleep, leaving no apparent heir to the throne, and Queen Malisa became secluded, and religiously devout, blaming her hedonistic lifestyle for the death of her five children. The Kingdom of Brentisk was replaced with a Republic style of government, which lasted more than a century prior to the planet Rynea being sterilized by a nearby supernova. All that is known of Ryn culture, history and mythology is derived from records onboard a generation ship launched a few years before the stellar holocaust, which was headed for a nearby star system where Ryn telescopes had detected the presence of a habitable planet (unbeknownst to them, this world was already inhabited by a primitive race of landgoing cephalopods). This vessel never reached its destination due to engine failure, and most of its cryogenically preserved crew died, while the descendants of the waking crew were discovered centuries later by a group of human explorers.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The rolyat is a legendary hybrid animal originating in ancient Frozian beastiaries, depicted as possessing the head of a Frozian, the body of a fangcat, the wings of a spinebat, and the tail of a stingcrab. The rolyat was rumoured to be capable of breathing fire, similar to the dragons of Earthly lore. It is said to have gained this ability when Zuthora, the king of the gods, was attempting to win the love of his future wife Jura, a goddess associated with family and childbirth. Jura, however, was hesitant, and demanded that in order to prove his devotion, Zuthora reveal his true name. The king of the gods agreed, and told Jura his name, before noticing a wild rolyetra, which had been listening in on their conversation. Zuthora then placed a spell on the animal, which caused his every breath to turn to flame, thus preventing him from ever revealing to another soul the the god-king's true name.
[2] Krambul, Cadomai Prime's answer to Charles Darwin, was a female naturalist who developed the Theory of Evolution.
[3] The prophet of the primary Brentese religion.
Star Wars: Galactic Folklore & Mythology
1: On the jungle planet of Kashyyyk, there have long been whispers of a short, hairless creature said to stalk the fertile plains beyond the edge of the furthest trees, a being known to the Wookiee tribal elders as Smallfoot.
2: The Bith homeworld of Clak'dor VII is surrounded by a series of thick rings, thought to be the sole remnants of a long-destroyed natural satellite. These rings are easily visible from the planet's surface, and feature prominently in Bith mythology, with different cultures from across the ages coming up with their own explanations regarding their nature and origin: some saw them as a great bridge or river connecting the mortal realm with the Great Above, the bow of some great cosmic archer waiting to smite heretics with arrows of lightning, or an ancient, slumbering serpent that will devour the world once it awakens, requiring regular blood sacrifice to keep it dormant.
3: Even in our current age of hyperdrives and artificial intelligence, superstition continues to play an important role in the daily lives of countless sentients across the Galaxy. Many Rodian parents, for instance, still subscribe to the ancient belief that it's possible to determine the sex of their unhatched child by counting whether there are an odd or an even number of speckles on the shell of its egg. In some cultures, should an egg failed to hatch, it was often claimed that the baby within had been stolen by thumbfolk (a legendary race of fairy-like creatures, so named as they are said to be no larger than an ordinary Rodian's thumb), and taken to the swamplands of the Netherworld to be raised as one of their own. Because the thumbfolk were thought to prefer males, it was not unheard of for parents to paint an extra spot on their egg in order to trick them - this has been known to backfire however, with the thumbfolk getting their revenge by causing poor harvests.
In other regions, there were stories of a monstrous figure known as Nana Jebhanye, who is the focus of a number of Rodian nursery rhymes. Nana Jebhanye is said to reside on a distant, frozen island to the far south, and her most distinctive feature is her tail, which is several times longer than the Rodian average, and ends with a third eyeball at its tip. Periodically, she travels around the world on her enchanted flying spoon, landing on rooftops and extending her long tail down house chimneys. Should her tail's eye spot an egg which has not been Marked (a Rodian ritual not unlike baptism), she will wrap her tail around it like a snake, placing it in the head of her flying spoon, and carry it back to her island to eat it in order to extend her lifespan.
