TEXT: OHUNKAKAN: 
  THE LIVING MYTHS
  BY ALINA PETE AND ANTHONY PASTORES
  
  2
  Writers/Designers
  Alina Pete
  Anthony Pastores
  Developer
  Monte Cook
  Creative Director
  Shanna Germain
  Editor/Proofreader
  Ray Vallese
  Artist
  Winona Nelson
  Graphic Designer
  Bear Weiter
  Monte Cook Games 
  Editorial Board
  Scott C. Bourgeois
  David Wilson Brown
  Eric Coates
  Gareth Hodges
  Mila Irek
  Jeremy Land
  Laura Wilkinson
  Marina Wold
  George Ziets
  © 2015 Monte Cook 
  Games, LLC
  The Strange and its logo 
  are trademarks of Monte 
  Cook Games, LLC in the 
  U.S.A. and other countries. 
  All Monte Cook Games 
  characters and character 
  names, and the distinctive 
  likenesses thereof, are 
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  Games, LLC.
  In Ohunkakan, the old stories still live. Tale-
  tellers practice their art throughout the 
  recursion, the constant flux of their tellings and 
  retellings weaving an ever-changing tapestry 
  of myth that shapes the fabric of reality. 
  Landmarks, villages, and even the patterns of 
  stars shift across the landscape, the familiar 
  freely mixes with the mythic, and elements of 
  dim ages stubbornly persist alongside images 
  pulled from modern Earth. Even today, a tale 
  told powerfully enough might just become true.
  The terrain of Ohunkakan is vivid and 
  changeable; every object seems to shudder 
  and breathe with life as if freshly imagined. 
  Throughout the plains, old men repair even 
  older cars with parts dug up from middens 
  deep in the hills intermixed with ancient 
  serpent bones, and then they trade stories with 
  far-ranging hunters beside towering tipis of 
  shimmering hides. Towns of stocky whitewashed 
  houses by day transform into rings of hoodoos 
  by night, the townsfolk whispering from within 
  the stones. Grandmothers watch sitcoms on 
  flickering screens of painted hide while their 
  OHUNKAKAN: 
  THE LIVING MYTHS
  grandsons wrestle giants in the wilderness. 
  Locals find nothing odd or out of place in 
  this. Though Ohunkakan was spun from the 
  traditional stories of the Lakota people, the ever-
  shifting flood of modern anachronisms shows 
  these traditions continue to change and evolve.
  Arrival: First-time recursors arrive atop the 
  flattened, quartz-littered crown of Fallen Star 
  Butte, which offers a sweeping view of the plains.
  SPIRITS AND ELDER SPIRITS
  The inhabitants of Ohunkakan are as variable 
  and inscrutable as the land. Birthed by the stories 
  themselves, each was cast out into the world 
  when their tale was finished with them. Most take 
  human shape, but others are animals, plants, 
  or inanimate objects: delicate men whose stag 
  antlers show only in shadow, sparrow-eyed old 
  women who reveal a flash of wing when they 
  dance, and dirty, heavy-footed men with faces 
  like granite are all possible. As they are already 
  trained to understand the part their lives play in 
  the continuing cycle of myth, the incidence of the 
  spark among them is unusually high.
  CREDITS
  The name “Ohunkakan” 
  derives from Ohúŋkakaŋ, 
  a Lakota word meaning 
  “myth” or “story of the 
  remote past.”
  Ohunkakan is 
  pronounced o-HOON-
  ka-kan: “o” like oh, 
  “HOON” like soon, 
  “ka” like spa, 
  and “kan” like khan.
  Ohunkakan was seeded 
  through a genesis quest, 
  but when or by whom is 
  unknown.
  Genesis quest, page 138
  Ohunkakan spirit, 
  typical: level 3, tasks 
  related to telling and 
  creating stories as level 5
  Throughout this 
  book, you’ll see page 
  references to various 
  items accompanied 
  by this symbol. These 
  are page references to 
  The Strange corebook, 
  where you can find 
  additional details 
  about that item, place, 
  creature, or concept. It 
  isn’t necessary to look 
  up the referenced items 
  in the corebook, but 
  doing so will provide 
  useful information for 
  character creation and 
  gameplay.
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  OHUNKAKAN: THE LIVING MYTHS
  3
  The oldest and greatest of these figures are 
  truly legendary. These elders—Coyote, Iktomi, 
  the Stone Child, the Blood-Clot Man, and many 
  others—carry with them a pocket of warped 
  reality in which the logic of their own particular 
  story dominates. Within these bubbles of 
  myth-time, ancient dramas spring up naturally, 
  incorporating unsuspecting wanderers as 
  fresh actors in living stories. Often escape is 
  impossible until the individual tale is brought to 
  a satisfactory conclusion, though clever victims 
  often find ways to spin new endings onto old tales.
