Monsters - The Blood of Dawnwalker Database

It looked like a human, but there was something wrong with it… As if someone who wasn’t human and didn’t understand humans tried to copy our form. As if the raging energy needed a shape and chose one randomly or based on myself – as I was the closest living thing around.

Years ago, Gremla’s husband went missing. For three days men searched the woods, but found nothing. And then… I found him in a bear’s lair. His left arm was gone, ripped out, nowhere to be seen. His guts were scattered all over the place. The bear had left him like that, half-devoured, and saved the rest for later. It took me another two days to pluck up the courage and tell Gremla…

Much time has passed since then, but I still believe that - unless there is no other option - trying to fight an angry bear is a terrible idea.

Everyone knows to beware of wolves or bears, but a wild boar isn’t much less of a threat. When provoked, it will charge at you, knock you down and maul you, even if you’re twice its size. So when an angry boar charges at you, it’s best to stay out of its way.

Some dogs roaming the valley are just strays, hungry or rabid – sometimes both. Others have been specially trained by the knyaz’s huntsmen. They are kept hungry on purpose, to sharpen their hunting instinct and bloodthirst. Soldiers often take them on patrols, especially outside Svartrau, where the dogs’s speed, agility and keen senses give them an advantage over common bandits or manumits.

Uriashi stick together, that’s the way they are. And no wonder. Few would survive the harsh highland winters without a helping hand.

And yet, sometimes a lone uriash or a small group attack travellers or merchants on a mountain trail. They are feral, merciless. They rob and they kill, as bandits do.

Who are they? Outcasts, banished for killing a member of their clan? Warriors who failed in battle and have to atone? Or maybe they’re sick, sent away from their homes to die? I guess we’ll never know.

A huge, winged beast, deadly and relentless, with scythes in place of arms, able to heal its wounds in an instant… While in the air, this gargoyle remains out of reach. It has to be fought while on the ground - and even then, it makes a formidable enemy.

Such a twisted monster can’t be nature’s creation. It must have been… constructed – and then brought to life. But by whom?!

When I worked in the mines, I heard people talk about cave-dwelling man-eaters called kobolds. These stories proved to contain more than just a kernel of truth. Kobolds are real - and fiercely territorial. They can be mostly encountered underground, though some - either lost or expelled by their own kin - can be found in the open. Kobolds have many monstrous cousins, known as imps or pookas, who may differ in appearance - but share the appetite for human flesh.

Kobolds may seem witless and ungainly, but don’t let it deceive you. They are, in fact, surprisingly smart and agile. They will leap at you, strike and then scatter before you even have a chance to react. Even the most skilled fighter, if alone, may fail to defend themselves against the entire swarm of these devils.

These weird creatures… I feel like they’re somehow connected to me. Were they vrakhiri once? Now they’re more like a shadow, an echo of something, acting out of habit, trying to kill me not because they want to, but because that’s just what they have always done…

I met a creature resembling a vrakhir, but… feral – with spikes growing out of its body and no glimpse of a human soul in its eyes. It made up for the lack of reasoning with sharp instincts – and an unquenchable thirst.

What was it? A failed attempt at creating a vrakhir? More failed than I turned out to be? If so, then maybe I should consider myself lucky to have retained at least part of my humanity. Perhaps it could have gone much worse.

Regular kobolds may seem monstrous, but they’re nothing compared to their unhinged cousins, the ‘Wrongs’, who live even deeper underground.

Whether because of an illness, or maybe due to some dark magic, these kobolds have lost all of their reason. They’ve become blinded by bloodlust and rage, which has made them act differently. Instead of sneaking around in the shadow, these monstrosities will charge directly towards their prey.

In short, they’re as dangerous as they are disgusting.

At first glance, you may mistake it for a big wolf. But then you start noticing the weird, unsettling details: the unnaturally long fangs, the glowing eyes, the strange way it moves… And then there’s the howls, low and rumbling, ringing in your ears like the promise of death.

Did nature create such a monster? I doubt it. But how, then, was it spawned? Was there a purpose to its creation? Or did it come to be as a side effect of something else? A wolf or a dog which happened to get too close to a dark, cursed place?

According to myths, salamanders are born from fire, and their skin is so cold it can put out a roaring flame. I don’t know if that’s true, and I’m not even sure if the creature I met was, in fact, a salamander – but it was certainly no ordinary lizard, either.

