Ridgeback

In the earliest days of the verdancy many mountain-dwelling folk considered themselves divinely spared from the forest that ate the world. Unfortunately, their sanctuaries quickly turned to graveyards; the harsher weather and lack of food meant that many died from exposure and disease, and those that clung on too often found dark solace in cults or cannibalism.

Those days are over now, for the most part, but their influence still shows. Those raised on the ridgebacks are built larger and stronger than their kin, and often worship strange, tenuous godlings.

Sturdy Ground

Unlike most on the wildsea, children growing up in ridgeback communities did so with solid ground under their feet and interaction with the waves around them as an option rather than a necessity. Despite their colonies being larger than most they produce comparatively few sailors, with most drawn to tasks making use of their unique environment - mining, stoneworking, smithing and cattle-herding.

Gods for the Godless

While many small settlements (and even some larger cultures) have deities and godlings that they worship or sacrifice to, organised religion is a rarity on the rustling waves. Ridgeback communities are more likely than most to have preserved the pre-verdant idea of warring higher powers and omnipotent watchers, but even these ideas become corrupt or debase over time. Bestial iconography is common, as are stories of divine punishment.

Questions to Consider

When you incorporate elements of the ridgeback into your character, consider the following questions…

• Did you settle a mountaintop island post-verdancy, or did your ancestors flee to one in the chaos of the event itself?
• The ridgeback life often tough and uncompromising. What lasting scar do you have from what you thought would be a harmless task?
• What animals are tended to on your safe-stone home, and why? For milk, meat, wool or something else entirely?

Alternate Presentations

To keep the ‘stable ground’ feeling of the ridgeback while divorcing it from the mountains, consider the hide or carapace of a slow moving leviathan as foundation for a community. On the other hand, running with the concept of life being a superstitious struggle, a ridgeback community could easily exist on a spire of rock trapped at the edge of a rift or shankfall, a great empty darkness perpetually beneath them.