4: Historically, the hog-like inhabitants of the planet Gamorr believed that nightmares were caused by a semi-historical figure known as Dormin, who served as a guard at the imperial palace in the (now-destroyed) Holy City of Quenx. One night, the city was attacked by soldiers from a rivalling kingdom, and as Dormin had fallen asleep at his post, the invaders were able to storm the palace, and murder the King and his family. The gods, outraged at Dormin's ineptitude, barred him from ever entering the afterlife, and placed a curse on him, preventing him from ever sleeping again. As a result, Dormin must now walk the planet in a state of perpetual exhaustion, sometimes attempting to alleviate his endless fatigue by stealing sleep from mortals, which he does by sitting on their chests while they sleep, causing his victims to experience paralysis, feelings of suffocation, and intense nightmares.
5: Generally, only male members of the Devaronian species possess horns, which are culturally regarded as a symbol of masculinity, and sometimes decorated with markings and fine jewelry by members of the upper classes. Due to a genetic mutation however, a small number (~0.2%) of females are also born with horns, although unfortunately, horned girls and women have a long history of discrimination in Devaronian society, often being regarded as witches and devilspawn. Over the centuries, many horned women have dressed up as men in order to evade this prosecution, and young Devaronian ladies are taught to beware of strange men, in case they are in fact a horned witch plotting to drink their blood.
6: The planet Kinyen, home to a race of short, three-eyed humanoids known as the Gran, is the larger of two components in a double-planet system. Kinyen's smaller twin, the wet, mountainous world of Vraxang, was historically seen as the home of the gods, with local legend teaching that in antiquity, a now-vanished Gran civilization known as the Zyresians attempted to build a structure so tall it would reach Vraxang, evoking the gods' wrath. As punishment, a tsunami was sent to wipe the Zyresians from the face of the planet, and their colossal tower was reduced to dust, and scattered across the heavens as a warning to future societies, thus forming the galactic spiral arm. As a result of this myth, the first Gran missions to Vraxang were met with much religious hostility, up to and including bombs being planted aboard spacecraft.
7: According to a prominent Toydarian creation myth, the first members of their species lacked wings, and lived on a distant, now-sunken island known as the Isle of Genesis. The gods followed the Toydarians' progress closely, but were ultimately disappointed with their creations, and decided to wipe them out by flooding the Island and starting anew. As the surrounding oceans were crawling with carnivorous megashrimp and electric kraken, the Toydarians were trapped, until a kindly spirit named Chaya took pity on their plight, granting them wings, which she stole from the nocturnal amsulcras while they slept (a vicious, and fiercely territorial predator native to the planet's northern continent). Using their stolen wings, the Toydarians were able to escape their doomed island and colonize the surrounding lands. Chaya, on the other hand, was turned into a smeerp (a creature resembling a cross between a rat and a Terran rabbit) by the gods as punishment for her infraction, and forever banished to the larger of Toydaria's three moons (explaining the dark, rodent-shaped markings on its surface) - to this day, amsulcras continue to howl at the Moon, cursing the deity who robbed them of their flight. In some Toydarian cultures, it was customary for younglings to be thrown off a cliffside. While most were able to successfully fly back up to the cliff's top, a small number of weak fliers usually fell to their deaths.
8: On the Inner Rim world of Yag'dhul, it is said that there once lived a great and wise philosopher named Mixan, who is remembered for his Pyrrhic victory over death: Mixan, who had grown sick with age, spent his final years developing a magical potion, which restored his youth, and rendered him impervious to all disease. A few nights later, while out dancing and celebrating his newfound vigor, he foolishly picked a fight with a grouchy Givin twice his size, who knocked the philosopher dead with a single punch. His contemporaries note that while Mixan's elixir may have restored his vitality, so too did it bring back his youthful arrogance, and sadly cost him the wisdom and experience that comes with age, resulting in his downfall.
9: One of the more curious elements of Ewok mythology is that of the legendary fallfruits, a kind of sentient, coconut-like fruit which said only to grow in sacred areas of woodland. Should a fallfruit sense an Ewok's presence on the ground below, it will detach from its branch, and land on its victim's head, causing instant death.
