The kaorti were a "species" of warped humanoids from the Far Realm that sought to turn the Prime Material plane into a place more to their liking.[1][2]
Description[]
Kaorti on the Material plane wore form-fitting armor of thick resin and tissue to protect themselves outside of their cysts. Without the armor, kaorti roughly resembled an emaciated human with brownish green skin marked with livid red, pink, and purple swirls; the whole of the skin seemed almost transparent and liquid. The arms and legs were elongated, with three fingers and thumb on each hand, though the digits were little more than boneless tendrils. The palms of each hand constantly secreted a thick green resin.[1]
The bulbous head of a kaorti was attached to the body by a long neck, and the face (which was, thankfully, almost always hidden behind wrappings of resin) looked like that of a melted spider. Kaorti stood about 7 ft (2.1 m) tall and weighed about 100 lb (45 kg) on average.[1]
Personality[]
Kaorti were a focused people, with little interest in hobbies or idle pastimes. Instead, they were fixated on a single, species-wide goal: to pervert and corrupt the Material plane and conjoin it with the Far Realm. They had an inherent respect and admiration for arcane magic.[1]
Abilities[]
Kaortis wielded arcane magic, having a small number of spell-like abilities: once each day, they could replicate the spells color spray, comprehend languages, disguise self, feather fall, ray of enfeeblement, and spider climb; some erroneous reports spoke of them using reduce. Additionally, many kaortis had a natural sorcerous talent.[1][2]
Horribly, kaortis possessed the ability to transform other humanoids into more kaorti or kaorti thralls (horrific, pseudonatural mockeries of their former selves). The transformation took eight hours, and required the victim to be either willing or, more likely, helpless, and for the kaorti's jaws to be locked onto the victim the entire time. The transformation was both physical and psychological, though the victim kept any prior training in the fighting or arcane arts; it was also the only way kaortis had to propagate their species. It was possible for particularly hardy individuals to resist the transformation, though that did not prevent the kaortis from trying again; even more rarely, the transformation was only physical in nature and not also psychological.[1]
The great vulnerability of the kaorti was that, outside of their cysts or resin suits, the Material plane caused them pain and fatigue, eventually killing them if they could not protect themself.[1]
Combat[]
The kaorti preferred to rely on magic during a fight, sending transformed minions and servant-monsters into melee in their stead. If magic failed, a kaorti would attempt to use ranged weapons; if that also failed and melee was inevitable, they would flee if possible.[1] Their physical weaknesses made them poor fighters in melee.[2]
Society[]
Kaortis lived in both the Far Realm and on the Prime Material plane, though nothing was known of their society and ecology on the former. In the Material plane, kaortis lived either underground or in remote surface regions, preferring captured ruins, where they built their hideous cysts: networks of tubes and chambers made of kaorti resin, inside of which kaorti were protected from the damage normally caused by the Material plane. Most kaorti cysts housed only a few dozen kaorti; when a cyst reached five dozen members, two dozen of those would leave on a pilgrimage to establish another cyst elsewhere. Some of the oldest cysts, however, ceased to send out such pilgrimages and instead focused on the creation of thrall races. Nonhumanoid victims transformed into pseuodonatural thralls made up the majority of a cyst's defenders.[1]
The landscape around a kaorti cyst, with a rukanyr visible on the left, a skybleeder overhead, and a line of captives in chains being lead into the cyst itself.
Once a cyst was established, kaortis from the cyst would go out, alone or in small groups, to seek victims. They used their spell-like abilities to blend in with regular humanoids, infiltrating towns and villages to first gather information, and then to abduct people. Kaortis chose as their initial victims people whose disappearances would not be noticed: mainly vagabonds and scoundrels, prostitutes, and street urchins. These unfortunate people were taken back to the cyst as prisoners. Prisoners of the kaorti were treated well (that is, fed and kept in "comfortable" quarters) as long as the kaorti believed the prisoner had useful information to give; once a prisoner was deemed to have revealed all useful information, they were quickly scheduled for transformation.[1][2]
Relationships[]
Kaortis created rukanyrs and skybleeders as thralls to aid and further their goal of corrupting the Material plane,[1] and kaortic hulks as shock troops. They also brought with them creatures such as half-farspawn, amoebic crawlers, nightseeds, and urquirsh back from the Far Realm.[2][3]
History[]
During the Dawn Ages, elves created the Vast Gate in an attempt to make travel anywhere instantaneous and to see what lay beyond the works of the gods. In doing so, the Vast Gate created a tiny opening into the Far Realm that allowed for an invasion from that plane's inhabitants. The Vast Gate was sealed forever, but the opening into the Material Plane from the Far Realm remained and slowly grew.[2]
A group of Imaskari wizards who called themselves the Quin (the Roushoum word for 'entitled'), discovered ancient tablets detailing the elves' quest for reality beyond reality. Working from what little magical lore remained on these tablets, the Quin created the Quinspire in a much-publicized attempt to bring new magic from the other reality back to Imaskar.[2]
The Quin succeeded but within minutes of their arrival, they had attracted the attention of a vast elder evil known as Zurguth. Zurguth's mere proximity to the unfortunate men transformed the Quin into the first kaortis. Imaskar soon forgot the Quin and little, if any, of their research survived. Part of the kaorti's alien minds recalled something of their previous existence however. This vague memory eventually spurred them to investigate faint traces of Material Plane residue left by the Quinspire, which they traced back to its source with their magic. When they rediscovered the Prime Material, they found it inimical to their existence and were struck by an all-consuming urge to transform it into a place more hospitable to them.[2]
Appendix[]
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External Links[]
- Random Encounters: The Kaorti Ubercyst, one of the oldest, largest, and most powerful kaorti cysts.
References[]
- ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 Eric Cagle, Jesse Decker, James Jacobs, Erik Mona, Matthew Sernett, Chris Thomasson, and James Wyatt (April 2003). Fiend Folio. (Wizards of the Coast), p. 108. ISBN 0-7869-2780-1.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 2.7 James Jacobs (August 2007). “The Ecology of the Kaorti”. In Erik Mona ed. Dragon #358 (Wizards of the Coast), pp. 58–63.
- ↑ Bruce Cordell (April 2005). “Enter the Far Realm”. In Erik Mona ed. Dragon #330 (Paizo Publishing, LLC), p. 20–40.