[This is part of an ongoing series of book my character Galim Aeltus is currently writing, relating its travels for the past months/years and all the discoveries he made during that time. This is about ancient history of Altera, and is not canon lore, based only on fictional writings, characters, places and events of old (and others not so old) Alteran times.
These books are available in-game for whoever wants to acquire one.]
The names, locations and people I will be using and quoting in this very book are for most of them not part of recent Altra history, and came to my knowing only through a long succession of oral and sometimes written passing on between various people of various origins, sometimes separated by several centuries and very opposite cultures. I will be using the names of people and places that were used at the times I'm writing about, and will let at the discretion of the reader to find the recent equivalents for them.These books are available in-game for whoever wants to acquire one.]
The Trallh Tribe is an ancient nomadic tribe of Hunters, that generally moved between various forest highlands to the east of Altera, as well as around the central mountain range that separated the east woodlands of the more centric plains.
The Trallhs were known to revere the soul of killed animals through songs and ceremonies, and celebrated the union of man and nature with the use of hallucinogen narcotics. Hunting was their main occupation, both for survival (for food and pelts) and for the prestige this activity brought them in the eyes of their fellows and of their sacred figures. Those are supposed to be some sort of "elevated" form of the classic animals they usually came across and hunted.
Hunting the earthly form of their sacred figures would serve to prove them that they were worthy of living and of treading the soil of Altera.
Of course, each hunt was therefore a ceremony, at the end of which the hunted animal would be sacrificed to one of the sacred figures of the Thrallh. If the prey wasn't dead, it could only mean that the hunter would have failed to its task, that only death could prevent to be achieved.
The tool through which the sacrifice would be made were their own personal ceremonial Axe, that each hunter would carry with him at all time, as they were their life and their life would only carry on through these weapon. Each ceremonial weapon was made by the four Elders of the Tribe, which were required to know the art of blacksmithing.
It is told that the soul of killed animals during the sacred hunts of the Trallh would get sucked in by the elders, and they would then give back this essence during the process of forging a new ceremonial axe. A new ceremonial axe would then be given to a warrior that doesn't already have one, meaning they would only be given to men and women who had recently attained the age of adulthood.
A hunter would live by and through its ceremonial Axe, meaning that if he was to lose it or if the weapon was broken, the hunter would be required to leave the tribe, or give himself death.
The Hunter, armed with its new Axe, would then be required to keep it sheathed at all times, and to hunt without using it, until a situation of mortal peril would be encountered.
Only then would he be allowed to use it, and that battle would then decide of the weapon's name (refer to a few found weapons names, like "Troll Breaker", "Wolves Dread", or "Eye of the Lynx").
In this process, many new hunters would find death, as using the ceremonial Axe only as a last resort would sometimes be far too late, dooming it's bearer.
Nonetheless, the Trallh Hunters were feared even by outsiders, as they were fierce and strong, raised in the respect of the animal reign and superiority, as well as in the predestination of knowing that their hardest battle of all would be against their animal gods, that they revered greatly.
The ceremonial axes are, along with some stories of outsiders being admitted with peace in their encampment, the only telltales of their existence.
Several encampment sites can still be observed in various points of the forest Highlands of the east of Altera, although only a trained eye can distinguish them from classic clearings.
