Meet the Salt in Wounds Iconics - Briddu Yittano, (Fighter - Mutated Warrior)

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Briddu Yittano

Race: Human, Male

Age: 33

Affiliation: God-Butchers (Journeyman)


Description


Briddu Yittano is a large, heavily muscled man with brown skin, black hair and gray eyes. His face is well lined from a hard life, his most notable feature is his right arm which is an enlarged wrap of throbbing muscle, purplish and scaled where it doesn't have the look of exposed flesh. Briddu has a near-permanent scowl on his face.


Early History


Briddu grew up poor in the Hind Quarter (what would become the modern day Tail Stones District). During the 12th Meridian crisis, Briddu’s family’s hovel was one of the innumerable residences smashed by stones sent careening by the Tarrasque's tail. While his family was gathered around the dinner table, a large boulder crashed through the roof. Briddu's mother and sister were killed instantly, while the stone settled upon his screaming father’s legs. This was only the beginning of his trials.
In the days to come, as the God-Butchers worked to get the beast back under control, as leaning buildings collapsed and ankhegs stalked the Tail Stones district unchallenged; Briddu would do his best to care for his trapped father and little brother. He tried to get help to move the large stone that pinned his father, but no one would listen to the scrap of a child crying for aid amidst the cacophony of the grieving city. The boy shifted focus to just getting enough food and water for what remained of his family, on just getting through the day. When his father’s legs began to sour, Briddu assisted the older man in cutting himself free, gathered the maggots to eat away at the diseased flesh till the stumps bled again, and finally sewed and sealed the flesh with fire. After, his father was never the same and a fifteen year old Briddu vowed that he would die before he would ever be diminished in such a fashion.
After, he spent every dawn waiting for hours in the long 'relief' lines, trying to get through the crowd of panicking refugees to beg for his family’s ration of water and gristle-hard Tarrasque jerky.
As the monsters and brigands were (mostly) cleared from the streets and the Tail Stones District was returned to a semblance of order, Briddu found work where he could. In an effort to rejuvenate their tarnished image, the God-Butchersbegan a large scale recruitment drive, specifically targeting the lower classes. The teenaged Briddu leapt at the chance to join.

The Development of a God Butcher


Even on an apprentice’s salary, Briddu earned enough to provide for his maimed father and sensitive brother, and he has continued to support them ever since.
Briddu quickly rose through the ranks of the God-Butchers; getting up sooner, working harder, striving to be better and always pushing through the hardships like a man possessed. If he became strong enough, then he’d never have to feel the fear, the vulnerability of being that beggar boy from the Tail Stones ever just three days away from watching his little brother die of thirst. By the time he reached journeyman status, Briddu had gained a reputation as a tough-as-horn burke who worked without quitting and terrified his underlings while deferring to his betters. He spent some time serving on several different meridian details until he’d finally gained enough ‘yay’ votes from other God-Butchers to attempt the Rite of Mutual Recognition.

The Great Failure

Everyone expected Briddu to pass the Rite of Mutual Recognition without incident. But when he stared into the eyes of the Tarrasque he saw the boy he was; trembling, afraid in the ruins of a home while his father wept. In the beast’s pupil, the scared child he’d denied so long stared back at him. He tried to ignore his fear, charged forward to sever the tongue anyway. But his footing was off, and the delay of a single stutter step caught him in the beast’s jaws.
The Tarrasque tore off and consumed his right arm and shoulder, tossed him away like he was nothing more than the Tail Stones trash he always secretly believed himself to be. As Briddu bled out, struggling to use his greatsword to prop himself up to stand, his God-Butcher brothers & sisters rushed in to help him; screaming for the surgeon-alchemists.
Applying a pancreatic poultice to his ruined shoulder, the healers only intended to staunch the bleeding. While limited regeneration is not unknown when using Tarrasque derived alchemy, it many Briddu included, when the limb grew back in its current form. Briddu Yittano is the most successful such recovery to date, so much so that he was able to resume his duties as journeyman God-Butcher, dedicating himself to retaking the Rite of Mutual-Recognition.

Behavior

Briddu has a tremendous chip on his (disfigured) shoulder, due in equal parts to his personal history, his failure in the Rite of Mutual-Recognition, and his sensitivity about his appearance. As such, he uses his status of God-Butcher as well as his own obvious martial prowess to bully his way through life deferring only to Master God-Butchers. Briddu regularly picks fights, is belligerently drunk on blood wine much of the time he’s not actively working.

