Leonidas
Leonidas is a land without borders or laws, a vast untamed expanse where only force dictates order. The Leoharix, anthropomorphic beings with feline features, dominate the plains, keeping a sharp eye on the fragile balance of the wild lands. Under their watchful eye, the Chayatiem thrive, protected from the growing shadows that stretch to the ends of the world.
Hierarchy of tribes
The Lions, bearers of the mane of the sun, reign as self-proclaimed masters. The Leoharix are united by the roar of the King-Dominant. These savage kings, protectors of the land, maintain the hierarchy by force and tradition. They sit at the Lion's Crown Palace. Whoever defeats the current king in a fight to the death will in turn be made king, taking his opponent's harem as well as glory.
Beyond the golden plains, however, lurk the Tigers, solitary in their majesty. Powerful but isolated, they steer clear of intrigue, preferring to act as the invisible blades of the Council. Their fierce independence makes them unrivalled warriors, but also troublemakers, whose brute force can overturn fragile balances.
The Hyenas form close-knit clans, with the matriarch leading the religious rituals. They hold the knowledge of laws and the secret of resources, ruling the Council's internal domains with a grip of steel. Feared for their cunning, they are the arbiters of conflict, holding the balance between war and peace.
The Panthers are diplomats and strategists, gliding between factions, weaving alliances that are only revealed on the brink of decisive battles. Their voice is gentle, but their claws fatal. Finally, the Cheetahs, runners of the wind and messengers of the dawn, carry the task of messengers. Agile diplomats and scouts, they ensure that words travel as fast as rumours of war. They enable exchanges with Tyrinthius.
Territory
In the arid steppes of Lion's Crown and Clawshadow Caverns, lions sit enthroned in palaces carved out of the rock. In the ghastly city of Lion's Gate, panthers run the Bazaar of Chains, a marketplace of souls where human slaves, stripped of their dignity, are sold like cattle. The hardiest dig the golden depths of the Golden Mountains, feeding the voracious Leoharix. The hyenas raise their young, fattened in gloomy pens, which they slaughter in rituals in honour of the Devourer, a silent god to whom they submit unconditionally. They regain their first teeth, the currency of these lands.
Further south, cheetahs, quick as the bite of the wind, scurry across the Prideheart Steppe, tracking down fugitives and maintaining the fragile links between feline factions. Cruel diplomats and agile mercenaries, they ensure that no chain is broken without reason. Finally, the panthers are the shadows of the kingdom: silent guardians, they watch over the borders and whisper alliances with the Chayatiem of Tyrinthius.
At the edge of everything, the Lands of the Burning Roar stretch like a yawning abyss. This is the purgatory of the disgraced: the disfigured, the outcasts, the fallen lions gnawed by shame. These lands roar with lament, where the volcanic rock absorbs the blood of the weak, and the winds carry the echoes of lost glory.
Economy
The economy is based on a bloody cycle in which human teeth serve as the central currency. Torn from dead slaves, they circulate among the clutches of the powerful as tangible proof of wealth and domination. Human ivory is exchanged for tools, weapons and precious artefacts. The skins of captives are reserved for the feline elite, transformed into luxurious garments or imposing armour, symbols of prestige and power.
The bones of the defeated, carefully polished, become blades, tools or ritual relics for the hyenas. Human farms spread out like open-air prisons. Slaves are bred like cattle, reproduced to feed a cruel economy. Some dig the quarries and gold mines of the Golden Mountains, enriching the feline coffers. The provinces of Tyrinthius pay lavish tribute every year to avoid the roar of war. And so, in this pitiless world, the feline economy prospers, built on the endless exploitation of bodies and lives.
Known places
Lion's Gate
Prideheart Steppe
Golden Mountain
Lands of the Burning Roar
Lion's Gate
Prideheart Steppe
Golden Mountain
Lands of the Burning Roar
Taboo
Among the Leoharix, where pure blood is revered as a divine blessing, there is an ancient and inviolable taboo: that of altered offspring. These unfortunate offspring, born of the unholy union between a lioness and a tiger, a panther and a cheetah, or any other cross-breed deemed unnatural, bear the mark of blasphemy.
From the moment they are born, these half-bloods, known as Counter-Bloods, are cursed by the gaze of their fellow creatures. Their bodies, often marked by a dissonant hybridity, are seen as an aberration because of their sterility. No clan or tribe claims them as its own, and their only legacy is exile.
Hunted without mercy, they are driven to the Lands of the Burning Roar. There, under a sky of volcano smoke, the Counter-Bloods wander as pariahs, their cries muffled by the incessant roar of the earth itself. These hostile lands, where life barely clings on, are as much a prison as a graveyard, a place where the disgraced must survive or disappear. It is said that these beings, united not by their blood but by their rejection, form a clan thirsting for vengeance.
Culture and believes
In the feline kingdoms, each race shapes its culture through ancestral traditions, guided by the law of the strongest. Lions, symbols of royalty and power, honour leadership, honour and family. Their culture reveres the sacred circle of protection, where rites of passage mark the ages of kings and protectors.
The Hyenas, with their implacable matriarchy, celebrate female resilience and ingenuity. In their festivals, they honour the Devourer and read the future. The Panthers interweave myth and ritual in a culture of secrecy, where the balance between light and shadow is celebrated in profound initiations.
But the cruelest custom is the hunting of humans. Freed in dedicated lands, these slaves become living prey, hunted as trophies by the felines, offering the elite a macabre display of power. A tradition that reinforces their ego and their status as supreme hunters.
This is really cool! I’m curious about the inclusion of hyenas; how did a non-feline become included with the Leoharix?
The term ‘Leoharix’ comes from humans, who try to classify the chayatiems. There used to be Chayatiem wolves, but they've disappeared. However, they would be classified as Leoharix because of their diet and the lack of knowledge humans have of them. But in reality, it's because of the expansion of humans that certain groups have been forced to join, more or less willingly. Hyenas have a special relationship with the forces of heaven and earth, they are shamans, and in exchange for their protection, they can read the oracle and sense bad omens. So they can advise other felines and found their place in the group.