Tundra Wilders

The Korcari Wilds are a cold southern expanse of forests whose extent is not truly known. The Chasind Wilders, who live within, tell of a wasteland of snow and ice further to the south, filled only with desolate tundra and nomadic barbarians. Most northerners believe little of what the Chasind have to say.

The northerners are right to disbelieve at least some of what the Chasind say. The southern Tundras are not populated only by barbarians, but in fact a complex and enduring society comprised of a people that are not unlike the Avvar tribes of the Frostback Mountains.

They are called the People of the South, for they have no name. ..

The Tundra Wilders are a scattered people, who have lived far from the developed lands to the north for centuries; some historians theorise perhaps even thousands of years, and that the men of the world originate from those lands, rather than the commonly accepted notion of origins to the east.

An ancient people
They are less populous than the Avvar, surviving the unforgiving frozen wastes in tribes of anywhere between two and five dozen people. The exact number of tribes changes by the year, a combination of the extreme terrain and encroachment from people to the north shaping the Wilders in most aspects of their lives.

Most of the lands are barely accessible, let alone hold the capacity for settlements, and so the people have kept to the same locations for residence; there are groves dotted about the wastes where the weather does not reach, the deadly touch of extreme cold halting at the edge of what have become thoroughly established encampments. Through gradual, small scaled mining and farming these groves have become the homes of the Wilders, tended to as they are by various tribes due to the nomadic lifestyle they still hold to.

Whereas their Avvar cousins migrate from settlement to settlement sometimes as often as more than once a year, the Wilders rarely move from grove to grove more than once in half a decade. Uniting with other tribes during migration is a common occurrence, as the Wilders have forged paths through the wastes over countless years; it is rare that non-Wilder groups would set foot upon them, and so they join together during their journeys to intermingle and maintain their culture. These routes are known to tribe members, but only a handful of maps of the area exist. They are fiercely guarded against outsiders.

Across the wastes
The further north tribes live the more open they are to outsiders, but they are still not considered hospitable. To the east is barely populated. This is directly south of the Frostbacks, as the land does not reach much further east than that. In this area there is a fortress that the tribes do not venture near; there are creatures and hunters that kill on sight. The tribes deal with supernatural beings on an increasingly regular basis, and so do not hold the same level of panic when they are near. Much of their beliefs and way of life comes from an ancient time, and so are unknown to those from the north.