Select A Different Topic:
Monsters
By Craddock the Hunter
There are no hard and fast rules to divide the so-called "monsters" from more natural beasts. My catalog encompasses all known classes of inhuman creatures which wield magic or possess sentience, the hideous undead, and entities known to be summoned from planes of existence alien to us. Some of the creatures listed below are neither magical, intelligent nor alien, but are included because they are known or regarded by the wise as being the creations of enchantment or manifestations of natural magics — I speak of the reaper, the sea serpent, and of rats, spiders and suchlike vermin of unusual size. A few, like the slimes, may well be creatures wholly natural, but are included because they are seldom found outside the habitats of other monsters, and therefore seldom encountered save by those like myself who seek out such dens.
If I have learned anything in my years of errant hunting, it is that the monstrous does not always equate with the evil or the daemonic. Many of the creatures below want nothing from man save that we stay well away from their demesne. Yet even as the mountain cat, which may rule the forest but must be slain in the sheep meadow, it happens betimes that mankind and "monsters" become inimical, and cannot exist in close quarters. It then becomes my function (or, more correctly now, the function of those who follow my path), to adjust the balance of nature in favor of our race. Nonetheless, as one who has seen these creatures in all their splendor and terror, I would not see them pass from the earth utterly. Even the grisly undead sometimes exist to fulfill a useful function of retribution or just vengeance. In extending his dominion over the land, I trust that man will always remember to leave space for those creatures he shares it with, even the strangest ones.
There are no hard and fast rules to divide the so-called "monsters" from more natural beasts. My catalog encompasses all known classes of inhuman creatures which wield magic or possess sentience, the hideous undead, and entities known to be summoned from planes of existence alien to us. Some of the creatures listed below are neither magical, intelligent nor alien, but are included because they are known or regarded by the wise as being the creations of enchantment or manifestations of natural magics — I speak of the reaper, the sea serpent, and of rats, spiders and suchlike vermin of unusual size. A few, like the slimes, may well be creatures wholly natural, but are included because they are seldom found outside the habitats of other monsters, and therefore seldom encountered save by those like myself who seek out such dens.
If I have learned anything in my years of errant hunting, it is that the monstrous does not always equate with the evil or the daemonic. Many of the creatures below want nothing from man save that we stay well away from their demesne. Yet even as the mountain cat, which may rule the forest but must be slain in the sheep meadow, it happens betimes that mankind and "monsters" become inimical, and cannot exist in close quarters. It then becomes my function (or, more correctly now, the function of those who follow my path), to adjust the balance of nature in favor of our race. Nonetheless, as one who has seen these creatures in all their splendor and terror, I would not see them pass from the earth utterly. Even the grisly undead sometimes exist to fulfill a useful function of retribution or just vengeance. In extending his dominion over the land, I trust that man will always remember to leave space for those creatures he shares it with, even the strangest ones.