The Creatures of Gardonia
The Gnomish homeland is filled with all manner of beasts and critters. From things you have seen to things you have only thought about in nightmares which really do want to eat you, Gardonia has it all!
Crop Nibblers
The Pesky crop fiend
While there are many creatures in Gardonia that often make lunch of a gnomes garden, the term crop nibbler generally refers only to mammal types.
Deer
Deer are one of the few animals in the land of Gardonia that don’t grow larger than one would find in the surrounding world. That being said they stand up to twice as tall as a gnome and aren’t much bothered by a lone gnomish farmer yelling and stamping its feet at them. A lone deer can do more than enough damage, but when a herd wanders through they can leave a garden in a sorry state.
Bunnies
There are two primary types of bunnies that live in the land that plague crops, a smaller brownish type and a much larger white kind. The smaller brown bunnies are plentiful throughout the land and love to find their way into gardens and cultivated fields. They are non-combative for the most part and can usually be chased off without the need for Mushroom Knight assistance.
Dire Bunnies
The larger species of bunnies have come to be known as Dire Bunnies. They measure approximately one and a half feet in height to the shoulder and also love to get into gardens. Though stubborn, one or two Dire Bunnies can be driven off by a farmer and their family, but when Dire Bunnies start to congregate they become driven into frenzied swarms. The swarms will eat everything in their path, plant, animal, gnome and each other. The swarm will rampage for miles and miles destroying all in it’s path until they have finally eaten themselves down to a handful of bunnies at which point they calm down and go their separate ways leaving a trail of carnage in their wake. Before the gnomes began clearing large areas of land for farms and villages Dire Bunnies very seldom gathered in numbers large enough to insight a frenzy, but it has now become a more common occurrence especially in the Leafy Green Flats, where vast tracts of land have been turned into fields. When dire bunnies start to gather the Mushroom Knights must be summoned quickly.
Mollusks
The slimy crop fiend
Slugs and Snails
The slugs and snails in Gardonia range in size from one foot to two feet in length, and snails with shells upwards of a foot and a half in diameter are not an uncommon sight. While not fast-moving, they have large appetites and can ruin a garden if they manage to slip in. Though dispatched without great difficulty they leave a gross slimy mess behind and their carcasses are sticky and unpleasant to remove from one’s garden.
The Great Mollusks
The Great Mollusks are slugs and snails that typically range from six to twelve feet in length with snails whose shells can reach six feet in height. Though not too commonly seen in the land they occasionally appear in the eastern reaches of the kingdom. They have been known to devour whole gardens in less than an hour. The Great Mollusks have a defensive ability to make their slime extremely sticky making it difficult to strike them with weapons more than once, as the weapons (or shields or gnomes) will stick to their side and be carried along with it. The Great Mollusks appear to be opportunistic carnivores and have been known to eat livestock in their pens and even unlucky gnomes.
Garden Pests
The icky crop fiend
Pack Moles
Commonly referred to just as moles, they are the largest mole species living in Gardonia and the only one to be a nuisance. The variety found in the gnomish land have developed a palate for earthy root vegetables namely turnips, beets, onions and parsnips instead of the typical fare of worms, grubs and bugs that moles normally eat. Pack moles tend to burrow under gardens and will take whole plants back to caches where they have a fascinating yet gross way of preserving them for future use.
Aphids, Grubs, Catapillars
As with any garden anywhere, other bugs and grubs and worm-type creatures enjoy eating the plants that grow in gnomish gardens, with the exception that they are generally much larger than those found elsewhere in the world. While not dangerous to gnomes, they can be extremely dangerous to their beloved gardens.
Spiders, Centipedes and Other Gross, Creepy Things
The typical variety of creepy insects and arachnids found throughout the world are also found in the land of Gardonia ranging in sizes from two times to hundreds of times larger than those found elsewhere. Centipedes, many types of beetles, termites, mosquitoes, grasshoppers, annoyingly loud crickets, earwigs and spiders to name a few. Though not typically dangerous or aggressive, a spider that is a foot across is rather unnerving. Still if accidentally disturbed a bite from many of these things can really hurt or even be fatal if the species in question is venomous. As with most everything in the land of Gardonia, occasionally unusually large versions of these creatures appear that regard gnomes as lower on the food chain. Giant Spiders and Great Mantis standing five or so feet tall are among the most terrifying and dangerous of these bugs. While, most of these now live deep in woods or the tall grass forests and opportunistic, there are some that develop a taste for gnome and venture closer to farms and villages
Plants
Unfriendly Plants
The Mad Slapper Plant
The Slapper plant fends off would-be predators by lashing out and slapping at anything that comes too near with bulbs that have whip-like vines. They grow up to eight-feet tall and have left many an unwary gnome with nasty bruises.
