Cosmir the DeadLander
Cosmir has survived the DeadLands for 31 winters. His life was based on subsistence hunting and trapping throughout the marshes and swamps surrounding the ancient and abandoned city of Ixe. By tradition, none of his village entered that cursed place for fear of what lurked there and what had ravaged the city when it was taken from men and given to the dead.
It was six winters ago, when the rains did not come and the gibbous horrors that dwelt within Ixe ranged afar from the city. It was this winter that he was poling his raft amongst the reeds, quickly checking for traps, and his boat was pulled beneath the water and he sank into the putrid muck. He struggled against a preternatural predator he could not see, slashing and striking at the grip that held him, each touch of his assailant bringing searing pain as the oxygen was crushed from his lungs. After what felt as hours, he struggled to the bank and laid there, his limbs and face swollen with leaking pustules where he was held.
Summoning all of his strength, he crawled to reach his village so that he might warn them.
He arrived too late. Not a soul was to be found there. It was clear that a struggle had taken place, but no person, not even their bodies, remained. He fell into despair and lay upon the ground to die. But death refused to come. He descended into a fevered and poisoned sleep tormented by dreams of those who had been taken and of his encounter beneath the water, until he could take no more. Meaning to end his life, he crawled to a hut and took a machete into his hand, contemplating a swift end to his pain upon his own, now empty, marriage bed.
From the corner of his eye, a blackened misshapen flash moved amongst the room. With a fury, he pounced, hacking at the unknown terror. This time, his aim was true and he swung wildly at the tentacled, misshapen beast, its broken body falling to the ground. When nothing was left, he looked upon the pile of ichor and once again life coursed through his veins. He had found purpose in the destruction of those who had destroyed everything else he had.
That day, he left his former life behind as the few huts burned from the blaze he had set. Nothing was left for him there. He took to the wilds, living as half-man/half-animal, killing all dark things where he might find them. A few painful encounters have taught him patience and cunning, and he traps and kills in silence when he can, often with poisons he has brewed. He fashions his own crude weapons and armors from the world around him. His life as a hunter and trapper have taken new meaning, as he no longer kills to feed others, but kills to feed the burning space in his soul.
Barely one moon ago, when he was watching the damned city from a small raft, searching for another target, a sudden storm blew upon him with no mercy. While capable in a boat, he was no mariner and drifted out to sea. He was thrown overboard and instead of drowning, he was plucked from the turgid waters by a trade ship heading to the city, and was granted passage to there.
Placed ashore, his story as one who had escaped the DeadLands has granted him the charity of some who pity him, but it is tempered by his gruesome appearance, only partially concealed by his crude leather mask. Word has reached him of some who seek to travel voluntarily back to the DeadLands….back to where he belongs, back to killing those who need to die.