Khani: Angels of Death
As a druid and a scholar, it is my responsibility to educate you, dear readers, on the intricacies of the natural world and, in this case, what happens when it is desecrated. Nature spirits (I shall simply label all of the different sprites and spirits as "nature spirits" rather than delving into the pedantries of naming differences) are commonly misunderstood by the non-druidic population of our world. It is oft thought that a nature spirit is just a wraith of sorts who aimlessly wanders the world, empowering nature to grow wherever the spirit wanders. In truth, a nature spirit in physical form is an ill omen in the vast majority of cases, and they would likely not be recognized as a nature spirit by any but an experienced student of druidry.
A nature spirit is just the same as the spirit of a human or elf or even a sow (though we often call our spirits "souls"). Has your spirit ever become manifest for you or any other to see? Likely not. In a similar way, nature spirits do not wander the world in manifest form save on a few occasions: they can be summoned by a powerful druid, they can be manifested by nature itself to enforce its will, or they can become manifest after destruction of nature by (usually) non-natural means. In the first two cases, the spirits are kindly to look upon and commune with, but in the third, the manifestation is called a Khani, or "angel of death" colloquially. The Khani come into existence only through the suffering and destruction of nature. Greater destruction, such as when a forest is burned by war, yields a more powerful Khani. In nearly every culture, there are legends to describe what we now believe to be ancient Khani birthed in the aftermath of the Morlu Cataclysm.
At first glance, a Khani may be easily mistaken for a wraith, particularly an elvish wraith. The core of the Khani is its heart of light, hidden behind a (wooden, usually) mask of sorts and shrouded in raw natural energy. This raw energy trails from the orb of light, let us call it simply the "heart," and swirls around the Khani, somewhat resembling a cloak. Thus the Khani is often said to be a cloaked orb of light with a mask hiding the heart. They do not move quickly, for the most part, and are known to collide with inanimate objects and creatures in their path, as if they are totally blind to their surroundings. The Khani are totally benign, save in a single case: only when the site of their origin is threatened with further desecration do the Khani attack in order to dispel the threat. Otherwise, they wander the world aimlessly, pulled towards suffering and misery -- the only sentiments that the Khani seem to comprehend. Indeed, their propensity for haunting battlegrounds and the still-dying is what gives them their ghastly moniker: "angels of death." Make no mistake, though they often haunt the miserable and suffering, the Khani are not the cause of any of it -- merely a symptom of imbalance in the natural world.
As the desecration that birthed the Khani is replaced by new life (assuming that it is), the light of its heart will slowly fade until the Khani simply disappears. Speeding up the process of rebirth and regrowth, which is my duty as a druid, helps to more quickly remove the Khani from our plane of existence. The difficulty in dispelling a Khani, then, is not in the restoration itself, which has been the subject of druidic study since Morlu times, but in finding the origin site of the Khani in the first place. At times, as in war, the origin is easy and simple to find (the path of war is hardly ever subtle), but some Khani may end up entire nations away from their home before they are found (in one case, the great Novo Baccar had to cross the Al-Braugh to put a Khani to rest). To seek out Khani and lay them to rest is a task that only the most skilled druids can accomplish, as Khani are notoriously difficult to commune with and can drive mad anyone who looks too closely into its mind. Many still take up the task, though, as they see Khani as the first messengers from the gods of nature, and to ignore their presence is to invite the wrath of the divines upon us.
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