Encyclopaedia Argollica

Corrich

For a long time, I was not sure whether or not to write this chapter. In fact the decision to include it was only made a short while before the final manuscript would be printed. The reason for this reluctance is quite simple: this chapter includes almost no confirmed information, but is entirely based on hearsay and rumour. However, I have seen at least some material evidence that supported the stories I was told and these tales, strange as they might be, seem to indicate that Argoll might have recently gained a new group of inhabitants. As such, I decided it would be good to devote a short chapter to them after all. Either it shall serve as the first written account of the arrival of these new beings, or it will be of use to students of folklore in the future.

While I was travelling around the White Islands to learn more about the selkies, I was staying in one of the small villages on the shores of the polar ice caps. A small feast was held to welcome me and after a few cups of the wine I'd brought with me, the tongues of the selkies had become rather loose. Most of what they told were the regular sorts of anecdotes one might expect from drunken hunters but one of them told me about something rather peculiar. It had started roughly a year before my visit, when the villagers had seen a bright green light race through the heavens. It seemed to disappear over the horizon, landing somewhere deep in the polar wastes. At the time, there was some discussion over the event's meaning, but as nothing of significance happened afterwards, people quickly returned to their daily lives. Strange things are wont to dance across the sky in the long polar nights after all and it did not seem like this instance of the phenomenon heralded anything peculiar.

The selkies don't stray into the interior of the southern wastes often. Their fish traps are installed on the shore, and the colonies of penguins that the southerners hunt stay close to the water as well. But occasionally it is necessary for a few hunters to journey inland. Despite their relative remoteness, even the southern ice caps were not unaffected by the large amounts of magical energy that were released during the War and mutated beasts sometimes make their lair on the frozen plains, preying on the nearby villages. As such, hunting parties regularly need to be organised to venture inland to cull these beasts.

After the strange light had flashed across the sky, strange things started to be found on the ice during such hunts. Chunks of a smooth, black metal were scattered around the plains along with strange fluids. After more and more of such finds turned up, the hunter who told me all of this decided to investigate by journeying further in the direction of the pole. She told me that the wind carried the sounds of metalworking and strange voices to her, with a faint green glow ever present on the horizon. Deciding that venturing closer was too risky, she quickly travelled back to her village.

When I visited other villages in the south, they all told similar stories. A few even showed me some of the metal they had collected during these trips. I was allowed to keep a piece and when I brought it to the alchemists of my order, they assured me that whatever the metal was, it was not native to Argoll.

In one of the villages, I found a hunter who claimed to have encountered one of the creatures responsible for the light and the loud noises. While on the lookout for a mutated walrus, she had found a trail of thick, green fluid, along with faint tracks in the snow. Deciding to investigate, she followed the trail to a nearby ice cave. At first, the cave seemed empty, though illuminated by a strange green glow, until she felt something drip onto her face. Looking up, she saw a long, spindly creature, with sharp claws and a long, constantly swishing tail, apparently attached to the ceiling with its hands and legs. It's eyes, and various parts of its body glowed a bright green and it made a hissing noise at her. She did not stay to discover the creature's intentions, instead running back to her dog sled and speeding away. In hindsight, she told me, she regretted the decision, since, considering the green substance and the silent state she found the creature in, it had probably been wounded and needed help with its injury.

None of the selkies I talked to seemed intent on travelling south to make contact with whatever these creatures are. As far as they're concerned, things that fall out of the sky and emit a strange glow can't be good news and are best left alone. It seems that it will be up to the creatures themselves, or travellers from elsewhere in Argoll, to establish contact. In the absence of firm information about them, including their name for themselves, I have decided to name these visitors Corrich in this work, the selkie word for foreigners.