10: One of the better-known legends from Brodo Asogi is the phantom island of Ezan-Throgg, which supposedly lies off the western coast of the Vomestran continent, and is shrouded by a thick mist, rendering it inaccessible to sailors. It is said that this magical fog is only ever lifted on a leap day, which occurs every five years on Brodo Asogi, and plays a role in a number of local folktales and superstitions (the magical floratch flower, which grants great fortune to any Asogian who picks it, is rumoured to only ever grow on a leap day, and in some cultures, infants born on this day are rumoured to possess supernatural healing and clairvoyance). According to one famous literary account, Ezan-Throgg was once visible all 408 days of the Asogian year, and was ruled by a fair and just king named Fonhom, who had nine beautiful daughters. One fateful day, King Fonhom returned from his hunt to find his palace had been ransacked by the Atarians (a seafaring people hailing from planet's northern regions), who had slain his guards and his daughters. With his finest soldiers dead and his people hopelessly outnumbered, Fonhom set out for a nearby nearby temple, where he prayed to Almighty Sacul, begging him for the strength to defeat the Atarian invaders. Sacul heard the young king's prayer, and stretched out a single long, glowing finger, temporarily transferring a tiny spark of divine power into his body.
Immediately, King Fonhom underwent a monstrous transformation, growing five times larger and ten times stronger, his mere glance capable of inducing fatal seizures in his enemies. Fonhom single-handedly slaughtered countless waves of Atarian warriors, with the few surviving soldiers retreating to their longships, vowing to never return to the island of the demon-king. Although his domain was safe once more, Sacul's divine spark had taken its toll on the king's health: the powers of a god are not meant to reside within a mortal framework, and by the time the last Atarian longship had retreated from Ezan-Throgg's shore, King Fonhom's skin had turned pasty white, and his burning heart was visible through his chest. With his last ounce of supernatural strength, Fonhom threw his black cloak around Ezan-Throgg, and resurrected his nine daughters in the form of beautiful aurorabirds (a species named for their beautiful, rainbow-coloured feathers). Fonhom's cloak magically sealed the island from the rest of the world, although every leap year, his aurorabird daughters lift it for a single day, allowing the light of Bigsun and Littlesun to shine upon the king's subjects. One of the earliest Asogian interstellar colonies, a small, stormy moon in a trinary system some thirteen lightyears from their homeworld (coincidentally, located in the 'beak' of the Aurorabird constellation) was christened Ezan-Throgg by early settlers because of its thick cloud coverage.
Aurorabirds feature in a number of other Asogian myths. Some stories claim that aurorabirds are in fact beautiful Asogian women, who may occasionally take their feathery skins off to bathe. One story tells of a hunter who discovered an aurorabird removing her skin in order to bathe in a nearby pond. The hunter fell hopelessly in love with this maiden, and went to visit his brother to tell him of what he has seen. Naturally, his brother was skeptical, and demanded that the hunter take him to the pond as proof. As soon as the hunter's brother laid eyes on the mysterious woman, he too was smitten, and cunningly suggested that his brother steal her skin away, so that she will be unable to turn back into a bird and be forced to marry him. The gullible hunter agreed, but as soon as he touched the feathery skin, he was immediately transformed into an aurorabird, and was overcome by his animal nature, taking to the skies. When the woman finished bathing, she returned to find that her skin was nowhere to be found, and with no home to go to, the brother of the now-transformed hunter proposed to her, and the two lived happily ever after.
11: On the desert world of Tatooine, many indigenous cultures believe that their world rests upon the back of Great O'bmud, an immense bantha who uses his unusually large ears to fly through the cosmic void, and causes earthquakes whenever he sneezes.
