#sarrukh

Like the legendary Shandaular, the ruined city of Ilimar is divided between the two ends of a portal. 

The portal’s northern terminus lies in the western reaches of the Gulthmere Forest, near the southern shore of the Lake of the Long Arm. 

This set of ruins is the domain of giant spiders and serpent-bodied lamia nobles descended from the infamous Nessmara, who recovered the Maguscepter and reigned as Westgate’s queen from 615 DR to 616 DR.

The portal’ssouthern terminus lies on the eastern slopes of Muaroghal (the East Wall of Halruaa), north of the Great Swamp of Rethild. 

This portion of the ruined city is ruled by a circle of spirit nagas who are worshiped as gods by the lizardfolk tribes of the Great Swamp.

Millennia ago, Ilimar was founded by a minor clan of sarrukh whose members served as slave procurers for the great empires of Isstosseffifil and Mhairshaulk. Three Ilimari sarrukh who have been in hibernation since before the drow conquest of Dambrath still lie buried amidst the southern ruins. 

The southernmost empire of the sarrukh was Mhairshaulk, which was founded about -34,800 DR and extended westward from the Lhairghal to the Jungles of Chult. The Mhairshaulkans are believed to have created nagas, pterafolk, and troglodytes, as well as numerous other races long since lost. The yuan-ti were the results of experiments that joined primitive humans with the sarrukh of Mhairshaulk, with varying amounts of serpent blood added to the mix.

Unlike such contemporaries as Isstosseffifil and Okoth, sarrukh-ruled Mhairshaulk declined gradually, sinking slowly into somnolence circa - 33,500 DR. The sarrukh slowly dwindled in number, and one by one, the remaining individuals entered a cycle of extended hibernation alternating with brief periods of activity. As the great clans of the sarrukh withdrew from the daily governance of their realm, Mhairshaulk increasingly became the preserve of the yuan-ti. Although the theocratic vrael olo ruled the heart of Mhairshaulk for millennia, the rising empires of the batrachi and aearee ensured that the yuan-ti would never achieve the dominance that their creators had enjoyed.

By the close of the Time of Dragons (circa -24,000 DR), yuan-ti-ruled Mhairshaulk had all but collapsed, thanks to repeated assaults on its cities by the great wyrms of the south. Around this time, an army of winged serpents known as couatls appeared in the Jungles of Chult from lands to the west, called into service by the god Ubtao. In the centuries that followed, these rival creations of the sarrukh battled each other for control of the peninsula. Time and again the yuan-ti were forced to concede their westernmost holdings to the couatls, until the war ended in a stalemate with the Hazur Mountains as the dividing line.

For millennia thereafter, the Chultan Peninsula remained the preserve of powerful individual serpentfolk, but no organized empires existed there. Around the time of Netheril's founding, the couatls began to decline precipitously in number, so they decided to seek out another race to keep the western end of the Chultan Peninsula free of yuan-ti influence. Eventually, they settled on the human tribes of a distant continent to the southwest and preached to them the teachings of Ubtao. The Eshowe, the Tabaxi, and the Thinguth tribes, as well as several others that accepted Ubtao's message, followed the winged serpents in a great pilgrimage across the seas to the Jungles of Chult in -2809 DR.

The tribes landed on the Wild Coast and marched inland to the Peaks of Flame, where the avatar of Ubtao welcomed them. After all but a handful of winged serpents had withdrawn from southwestern Faerûn, the Father of Chult's avatar founded the great city of Mezro in -2637 DR. He dwelt there for a time among the Tabaxi, the greatest of the tribes, while the other tribes scattered throughout the jungles. Eventually the Father of Dinosaurs withdrew, but not before imbuing Chult itself with a portion of his essence. As an unintended consequence of this action, a shadow of Ubtao was released into the ground.

Without the direct rule of the Father of Chult, a great war broke out among the tribes, lasting from the Year of Dripping Daggers (-438 DR) to the Year of Unleashed Sorrow (-122 DR). During the conflict, the Eshowe released the Shadow Giant from the floor of the Valley of Lost Honor. After nearly destroying Mezro and the Tabaxi, the giant (who was called Eshowdow) turned on the Eshowe and nearly annihilated them. The remaining tribes (except the Eshowe and the Thinguth) were assimilated into the Tabaxi, tribe, whose diverse peoples became known collectively as Chultans

The arrival of the Chultans, who lived free of oppression, indirectly inspired a revolt among the Lapal tribes that had been serving the yuan-ti as slaves. After centuries of scattered uprisings, the Lapaliiyans finally escaped in -1732 DR, fleeing north and east to the lands now claimed by Lapaliiya and Halruaa. Deprived of their slave race, the yuan-ti were forced to capture tribes of lizardfolk from the Great Swamp of Rethild and bring them back to the shores of the Lapal Sea and the Thingulph.

