Cassan

Cassans hail from the distant deserts of the east, they are small, bird-like humanoids with an affinity for speed and resemblance to humanoid shrikes.They enjoy developing and using crossbows and guns, and have a huge natural liking towards those weapons. There are well known Cassans in many professions, but the most efficient are marksmen and thieves.

Many cassans are excellent at crafting guns and crossbows, and given their liking of invention and developing gadgets, its commonly believed they invented the gun itself. They are naturally carnivorous and forgo eating vegetation due to their origin of being evolved birds of prey. Primitive cassan societies are known to preform cannibalism and will eat other intelligent species just as easily.

They were known to be some of the deadliest birds in the forests, a creature known only as the "silent stalking" by the cassans came across them, it agreed to lend its power to the small but deadly birds, giving them sentience and great size, along with the knowledge of more advanced hunting... And of weapons.

It was when the humans met the Cassans that their interest in invention begun, they saw the human's great academical devices and forges, and knew then that the weapons they dreamed of were possible, they used the devices to create their own... This led to the creation of guns, deadly ranged weapons infused with the Cassans art of bloodletting.

Even after their creation of the gun, the Cassans were still tribal bands hunting and gathering under the watchful eye of the empire. Enter queen Quieslath, master hunter who brought together the tribes into a kingdom of the forest.

in 2017, it had been discovered that queen Quieslath had been travelling to a village known as Fystren in secrecy and taking part in extramarital relationships, leading to an entire generation of royal blood being born in the village, this scandal eventually reach Quieslaths palace and she begrudgingly had the village burnt down, leading to one of many controversies Quieslath had done. This led to a great decrease in Quieslath's power and the formation of a council that oversees her actions. The day was known as The "Frystren massacre" and the "night of the hunt".

Eventually, despite the current queen's fear of war, the Cassan brought together the dryads and yetis to attempt a ground war with the kraezian empire, hoping to obtain land lost after the Fystren masscare, in which land was confiscated by the Kraezians.

a thousand years later, in 3036, an army of undead ravished the then-peaceful Cassan kingdoms, this led to the loss of land and loss of diplomatic relations with the Kraezian empire after their refusal to aid in the undead war.

The Cassan kingdoms are locked in the middle of deep forests, connected by sparse footpaths making it hard for large groups to travel. This mixed with their relishing of hunts and guerilla tactics makes them deadly in defense of their homes. But at the same time they have tried hard to be pacifistic. They openly use bones, body parts, and other animal material in crafting and construction. But will also rely on metal imported by sea. There are many primitive Cassan tribes beyond the kingdoms that cannibalize and eat intruders. Besides this they are very open to travelers of other races entering their lands. At least the more advanced ones are...

While Quieslath's dynasty holds external affairs, each is to his own in the cassan kingdom, villages are ruled over by chieftains, sorcerers, and all sorts of other individuals, even adventurers, who manage to take control of a village can legally rule.

As one can easily tell, the god the cassans most commonly worship is the "silent stalking", a massive, immortal carnivore that stalks the jungles the Cassans call home... It is almost never seen besides by those of Quieslath's dynasty.

Unless you try to harm the forests, it is very difficult to break the laws of cassan society, as they only extend to harming the trees and forests they live in directly. Even if its another kingdom, they must pay if it is harmed... But these laws are slowly dying away as the kingdoms advance, and the staunchest followers of the old laws are the primitive tribes.

They also revere mageries as well, as the Quieslath dynasty is known for being a long and strong bloodline of sorcerers. The queen is known to be a good authority to converse with on magical matters, as long as they are important enough to the queen..

With the requirement of metal in gun forging, its hard to tell exactly how the Cassans still use them over crossbows, but they persevere in making weaker guns over steel ones in order to follow their forestry laws, but steel guns are still possible in the form of foreign traded ores. And the only forges cassans use are on Kraezian border towns and coastal harbors.

What may seem like a lack in architecture is replaced by a truly difficult but interesting method of building construciton- They utilize animal parts only, leaving even their more recent buildings to resemble crude but still tough structures of bone, hide, and chitin.