little way to the north of Nevrast are a crude fortress and stockade built of wood. These poorly-built structures are home to a tribe of vicious gnolls, savage, hyena-headed humanoids who war on anyone weaker than they are, particularly their northwestern neighbors, the Great Delve of the Dwarves. The gnolls are largely to blame for those dwarves' decline over recent generations, as the ongoing conflict gradually takes its toll on the dwarven population: the flesh-eating gnolls do not only kill dwarves in combat, but frequently raid the outlying fringes of the dwarven settlement for prisoners to take back to their hovel of a fort as slaves and food.