When the Branthorn Bog turned sour, the carrion crows that circled its waters changed with it. Fed on rot, poison, and endless corpses left to sink into the mire, their beaks grew serrated ridges like saws. Their feathers turned slick with a permanent, oily sheen.
They no longer scavenge in silence. They hunt. And when they descend, they do not kill cleanly, they peel.
The bog is their cradle and their throne: Thɪs chapter is updated by NoveIＦire.net
Deadfall Trees serve as rookeries, nests lashed together from tendon and bone.
Reed Beds flutter with scraps of drying meat, cut in ribbons by crow beaks.
Skin Gardens are strange patches of bark and stone layered with flesh strips, left to cure before being woven into nests.
No corpse left in the Branthorn Bog remains whole for long.
To those who live near the bog, the Skinner Crows are an unspoken law:
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Nothing Dies Clean. The bog strips everything bare.
The Bog Keeps Its Tithe. Wander too far in, and the crows will collect.
Flesh Is Thread. Their nests are shrouds, stitched from the bodies of the lost.
Wingspan stretches up to three meters.
Beaks serrated like sawblades, designed to cut strips rather than pierce.
Eyes white and gleaming, reflecting light even in full dark.
Talons curved to drag flesh rather than tear meat free.
Their calls are jagged screams that sound like tearing cloth.
Skin Offering: Travelers cut small strips of their own flesh and toss them into the waters before crossing. To deny the crows their due is to invite swarming.
Feather Veil: A cloak woven from shed crow feathers is said to disguise the scent of living flesh.
Bog Silence: Within the Branthorn, no one speaks above a whisper. The crows come to sound.
Circle high until prey is mired knee-deep in bog mud.
Strike in groups, cutting strips until exhaustion takes the victim.
Leave bodies alive as long as possible, flesh peels easier from the living.
Hooked talons for dragging.
Serrated beaks for shearing.
Screams that break courage and scatter groups.