Let’s learn all about the secret organization known as the Wasting Walkers in DireLands. Join Adam as he explores his DireLands fantasy campaign setting. You can learn more about DireLands here: https://reverendcampbell.com/direlands/
Transcript
Cold Open
There are few organizations as misunderstood as the Wasting Walkers, but when they show up on your doorstep, you had better give them what they ask for.
Intro
Welcome to this continuation of my DireLands system agnostic, dark fantasy campaign setting! My name is Adam and in this episode I will be discussing the secret organization known as the Wasting Walkers in DireLands. If you appreciate the development of this campaign setting, or the features of other games on this channel, I would like to invite you to consider becoming a patron on Patreon. You can even purchase tabletop roleplaying games or get $10 by signing up to StartPlaying.Games using my affiliate links in the description below.
Details
Western Faulest (faw-lest) is the home to many native tribes. Some known, and some hidden in the vast forests, deserts, plains and hills which sprawl across the land. This territory has been traveled by the Wasting Walkers since time immemorial. But who are the Wasting Walkers and why do they travel the desolate land of Faulest? It’s because they have been cursed by the gods. It is believed that Heru Tivis was a druid of Nàdar (naa-ter), the god of nature. Tivis walked the wildlands with the gods when mortals were first created and the wildlands were spread all across Ciar-mhonadh (kierd-vonnig). Nadar forbade man from walking the Dòigh Nàdair (doe-na-dare), the divine path which leads to sacred wisdom. Nadar didn’t believe man could handle the knowledge of the gods, but Fìrinn (FEER-inn), the god of knowledge foresaw a coming calamity, and believed man would need this knowledge to protect the wildlands.
Tivis was seduced into action by the promise of divine truths and walked the Dòigh Nàdair. Nadar was so enraged that he cursed Tivis to never know peace, thus never being able to consciously process the knowledge he had gained. Anyone he would then try to instruct would also become cursed, thus the knowledge would never be known to man. Tivis walked Faulest for years and eventually died, but he passed on the knowledge he gained to the first born son of all whom he met. This led to hundreds of Wasting Walkers, secure in divine knowledge, but unable to share it without destroying the mind of those who listened. Some of the first-nation people of Faulest took pity on these Wasting Walkers, and others became aggressive. The orc tribes of Faulest created bands of warriors that would hunt them. This led to the Wasting Walkers to hone their skill at combat, taking up the bow and spear with brutal efficiency. In fact, combat became a way of focusing their scattered minds.
As the generations of Wasting Walkers moved throughout the continent, and more and more bounties were placed on them, the group began stringing up the hunters’ bodies as warnings to those who would threaten them. The Wasting walkers would have a number of sacred sites known as àite eòlais (AH-tyeh YOH-lish). These familiar places would be decorated with the dead, and it is in this practice that the reading of entails became a way of processing the divine knowledge for the Wasting Walkers. While the Beàrrta (bee-och-te), or men from the west, eradicated many of the Wasting Walkers in their now nation of Bressus (bress-sus), it took generations. And the myths of the Wasting Walkers taking your first born son became a tale told to frighten children into obedience.
But the act still goes on. As widespread as the nation of Bressus is, it is difficult to maintain control in the wilder regions of the nation, and it is known that the Wasting Walkers still travel, and still take boys into their order. Whatever the divine truths they are able to glean from the entrails of their victims remains unknown to outsiders, but it must be potent knowledge, for the Walkers are a mysterious presence even to this day. When the Witch-Queen came to power, the Wasting Walkers were one of the many male centric organizations she targeted. This diminished their numbers significantly, but there are still dark corners of Faulest where people will not travel. The Efelius jungle in Caelia, the southern deserts in Bressus, and the western glaciers in Locaston (low-cast-on) are only a few of the regions which bear markers of the Wasting Walkers domains.
In 5 F.A. or ‘Frozen Age’, Director Klay Voceron of the Jhion (Gee-on) Order wanted to try to document the knowledge the Wasting Walkers carried and formed a company of one hundred men. They traveled the vast southern deserts of Bressus and the stories that returned were more horrifying than anyone could imagine. Dorian Urusta, a mercenary, was the sole survivor of the expedition and when he stumbled into Ochar, he was half mad. He spoke of men who consumed other men. They would tear them apart and use their organs in monstrous rituals. He was forced to eat the entrails of Voceron in a sacred rite which is the sole reason he was allowed to leave. For he bore a prophecy: The gods are soon to walk the land again when the unnamed return to their world. Whatever this meant is lost to Urusta. He now is institutionalised in a center in the city of Wallun.
The Wasting Walkers may be monstrous to more civilised men and women of Faulest, but they are cursed with knowledge no mortal should hold, and an insatiable desire to try to understand this knowledge through ritual and travel. Will the Wasting Walkers ever process this truth? Can the other men of Faulest benefit from their knowledge? And what does the prophecy relayed by Urusta mean? Only your home campaign can answer those questions, as the future of these DireLands are in your hands.
Outro
Thank you for watching today’s DireLands Fantasy Campaign Setting episode. Please consider subscribing to this YouTube channel, liking and commenting on this video. And if you enjoyed this episode, consider becoming a patron on Patreon.
Thank you Creator Patrons Aaron Hardy & D. Robert Handy and Developer Patrons Chris Androu & Sam Ruiz!
Always remember that evil spelled backwards is live, so get out there and be evil!