12: On Ryloth, the native Twi'leks tell tales of a mystical melody known as the Resurrection Song, a long-lost piece of music said to be haunting in more ways than one. It is said that singing the Resurrection Song above somebody's grave can restore life to their body, provided that the corpse in question has been dead for at least a year and a day, and it is sung during a nomoons (a period where none of Ryloth's three moons are visible, often associated with bad luck and the supernatural). However, this ritual is not without its risks - it is claimed that should one falter, or miss a note while performing the spellsong, the dead person's spirit will instead return in the form of a near-indestructable, monstrously deformed creature known as a Receased. The Receased are usually described having no skin, and are stiff-moving, with glowing, bloodshot eyes dangling from pus-filled sockets (looking directly into which has been reported to cause either blindness or paralysis), and is said to let out a howl far more terrible than that of any beast. Immediately after manifesting, the Receased will attempt to murder the one who has summoned them, and devour their lekku (or head-tendrils, which is where ancient Twi'leks believed the soul to be located). Should the singer escape however, the creature will instead head for the Twi'lek nearest settlement, slaughtering and consuming any person unfortunate enough to cross its path, in a rampage that will not cease until the the one who has summoned them (or alternatively, their next of kin) is offered to them, whereupon it will consume their lekku, and return to its grave without causing any further damage. The sour, lemon-like fruit known as the Rylothic moko is said to have magical properties, which keep the Receased at bay.
13: Most members of the Moogan species shed their skin at least once a year, a process which begins in early childhood. Historically, Obroan warriors would buy and consume the skins of young children, as it was believed that this would bring them good luck in battle. While the consumption of shed skin became increasingly frowned upon in Moogan society, this practice inspired a legendary figure not dissimilar to a certain character from Terran lore: young children were told that if they placed their shed skin beneath their bed at nighttime, a creature known as the Skin Sprite would come to take it away, leaving a coin in its place. It was said that the Skin Sprite had no children of his own, and took these skins back to his home, where he stuffed them with magical straw, bringing them to life, and raising them as his own.
14: One of the most persistent legends originating on the frigid Outer Rim world of Orto is that of Big Bloqo. Mount Tsovum, the largest mountain in the Orto system, was said to be inhabited by a race of violent, bloodthirsty giants (who had been banished there long ago by the heroic Gorbu the Great), the smallest of which was a young boy named Bloqo, who faced much teasing and bullying from the other giant children due to his short stature. One day, in order to make himself grow larger and end his constant mockery, Bloqo consumed all of the food in his parents' house. When his hungry father came home and found only crumbs in the pantry, he threw Bloqo over the side of Mount Tsovum, who landed hard on his head a few miles from a small Ortolan settlement, and was left with amnesia as a result of his fall, forgetting he had learned on Mount Tsovum. The townsfolk , initially skeptical, adopted the smallest giant, feeding and clothing him in return for his protection (with his mighty breath, Bloqo was able to blow away any blizzards and snowstorms which might threaten their village).
Big Bloqo is said to be responsible for the creation of a number of noted landmarks - for instance, the Vikrem River is said to have been created when the smallest giant fell asleep against a hilltop, his drool forming its waters. Similarly, Bloqo is sometimes said to enjoy spitting fruit seeds at the Moon, thus causing its cratered surface. It is said that Bloqo uses tree trunks for toothpicks, and enjoys bathing in the L'fregian inland sea, where he uses a bladefish as a sponge. Because no usukalf (a common Ortolan beast of burden, rivalling banthas in size) was able to withstand the giant's weight, Bloqo made his own usukalf out of snow and pebbles, and christened it Frostbite, for its icy breath was capable of freezing foes in their tracks. One account claims that Big Bloqo would eventually marry Tiny Tovyo (another legendary figure, said to be just a few inches tall, due to a mouse crawling up her mother's trunk while she was pregnant), who lives in his navel, and knits dresses from his lint.
