#therrin

So here's a thing that I spent way too long on-- my latest conlang for my book series, that will probably never be spoken aloud because it's assumed they are ALWAYS speaking in Therrin so there's no need for this ever to be used but I'm a freak about worldbuilding so I made the entire language, based on the physiology of the Therrin's mouths and vocal chords as to what sounds they could make.

I put way too much effort into this, someone love me.

This is the first paragraph of "The Raven" translated.

This particular IPA reader could not do the clicks. But this is it written out:

zhanuzha daju za žena anadze saẓazheẓa , jedzu zhu ena , ǰatha ǁu zhana seru zhuna za sadzude ǁu susa ǃaža ju date kaze jedzu zhu tene , kasu zaduzu , sathunu dzazeza ǃaare za tezhu ǃa ju za ẓu ẓa ǃane tezhu , tezhu de zhu zena zudza u za seḍaḍa zhu zhadera , tezhu de zhu zena zudza ǂu ǃe ǁu ǁudzu zhaǰa.

And because I'm treating this like a linguist making the first Therrin translation of English poetry:

Other possible translations: weak adj. ǰatha, seḍade tired (needing rest) adj. rakene, sude, zhana strange adj. susa, zhanuna old adj. date, ǂedzu story n. ezha, kaze fall v. seda, tene almost adv. era, kasu there adv. dzazeza, ǃeza it pron. su, u hit v. tezhu, ǂasu only adv. ǂu, ǃuna

Approximations made due to no equivalent concept:

Forgotten Lore = old stories

Tapping, rapping = Hiting

Dreary = sad

Weary = Tired

Softly = not hard

At the heart of the haunted ruins of a school for assassins, after progressing through extensive networks of boobytrapped tunnels, in the center of a large council chamber with only its round shape and a circle of rotting thrones giving away the room’s purpose, the player will find Therrin. They’re androgynous, with blood red lipstick, copper hair, and are garbed like one of the assassins (dark camoflauge, soft leather armor, bandoliers with pockets of needles, vials of poisons & noxious fumes, smoke grenades), but with no helmet or mask on. They’re weeping and holding a skull. Once the player enters the room and gets Therrin’s attention, they’ll stop weeping and wordlessley stand up, and don a featureless mask of dark steel before drawing their sword. A melancholy tune plays on a single violin.

For this first phase, Therrin uses a wide arsenal of ranged attacks. They’ll launch darts from wrist crossbows hidden under their sleeves, or throwing fans of poisoned darts to disengage. Try to close to quickly and Therrin might drop a smokebomb and reappear a far distance away. If one successfully gets too close, Therrin will draw hidden knives with freakish speed, dealing large damage while applying DOTs or slowing debuffs from their poisoned daggers. The trick will be engaging them at medium to long melee distance with a sword or polearm, as Therrin is absolute shit with swords and won’t be able to parry well.

They’ll die pretty quickly once the player figures out how to effectively hit them. After getting killed, two to three seconds will pass, and Therrin will sigh on the ground before getting to their feet. Trying to strike them while they get up will have an invisble ghostly knight appear, glowing green, and blocking the player’s attacks. When Therrin gets up, they’ll start using caltrops, and dropping poison mines when they fan-of-knives and dodge roll away from the player. Once the player effectively closes with Therrin, it only takes a few more hits to kill them. After they got up from their first death, a second violin joined the first in the score. A third violin joins in the song as Therrin gets up from death a second time. A marimba also joins the haunting number.

Each time Therrin dies and gets up, they deploy more tricks in the combat. They drop more traps on the ground, dodge roll more, apply new status effects (like burning when they throw an explosive cocktail) and generally get more dangerous. After the third death, Therrin will occasionally stop at long range, do a big dramatic point at the player, and a volley of crossbow bolts will fly in the player’s direction from shadows at the edge of the chamber. On the fourth death their sword breaks off its tip, shortening it, and Therrin draws a dueling dagger in their offhand, which together shrink the effective range at which the player can hit Therrin. After the fifth death glowing ghosts start gathering in the background as well as spectral figures cloaked in shadows. A theremin also begins playing.

After the sixth death, the phase changes. Therrin falls. The music stops. The walls of the chamber fade into smoke and shadow, leaving the wide circle of the floor as a platform a great gray void. Whispers fill the room as Therrin stays down, the whispers coming from the crowd of shadows and ghostly figures that have been gathering. Suddenly – The ghosts light up glowing with viridian fire! An entire choir of ghosts begins to sing O Fortuna and then moving through other songs of that cantata. As Therrin begins to rise, the ground follows with them, revealing itself to not be a marble chamber floor but a platform of bones packed tightly together. The bones that follow with Therrin wrapp around their legs like a massive serpent-tail of interlocking bones. Therrin is armored in plates of solid bone.

Their attack pattern at this stage will consist of using the stage itself as a weapon with their necromancy. They might drop a shrapnel or poison gas grenade and have the floor carry the grenade under its bony surface to launch from the ground next to the player like a torpedo. Occasionally Therrin will jab a pointing finger at the player from long range, and the ground will open up to shoot a volley of bone fletchettes at the player. They might also close for terrifying attacks where Therrin and the bone-tail will rise high abover the player and then crash down like a striking cobra.

If the player can dodge, Therrin will be vulnerable just after the cobra strikes. In addition, the bone-tail will have nodules of flesh every ten feet or so which can be strick from behind the tail. Damaging three of these will drop Therrin as the tail becomes unable to support them, giving the player a few moments of opportunity to strike. Therrin takes significantly longer to kill in this second phase.

Oh, thank you for the questions Corinne!

5. At the start of Blood of the Roc Therrin's going to be dressing entirely for utility. Masked Hunter uniform armor when at base, and all sorts of disguises. During their rare time resting they'd dress in baggy greys with no adornment. This majorly changes halfway through, where Therrin's spending a lot of time with high society folks they hate. They start getting real bombastic with imported silks, embroidery, scrimshaw buttons, and other sorts of flourishes that don't fit current fashions. It's all designed to show off that Therrin's even richer than the gentry they're surrounded by, and that they don't respect them.

9. Therrin tries gumbo during their travels between TBWD and BotR and it changes their life. Afterwords they love peasant foods from different cultures and places they've visited. They also have a deep love for rum. Their least favorite food is human meat.

Oh, thank you for the questions Kessel!

23. Therrin has some classical singing experience, but like the rest of the performance face of the Cloakhouse, Therrin's pretty insecure about the skills they developed there. Sits somewhere in a low tenor / high baritone for their natural speaking voice, but being a spy they have some serious vocal control in terms of cadence, accent, and tone.

32. They're always touching things! They get bored easily, or frustrated if they're dealing with complex problems, and they think through those by interacting with or inspecting other things. So they might be reading letters at a cafe and drop that to inspect the construction of the chairs at the cafe, then use that to make some absurd connection to their problems.