The Vizier Bird is a rare talking bird which comes from over the ocean. Its plumage is incredibly colourful with blues, reds, greens, and yellows being incredibly common. They are about as tall as a man's arm is long, and fairly bulky for a bird, they often seem like they wont fly to onlookers, though they can take wing at impressive speed. These birds tend to come from across the sea, brought by traders, pirates, and adventurers looking to bring back curiosities to sell in the markets and stalls of nearby towns and cities. The nobility of nearby lands will often pay to display vizier birds in their menageries and homes.
Those finding vizier birds in far away places know they they can be taught to speak, increasing their value as a curiosity. The vizier bird will learn words spoken near it, sometimes incredibly quickly, and sometimes very slowly, entirely based on the whim of the vizier bird. And this is because, the bird can very likely already speak whatever language is being spoken near it. Since it can speak dozens of languages. These birds are able to learn almost any language with incredible speed. They are also able to learn many other skills very quickly. They also have their own ideas of why they've headed north.
Vizier Birds are away of the intruders in their home. They're aware of the designs of these marauders and the reasons their ships come south. They have decided, as a parliament, to try to limit the encroachment of these intruders, and so have posed as large parrots, pretending to just be more of the strange southern birds, those who can speak and impress. But their plan isn't to simply protect their land, their plan is to collapse the nobility of this land, make it unable to ever again muster an invasion force to destroy their home. Their longterm goal is to assassinate as many kings as possible, and begin a series of civil wars, hopefully rendering the land unable to mount an expedition for generations.
In order to execute this strange plan, the vizier birds do what they can to be attractive to the rich and powerful, performing well, being docile and ideal pets. They do their best to become desirable to the most powerful person nearby, being a wonderful showpiece, often on the should of a pirate captain. Once there, they begin to speak to their victim in their sleep, whispering into their ear dreams of power and ascension to greater power. Often this means the vizier bird is shown off to more powerful people, which then allows them to enter greater spheres of power. Once they are as high as the bird feels it will go, it begins to reveal its true nature to its owner. Flattering them, putting ideas into their minds, and slowly turning them toward war upon their neighbours, attempting to start civil wars. The vizier birds, bit by bit, get their way, and begin wars at a scale that should be impossible for such a small bird.
The vizier bird can be often encountered in their homeland, where they are much more feared. In their homeland they are considered a creature of ill-omen due to the fact that they are mind controlling birds who have been attempting to build an empire for a thousand years. Their relatively small size, but their relatively powerful wills, has meant that their empire building has been limited to controlling humans and orcs, becoming priests and kings, reining over cities or kingdoms. They have demanded the building of ziggurats, irrigations ditches, or massive armies. They have brought their armies to war to build empires out of the peoples of the south, but always as advisers, always as the subordinate, always having a king or theocrat to be the tool of the vizier bird. Of course, since the resolution of the Avian Parliament, the empires of the vizier birds have been pulling back from the other empires, to allow the birds to focus.
Captivating: This creature's voice is magically persuasive. This creature can cast the Persuasion spell using its Will in place of the Sorcery skill, though it remains open ended. This does not cause the creature Tax.
Fast Learner: Reduce aptitude for all skills by three.
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