Battles on the other hand are focussed on the capture of enemy tribal members, for the purposes of ritual sacrifice to propitiate the gods or binding their souls into service as shrunken heads. Due to the shift in emphasis, most battle weapons are designed to incapacitate or bludgeon the foe into submission. These include slings, clubs, stone maces, bolas, and even garrottes. All other armaments, such as shark-toothed swords, obsidian daggers or spears, and bows are considered hunting weapons, only used for the killing of beasts and unfit, indeed dishonourable, to use in battle. Before a battle can occur, a formal declaration of conflict must first be sent to the enemy tribe. This must include a flowery description of the titles and ancestors of the challenging hetman, a thorough humiliation of the recipient hetman with accompanying eloquent insults, and the stated reasons why the conflict must occur; the latter usually some retribution for previous unforgivable transgressions. If the poetry and wit of the declaration is lacklustre, then the receiving hetman is at liberty to refuse the battle, in which case it becomes the responsibility of the tribal shaman-priests to ensure the aborted conflict progresses no further. Accepting the declaration permits both tribes to meet at a pre-defined location on a specific date, and there battle one another until one side flees the field or the sun sets. Such encounters are truly spectacular events, with the participants dressed in dyed armour, feathered cloaks and wielding their most fearsome weapons. Non-combatants often seat themselves around the field of battle to offer witness to the deeds done that day and give vocal support to their champions. The ritualised nature of these conflicts ensures that the number of deaths incurred remain quite low. Enough natives are already slain by the strange creatures which regularly enter through the dimensional gates, to keep the tribal populations under tight control. The third method of conflict is that of total war, where the fighting continues beyond just a single ritual battle. It rarely ever occurs, since it usually causes an excessively high death rate. Accidentally exterminating an entire tribe would risk arousing their god, causing it to run rampage, a catastrophic consequence that would threaten all the inhabitants of the island. Only the most dire circumstances would ever prompt a tribe into such a disastrous act; the desecration of burial grounds, annexing of tribal lands or unprovoked assault on a settlement resulting in the death of mates and young for example. Due to the serious nature of total war it must be announced not only to the offending enemy, but to all the tribes of the island, permitting them an opportunity it intercede or seek a diplomatic solution. Such a pronouncement is a very dramatic display. A messenger of high status, usually an elder famed for his past battlefield victories, arrives to berate the enemy hetman, using the most vile language. He then casts off his feathered cloak; spits and urinates before the chieftain, then kills himself in the most dramatic manner available to him. For the messenger this is actually a most noble way to die, especially for those elders beyond fighting age, as it guarantees a prime seat in the Spirit World, venerated as a hero. For the insulted tribe it is a knell of doom, knowing that after the waxing and waning of a moons, the full might of the declared foes will be thrown against them with out cease, until one or other begs for forgiveness. Once it s tarts, everyone in a tribe becomes a valid target of attack.
Customs
Of all the aspects of their culture, probably the most prominent reason for their categorisation as ‘Savages’ are their traditional customs. To an outside observer many of these practices seem unduly cruel, even horrific, but each has a central place in society. Most will appear completely alien to characters unless they take the time to understand the natives. Geriatricide Although the passage of beasts through the ‘Smoking Mirrors’ provide an unlimited source of potential food, neither the dimensional gateways nor the creatures which pass through are reliable. Occasionally nothing emerges for months, placing the survival of the tribe at risk. In such circumstances the number of mouths to be fed must be reduced. Rather than practice infanticide, the eldest of the tribe offer themselves up for exile or sacrifice. Voluntary exile usually means that an elder ventures into the wild places claimed by no tribe, seeking to perform a great deed in service to all the peoples of the island. Most die during the self-imposed quest, failing to achieve any thing of note. However their soul still ascends to the Spirit World, where it is honoured for its martyrdom. Others join or re-garrison one of the drummer towers. Another path taken is that of sacrifice, the elder volun teering to ‘feed’ their god or be a propitiatory offering at one of the ‘smoking mirrors’, in the vain hope of drawing more beasts through. Both methods usually result in the elder being eaten by some monstrous creature. The last method of geriatricide involves the elder offer ing their soul to serve the tribe for a short period, bound into the body of an animal or guardian tiki, before being released to take their place in the Spirit World afterlife with the other honoured ancestors.