In the Year of Netted Dreams (-320 DR), the Hss'tafi tribe of yuan-ti was magically called to the ruins of Ss'thar'tiss'ssun by the ophidians of Najara. The tribe's disappearance from its traditional holdings on the western shores of the Lapal Sea upset the long-standing status quo among the neighboring yuan-ti tribes, precipitating two decades of intense warfare amongst the remaining yuan-ti in Mhairshaulk. When civil war threatened to destroyed the ranks of his remaining worshipers, the long-somnolent Merrshaulk responded by dispatching a winged avatar named Sseth through one of the portals beneath the Peaks of Flame in the Year of Erupting Crypts (-304 DR).

Under the guidance of Sseth, the yuan-ti forged the empire of Serpentes on the ruins of Mhairshaulk. Because the Lapal states had been severely weakened by the Empire Plague (-375 DR), the yuan-ti tribes had no trouble conquering all the lands from the Lhairghal to the Peaks of Flame by the Year of Sunned Serpents (-189 DR). Sseth's reign as emperor of Serpentes abruptly ended in the Year of Dreams (10 DR), when he vanished beneath the Peaks of Flame. Some say that his disappearance resulted from a failed attempt to unleash Dendar the Night Serpent and thus end the world; others say he withdrew deliberately to undergo apotheosis. Whatever the reason for his departure, the clergy of Sseth began to venerate their vanished emperor as Merrshaulk reborn. The once-allied tribes of yuan-ti began to feud over who should succeed their one and only emperor while the empire collapsed around them.

In the centuries since the fall of Serpentes, the yuan-ti tribes have continued to dominate the Mhair and the Black Jungles, and to a lesser extent the lands now claimed by Samarach and Thindol. Nominal rule of the peninsula, however, passed to the nation of Tashtan, then to the Shoon Imperium, and then to the individual kingdoms of Lapaliiya, Samarach, the Tashalar, and Thindol. Although the yuan-ti have never agreed upon a new emperor of Serpentes, the tribes have begun to work in concert once again, collectively exerting influence over many of the surrounding states.

The Time of Troubles brought new energy to the serpentfolk when the avatar of Sseth reappeared briefly above the waters of the Lapal Sea just before battling the dinosaur-avatar of Ubtao on the eastern edge of the Jungles of Chult. But after the Avatar Crisis, Set and the traitorous Okothian sarrukh bound the Great Serpent in a slumber of endless nightmares. Once again the yuan-ti are actively seeking to subjugate the human realms of the Chultan Peninsula and the Shining Sea. 

During first era of the Days of Thunder (more than 35,000 years ago), the sarrukh ruled over all Faerûn, centring their power in three major empires. The first and easternmost of these was Okoth, founded circa –35,000 DR along the forested shores of Azulduth, which was then the largest freshwater lake in Faerûn. 

Like their kin in Isstosseffifil and Mhairshaulk, the Okothians created many races in their own image, including lizardfolk and others long since vanished.

Okoth crumbled after less than a millennium, when a devastating civil war forced its feuding great clans to flee across the planes. The races they had created were left behind to find their own homelands and survive as best they could. 

During their plane-walking, the Okothian sarrukh experienced alternating periods of growth and decline. Several millennia ago, in the Barrens of Doom and Despair, they chanced upon a reptilian race known as the khaastas, which they incorrectly assumed to be descended from their own lizardfolk creations. An ill-considered attempt to enslave these creatures resulted in a war between the two races that raged for centuries. When the tide turned in favour of the khaastas, the Okothian sarrukh fled across the planes with their foes at their heels.

In the Year of the Nesting Harpy (643 DR), Nezram the Transmuter, author of the famed spell tome boastfully entitled Unique Mageries, left his tower on the western shore of Lake Azulduth to explore the outer planes. Nearly forty years later, most of his Mulan descendants were scattered or slain when a young green dragon named Chaathuuladroth tore apart Nezram’s Tower in the Year of the Zombie Lords (681 DR).

