The Ytepka

The Triceratops Society is a secret organisation, hidden among the people of Chult, dedicated to preserving the Chultan way of life. The Ytepka agents watch and wait, monitoring everything until someone does something to break Chultan society, then they issue a warning before forcibly correcting the situation.

Anyone can be one of the Ytepka, they live among the Chultans in every settlement in Chult

History

The origin of the Ytepka lies two thousand years back when the wizard Bara Kyuss fled Mezro for the ruins of Kuluth-Mar, taking more than a thousand of his followers with him.

A number of couatl hidden in Chultan society began amassing allies and preparing to stop Kyuss and his evils, this secret alliance was named the Ytepka, the triceratops being revered as a three horned protector among the Ubato Zazqura (children of Ubtao), and the alliance was composed of three races (aarakocra, dur-Authalar, and human), and there were originally three couatl that remained to protect Chult.

The Ytepka attacked Kuluth-Mar in -483 DR, and defeated the aspiring demigod, imprisoning him within a black stone obelisk. Many of the Ytepka remain behind in the Chultengar and the Luo Plateau, manning the defences such as Ubtao’s Fingers, and reinforcing the villages of the Chultans nearest to the ruins of Kuluth-Mar, watching for signs of Kyuss’ return and battling the legacies left behind by the worm-god.

The war between the tabaxi and the eshowe weakened the Ytepka (who sided with the tabaxi during the conflict), and gradually over the centuries the territory of the Chultans was pushed out of the Chultengar and the defences of the Luo Plateau were eroded by yuan-ti and other infiltrators.

As Mezro withdrew more and more from Chultan society, the Ytepka took over as the secret guides and guardians of the tabaxi and other tribes, making sure that evils like Kyuss can never return. It was the Ytepka that first uncovered the yuan-ti threat hidden among the humans of Chult. It was the Ytepka that spread rumours throughout the Sword Coast that the Bormul (of Amn) merchant family were involved in slave trading after slavers spirited away the entire Jahak tribe and most of the profits went to the Bormul family.

More recently the Ytepka have delivered a warning (the iron coin) to the Amnian merchants involved in Port Nyanzaru. If the Amnians do not stop sponsoring the wholesale plunder of Chult’s ruins and resources then the Ytepka will begin plans to ruin Amnian business in the region and ultimately cause uprisings among the native Chultans and drive them from the peninsula.

Organisation

Headquarters: Chult, Mezro, the Great Library

Members: 4,000 agents spread throughout Chult

Hierarchy: Loose

Leader: Ekurzotl

Religion: Ubtao

Secrecy: High

Symbol: An iron coin with a triceratops face etched into either side

The Ytepka is a rigid organisation, with agents spread throughout Chult. The most senior members of the Ytepka are made up of the most aged of Mezroan society, including a number of senior Mazewalkers from the Mezrakura (but equally a larger number of scholars, elderly farmhands, and people from all walks of life).

The agents of the Ytepka (known as horns) are spread throughout Chult, with two or three agents in every settlement of Chult with more than a hundred inhabitants.

The Ytepka all believe they serve one of the Bara, although few can agree upon which Bara provides the orders. In truth they serve a couatl known as Ekurzotl (or Eku for short), who uses magical disguises to appear as whomever she desires including the occasional Bara, she is also able to possess people (including Bara) and implant suggestions, and through these methods has manipulated the Ytepka since their inception.

Positions within the Ytepka never change. Agents remain on the front line, as part of the society into which they were born. The senior Ytepka that make decisions and give orders will never take part in the activities and remain removed from those decisions and consequences.

Dogma / Motivation / Goals

The Ytepka seek to preserve the Chultan way of life. That is not to say they seek to preserve the tabaxi way of life; even though most of the senior Ytepka are tabaxi, but all the Chultan tribes (except for the Eshowe) obey a similar set of rules.

The Ytepka hold that all life is sacred, not just individual living creatures, but the mountains and lakes and jungle as a whole living organism. Slavery is abhorrent and should be punished wherever it is encountered. Magic is dangerous and needs to be controlled. As a general rule, nothing should be taken to excess, because an excess of anything results in the destruction of something.

The agents of the Ytepka keep watch for individuals that grow to powerful, or begin dabbling with magic, or succumb to outsider influences such as the excesses of wealth. When an individual comes to the attention of the Ytepka they are monitored closely for any signs that they have broken the unwritten rules of Chultan society.

All information gathered about an individual is funnelled back to the senior Ytepka in Mezro through the use of birds that communicate through the use of trill like songs akin to the language of the dur-Authalar (the birds repeat any song they hear and are especially fond of the dur-Authalar language). These birds congregate in Mezro each evening where they are safe from larger birds that hunt them, before returning to their patch of forest each morning. Only the dur-Authalar and the Ytepka are likely to have any chance of understanding the birds.

The senior Ytepka make a decision for when a warning should be given and then agents in that settlement are instructed to give the individuals the Iron Coin. Any reprisals are communicated to Ytepka in other portions of the jungle who then travel in search of the target and enact the punishment.

The punishment of the Ytepka usually befits the crime. Those who enslave others are similarly gifted to pirates. Murderers are fed to the Children of Ubtao (dinosaurs). Abusers of magic are twisted into a weakened form unable to practice magic any longer. Greedy merchants are made destitute. The punishment is deliberated for months by the elders of the Ytepka and then the punishment is enacted by those far from the crime so that anyone involved is removed from the emotion of the situation.