15: One of the most famous monsters from Sullustan folklore is The Voice-Taker, a legendary boogeyman dating back many centuries before the planet's spacefaring era. The Voice-Taker is described as a ghost or revenant, and is consistently depicted as a tall, rotting figure, wearing a beard made from flies and maggots, and dressed in tattered clothing, with a heavy sack slung over its shoulder. The creature is said to have been born with a mouth two sizes too big (a deformity which most tellings attribute to his gossiping mother), and as a result, his cries during infancy were so loud and frequent that they would regularly keep his family awake at all hours of the night. The boy's father consulted a local alchemist, who provided him with a magical elixir, which he swore by the gods would silence his son's screams until his first birthday, allowing his parents some much-needed rest. Sadly this potion proved to be far more effective than the alchemist thought - the boy's first birthday came and went, and he remained permanently mute. He was soon put to work on his family farm, until in his eighteenth year, his life was cut short after he tripped and fell down an old well. Although the boy's family searched and searched, because their son was unable to shout for help, he was never rescued, and as his body was never buried, his spirit was forced to wander the material realm for eternity.
The Voice-Taker's experience has given him a strong appreciation for the value of speech, and an even stronger disdain for children who take theirs for granted by yelling, swearing, and being rude to their elders. Unruly children are warned that if their behaviour does not improve, the Voice-Taker will visit them in the night. Upon awakening to the pungent stench of decay, the child will inevitably scream upon catching gory glimpse of the maggot-bearded monster looming over them. The creature strikes by extending one bony arm down his victim's throat, and stealing their voice away before stuffing it into his sack. Precisely what the ghostly figure does with its stolen treasure tends to vary between interpretations. Many tellings claim that the stolen voices are hidden in locations where their owners can never retrieve them, such as down wells and deep inside caves (children sometimes being told that the echo they hear upon shouting into a cavern is in fact a young Sullustan's stolen voice, in its disembodied state, only able to repeat what is called to it). Others claim that they are given as presents to good children who were born mute, or fed to baby birds in the spring, giving them their morning song. Some variations maintain that once nine years have passed, the Voice-Taker may decide to return a voice to its owner (provided they have been well-behaved), although as the creature has a tendency towards carelessness, this often results in embarrassing situations where boys are mistakenly given girls voices, and vice versa.
16: One of the Twelve Wonders of the Planet Ojom, homeworld of the four-armed Besalisks, is Painted Caverns, a series of expansive caves containing countless works of ancient art (some dating as far back as 40,000 BBY), featuring unusually well-preserved depictions of everything from storm gods and fierce warriors to prehistoric plants and livestock. Of course, later generations of Besalisk had no way of knowing just how unfathomably ancient the drawings found therein truly were, with one myth ascribing a much more recent origin for Painted Caverns: it is said that long ago, there lived a poor artist of unparalleled skill named Othobludge, who produced magnificent portraits for every noble man and woman in the land. Once the cruel and rich Emperor caught wind of Othobludge's wide body of work, he demanding an audience with the artist, insisting that Othobludge paint him a portrait to rival all others. However, as soon as Othobludge saw how poorly the Emperor treated his servants, he decided to create a rather different portrait to what the Emperor had in mind, and painted a picture of the wealthy tyrant standing naked, which he presented for all his friends and servants to see. The Emperor was so enraged at this act of treachery that he demanded Othobludge's entire body of work be incinerated, and banished the artist from his kingdom, forcing him to take refuge in the caves that would one day be called Painted Caverns. Othobludge spent the remainder of his life in these caves, where he continued to perfect his craft, decorating the caves' walls and ceilings using berries and charcoal in place of paintbrushes.
17: The low-gravity world of Froz is home to a civilization of furry, odd-looking marsupial bipeds. Thanks to its unusually rich hydrium reserves, airships and dirigibles remained a common mode of transportation well into the Frozians' spaceflight era, with a number of aerial myths and superstitions emerging as a result. One of the most famous of these so-called 'airmen's tales' is that of Rainbow Cove, a legendary afterlife for pilots and aviators who die in the line of duty, which is described as a verdant island floating amongst the clouds, inhabited by a race of beautiful women with bird-like features. There were also widespread concerns about gremlin-like creatures, which are feared to wreck havoc on airships by stealing food and cigarettes, tampering with machinery, damaging parachutes, and even singing hypnotic lullabies, causing pilots to fall asleep mid-air, before fleeing. A force much more threatening than gremlins are the huge, tentacled abominations which were said to dwell in the so-called 'sky-jungles' of the upper stratosphere, never venturing any lower than forty thousand feet above ground, and destroying any vessel which flies too high up (in spite of a number of grainy photographs, these gaseous monstrosities were ultimately disproven when the Frozians developed satellite technology). Another, more minor threat to Frozian aircraft were the sully-gullies, a fictitious species of seabirds, which were typically abandoned by their partners after mating, subsequently becoming incredibly depressed, and would supposedly fly intentionally into the propellers of planes and dirigibles, causing them to crash.
