Nagaji

Nagaji are a race of snake people created by the ancient naga to serve as a slave race. Over the centuries handfuls of escaped slaves have managed to flee, though only one large community of free Nagaji is known. Those that escape make their way to ports as far from their home as they can, and small secret communities of ex-slaves have formed in some areas.

Ophidian Forms

Like their naga creators and masters, the Nagaji have a distinctly ophidian form. Their torso are humanoid, though covered in scales, but both their lower extremities and their heads are very snake like. They have two arms that end in five fingered hands, but instead of legs they have a long, powerful serpent’s body. This gives them great strength and the naga often use Nagaji as beasts of burden as well as servants and warriors.

Created by the Naga

Eons ago a group of powerful naga fused human and snake to create the first Nagaji. For generations these progenitors of the Nagaji race were mere beasts, but in time careful manipulation of their lineages produced an intelligent, if sometimes belligerent, race capable of serving the naga. The Nagaji are capable of reproducing themselves, and the naga continue to tinker with their slaves to breed specific lineages, most often for color or pattern of scales. So far none of the naga slave breeders has managed to create a more docile Nagaji.

A Slave Race

Nagaji perform all physical labors for the naga. The naga lounge endlessly, barely lifting their heads even to eat, instead having their slaves to fetch and carry, build and lift, pull carts and plows, work the fields, make the wine, and fight the wars. Lacking arms themselves, the naga have come to rely n the Nagaji to perform nearly every task for them. Even the lowliest of naga has slaves to turn the pages of books, dress them, carry them around on palanquins or drawn carts, and stand vigil while they sleep.

Free Nagaji Movement

The naga use brutality, tradition, and their own mystical powers to keep their slaves in bondage. Even so, every generation sees the threat of a Nagaji uprising. These are put down with much bloodshed, and many naga believe that the best way to handle slaves is to regularly kill and replace them. Despite this, and because of it, a free Nagaji movement has begun. It grows in fits and starts as slaves escape and meet each other in the wild, word gets passed from one Nagaji to another, and the wandering camps of free Nagaji move in response to slave hunters.

• Ability Score Increase. Your Strength scores increase by 2, and your Intelligence score increase by 1.
• Age. From hatching, a Nagaji achieves adult size in roughly ten years. Many die of abuse or because their masters have passed before they reach their thirtieth year, but free Nagaji can live for two to three centuries.
• Alignment. Generations in bondage have given the Nagaji a strong habit of law and order, or at least a willingness to follow orders to avoid punishment. Many see the evil of their race’s treatment but are unable to do much about it. Others fight against their former masters. Neither tend to concern themselves with moralizing about their actions, survival or freedom are of paramount importance.
• Size. You are 8-9 feet long and when coiled stand around six feet tall. Your body is strongly muscled and dense, you weigh around 200 pounds. You are medium sized.
• Speed. You slither along at 30 feet.
• Coiled Spring. As a bonus action, you can coil your serpentine body beneath you and launch yourself in to the air. When you do so you double the distance you can jump.
• Endurance. Your powerful frame allows you to carry heavy burdens. For purposes of endurance or calculating how much you can lift or pull, you count as large sized.
• Slither. As a bonus action, you can lay yourself out horizontally on a surface and make full use of your serpentine body. When you do so, your speed increase by +10 feet until the end of your next turn. This is tiring, ad you can only slither for a number of turns equal to your Constitution modifier (minimum 1). You regain use of this feature following a short rest.
• Trained. Your naga masters trained you for a particular task. You are proficient in two skills or tools of your choice.
• Poison Fangs. You have a pair of fangs and poison glands that you can use to make a melee attack. If you hit, you inflict 1d4 piercing damage and the target must succeed at a Constitution save equal to your 8 + your Strength modifier + your proficiency bonus or suffer 1d6 poison damage and gain the poisoned condition until the end of their next turn. It takes time for your poison glands to refill, and you can only do this once. You regain use of this feature following a long rest. Naga of any kind are immune to this poison.
• Languages. You can speak, read, and write Abyssal and Common.