The victorious dragon flew off to the lonely, mountainous regions to the west with most of Nezram’s treasures. Unbeknownst to anyone else, Nezram had spent a great deal of time studying the ancient legacies of Okoth and knew of the sarrukh. When he discovered an ancient portal in the depths of Azulduth, he passed through it in hopes of discovering what had become of these once-mighty creatures. Nezram’s fate is not recorded, but an ancient warding spell alerted the scattered sarrukh clans to the use of their long forgotten portal and prompted at least one group to return secretly to Faerûn in the Year of the Rampaging Raaserpents (699 DR) to investigate.

In the centuries that followed, increasing numbers of Okothian sarrukh returned to their ancient homeland in hopes of evading the vengeful armies of the khaastas. 

Amidst the ruins of their former empire, the Okothians hoped to recover their long-buried weapons and hide long enough to rebuild their strength.

The latter’s wish came to naught when the first khaasta raiding party passed through the portal in the Year of the Gate (1341 DR). Although the sarrukh managed to close the ancient portaland destroy the raiders before they could alert their fellows, the disappearance of this group drew additional bands of khaastas to Faerûn in subsequent years.

During the Time of Troubles (1358 DR), the Okothians secretly approached the divine minions of Set with a brazenly treacherous offer: In exchange for assisting Set in binding their god Sseth into eternal slumber, the Mulhorandi Lord of Evil would grant the sarrukh spells and aid them in their ancient battle with the khaastas. 

Set accepted their proposal and created the first wereserpents to mark the agreement. He also convinced his sometimes-ally Sebek to send a host of werecrocodiles up the River of Swords to serve in the Okothians’ army.

Today, the Okothian sarrukh and the khaastas have reached a détente of sorts. The khaastas continue to dispatch raiding bands to Faerûn, but the Okothian sarrukh continue to hold them off, thanks to their newfound patron and an army of lesser allies. 

The sarrukh empire of Isstosseffifil is all but gone. Its ancient secrets were destroyed by the phaerimms and the folly of the Isstossef (as the inhabitants were known), scattered by the Netherese, and buried by the drifting sands of Anauroch.

In its heyday, the Land of the Lost Sea ran along the eastern shores of the old Narrow Sea, encompassing the fertile lands that stretched from what is now the Saiyaddar to the High Ice and from the water’s edge to the Plain of Standing Stones.

Today, all that remains of this once-great empire is the buried city of Orem.

The sixty sarrukh liches of Oreme are ancient even by the standards of most undead. Only one, always known as King Oreme, is awake at any given time to fulfill the duties of monarch.

The remainder lie in repose in the Crypt of Dreaming Lizards, dreaming of lands long lost and awaiting their turns to rule.

Ancient contingency spells ensure that all the liches wake up if any real danger threatens the city, or if the currently awake lich is destroyed or incapacitated. The current ruler can also awaken all of his companions at once with a single mental command.

The current King Oreme spends his time in much the same way as his predecessors did, scrying events of interest to reptiles in Faerûn and recording his observations in the city’s vast library.

The asabis that guard the city are largely left to rule themselves, although the currently awake lich can be persuaded to intervene if the tribal council cannot reach agreement about an issue.

The asabis and stingtails that make up the vast majority of the population are organized into tribal mercenary companies.

Each tribe is controlled by an asabi chief, who gains control by allying with the tribe’s most powerful stingtails. All the chiefs serve on the Council of Chiefs, which answers only to King Oreme.

The liches of Oreme keep only enough asabis and stingtails in the city to ensure its defense and maintain a viable breeding population.

According to sarrukh mythology, the World Serpent came to the sarrukh when they were still savages, offering to teach them the secrets of magic, civilization, and power. All that he demanded in return was that they worship him and offer sacrifices to him.

The sarrukh agreed to his terms and were rewarded for their loyalty with great knowledge and power.

During the heyday of their empires, all sarrukh worshiped the World Serpent. As they expanded outward into Faerûn, they forced the populations they conquered into the worship of the World Serpent as well. 

This practice made enemies not only of the dominated races, but also of their gods.

The Fragmentation of the World Serpent

At the height of the sarrukh empires, the World Serpent literally fragmented into an entire pantheon, each deity of which was a different aspect of himself. 