The Sneaky Trip Vine
Sneaky trip vines are a real nuisae. Laying about the ground they will dart out and curl themselves around low moving things like feet and legs, then go ridged. They are responsible for many bruised knees and spilled foraging baskets.
The Hockaloo
At two-feet tall, the Hockaloo resembles an oversized poppy before the bulb has flowered. This plant deters would-be predators by spitting green globs of smelly mucus at anything that draws too near. Complete with a phlegmy sounding wind up it boasts an impeccable accuracy at up to twenty feet that would make a Mushroom Knight Bolter jealous. If you are unfortunate enough to hear the sound of someone horking up a big ball of spit with no trees to hide behind the best thing to do is duck and cover and hope for the best.
Awakened Plants
While not all that common, it does happen from time to time that random plants throughout the kingdom seem to wake up and become sentient—and seemingly quite grumpy. Grass, crops and very rarely trees have been known to cause mischief including vandalism and assault. In extremely rare cases a whole field, garden or grove has woken up, to the great dismay of anyone nearby.
Carnivorous Plants
The forests and tall grass forests are home to a number of carnivorous plant species. Though most are not large enough to eat a gnome, deep in the grass forests some giant specimens have been discovered that were all too capable of the feat. There have even been tales from foragers who claim to have seen terrifying plants walking about and even stalking them.
The Green Gobbler
The tale of the Green Gobbler is one of a mysterious plant creature, undoubtedly out of the Great Grass Forest, which stalked the stretch of road between Grand Caps and Hazelmere for several years, attacking and abducting many gnome travellers before finally being hunted down. However no living gnome ever saw it as all who did, including the Mushroom Knight patrol credited with its demise were eaten. The Green Gobbler apparently choked to death on the knight’s metal armour and weapons and when it was found it had shrivelled into an unidentifiable husk. It is suspected that Green Gobbler type plants are responsible for the disappearance of many a gnome wandering off the beaten path.
Gardonian Rat Trap
Similar to the Venus Fly Trap, the Gardonian Rat Trap is a carnivorous plant capable of eating the very large rodents of Gardonia. Activated by movement they often will bite a gnome who ventures too near. Bites can be painful, but not usually deadly depending on the size of the Trap. Deeper into the tall grass forests grow some larger versions that a gnome will fit nicely inside of.
The Hatnapper
The Hatnapper is a viney plant with a large bulbous head found deep in deciduous forests. They wind their way up trees and out along branches where they hang waiting for something to walk underneath. When they sense movement the bulb opens into a wide sticky mouth and drops down onto whatever may be below before retracting back up to the branch. Many gnomes have lost hats to Hatnappers, hence the name, and more than a couple have had the terrifying experience of their whole heads being engulfed. A few unfortunate enough to walk under a very large specimen have been swallowed whole.
The Red Jumper
Red Jumpers have nice pretty red flowers the size of a small dinner plate. When the flowers have been pollinated, the plant will launch the pretty red flower at nearby moving creatures. The flowers have barbed stamen, which stick into the host and emit a powerful toxin that causes permanent paralysis. The parazlyed host remains alive until the seeds mature and drop out of the flower, latching onto the host where they begin germinating and using the unfortunate host as food eventually killing it. It is apparently an unpleasant death. A few poor souls wishing to get a sniff of the pretty red flower have gotten much more than they bargained for. If a victim is found within the first day of being jumped, and the flower is removed, the survival rate is quite high with only a week or so of ridged paralysis.
Other Creatures of Note
Cabbage Spiders
The cabbage spider’s appearance resembles a wild cabbage with legs that look like vine runners from squash type plants. Their biggest difference from a cabbage is that they are not in fact edible and they bite when you try to pick them. Fortunately, they are not common or venomous.
Bears
These days bears are almost unheard of in Gardonia. There was a time when they were common in the land, before the Greensmore Valley Relocation Project saw them rounded up and re-homed in the deep walled valley. Bears were for the most part passive and more of a nuisance to the gnomes except for a week in early spring and a week in late fall where gnomes suddenly appeared on their menu. Standing four to five feet at the shoulder when on all fours they aren’t the largest bears in the world, but are big enough when you yourself are only three feet tall.
