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On the Hunt

It’s common knowledge to the denizens of the plane of Crossroads that their world was manufactured by powerful planeswalkers centuries ago. Further, they know that their ancestors were all displaced peoples, robbed from their native lands, and made to do battle on behalf of these all-powerful mages. In the time since, the land has found some semblance of balance, with beasts, plants, and animals co-existing with sapient races that make up the population. As a Ranger for Magistrum City, maintaining and fostering this ecosystem is one of Bartholomew Azurium’s primary responsibilities.

However, this balance can often can be a delicate one, threatened by powerful beasts, or reactivated war machines of ages past. With no other recourse available, it is a Ranger’s duty to cull such beasts to manageable levels or to dismantle and disable war machines, before they are able to cause lasting harm to the environment and its inhabitants.

Though not a requirement of the job, skilled Rangers like Azurium can often receive bonuses for leaving their kills relatively intact. The Artificer’s Guild will pay handsomely for old war machines to study and analyze. And the meats, bones, hides, and parts of animal carcasses are put to use almost immediately by chefs, tanners, and other craftspeople in Magistrum City.

Tracking another dangerous mark, the tigerkin draws his weapons and prepares for a hunt.

This piece from balalaevGod, commissioned in November of 2023 and uploaded by me in January of 2024, served as another excuse to elaborate more of the Rangers of Magistrum City and how their duties fit into the larger ecosystem of the city. It would be wasteful for them to just let the monster and machine carcasses rot and fester, so naturally they would need a system in place to make use of them.