Sages agree that this event was precipitated by the conflicting needs and demands of an ever more diverse base of worshipers.

The sarrukh’s magical research resulted in two major contributions to the development of magic in Faerûn: the Nether Scrolls and the secret of physically manipulating other creatures.

The Nether Scrolls were the results of sarrukh efforts to compile, deconstruct, and extrapolate the magic gleaned from the savages that inhabited most of Faerûn during the early days of the sarrukh empires.

Penned by the Ba’etith long after the sarrukh empires had fallen, these scrolls remain an invaluable reference today.

The second major contribution of the sarrukh was the discovery of permanent transforming magic that affects the bodies of other creatures.

This technique allowed the sarrukh to permanently transform a creature’s physical body and also grant it new extraordinary and supernatural abilities. Furthermore, such characteristics were invariably passed along to the next generation when the altered creatures bred with members of their original races.

Eventually, the sarrukh found a way to imbue themselves with the ability to use this magic at will.

The first significant civilizations of Toril were the empires of the sarrukh, which rose and fell between –35,000 DR and –33,500 DR. This race of intelligent scaled creatures first appeared in the area known as Okoth, south of Mulhorand.

The development of the sarrukh was relatively uncontested in their homeland, and their population quickly surpassed the level sustainable by the local resources. Thus, the sarrukh were forced to expand.

They spread rapidly throughout much of Faerûn, conquering other lands and sowing the seeds for civilization as they went. They encountered short-lived and disorganized resistance from the savages that inhabited the lands, but the fact that the sarrukh had already learned to smelt iron for steel weapons and armour made them virtually invincible.

Within a hundred years, most of Faerûn was theirs.

The Mhairshaulk Empire arose in –34,800 DR on the Chultan peninsula, and the Isstosseffifil Empire followed in –34,500 DR, based in what is now the Great Desert of Anauroch. Okoth, the first of the sarrukh empires, still encompassed the race’s original homeland. Lesser realms, including the city of Ss’thar’tiss’ssun (in what is now the Forest of Wyrms) and the city of Ilimar (which is split between the Great Swamp of Rethild and the Gulthmere Forest) sprang up outside of these two great empires.

These regions constituted the major hubs of sarrukh civilization, and the first stable portals in Faerûn were created to connect them.

As the sarrukh spread out, they discovered that the shamans of the chaotic races living in certain wilderness areas held magical lore that they had not yet encountered. After studying these primitive forms of magic, the sarrukh consolidated their discoveries into a series of tomes.

Upon completion, the books where brought to Oreme, the capitol of Isstosseffifil, for study. The most magically gifted among the sarrukh and their servitor races pored over these tomes, which contained both easily researched magical knowledge and obscure information. The empires of the sarrukh didn’t last long enough to gather the full fruits of their work, but this collection of minds eventually grew into its own secret organization, which was called the Ba’etith.

The members of this group consolidated and extrapolated the bounds of their newly found knowledge, penning the Golden Skins of the World Serpent(otherwise known as the Nether Scrolls) many thousands of years after the fall of the empires.

The empires continued to grow until the sarrukh had conquered so many races that they became the minority in their own empire. Thousands of other races fulfilled their needs and satisfied their every desire. The sarrukh savoured the finest meats, surrounded themselves with gold, gems, and other finery, and enjoyed all the luxuries of a civilization at its height. But as with so many empires since, their increasing dependence on other races and their growing indolence spelled the beginning of the end.

Okoth was the first empire to fall, collapsing about –34,100 DR after a century of civil strife that drove many sarrukh to the planes. Isstosseffifil followed suit around –33,800 DR when, during a war with the phaerimms, its leaders rerouted the Narrow Sea, flooding the Underdark and precipitating climatological changes that doomed their own realm.

Mhairshaulk was the last to fall, sliding into a slumber from which it never emerged circa –33,500 DR.

Although most of the sarrukh died in the collapses of their great empires, many survived. The sarrukh of Isstosseffifil retreated into lichdom in the depths of Oreme where, protected by the asabis they had created, they sleep safely to this day.

The sarrukh of Mhairshaulk, faced with starvation, began a cycle in which thousand-year hibernations alternated with brief periods of activity, during which food gathering and procreation could take place. The great clans of Okoth wandered the planes for millennia but never found a plane where they wished to remain for more than a generation. This nomadic existence hardened them, turning them inexorably toward evil.