There have also been stories of ghost airships, perhaps the most famous of which is that of the legendary Black Rolyat[1], a cargo zeppelin which became hopelessly lost in a vast mountain range after encountering a fierce storm. Its crew, hungry and tired, were visited by the Frozian Devil, who offered them a route home, in exchange for the first soul aboard to set foot back on land. The ship's cunning captain agreed to this deal, and the Devil created a great path through the clouds, leading back to the crew's homeland. After hours of travel, the Wyvern had arrived back in its own airspace, and the Devil returned, eagerly awaiting his prize, but the captain, refusing to sacrifice one of his men, instead grabbed the ship's jonzi (a furry, cat-like critter often carried aboard Frozian air vessels, believed to frighten gremlins) by the tail, and threw it over the edge of the vessel. Angry at being outwitted by a mere airman, the Devil placed a terrible curse aboard the Black Rolyat and its crew, condemning them to sail the skies for all eternity, never able to make a landing. It is often claimed that the Rolyat can still be seen flying during terrible storms, and catching a glimpse of this ghostly craft is regarded as very bad luck.
18: With some notable exceptions, such as the fungi inhabitants of the planet Tsalal Prime in the Firefist Galaxy, the practice of cannibalism is regarded as highly taboo in most races, and has long been the subject of cautionary folk tales. One popular legend from the Inner Rim world of Cona tells of a character named Myar, an Arcona who lived during a time of severe famine. Growing tired of his diet of nuts and seeds, one night, while the town slept, Myar decided to butcher and eat his imbecilic son, Narbo. Sleeping off his full belly, Myar awoke in the early morning to a sharp pain in his left hand, and noticed that a fang-rat had chewed off two of his fingers. To his horror, Myar found that his body was no longer of flesh and bone, but of sweet, sugary dough, and tried to make a quick escape before any of his hungry neighbors awakened.
Unfortunately for Myar, the entire village had smelt the delicious aroma, and had surrounded his house. The confectionary cannibal narrowly escaped with his life (losing one of his arms to the starving masses) and fled into a nearby forest, where he was pursued by a hungry creature known as a daggerlip (a pack animal found primarily on Cona's northern hemisphere). The creature bit off one of Myar's legs, forcing him to took refuge high up in a tree, where he was forced to fend off the birds using its branches, while the ravenous daggerlip waited patiently at the bottom. After remaining in the tree for a day and a night, with the daggerlip showing no signs of leaving anytime soon, Myar, growing hungrier and hungrier, noticed how tasty he smelled, and ate his arms, legs, torso, and finally, (somehow) his own head. The story of Myar proved so popular that Arcona-shaped cookies (known as Myar biscuits) became incredibly popular on the planet Cona in future years, and are an especially common treat during local holidays, such as St. Frike's Day and Conese New Year.
19: Some of the strangest mythical animals dreamt up by denizens of the Galaxy can be found in the folk tales of the Snivvians, a humanoid race native to the Outer Rim world of Cadomai Prime. Perhaps one of the weirdest Snivvian monsters of all are that of the oilcows, a legendary animal-machine hybrid which is claimed to exist on the planet's westernmost continent. The oilcows are similar in appearence to dwarf banthas or Terran cattle, and appear to fly in the face of Krambulian evolution[2], being creatures made not of flesh and bone, but from rubber and metal. Oilcows move about on four wheels in place of legs, leaving thin tracks behind them as they traverse the endless plains of the planet's western continent, and possess small lightbulbs for eyes. Instead of milk, the oilcows (as their name suggests) produce oil for their young, and are said to defecate coal, making them incredibly valuable. However, no farmer has been able to catch them, only catching quick glimpses as they speed across the grasslands, and occasionally finding the rusty remains of deceased specimens. Some accounts claim that the oilcows are capable of firing bullets from their horns when threatened, and their long, metal tails are able to extend, and fold out into umbrellas to protect them from rainfall. Being made of metal, the mechanical cattle are said to have a weakness for magnets, which some have used to try and catch them.