Coyotes
Coyotes, standing a little taller than half a gnomes height, while frightening are more of a nuisance than a predator. They seldom attack gnomes, even those travelling alone, and tend to keep their distance from settlements. Coyotes are most common in the south of Gardonia, from the border up to Grand Caps, near the Good Garden, avoiding the Great Grass Forrest and The South Carrot Mires. They also live in the Tri-Villages region. When the Gnomes first settled around New Old Town there was a larger more aggressive coyote in the region that did often prey upon the pioneering gnomes. However, they have been dealt with in a rather permanent way—both by the efforts of early militia groups and the Greensmore Valley Relocation Project. It is a theory that coyotes are responsible for the very few numbers of Dire Bunnies in the south, and there has been talk about introducing them to the Leafy Green Flats to deal with the large numbers of them there, though most gnomes are against the idea.
Fortunately for the gnomish folk, there are no wolves in Gardonia.
Sabre Toothed Weasel
The Sabre Toothed Weasel is about a foot-and-a-half tall and three feet in length. They are feisty creatures sporting two large fangs from which they get their names. While large enough to take down a gnome there have been no recorded attacks and they seem to be one of the few natural predators of the Dire Bunny, perhaps even finding them to be a delicacy.
Bellow Toads
Bellow Toads aren’t truly toads but rather a very large species of frog. They get their name from the loud bellowing croaks that they make. Not native to the land of Gardonia, the amphibians escaped from a caravan of squat, hairy bearded traders from the far south who brought them to sell as pets and for their delicious legs. The toads took to the South Carrot Mires, where they quickly established a foothold. The first generation of Bellow Toads to hatch in the swamps were four times as large as the original escaped toads, and the following generation twice as large again measuring up to three feet from nose to tail. Soon they spread throughout the entire region, consuming all the local frogs and wiping out several other swamp-dwelling species. Now they primarily feed on the rodents of the land. Their loud bellowing croaks can be heard for miles and parts of the mires can be quite a deafening place at certain times of the year. The giant frog legs have become one of the few locally-sourced meat products exported by the gnomes to surrounding lands, particularly fond of them are the men living to the west. Trading caravans will clean out entire markets paying handsomely for them.
But as is common with many other creatures in Gardonia, there are some Bellow Toads that have grown much larger and have eaten small gnome children who have wandered alone through the swamps. “The Bellow Toad” was a monstrously-large toad that plagued the South Carrot Mires for years swallowing many a full grown gnome and avoiding attempts to hunt it for decades. It was eventually found and stuck with a spear, whereupon it retreated into the depths of the swamp and has not been seen again. No one knows if it is still out there, but the locals like to tell the tale of “The Bellow Toad” to travellers stopping at the inn.
Intelligent Creatures
Cobbies
Standing about two-and-a-half-feet tall, Cobbies are smaller than gnomes who barely consider them to be a race as they view Cobbies intelligence as hardly above that of a wild animal. Cobbies live in holes or caves sometimes constructing crude tools, animal masks and things resembling clothes, which they usually forget to put on. They live in small groups that love dancing around fires. They seem to have an unintelligible, babbling vocabulary of sorts consisting mostly of “Gaks and Guks and Guus” but it is not known if it is actually language or just nonsense. Cobbies have taken to scavenging discarded or broken gnomish tools and stealing old rags or random laundry off clothes lines, which they (if remembered) attempt to wear as clothes. The first several times the pale, clammy creatures were encountered were in corn fields stealing cobs of corn and so the name Cobbie was given to them.
Individual Cobbies or small groups up to five or six will make raids on crops if they are unguarded, but large groups will occasionally come together for all out pillaging. Taking more than they can carry, large groups will leave a trail of veggies that the Mushroom Knights can easily follow back to their dens, where justice is swiftly dealt out. Being fond of parsnips, though oddly not fond of carrots and unable to tell the difference while they are yet in the ground, Cobbies have been known to dig up whole carrot fields wondering if the next one might be that parsnip they are looking for. If Cobbies like parsnips they absolutely love turnips. Turnips cause an irrational exuberance similar to “gold fever” in the big folk and entire gardens have been overturned if it is even suspected there is a turnip buried in the ground.
There are two known types of Cobbies: Mountain Cobbies and Hill Cobbies. While they seem only to differ in colour, Mountain Cobbies being pale brownish live to the east of Donglemore and the hill cobbies being pale greyish live to the west of the desolate land. The two types have not been known to interact with each other and the gnomes are unsure that they are even aware of each other’s existence. Recently, a few Cobbies have been discovered in the south east of the kingdom, but the region is not populated and they have not yet been a nuisance. These Cobbies are also pale grey resembling the Hill Cobbies of the North West.