As the sarrukh of Okoth increasingly embraced their darker natures, a few dissenters, despairing of their kindred’s push toward evil, broke off from the main group. They entreated Jazirian, a fragment of the World Serpent, for succour, and it responded by transforming them into couatls. A bitter war ensued, but the couatls held their own against the more numerous Okothian sarrukh until Merrshaulk, a darker fragment of the World Serpent, finally slew Jazirian.

At that point, the couatls were forced to flee to Abeir-Toril, where they eventually settled in Maztica. The god Qotal embraced them as his divine minions, and they acknowledged him as Jazirian reborn.

Most remained there, but a few couatls eventually returned to Faerûn to deal with the fell legacies of their kindred in the Jungles of Chult. This splinter group embraced Ubtao as its patron deity.

After the war with the couatls, the sarrukh began to explore the Barrens of Doom and Despair, where they happened upon the khaastas. Believing these creatures to be inferior and weak reptilians, the sarrukh attempted to enslave them. Much to the invaders’ surprise, not only were the khaastas extremely resistant to serving, but they also had powerful demonic allies willing to aid them.

Thus began a centuries-long war between the sarrukh and the khaastas, which the sarrukh ultimately lost. To escape the wrath of the victorious khaastas, the sarrukh secretly returned to Faerûn and began skulking around the ruins of Okoth, on the shores of Azulduth.

Before the Fall of the Gods, the Okothian sarrukh realized that Sseth had sunk into some sort of hibernation and was barely answering their prayers. To complicate matters further, the khaastas had finally tracked them to Faerûn and were seeking to obliterate the last few of them. Lacking the full support of a divine patron, the sarrukh once again found themselves in danger of extinction.

Then, during the Time of Troubles, Sseth stopped answering prayers from the Okothian sarrukh altogether. Clerics of Okoth felt the need for action, so the approached the minions of Set and bargained with the Lord of Evil. Set agreed to answer their prayers if they in turn aided him in binding Sseth to eternal slumber.

The deal was struck, and at the conclusion of the Avatar Crisis, Set claimed Sseth’s portfolio.

About eleven years after the Time of Troubles, Set began answering the prayers of all his newly acquired worshipers (including the yuan-ti, who still believed their divine power to come from Sseth).

The treachery of the Okothian sarrukh has resulted in unintended consequences. Beset by nightmares, Sseth has begun thrashing against his bonds, awakening the serpentfolk elsewhere in Faerûn.

The sarrukh of Mhairshaulk are emerging from hibernation, seeking a means by which to liberate their god from his prison and oppose the Okothian sarrukh. Toward that goal, the Mhairhshaulk sarrukh have begun working to re-energize the long-slumbering yuan-ti empire known as Serpentes.

In Okoth, the Cult of Set is growing in strength under the leadership of Pil’it’ith, the legendary albino sarrukh leader. The cult’s membership consists primarily of Scaled Ones, but a few others have joined its ranks as well. Opposing the cult are the khaastas, which have begun appearing in the Lakes of Salt region. Battles between these two ancient foes have given rise to strange reports of tremendously powerful lizard races openly fighting one another.

The sarrukh have not forgotten the heights to which their race once climbed, but they also know that many other races would happily eradicate the last few sarrukh should they learn of their continued existence. Thus, they choose to remain in hiding, quietly seeking to increase their numbers so that they can one day rebuild their ancient empires.

Hello!

Yes, I am doing well, just a bit overworked. Thank you for asking. I hope you’re doing well, too.

Morag was indeed a sarrukh. She looked like one is usually described and the sarrusk are one of the more well known of the creator races. 

It’s been a while since I have played Neverwinter Nights 1, but as far as I remember and could understand, knowing more of Faerun history than I do real history, she was one of the sarrukh that woke up. The Queen of the Sarrukh, even, in the jungle location that turned into the Sword Coast. 

More sarrukh posts are to follow, which explain more on the race, but there is a lot of evidence that they led to the discovery and creation of many well known artefacts that cropped up later. Being a magically talented race, it would explain the knowledge on the Words of Power and Source Stone, although I always suspected the Words of Power were, in fact, Truename magic.

Quite a lot of sarrukh still exist, and are dormant. Morag was a special case who, I assumed, woke up very suddenly and had plans. Her race usually plan for the return of their territory or helping yuan-ti.