Goals

To pass the Rite of Mutual-Recognition, either by growing strong enough or by gaining some unknown advantage.

Plot Hooks/GM Uses

1. Briddu is best encountered by the party when they are at much lower levels than him. Perhaps he does the classic shoulder bump, pushing past a PC to demonstrate his power; maybe ignoring them or demanding an apology.
2. The party might be hired to abduct Briddu, the miraculous recovery of a limb stronger than what he had before is of great interest to several local alchemists who would like nothing more than to dissect him.
3. Briddu could hire the party to help him pass the rite of mutual recognition, alternately this contract may be arranged by a benefactor looking for leverage over a Master God-Butcher (this could be accomplished by stealthily reflecting sunlight into its eye with a giant, hidden mirror or secretly suppressing, wounding, or distracting the beast when Briddu is supposed to be facing it alone).
4. Briddu might be involved in the criminal underworld, using his status as God-Butcher to engage in ‘light’ smuggling or using his fearsome appearance for enforcement. In such a role, he could be either be an obstacle or questionable ‘ally’ for the party depending on their activity.

Art by Jeffrey Chen

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Salt in Wounds - Overview & Origin

The City of Salt in Wounds

Lawful Evil Metropolis

Statistics

Corruption +7; Crime +4; Economy +15; Law -6; Lore +3; Society +8
Qualities Plagued, Notorious, Cosmopolitan, Tourist Attraction, Prosperous
Danger +15
Government Oligarchy
Population 155,000 (Incredibly diverse)

Approaching the City

Everyone knows how the City of Salt in Wounds came about. But for those who have not visited in person, it is hard to conceive of the scale of the place. It is even harder for outsiders to understand how wholly the economic engine of butchering the bound Tarrasque has transformed the society of Salt in Wounds and reshaped the surrounding landscape.

Upon approach to the city, the first thing a traveler will note is the sounds of the monster screaming. Its roar echoes

Tarrasque-Fed Mutations

 

The essence of the Tarrasque bleeds out into Salt in Wounds and the surrounding landscape, reshaping the creatures that live there. These changes can affect both mindless beast and sentient citizen alike. Mutations are commonly gained through drinking Tarrasque blood tainted 'red water' and thus particularly common amongst the most impoverished citizens and wild creatures who do not have access to imported water.

Mutations can also be gained

The Ghouls of Salt in Wounds

Despite the more poetically minded chroniclers claiming that the entire city is comprised of ghouls and parasites, literal ghouls comprise only a small percentage of the population of Salt in Wounds. While the statecraft of 5th House has gained them begrudging legal acceptance by the legislators (aka the other meridian houses) they are still largely despised and feared by the general population.
The primary legal argument that 5th House presented to justify the legalized creation of ghouls is that issues of ghoul attacks/violence is driven by unsated hunger for flesh, which -they argued- would never

Coins of Salt in Wounds

While awash with foreign money, as a point of pride Salt in Wounds mints their own coinage. The currency of the city features several distinct features. First, these copper, silver, gold and platinum tokens do not sport portraits but instead are pressed with famous phrases, maxims, and laws spouted by the aristocracy: which phrase is selected for placement on this year’s platinum (and -to a lesser degree- other metals) is a source of much competition and political maneuvering by the Binder-Lords.

In addition, the center of each coin features a small conical point on one side with a small hollow that can accommodate another coin’s point on the reverse face. These are referred to as the ‘tip’ and ‘divet’ respectively. This construction makes Salt in Wounds coins easy to stack securely on top of one another (useful for quick counting and pushing stacks of coin back and forth across a table without risk of toppling). Coins are usually kept in neat rows within pouches with reinforced corners. Out of towners can often be identified by how they improperly shove coins into their pockets where they are liable to jut uncomfortably into flesh (or poke out of fabric). However, some especially cautious merchants are known to deliberately keep the tips of their coin stacks pressing into their skin to be aware if there’s a change in weight resulting from a visit by one of Salt in Wound’s notorious pickpockets or as part of a religious practice known as ‘merchant’s penance.’

Slang Related to Coins

To ‘know the pain of their stack’ refers to an individual with business acumen or is otherwise good with money.

When discussing transactions or jobs; commerce can be described as ‘tip’ which means ‘above board’ and can be discussed openly, while ‘divet’ dealings are secretive, under the table, and usually of dubious legality (if not wholly black market).