20: Magical weapons and armour play an important role in the mythologies of many species across the Galaxy, and the Ryn are no exception. Arguably, the most famous weapon in Ryn folklore is Clurabexi, an indestructible sword crafted by the gods, and possessed by King Ofar (the semi-legendary first ruler of Brentisk, possibly based on one or more real-life figures). Clurabexi is described as being capable of inflicting wounds that never heal, and never misses its target, although cannot be removed from its sheath without being used to kill. Although Clurabexi allowed King Ofar to unite the Six Provinces of Brentisk, it would also ultimately cause his downfall. One day, a black vergat (a small, raven-like creature) perched itself on the window of King Ofar's palace, seen as a potent warning of doom, and that very afternoon, the King's wife, Queen Durvica, was kidnapped by the dark wizard Nagmor while picking flowers in the royal garden. She was brought back to Nagmor's castle, where the evil magician kept her as his slave, forcing her to wash his clothes and cook his meals. Fortunately, while preparing Nagmor's dinner, the young queen remembered that she still had a shemflower (a very pretty, but also very poisonous plant) from her garden, and placed it in her captor's broth. Upon finishing his meal, the dark wizard noticed the petals at the bottom of his bowl, and attempted to kill the queen, before quickly succumbing to the shemflower's effects. Queen Durvica then stole Nagmor's cloak, and embarked on a long and perilous journey back home.
The day after the Queen's disappearance, a second vergat landed on a window of the royal palace, heralding still more misfortune yet to come. That night, during a fierce thunderstorm King Ofar, who was in a deep depression following his wife's capture, heard three loud knocks at the castle door, and looked out to see a figure dressed in a long black cloak. Certain that this was Nagmor returning to kill him, and the castle's guards all out in search of the missing queen, the king drew his sword, and demanded the visitor present themselves, whereupon Queen Durvica removed her cloak. Although overjoyed to see his wife was unharmed, King Ofar recalled that Clurabexi could not be unsheathed without being used to kill, and refusing to take his beloved queen's life, dug the sword deep into his belly. After her husband's sacrifice, Queen Durvica became very sick, and died of grief. Before she passed, she demanded that the sword Clurabexi be hidden deep in a cave where it could never be found by mortal hands again. Many explorers and generals alike have tried to find this magical weapon across the centuries, to no avail.
Another legend relating to Ryn royalty is the supposed curse of Queen Malisa. Unlike King Ofar and Queen Durvica, there is little doubt that Malisa was a real historical figure, who served as the final Queen of Brentisk after marrying King Borch VI. Although not an especially popular queen (being seen as too 'common' for the Royal Family), Malisa was known to be incredibly devoted and the King's five children, whom she once declared that she loved 'more than Frith himself'[3], causing much controversy. This is said to be the source of the family's alleged curse, with each of Malisa's five children outliving their parents. Just a few weeks after the short-sighted remark, the King's eldest child, Princess Lymba, succumbed to the dreaded purple fever, while their son, Prince Jast (one of the first sons of a Brentese monarch to attend public school, where he struggled to fit in) would later die after cracking his skull during a fisticuffs with an ill-mannered classmate. The heir to the Brentese throne, the flying ace Prince Ofar (nicknamed 'Clurabexi', for it was said that any time he took to the skies, three enemy planes would come crashing down) was accidentally downed by friendly fire towards the end of the Third Great War, while his younger brother, Prince Flosk, was left totally paralyzed after getting stung by a poisonous beetlefrog while honeymooning in the tropical Sargolish Isles. That same day, Flosk's wife, Princess Emala, suffered a miscarriage, which she attributed to the shock of her husband's sudden illness. Several years later, Princess Emala rekindled her relationship with her old boyfriend, her husband's younger brother, Prince Vudo, who she had dated for several months prior to her meeting Prince Flosk. As divorce was illegal throughout the Six Provinces at that time, Emala was forbidden from parting ways with her immobile spouse, and Prince Vudo, head over tail in love with a woman he could never wed, ultimately decided to take own life via poisonous shemflower.