As any child in Vale Sangora will tell you, deep in the burrows – with moles, mice and rabbits for neighbours – dwell the sanzhani. They are small, but so are hornets. They don’t care much for things that humans value – but they are fond of our teeth, which they love to steal from us and offer as gifts to their rulers, called tsarinas.

The swamps of Vale Sangora are a bleak and hostile place, rumoured to be the hunting ground of huge, lizard-like monsters, hiding underwater and in the peat bogs. To make things worse, their numbers seem to be growing - so much so that they started spreading beyond the marshes, into the nearby woods. If that’s true, even those who stay away from the swamps have reasons to fear.

And there is, in fact, much to fear. The creatures wait, sometimes for days, without making a single move or sound. But the moment they realise their prey is near, they spring out swiftly, like a lightning bolt. And even if you avoid it, you won’t be able to reach the monster before it hides back in the ground – only to emerge somewhere else a moment later and try to kill you again, with relentless determination.

First came a grinding sound, as if two pieces of clay were scraping against each other. Then - a deep breath, perhaps the first one in centuries. The warden woke up, brought to life by an unnatural calling, driven by a single purpose: to kill the intruder.

What was it? A human encased in clay? Or a clay figure brought to life by some ancient forces? Did it act on its own, or was someone pulling the strings? I do not know, and I doubt I ever will. It seems to be yet another of the ancient secrets buried deep beneath Vale Sangora.

In many legends kings and heroes of old were buried together with their servants. That way, the servants could remain in their masters’s attendance in the afterlife. In the ruins, I stumbled upon atrocities that seem to confirm those tales. A creature I had to fight was neither living nor dead. It used to be a warrior, a protector of someone or something – that I’m sure of. But it had lost all of its humanity long before.

Whatever vile magic brings corpses back to life, it doesn’t just work on humans. The undead dogs, loyal to their masters even after death, guard their treasures – and their souls – to this very day.

Something horrible happened at Saint Tyna’s. It covered the woods with thick fog and revived the nuns killed by the plague. Even when struck down and seemingly killed, they rise again, raging with fury. Stripped of any trace of their humanity, they have transformed into unkillable, undead monsters, unable to find eternal peace.

Most people I know fear the uriashi. And yes, they are intimidating, both much taller and bulkier than us. To make matters worse, they have horns, which – to some – make them look like devils.

But in actuality, they treat people with the same cautiousness and distrust with which we treat them. That’s why – despite Brencis’s invitation – most uriashi still live high up the mountains and only a few decided to settle among humans. If threatened, they won’t hesitate to defend themselves against us. Given their imposing size and strength, it may end up with them snapping a grown man’s neck with just one hand.

These spectral figures – they’re rumoured to appear near murder sites and battlefields or around mass graves. That’s why people say they’re ghosts. Yet they seem much more powerful than the mere spectres from ghost stories I listened to as a child. I don’t know if they were ever human, but I’m certain they are something else now.

All vrakhiri used to be human. At some point in their lives, they were turned. To make that happen, their heart must have been stabbed by another vrakhir’s fang.

Vrakhiri consider themselves above humans, better than us. And in some regards, they are. They don’t grow old, their wounds heal instantly, and they have a whole array of other inhuman abilities. Contrary to what people may believe, they don’t fear crucifixes or garlic, either. Only silver and sunlight are a threat to them, but they’ve learned to avoid both of those things pretty well.

But in spite of what they say, they need us. For one, we supply them with our blood. But also – and maybe more importantly – they feed on our fear. They are themselves too feral and too proud to be ruled and snarled at. And our obedience brings them immense satisfaction.

When I was younger, I heard a story about the will-o-the-wisps, or ‘the shimmering lights’. You could see them in the swamps at night – if you were reckless enough to travel there, and if you gave them a gift. But not just any gift. The wisps crave our sorrow, anger, hatred, and regret. Give it to them and they may guide you to treasures hidden in the marshes, left by wanderers who died there long ago… or they may lead you astray – and you’ll join the dead.

Wolves’ strength lies in the pack. And while most are no larger than five or six animals, I’ve also heard stories of a pack of thirty wolves, seen a couple of times in different parts of the valley. I imagine not even a vrakhir would have an easy time dealing with them, especially given how cunning they are.

Walking corpses… mindless, soulless, wandering without a purpose… Shells of the humans they used to be. They seem slow, but each of their blows may prove deadly. What force brought them back to life? Whose will? And is any dead man at risk of becoming such a beast?