Halflings, sometimes called the Little Folk, are a reclusive and gentle people, rarely found outside their modest farming communities nestled in quiet vales and green hills. Eschewing power and prestige, they lead lives rooted in simplicity, hospitality, and the rhythms of the land.

Though often overlooked in the greater histories of Arda, halflings are renowned for their joy in life’s small pleasures—good food, warm hearths, and company well-kept. Their gatherings and festivals are the stuff of legend, filled with music, dance, and an abundance of cheer.

They are not warriors, nor scholars, nor smiths of note—but in times of darkness, it is said the courage of a halfling can burn brighter than any blade.

The Tabaxi, lithe and feline in form, trace their lineage to the Lost Lands—a sunken continent whose name has been forgotten by most, but whose myths ride the waves still. Agile by nature and born with an uncanny talent for climbing and balance, the Tabaxi have long since turned their gifts toward the sea.

Masters of sail and star, the Tabaxi are famed across Arda for their immense, elegant ships—vessels of sweeping design and unparalleled craftsmanship, often large enough to house entire extended clans. Many among them never set foot on land, living out their days upon the rolling waves beneath sun, steering by moonlight and memory.

Though they claim no fixed kingdom, the Tabaxi are bound by ancient maritime traditions, oral law, and a deep reverence for the ocean’s mysteries. Their ships are their homes, their hearths, and their heritage—and where they drop anchor, stories follow.

The Dragonborn are a rare and dwindling people, forged in the darkest depths of the Sundering War. Bred by Melkor—later called Morgath—as perfect soldiers, they were shaped in draconic form to serve without question, vessels of might, flame, and obedience. For a time, they were legion: disciplined, deadly, and utterly bound to the will of their master.

Yet in the crucible of war, something stirred within them. In defiance of their own making, many Dragonborn turned against Morgath, breaking the chains of their creation. It is said that in the moment of their rebellion, Ilúvatar Himself looked upon them with mercy—and granted them souls, elevating them from tools of war to beings of will, honor, and sorrow.

But Morgath's spite runs deep. In his retreat beyond the Doors of Night, he cursed the Dragonborn, decreeing that no more would ever be born. Since that time, no clutch has quickened, and no new life has stirred in their forges or halls. The few young that now walk Arda hatch only from forgotten egg-caches, sealed before the curse took hold.

They are a proud and haunted race—living relics of a war long past, carrying both the shame of their creation and the dignity of their defiance. Most dwell in scattered enclaves, bound by honor, memory, and a fierce loyalty to one another. Some serve as wandering swords, others as silent sages. All know that their time in the world grows short.

The race known in common tongue as Lizardfolk call themselves Ghaarrichk'k, a name that translates—loosely and ominously—as Those Who Consume and Remain. First recorded as arriving upon the southern shores in crude rafts and scaled vessels during the early Seventh Age, their origin lies far beyond the maps of men, in a continent shrouded by heat, jungle, and myth.

The Ghaarrichk'k are relentless in their expansion, driven not by ambition or ideology, but by a deeply-rooted instinct: to hunt, to consume, and to claim. They see themselves as the apex species of Arda—superior not through intellect or culture, but through sheer biological sovereignty. In their worldview, all that lives is prey, and that which is strong enough to endure deserves dominion.

Lacking in original invention, the Ghaarrichk'k are instead terrifyingly adept at mimicry. They conquer, devour, and replicate—taking the technologies, weapons, and practices of those they destroy, refining them through a cold, utilitarian lens. The knowledge of a people is not something to be studied—it is to be eaten, assimilated, and made useful.

Rarely emotional, and nearly incomprehensible to most other races in terms of culture or motivation, the Ghaarrichk'k do not negotiate, and they do not mourn. What they build, they build from the bones of the fallen. What they keep, they keep in silence.

Their settlements rise quickly—efficient, brutal, and alien. Their numbers swell with each conquest. And though they lack the magic of the Elves, the honor of Men, or the memory of Dwarves, they bring with them the one force few civilizations have endured forever:

Hunger.

The Orcs were the second of Melkor’s creations—forged, not born, in the dark wombs of his hidden pits during the early wars of the world. Where the Dragonborn were made to be vessels of strength, the Orcs were shaped for obedience—crude in form, broken in will, and bound utterly to their master's voice. Their minds were not crafted to wonder, but to serve, and the echo of Morgath’s will still coils like black thread through their very essence.

Though lacking the draconic ferocity of their elder kin, Orcs possess a cunning born of cruelty. They fight not with honor, but with instinct and spite. They adapt quickly, breed faster than any other sentient race, and flourish in places where light falters. In the ancient tongue of the Valar, they are called Yrkuul—those twisted by unmaking.

With Morgath sealed beyond the Doors of Night, his voice has grown silent—but the Orcs still listen. They gather in shadowed places where his memory lingers, worshipping ancient relics, mimicking his commands in chants and rites long-corrupted. Some claim they can still hear him, in dreams, in fire, in blood.

In the present age, they are most often found in the bleak wastes of Helcaraxë and the cursed forests of Fos Almir, though roving warbands and raiding parties are sighted across much of Arda. They strike quickly, vanish into mist or ruin, and leave behind only ashes and silence.

To most, they are monsters. To scholars, they are a tragic corruption. But to those who have stood against them in the dark—they are the reminder that evil does not sleep, it waits.

The true origin of the Goblins remains a matter of scholarly debate and grim speculation. The prevailing theory—drawn from scattered texts and the grim accounts of surviving Mía—is that goblins are the failed strain of Melkor’s second creation, rejected orcs, twisted too weak, too unruly, or too strange to serve in the disciplined ranks of his armies.

