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====== The Great Sand Seas ====== ===== The Land =====

==== Cli­mate & Ter­rain ==== Sand, lots of it. Great deserts with bare­ly any rain year round. Some small moun­tain chain­s. Clifts near the shore­line. An­cient car­a­van routes link the few oa­sis and springs. A few wadis­(dry riverbed­s) rush with wa­ter af­ter the in­fre­quent but in­tense rain­s.

==== Flo­ra & Fau­na ==== Very lit­tle veg­e­ta­tion grows any­where out­side of oa­sis and a few scat­tered dry river­s. It ex­plodes in­to life for a few weeks af­ter the rare rain fall­s.

Preda­tors are sparse but dead­ly.

Mon­sters are com­mon in the deep desert­s, the moun­tains and far too fre­quent­ly en­coun­tered on the car­a­van routes.

Drag­ons are known to live in the moun­tains as well as in des­o­late sand dunes.

Grif­fons are na­tive to the rock­y/hilly ar­eas sur­round­ing the dune sea.

===== The Peo­ple ===== The Babrem have plied the car­a­van routes for long, long time. At least a thou­sand years and per­haps as much as two thou­sand. They have com­mon roots with the Qa­trun shar­ing the same lan­guage but their cul­tures are very dif­fer­en­t.

They are “at one” with the desert en­vi­ron­ment and their cam­mel­s. Babrem are ex­perts with thi­er com­pos­ite short­bows. Many a proud war­rior has been brought low by hails of ar­rows de­liv­ered from cam­mel­back.

Scim­i­tars and curvied rapiers are their typ­i­cal arm­s. Their dag­gers are al­so curved and work like Kukri. The stan­dard desert out­fit is equiv to padded ar­mor. Leather and scale is al­so used. Chain­mails are bought from Fist or tak­en off their dead war­riors.

Al­so call­ing these deserts home are the mys­te­ri­ous Arite.

==== Pop­u­la­tion ==== No one knows for sure and most do not care but there is prob­a­bly around 6-10 thou­sand Babrem still fol­low­ing the no­madic life­style. Three times that num­ber liv­ing in the cities of Fist.

The Arite pop­u­la­tion is any­one’s most schol­ars as­sume it can’t be too many cause what could they all be liv­ing on in the de­sert?

=== No­mad Clans === == Kaldun Ma­jid == This mil­i­taris­tic clan has been heav­i­ly in­flu­enced by Fist. Many of their mem­bers have moved to Qa­trun cities. Their war­riors serve as scouts and mer­cha­naries amoung the armies of Fist. They live by hunt­ing, herd­ing, and raid­ing oth­er clan­s.

Their trib­al garb is a red Tur­ban with black trim.

“There are many paths to Un­der­stand­ing, the wise tred them al­l.”

== Thukir == Small clan who re­vere as holy gifts of na­ture the oases that dot the track­less wastes of the Dune Seas. The Thukir de­fend the wa­ter­s, al­low­ing all who wish to drink, but de­ny any at­tempt to con­trol the oa­sis­es. They al­so pro­tect the an­i­mals and plants that vis­it or make their homes in he oasies. Hunt­ing or de­struc­tive agri­cul­ture is not tol­er­at­ed.

The pri­ma­ry oa­sis guards are an or­der of druids all trac­ing their lin­eages to Ab­dul-Bar­i, ser­vent of the cre­ator. The com­ming of age rite for these guards is called the wis­dom quest, trav­el­ing the world to ex­pe­ri­ence the true breadth and depth of na­ture.

Their trib­al garb is green and red

==== Cul­ture ==== The Babrem of the deserts fol­low a prim­ia­tive no­madic life­style. Cen­tral to their sur­vival and hence cul­ture are their herds of cam­mel­s. There are cou­ple dozen trib­al af­fil­i­a­tion­s. Some tribes fight each oth­er con­stant­ly oth­ers are more friend­ly. Their so­ci­ety is chau­vanis­tic and patrichial.

Babrem or­ga­nize them­selves in­to lar­gish clans 100-200 mem­bers all of the same tribe. Typ­i­cal­ly all the mem­bers of sev­er­al ex­tend­ed fam­i­lies. Clans are gen­er­aly friend­ly with oth­er clans of the same tribe. But life in the desert is hard and some­times it’s you or them.

==== Re­li­gion ==== Gen­er­al­ized na­ture wor­ship (i.e. dru­di­cal) is prel­e­van­t. Oth­er Babrem are shaman­is­tic, wor­ship­ing el­men­tal na­ture forces/­god Fire, Air, Mtns, de­sert, some re­vere drag­on­s.

== Zorster == Fire

== Ib­lis == An an­cient Jin­n. Mad with ha­tred and jeal­ous­ly over man’s suc­cess­es. He con­stant­ly tempts men with sin­full ideas and false sug­ges­tion­s. Wish­ing noth­ing more than to see them suf­fer from their own hand.

Ib­lis is al­so gen­er­al term for “evil” and all bad things in the world.

== Haizum == Fa­bled white, flam­ming, winged, spir­i­tu­al horse. The per­son­al mount of myth­i­cal hero Ah­mad.

== Ah­mad == Myth­i­cal war­rior and “fa­ther” of the Babrem. De­feat­ed Ib­lis and cast him from the lands of man.

===== The Gov­ern­ment ===== There is none to speak of. The var­i­ous tribes take care of them­selves. There aren’t typ­i­cal­ly trib­al lead­ers even. The heads­man of each clan be­ing the high­est au­thor­i­ty known.

==== Law & Or­der ==== Laws are sim­i­lar with slight trib­al vari­a­tions amongst the Babrem. It is based on an­cient tra­di­tions of vendet­ta and blood price.

Or­der and safe­ty are large­ly de­pen­dant on how large of a stick one car­ries.

==== Trade & Com­merce ==== Trade is vir­tu­al­ly the on­ly but very lu­cra­tive ac­tiv­i­ty. Trans­port­ing vaula­ble goods be­tween Fist, Sunesh, Pelos, and the Old King­dom. Is the pri­ma­ry oc­cu­pa­tion of most Babrem no­mad­s. Ban­dit­ry be­ing the on­ly close com­peitor.

==== Mil­i­tary ==== There is no or­ga­nized mil­i­tary. But gen­er­al­ly all the able males of a tribe are war­riors. Dead­ly with bow and lance atop their cam­mel­s.