Khenan Raiders
Overview
The Khenan Raiders are a band of outcasts and renegades, forged from those whom the desert tribes would no longer tolerate. Exiles, criminals, deserters, and broken souls gather under the banner of the Khenan, bound by their rejection of the tribes that cast them out. In the eyes of most desertfolk, they are no better than vultures—but to the Raiders, survival is vengeance, and vengeance is survival.
Origins
No single tribe birthed the Khenan. Instead, they emerged from the fragments of many. A murderer spared from execution, a cowardly soldier who abandoned his post, a thief caught too many times—each had nowhere else to go. These misfits found one another in the shifting dunes, and over time, their gatherings grew into warbands. What began as desperate survival became a way of life: to take, to raid, to plunder, and to burn the ties that once bound them.
Their name, Khenan, is said to come from an ancient word for “Ashborn” — those who rise only to consume and destroy
Culture & Values
The Khenan live without honor, but not without rules. Their creed is simple: the strong lead, the weak follow, and the desert takes the rest. Loyalty lasts only as long as a warband prospers. Leadership is decided by challenge—raiders may slay their own captains if they grow weak or fail.
Yet, there is one bond the Raiders share: hatred of the tribes. Each carries the scars of rejection, whether real or imagined. Their raids are not just about plunder—they are acts of revenge. A caravan stripped bare, a settlement torched, a captured warrior slain—all are messages carved into the sands: we will not be forgotten.
Tactics & Hideouts
The Khenan move like shadows. Their hideouts are scattered across the desert—caves, abandoned ruins, forgotten canyons—constantly shifting so no tribe may root them out.
They strike with speed, favoring swift raids under cover of sandstorms or moonless nights. They steal supplies, livestock, and valuables, then vanish before reinforcements can arrive. They leave little behind but blood, ash, and fear.
Some Raiders grow bold enough to linger in captured places for weeks, turning them into temporary bases of terror before abandoning them once their presence draws too much attention.
Relations with Others
Desert Tribes – The Khenan are universally hated by the tribes, though some whisper that certain chiefs secretly hire them to harass rivals.
Green Republic & Poachers – Raiders often collaborate with poachers, guiding them through hidden routes or selling them stolen goods. To many poachers, the Raiders are both allies and necessary evils.
Orcs – They share a common hate towards the desert tribes, thats why Raiders occasionally serve as mercenaries, selling their blades for a share of plunder.
Scorvians and Lizardfolk– Raiders try to avoid direct war with these powers.
Appearance & Gear
The Khenan wear whatever they can steal: mismatched armor, scavenged weapons, desert rags dyed to blend with sand and shadow. Many Raiders cover their faces with scarves or bone masks, both to hide their identities and to mock the tribes that cast them out. Their weapons are rarely elegant but always practical—short bows, spears, scavenged blades, and cruelly barbed daggers.
A drawing of a bloody dagger is their emblem, and they always visibly wear it and have tatoos with it.
Leadership
The Khenan are not united under a single leader. Instead, they are divided into loosely connected warbands, each led by a ruthless captain. The most feared of these captains are whispered of across the desert, their names spoken in curses or warnings. The largest gatherings of Raiders occur only rarely, when multiple bands unite under a charismatic warlord to launch grand raids—events that can change the balance of power in the desert for years.
Reputation
Among desertfolk, the Khenan are more than bandits—they are bogeymen, invoked to scare children into obedience. Caravans pray to the sands that no bloody dagger-bannered riders descend upon them. Yet for all their savagery, the Khenan remain an unavoidable truth of the desert: the forgotten will always find a way to be remembered.