Bogwits
The Bogwits are a very odd race of creature living in the South Carrot Mires that stand upright like people and kind of look peopleish in their appearance except for their webbed feet, oval pupils, long tongue and white throat. They stand about three-feet tall, similar in size to a gnome. Their life cycle is rather peculiar as they start as amphibian-like egg masses that hatch into tadpolish type things. They also have a not quite frog, not quite humanoid stage before they stand on two legs. They seem to be quite intelligent—as much as any human, elf or gnome.
At one time, the Bogwits were quite numerous throughout the South Carrot Mires. Their people had a prophecy that said when the bearded ones came it would herald the fall of their civilization. When they first met the gnomes, the elders feared the time of the prophecy had come. But the gnomes turned out to be peaceful and friendly. After many years of wary hiding, they eventually started some limited trade with the gnomes and some of them learned the common speech. Then one day after the South Pass was discovered, bellow toads escaped from the squat, hairy, bearded human traders from the far south. In a very short number of years, the third generation of Bellow Toads had grown quite large and spread like wildfire throughout the mires. The giant toads then began eating all the eggs and young of the Bogwits who before had not had any predators. The native swamp people are now all but extinct and hide deep in the mires protecting their last egg pools, all but forgotten by the gnomes.
Most Bogwits have accepted that the years of their race are numbered and have resigned themselves to slowly disappear. However, there are some who are angry and blame the gnomes for their declining state. Rarely some will disguise themselves and sneak into the gnome’s towns but to what end no one knows.
Furgols
Furgols are weird, furry creatures that when first discovered in ruined cave dwellings in the mid-western mountains, were standing motionless and thought to be dead. Resembling a pile of living hair, they stand four feet tall with furry clawed hands and feet with leathery palms and soles. Their faces and eyes are hidden through all their hairiness. Their sleepy race was suddenly roused when the exploring gnomes prodded one with a stick. Within short moments, shouts and yells in an unfamiliar speech sounded in the mountain ruins and the gnomes fled. They were soon pursued by four-foot tall armoured globs of fur-wielding double-bladed axes, wicked pole arms, hammers and two-handed swords. They chased the gnomes all the way back to the village of Collard Stones, burning it to the ground and killing everyone they saw. A patrol of five brave Mushroom Knights was alerted and rushed to the defence of the village holding the Furgols off long enough for most of the villagers to escape, though sadly all the gardens were lost along with the five knights. With the village destroyed, the Furgols returned to the hills, rallied a large host and headed north storming the unsuspecting fortress of Lettuce Berg, razing it to the ground. They then followed the road east, burning every farm and village they happened upon until they were met by two companies of Mushroom Knights. Lines were drawn and a fierce battle ensued. Outnumbering their opponents two to one, the Mushroom Knights eventually proved victorious, though it was costly and there were a great deal of wounded. Only a small handful of Furgols escaped back to their mountains.
Soon after their clash with the gnomes, the Furgols began rebuilding their crumbling mountain holds and increasing in number. Small raiding parties now plague the Pebbly Plain in the east and every 20 to 30 years a small horde marches out to wage war on the gnomes. No one knows why their meeting of the gnomes caused them to rally out of years of sleep or what caused them to enter their hibernation-like state in the first place. Furgol arms and armour taken from the battle field has become the gnomes main source of iron, though the quality is poor and it is melted down and made into higher-grade iron.
Bandits
Since the discovery of the South Pass out of Gardonia and the meeting of the peoples who live nearby, bandits have become quite a problem along the southern trade routes and sometimes even in the south of the kingdom itself. Usually only lightly armoured, if at all, and not well armed, bandits comprised mainly of humans and elfs prefer to waylay small caravans or lone traders, typically avoiding ones with Mushroom Knight escorts. They steal what they can carry, usually leaving the gnomes frightened but alive. Before regular patrols of the roads, bandits attacked roughly a quarter of the caravans, but now they attack one in ten. If the caravan has an escort the chances of attack drops significantly more.
Testimonial
Wild Gnomes
When the lands around Donglemore were deserted, there were some gnomes who refused to leave their farms and homes and stayed in the north. As time passed the lands became more and more desolate and dangerous and there were fewer and fewer travellers. Eventually, the roads were abandoned and fell into ruin and the few remaining gnomes in the north were isolated and forgotten. Two thousand years later, a northern expeditionary party attempting to circumnavigate the Donglemore Valley came across some strange rustic gnomes. These wild gnomes had forgotten their past gnomish heritage and had become feral and wild. Abandoning farming and building practices they are strictly hunters and foragers living in tents in the wilds and wearing animal hides, leaves and bug shells. They have learned to survive the harsh land filled with dangerous, twisted creatures of Donglemore and are wary of their not so distant relatives from the south.