Cast out, abandoned, or simply overlooked in the vast forges of darkness, these creatures were left to fester without the binding influence of Morgath’s will. And in his absence, they changed. No longer held in the iron order of their brethren, goblins grew feral, fractured, and unpredictable. They scattered into the hidden places of Arda—deep caverns, ruined strongholds, and the underbellies of mountains the sun has long since forsaken.

Though smaller and physically weaker than orcs, goblins are marked by deceptive cunning and a boundless appetite for chaos. They cobble together weapons from refuse, trap their dens with cruel ingenuity, and squabble among themselves in chittering dialects few outsiders have learned to survive. Lacking centralized rule, goblin tribes are led by the strongest, the loudest, or the maddest—often all three in one.

Unlike the orcs, goblins do not worship Morgath; they fear him—or what he once was. Their oral traditions, where they exist, speak of “The Flame-That-Burned-Too-Bright” or “The Shaper-Who-Forsook,” and they tell their young not to pray, but to hide.

Though rarely a threat alone, goblins breed swiftly and thrive in numbers. When roused or driven by greater powers, they become a scourge—a flood of shrieking blades and gnashing teeth.

To most of the world, they are vermin. But in truth, goblins are the survivors of a forgotten failure—scraps of a dark god’s ambition, who learned to endure without his voice.

The precise origin of the Kobolds remains shrouded in mystery and contradiction. Some scholars posit they are a stunted offshoot of the Dragonborn—spawned from flawed clutches, or twisted by exposure to wild magics in the waning days of the Sundering War. Others claim they are not descended from dragons at all, but from ancient daemonic experiments or rogue enchantments given shape and mischief.

Whatever their origin, kobolds are now a race entirely their own: small, scaled, and fiercely energetic. Though rarely taken seriously by the great powers of Arda, they are far from harmless. Driven by a frenetic curiosity and an almost instinctive gift for tinkering, kobolds are natural trap-makers, scavengers, and inventors. Their warrens—often dug deep into abandoned ruins, cliffside hollows, or forgotten mine shafts—are mazes of pulleys, counterweights, unstable alchemical mixtures, and aggressively repurposed objects.

They are obsessed with objects of shine and shimmer—not for power, but for the joy of possessing them. Jewels, cogs, enchanted buttons, even polished stones are considered treasures beyond price. Within their warrens, these “collections” are displayed like holy relics, fiercely guarded by clever mechanisms and an overwhelming number of teeth.

Kobolds are rarely malicious, but they are persistent nuisances, capable of disrupting entire caravans or fortresses through sheer enthusiasm and ill-timed experimentation. Some tribes have even begun imitating the inventions of other races—often with explosive, if short-lived, results.

And yet, for all their eccentricity, kobolds endure. In a world of grand tragedies and fading legends, they are a flickering spark of unpredictable life—brilliant, stubborn, and entirely unbothered by their place at the edge of myth

Known in the elder tongue as Moriquendi, or Elves of the Shadow, the Drow are a splintered kindred of the Firstborn who, in the earliest ages, turned away from the light of the newly risen Sun. While many Elves followed the call of Varda’s starlight and later embraced the day, the Moriquendi chose a different path—downward, into the hollows of the world, drawn not by starlight, but by the shimmer of gold, quicksilver, and the quiet hum of the earth’s deep veins.

They are Elves still, bound by long life, sharp senses, and ancient memory—but shaped by darkness, stone, and solitude. In their subterranean cities—vast, silent, and radiant with cold bioluminescence—the Drow have forged a culture apart: austere, brutal, and steeped in ritual. Where the Elves of the surface revere song, beauty, and light, the Moriquendi revere endurance, precision, and power earned through strength.

They are not inherently evil, though many among the surface races speak of them as such. Rather, they are pragmatic, and often cruel by necessity. In the deep places of the world, mercy is a luxury, and hesitation is death. Their methods may seem harsh, their justice cold, but theirs is a world that has never known a sunrise.

Drow society is often matriarchal, martial, and rigid. Their art is forged in metal, their music in silence, their magic in geometry and stillness. Few surface-dwellers ever earn their trust, and fewer still return from their realms unchanged.

On the Gnolls, the Cast-Off Howl of Morgath

The Gnolls are yet another of Morgath’s brutal experiments—an attempt to mold a new race of savage infantry, born not for endurance or loyalty, but for pure, unrelenting aggression. Fashioned in the latter days of the Sundering War, they were shaped with claws, fangs, and a mind attuned to bloodshed.

But the design was flawed. Lacking cunning, incapable of discipline, and too wild even for the dark god’s purposes, the gnolls were ultimately rejected. Morgath turned his will to more promising creations, and the gnolls—like embers cast from a dying flame—were left to burn out on their own.

They did not.

Now, they prowl the wilder places of Arda in savage packs, driven by hunger, instinct, and a fractured echo of their original purpose. They are not builders. They do not farm, forge, or sing. They hunt, feast, and follow. Without guidance, gnoll packs tear through villages and borderlands, leaving chaos in their wake and vanishing before true retaliation can arrive.

Though most are barely sentient, gnolls possess an animal cunning and a terrifying capacity for violence. When left to themselves, they are a scattered nuisance. But when a mind strong enough—and cruel enough—rises to dominate them, gnolls become a weapon. Entire regions have fallen to warbands held together by a single shaman, warlord, or rogue sorcerer who managed to bend the pack to their will.

They have no homeland. No history. No gods of their own. Only the hunger, the howl, and the memory of what they were meant to be.

And that, perhaps, makes them the most dangerous of all Morgath’s forgotten spawn.