On the tenth anniversary of Prince Vudo's suicide, King Borch died in his sleep, leaving no apparent heir to the throne, and Queen Malisa became secluded, and religiously devout, blaming her hedonistic lifestyle for the death of her five children. The Kingdom of Brentisk was replaced with a Republic style of government, which lasted more than a century prior to the planet Rynea being sterilized by a nearby supernova. All that is known of Ryn culture, history and mythology is derived from records onboard a generation ship launched a few years before the stellar holocaust, which was headed for a nearby star system where Ryn telescopes had detected the presence of a habitable planet (unbeknownst to them, this world was already inhabited by a primitive race of landgoing cephalopods). This vessel never reached its destination due to engine failure, and most of its cryogenically preserved crew died, while the descendants of the waking crew were discovered centuries later by a group of human explorers.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The rolyat is a legendary hybrid animal originating in ancient Frozian beastiaries, depicted as possessing the head of a Frozian, the body of a fangcat, the wings of a spinebat, and the tail of a stingcrab. The rolyat was rumoured to be capable of breathing fire, similar to the dragons of Earthly lore. It is said to have gained this ability when Zuthora, the king of the gods, was attempting to win the love of his future wife Jura, a goddess associated with family and childbirth. Jura, however, was hesitant, and demanded that in order to prove his devotion, Zuthora reveal his true name. The king of the gods agreed, and told Jura his name, before noticing a wild rolyetra, which had been listening in on their conversation. Zuthora then placed a spell on the animal, which caused his every breath to turn to flame, thus preventing him from ever revealing to another soul the the god-king's true name.
[2] Krambul, Cadomai Prime's answer to Charles Darwin, was a female naturalist who developed the Theory of Evolution.
[3] The prophet of the primary Brentese religion.
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Based on (and intended to be consistent with) Emperor Julian's timeline here, this map depicts the House of Representatives election in 1922 where Woodrow Wilson was nominated for a third term as President in 1920. This one is substantially more speculative than yesterday's 1920 map. In particular, there were many New York seats won by Democrats in landslides OTL and hence are hard to imagine staying Republican but which canonically did. Again, not authorized or endorsed by Emperor Julian.
Why just Manhattan? By 1922, all of NYC had consolidated, and Brooklyn's population was barely smaller than Manhattan's (though I wasn't able to find House districts).
You have blown-up maps of Chicago, Philadelphia, and Manhattan displayed off the East Coast.
Oh, okay. It's simply because the Wikipedia maps which I based mine one didn't have it. I didn't draw any of the state or congressional boundaries myself.
It's a map of systems in 2020, and RCV won't take effect in Alaska until after this year.
The Lithuanian Seimas is elected using parallel voting (like Italy), while South Korea has both compensatory and parallel PR seats, so technically it's a combination of MMP and parallel voting.
I really like the map though.
In Switzerland the Kantone [States] can choose how their representatives are elected, and one Kanton, Graubünden, uses a plurality voting.
Heightmap for a world I designed forever ago based off randomly drawn tectonic plates
Reminds me of early continental earth
Heightmap for a world I designed forever ago based off randomly drawn tectonic plates
It's a brilliant map. I suppose this means Edmonton is the capita of Odahi?
At first I was very perturbed, but the more I look at it, the more okay it seems.
This was a hit on Twitter for some reason.
Thanks, I hate it.
This was a hit on Twitter for some reason.
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