Slang Terms for the Denominations of Coin

Copper | Spike

Silver | Scale

Gold | Bone

Platinum | Horn

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Salt in Wounds Map

Inexpensive, poor quality maps like this one are mass-produced by slave-scribes and sold (or even given freely) to visitors and the curious the world over. They are usually further annotated with different taverns, merchants, and lodging locations claiming to be the best (but ultimately determined by kickbacks received by the map making shop).

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The Wyvern Siege and the ‘All Consumption’ Doctrine

In 67 AB, a human mercenary warlord named Segund the Wyvern King (so called for his command of two dozen of the creatures) set his eyes to conquer the booming town of Salt in Wounds. Leading an army of 10000 (bolstered by the aforementioned Wyverns and other magical support), the brilliant logician managed to scale the steep track to Salt in Wounds with only a minimal loss of life. Before him, he faced hastily conscripted forces of around 2000 militia, mercenaries, and irregulars and so –confident of an easy victory- the general was already plotting how to best leverage this conquest for further gains.
As the army grew closer, Salt in Wounds

11 Crimes and their Punishments

The city of Salt in Wounds tends to have extremely harsh penalties for infractions (although imprisonment or hard labor are almost never used). The most common punishments are fines (even for serious crimes for those who can afford it) followed by flogging,

Surrounding Locations

The Laboratory of Dr. Mundacri Dr. Mundacri is (possibly was) one of the finest alchemists of this age who left Salt in Wounds to pursue their research outside of the city’s environs (and in a more controlled environment) by setting up shop in a derelict manor and orchard that had been abandoned when the taint of the Tarrasque soured the land. Provided with men & material, the brilliant researcher vivisected dozens of mutated vagrants and hundreds of exotic beasts to divine their secrets. Before their correspondence with some

Dwergo Alchemical Revenants

Dwergo are the ‘true dwarves’ of legend; six foot, 500 hundred plus pound savants who lost their war against the elves after suffering from a reproductive curse that caused them only to be able to give birth to the greatly diminished dwarves of the modern era. They have been extinct extinct for 2000 years.
In their ruins below Salt in Wounds –the deepest rooms of the CapCaps- a frigid tomb was discovered by explorers which held the preserved corpses of several thousand Dwergo; many of which featured intricate clockwork prosthesis. Knowledge of this discovery

Sage's Row

Sage's Row is a series of interlocking streets famed for its preponderance of alchemists as well as other researchers of the arcane and mundane alike. By city edict, every other building sports tall smoke stacks - venting clouds of colored fog and ash of variable toxicity. Most times, a breeze takes the offending miasma and disperses it harmlessly... though if

10 Delicacies of Salt in Wounds

Five-Roast Five-Roast is a stirge stuffed in a singing house-lizard stuffed in a hatchet beak stuffed in a juvenile remora flea stuffed in an axe beak. Before encasing it in the next layer, each animal is cleaned, skinned/plucked, coated in

Colors, Symbols & Iconography of Salt in Wounds

As a polyglot metropolis, Salt in Wounds is awash with color, symbols, and imagery imported from dozens of ethnicities and cultures. However, certain motifs carry over into the sigils, seals, and other identifying marks of the aristocratic houses, merchant guilds, and those belonging to high profile individuals.
Of course, imagery

5 New Monsters: Hatchet Beaks, Infiltrex Harpies, Alchemical Oblate, Stunted Stone Giant, Clot

Hatchet Beak

This diminutive subspecies of axe beak (a supposed cross-bread with blood hawks) is a creature common to Salt in Wounds although many more thousands have been exported in recent years. These riding dog sized birds can readily serve as mounts for small creatures in addition to providing home & property defense or even serve to bolster militia forces. While not

Ramora Fleas

These gigantic vermin –roughly the size of a horse- are one of dozens of native species of parasite & symbiote that live upon or within the Tarrasque. However, they are one species that has managed to thrive even post-binding and represent a continued threat to the citizens of Salt in Wounds and its environs. Ramora Fleas resemble exactly a titanic version of an ordinary flea that can be glimpsed under a magnifying lens; all chitonous plates and oversized legs. When not feeding upon the Tarrasque, they can grasp a creature with their forelimbs before plunging their mouthparts into flesh, and their ravenous thirst can drain a man in less than a minute. They are also capable of leaping hundreds of feet, even whilst holding a screaming duergar.
Due to their mobility, Ramora Fleas represent a fast moving hazard to the entirety of the city and beyond. God-Butchers regularly scour the surface of the Tarrasque to kill these creatures and destroy their eggs; issuing city-wide warnings when they plan to disturb a patch of the things… anticipating that dozens if not hundreds will flee over the walls of the fortress Salzinwuun into the districts beyond. Certain individuals with racial or magical control over vermin prize these creatures as incredibly powerful servants and mounts.


