I spent the last weeks searching for a guide who would accept to bring me into the Kalweiri territory. I finally found a brave man whom I promised to bring a special blend of herbs he had started smoking a few years before. He was out of it and seemed to have grown addicted to it.

He left me alone one hour’s walking distance from the forest where one Kalweiri family was supposed to be living. He swore to me that he wouldn’t get nearer to this place. It seemed that many stories exist about people who disappeared when they got too close.

So I decided to wait patiently and not to impose my presence. I spent the rest of the day in the same place, trying not to show any impatience. The next day, I walked for about thirty minutes and waited until the day after to reach the edge of the forest and wait there. After all, one doesn’t enter someone’s home without being invited! A few hours after my arrival, the Kalweiri people decided to make their presence known to me.

Indeed, they had been there for quite a while as they observed me and weighed my intentions. If I’m writing these lines, it’s because they must have concluded that I didn’t pose any risk to their existence. At least, that is what I chose to believe.

Here are some observations that I had the chance to make while I was with the members of this family.

The Kalweiri people are smaller than the average man. Those I spent time with during my stay reached the height of my shoulders at most. They have a greenish skin and they have long brown or dark green hair. They’re thin and move very graciously. Despite their small size, they’re very strong and have great stamina.

Both males and females dress in the same way. They wear tree bark as clothing or even as armour. They also use other vegetable fibres that they weave with agility. They only take what the mother gives them, as they say.

It’s easy to understand that they pray Dee Mariela, the divinity of nature, depicted by an immense millennial tree. They seem to be in communion with the forest and its inhabitants, as if they were part of the same family. According to one of the guides from this people, the Kalweiri communicate via the trees. This way, they can share information from a group to another without needing a messenger!

The members of this gracious race can live up to three hundred or even five hundred years. They told me that this great longevity is due to the way they eat. They drink pure water and only eat fruit, vegetables and roots for which they offer the greatest gratitude to the mother. The Kalweiris don’t hunt.

However, they’re fierce warriors. As I said earlier, it’s impossible to see them before it’s too late! I was lucky enough to observe the group I lived with hunt bandits who thought they could do whatever they wanted. They were cutting down a tree when suddenly, all the intruders lied lifeless on the ground, with arrows or spears all over their bodies. Those men were unaware about the threat that lurked on them. The Kalweiri explained to me that they had sent them back to the great sleep.

On this, I strongly advise against anyone trying to get into one of the ancestral forests with ill intent since you wouldn’t live to see another day.

It’s regretfully that I have to leave the territory as, from what my guide told me, the mother had so decided.

After my stay with the Kalweiri, I have to say that I feel rejuvenated. It’s probably because of the way they live, which is in harmony with nature. And the pure food and water I had during the time I was with them. 

Taradussa

Name: Kalweiri

Visual description:
Humanoid, shorter and thinner than human beings. Their skin is light green and smooth. An adult Kalweiri reaches the shoulders of a human male and looks as thin as a human teenager. Their hair is brown like the ground or deep green like the leaves from a tree and is rough to the touch. They use the bark that has fallen from the trees as clothes or armour. They also use vegetable fibres to weave clothes.

Height:
Five feet.

Maximum age:
Between 300 and 500 years.

Time of gestation:
360 days.

Litter:
One baby.

Sight:
They see better during the daytime, like the humans.

Hearing:
Better than a human ear.

Habitat:
They live in the oldest forests of the Karen’der continent.

Social behaviour:
They live in small groups that they call families. They have a brother or a sister that speaks for the group if they have to make important decisions. The forest is more than their habitat. The Kalweiris consider the trees as their brothers, as they do for every living thing. They can communicate with others that are far. They do this though the vast network of roots that run beneath the ground. As such, they don’t need to send any messenger to speak to other families that are days apart from them.

Nature:
They only eat fruits and vegetables that they find in nature as they see every living creature as their brothers and sisters.

Race’s particularities:
Great sense of their environment.
Night vision.
Fragile if out of their natural environment. They need to connect with nature to regain their strength.
Forest camouflage (blend with the environment).

Combat specialties (attack and defence):
Stealth in the forest. They can hide their presence to the enemy until the last moment.
Warrior race.
They use alchemy and herbalism from the forest.

Weapons/favourite armour:
Daggers.
Spear.
Bow and arrows.
Armour made from tree bark.
Their weapons seem to be naturally bearing magical capacities, although not of Kentric nature.

Loot:
Weapons.