Worlds Numberless and Strange
When sailors notice a sinuous form undulating across the sky, most wisely choose to go below decks rather than catch the notice of a traveling tetsu. A tetsu that has emerged from the lake it protects or doffed the streaming cloak of clouds in which it normally hides is a tetsu that has been roused to action and probably rage.
Tetsu are dragonlike creatures seeded by Japanese myth. Despite their lack of wings, inborn magic allows them to fly. In addition to flight, a tetsu's magic gives it a host of potential abilities, which often include taking human or yobuko form, producing magic "tide jewels," and divining the true intentions of other creatures.
Tetsu tide jewels can quell storms or transfer someone between any two known points in Seishin Shore.
Doing either reveals the
jewel's true nature as a tetsu egg, which hatches and releases a tetsu hatchling.
Tetsu hatchling: level 3; flies a long distance each round
Motive: Protection
Environment (Seishin Shore | Magic): Usually alone, protecting a lake or cloud realm
Health: 32
Damage Inflicted: Moderate wound (6 points)
Armor: 2
Movement: Long while flying or swimming; short while on the ground
Modifications: All tasks related to empathy and divining another creature's true nature (and detecting falsehoods) as level 7.
Combat: Tetsu can bite or claw opponents while in dragon form, or attack with appropriate weapons while in humanoid form. A tetsu can switch between forms as an action. In either form, a tetsu can call up a storm blast against a group of targets within half a mile (1 km) that are within immediate range of each other. Affected targets suffer damage and are blown up to a long distance. A tetsu can use its storm blast once every other round. Interaction: Tetsu are usually remote and unconcerned with individuals, mostly because the creatures feel responsibility for large regions and focus on the good of the many over the few. That said, tetsu sometimes notice the plight of individuals, especially those who are kind or good-hearted, and they can become fierce (if often absent) friends.
Use: A pirate skyship ransacked the treasury of a tetsu that was out traveling and made off with several tide jewels. The tetsu, reluctant to leave its domain again, promises to reward those who return its precious jewels or, failing that, deliver vengeance upon the thieves.
Loot: In addition to a tide jewel or two, a tetsu may possess one or two cyphers or an artifact (though it normally has the latter only while in humanoid form).
GM Intrusion: The tetsu divines the character's next action, and it moves or otherwise does exactly what's required to cancel out that action.