(For some of my thoughts about the size of Salt in Wounds' Tarrasque/how horse sized creatures could hide on it - check out some of my design notes here.)


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The Marrow Miners & Mirayda of the Five Cask Clan (GM Knowledge)

Note: this post includes *excessive* 'secret' information about Salt in Wounds. GMs welcome. If you ever plan on *playing* in a Salt in Wounds game you might want to skip this post.

The Capcaps

Almost everyone has heard about the tunnels and passageways that riddle the earth below the city of Salt in Wounds – the so called ‘Capcaps.’ Unfortunately, much of what is ‘known’ is incorrect, the product of speculation, heresay, and unsubstantiated rumor liable to get a would be explorer hopelessly lost.

The Capcaps are an odd mix of ever-changing ankheg hunting-tunnels, the ruined vaults and halls of the abandoned

Races of Salt in Wounds

These are the most common races in Salt in Wounds and what sort of place they make for themselves in the city.




Human Humans are the most common race of Salt in Wounds and dominate most power structures. However, given the incredible diversity of the city, it is important to note that they are not the majority, merely the largest minority. Notably, humans of dozens upon dozens of ethnicities live and work in the city. Common wisdom holds

Salt in Wounds and the Wider World | Synoma – The Fantasy Cold War

(Note: Salt in Wounds is designed to be largely standalone, isolated, and able –with relative ease- to be plunked right into your favored game world. Just select an out of the way valley amidst the mountains –preferably somewhere you can imagine daring heroes trying to lure and ambush the Tarrasque- and Salt in Wounds can easily fit there. The city’s unique features justify it as able to function more or less anywhere. However, Salt in Wounds is officially part of Synoma which is a fantasy setting in the midst of a ‘cold war.’ The post below discusses the world of Synoma in broad strokes as well as Salt in Wound’s place there.)

Synoma: The Fantasy Cold War

Built upon the ruins of empires of old,

Adventurers in Salt in Wounds

Every region and city of the world produces adventurers; those exceptional individuals who hunt monsters, recover artifacts, thwart (or enact) magical plots, and/or otherwise deal with the issues beyond the ken of the vast majority of the population. The unique features of Salt in Wounds however ensure that certain qualities (favored tactics, abilities, and even psychological quirks) are often found in the adventurers who hail from the land that exists in the shadows of the Tarrasque. These commonalities include (but are not limited to):

• Strongly Favoring Two Handed/high damage weapons With so many monsters and threats of Salt in Wounds having some capacity for regeneration or to otherwise shrug off minor lesser blows via damage reduction, a common adaptive tactic is to simply do massive damage capable of severing limbs or cracking through the toughest armor.
• Obsession with Recovering Organs, Teeth, and Other Viscera Moreso than most of the world’s adventurers, those of SiW see great value in the parts of monsters and will take great pains to collect glands, teeth, and more… most especially for rare creatures. Even if they have no particular interest themselves, experience has taught them that there *will* be an interested alchemist who will pay well for any hitherto unknown or rare biological samples. This quirk often gives adventurers from Salt in Wounds a reputation for ghoulishness or the ‘salt stink’ – a foul aroma  emanating from packs stuffed full of rotting, improperly preserved meat.
• Solo Tactics Given the moral outlook of much of the city, it can be difficult for adventurers originating in SiW to trust one another to the degree necessary to utilize advanced, team based tactics. Most adventuring groups are short term affairs driven by a ruthless mercenary calculus/ As such, most adventurers favor developing themselves to be as self-sufficient as possible. The exceptions however are notable (see below).
• Inhuman Loyalty Group Membership is the primary survival strategy in Siw and as such the members of the various factions (God-Butchers, Merdian House, Circle of Release etc.) are nearly inhumanly loyal to whatever they view as their ‘clan.’ Those rare groups of adventurers who learn to view their party as the primary group support are legendarily devoted to their fellows, recognizing that the success of their group is the only thing that is keeping them alive in a hostile city & biome.

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