Avarine

If an Avarine ever tells you something is a bargain, love, run. The only ‘deal’ they’ve ever given anyone is a head start.

— Soki Noles, Field Guide to Creatures Who Smile When You Sign Things

I. Nature of the Avarine

Avarine are the hoarders, collectors, and robber barons of the Secundi.
Where Authorities hunger for obedience and Anabus hunger for sensation, Avarine hunger for possession.

Everything that exists—or might exist—is something an Avarine wants to own:

wealth

objects

secrets

supplicants

slaves

planets

people

ideas

even other Sentients

An Avarine’s desire is acquisitive but not indiscriminate; they covet with strategy, not gluttony. They do not simply want treasure. They want treasure others want, treasure with history, treasure with significance, treasure with stories.

Their greatest pride is not what they have acquired, but what others believe they have.

II. Appearance & Aesthetic Philosophy

Avarine project wealth with the subtlety of a collapsing star.

They adorn themselves in:

jeweled rings on every finger

gold leaf splashed across armor like cheap paint

brocaded cloaks too heavy to wear

crowns stacked atop crowns

priceless relics repurposed into gaudy shoulderpieces

gemstones that do not exist in realspace

exotic creatures used as fashion accents

Their aesthetic resembles:

a tin-pot dictator,

a Renaissance prince,

a dragon with opposable thumbs,

and a street hawker selling luxury watches—
all at once.

They swap ornaments constantly, curating themselves like living storefronts. The display is always for someone—
a rival, a guest, a customer, a target.

III. Subspace Vaults: The Bottomless Coffers

Avarine possess what no other Secundi can replicate:

Pocket-Universes of Wealth

Their vaults are:

extradimensional cysts

stitched into subspace by their will

vast, labyrinthine, timeless

filled with floating planetoids of treasure

populated by enslaved creatures, Wight tribes, and stored enemies

Avarine use their vaults for:

Storage – for impossible wealth
Banking – they never forget a deposit
Gizmo-like retrieval – weapons, relics, documents, tools
Punishment – oubliettes of darkness and time dilation
Display – curated greed made manifest

Inside a vault, a human could live a year in what realspace registers as a day—or die of age in minutes.

Only the Avarine may open or close these vaults.
Only the Avarine determine what enters or exits.
Only the Avarine know the full inventory.

And they remember every single item ever stored.
Down to the last misplaced chit.

IV. Protection Against the Avarine

Avoiding Avarine predation is possible—but extraordinarily dangerous.

1. Do Not Make Deals

If an Avarine offers a contract, they already have you at a disadvantage.
Every deal is crafted to benefit them twice—once immediately, once later.

2. Reject Materialism

Aesthetic or philosophical anti-materialism confounds them.
They cannot tempt you with wealth if wealth holds no meaning.

3. Steal From Them (High Risk)

The only time an Avarine loses leverage is when their wealth is stolen.

Especially their Sworn Objects, artifacts bound to their identity.

Stealing a Sworn Object is:

a death sentence,

a source of desperate bargaining leverage,

the origin of “wish-granting devils,”

and the beginning of a feud that never ends.

You may get what you ask for.
But you will never, ever sleep safely again.

V. Role in the Courts

Avarine run the financial bloodstream of Acheronian society:

treasurers

bankers

insurers

loan sharks

usurers

contract-brokers

ransom negotiators

slavers

traffickers in items forbidden or cursed

As Barons, they become:

pirate-kings,

toll collectors,

hoarding tyrants,

or conquerors who burn down worlds only to melt the ruins into bullion.

As Presidents, they are:

resource managers,

supply chain administrators,

and the terrifying accountant who remembers the last ten millennia of unpaid debts.

As Knights, they are:

raiders

ambushers

treasure-hunters

opportunists

and the devils most likely to encounter kthonikers early in their careers

Avarine are the quintessential dealmakers—
but a deal with them is always a loan, never a gift.

Callings of the Avarine

Shark

“Easy money has never been free money.”

Regular

The supplicant receives a sudden infusion of wealth—
$100 Chits per point of success on a Will roll.

If the full amount is not repaid at double within one week,
the Avarine dispatches collectors—usually Tallywights.

Collectors remove one pound of flesh, almost always something valuable
(a hand, an eye, a kidney, a tongue).

The Avarine keeps it in their vault as collateral.

Cost: 1 SP

Activation Time: 1 Mental Action

Duration: 1 week

Hell’s Sword

“Every treasure is a leash.”

The supplicant draws a weapon from the patron’s vault.
Anything wieldable by hand is fair game:

a bronze spear older than writing

a particle carbine from a forgotten war

a living blade forged from a Verminous RAI

a neutron-dusted execution saber

a Dreadknight dueling lance

The weapon remains for one day, unless maintained.

Price: One day—known only to the Avarine—the supplicant must use the weapon on the Avarine’s chosen target.
Refusal invokes contract penalties.

Cost: 3 SP, 1 SP to maintain

Activation Time: 3 Actions

Duration: 1 day

Safe and Sound

“Only a fool thinks that giving is the same as storing.”

The supplicant hides an object within the Avarine’s vault.
Retrieving it requires another Calling.
The object becomes marked psychically and legally as tribute.

The Avarine will expect it back.
If not voluntarily, then by force.

Cost: 1 SP

Activation Time: 1 Action

Duration: Instant