Skinning
Every savage has its deeds, and thereby its status, recorded upon its own skin in the form of tattooed pic tograms. These stylised illustrations are sized according to how great the endeavour was, truly epic acts taking an entire limb or torso to tattoo, minor ones merely the size of a finger joint. If and when a tribal member runs out of available surface area, the tattoos are superimposed over previous pictograms. Even negative acts are recorded in this manner, providing an indelible record of their life. When a native dies their skin is carefully removed by skilled flensing, then cured so that this record is pre served. In every settlement is a longhouse in which these skins are stored, with one member of the tribe tasked with remembering the original owners of each skin and what the pictograms mean. Due to the great importance of this his tory, tribal Skin-Knowers are exempt from geriatricide. It is considered a great insult to kill a native and not return its skin to the tribe for remembering. The skins of those eaten by beasts are considered a tragic loss, so that those deliberately offered to the Smoking Mirrors are usu ally flensed first, unless the offering is a punishment – in which case the skin is eaten with the taboo transgressor – a most shameful way to die.
Head Taking
Whilst skins are always returned to the tribe or family, heads are considered valuable trophies. Head taking normally occurs during ritual battle or open war; and whilst a legitimate act, it can propagate blood feuds lasting generations. The reason head taking is so contentious is that it per mits the killer to bind the soul of the victim into its own head. This creates a kind of fetish ghost, providing great power to the head’s owner. The binding lasts as long as head remains intact, meaning that some of these ghosts have been enslaved for hundreds of years. Sometimes raids are launched solely with the purpose of recovering a head (or at least breaking the binding) belonging to a long imprisoned family member. Normally these heads are kept at the far end of long houses, arranged to portray the power of the owning family. The heads are shuttered behind exquisitely carved panels to conceal their forbidding aura. During storms the heads sometimes chatter malevolently, especially those which are too powerful for the head of the household to control. Normally head ghosts are used to protect the longhouse from unwanted incursion. Sometimes however, heads are taken on hunts or to battle to strengthen the bearer, but at some risk of the head becoming damaged or lost.
Cannibalism
The eating of the dead is the traditional method of dis posing of corpses amongst the native tribes. Although viewed with horror or disgust by foreign cultures, cannibalism actually serves several practical and religious purposes. Burial within the jungle might at first seem the preferred method of disposal, but most of the soil is choked with competing root systems, making digging surprisingly difficult. Graves tend to be shallow and the lack of depth soon attracts carrion eaters, of which Monster Island has more than its fair share. Desiccation upon aerial drying racks suffers similar issues, with the additional problem that the air is too humid and makes bodies putrefy rather than mummify, which tends to attract disease spirits. Eating bodies also serves to make the corpse useless for the purpose of raising as an undead monster. Whilst the bones are not consumed, but rather laid aside for interment within sealed pots, the skeleton itself is completely disjointed. Over generations the eating of relatives or enemies has become considered an act of respect to the dead. In fact after ritual battles most of the participants gather together to hold a mighty feast for the fallen. To be invited to such a banquet is a great honour. Not eating the corpse is deemed insulting, implying that the deceased is no better than a uselessly inedible animal.
Religion
The savages are primarily animists, worshipping the ancestors and natural spirits of the island. At first sight their tribal ‘gods’ appear to be merely totemic great spirits, but are in actual fact the weakened fragments of the island’s original deities who trapped themselves by taking physical form. Now they are kept imprisoned in their monstrous shapes by the coordinated efforts of tribal shaman-priests, who annually refresh the bindings in mighty ceremonies, fearful of the mindless destruction a god might wreck if allowed to fully awaken.