  For example, where Coyote walks the world 
  is tinged with absurd humor, and foolishness 
  always leads to comedic consequences. Those 
  passing must be wary of being caught up in 
  his elaborate pranks. Similarly, the Grandfather 
  of Bears might force passers-by to hold up a 
  mountain with uncanny strength so he may dig 
  for grubs underneath, becoming angry if they 
  cannot accomplish the task.
  Other, less-revered spirits slip across the 
  landscape as well, playing out their own endless 
  retellings in the wilds. In distant and dangerous 
  places, fearsome things stalk—some are well-
  known figures of story and song, while others 
  are only vague memories of beasts slain long 
  ago in half-forgotten tales. These giants, man-
  eaters, and double-faced horrors lure uncertain 
  victims down dangerous paths with their trickery, 
  tempting heroes to venture forth and slay them. 
  But as long as they are spoken of, the monsters 
  will return, for killing a story is a difficult thing.
  STORYTELLING
  A peculiar kind of narrative magic is practiced 
  in Ohunkakan, allowing storytellers to alter 
  the world around them with the power of their 
  words. This ability is highly esteemed, and those 
  with powerful stories to tell are welcome in 
  every village. Skilled storytellers might move a 
  village away from an oncoming storm, calm a 
  long-standing feud between families, or produce 
  many other fantastic effects.
  Some professional tale-tellers act as healers, 
  collecting curing tales to help the weary fend off 
  magical maladies or curses. Each cure requires 
  participation from the patient to complete the tale. 
  Often this is a simple process—perhaps bathing 
  in cedar smoke or spending a night atop a sacred 
  bluff with a red ribbon tied around one’s hands. 
  But more complex curses require more complex 
  OHUNKAKAN ATTRIBUTES
  Level: 6
  Laws: Magic
  Playable Races: Humans
  Foci: Carries a Quiver, Entertains, Leads, 
  Lives in the Wilderness, Shepherds the 
  Dead, Works Miracles
  Skills: Ohunkakan storytelling
  Connection to Strange: Where the wills 
  of elder spirits collide, occasional tears in 
  reality rip directly through to the Strange. The 
  battlefields of the Thunderer and the Horned 
  Serpent are particularly known for this.
  Connection to Earth: Various gates, all 
  located at the sites of deeds celebrated in 
  story.
  Size: Exact size unknown due to 
  malleable nature, but approximately as 
  large as the Great Plains of North America
  Spark: 80%
  Trait: Strange. The difficulty of tasks to 
  recognize and understand the Strange 
  and its denizens (including identifying 
  translated visitors from alternate recursions, 
  as well as identifying and understanding 
  cyphers) is reduced by one step.
  WHAT A RECURSOR KNOWS ABOUT 
  OHUNKAKAN
  • Ohunkakan operates under the law of 
  Magic and is a place where stories, fears, 
  and dreams are made manifest.
  • Though the inhabitants of Ohunkakan 
  appear human, most originate in 
  traditional Lakota narratives, having a 
  deeper nature that, if deduced, might be 
  used to predict their behavior.
  • The reality of Ohunkakan is somewhat 
  unstable, and the more powerful beings 
  of the recursion—called elder spirits—
  warp this reality simply by existing.
  • Two of the more powerful elder spirits, 
  the Thunderer and the Horned Serpent, 
  are actively antagonistic toward each 
  other, and their periodic struggles leave 
  great swaths of destruction across the 
  landscape.
  Coyote: level 6, trickery 
  and deception as level 
  8, resist trickery and 
  deception as level 2; 
  regains 2 points of health 
  each round
  Easily fooled despite his 
  swagger, Coyote’s frightful 
  resilience allows him to 
  bounce back from any 
  setback.
  Grandfather of Bears: 
  level 8; stories ensnare 
  targets within short 
  range and hold them in 
  thrall until the story is 
  concluded; can confer 
  limited supernatural 
  abilities on targets while 
  they are in thrall to a 
  story
  Storyteller: level 5, tasks 
  related to telling and 
  creating stories as level 7; 
  can create story bubbles 
  within immediate range
  Creating story bubbles 
  is similar to creating 
  recursions, except no 
  nexus is required and a 
  good story, properly told, 
  takes the place of the 
  reality seed.
  Rules for Creating 
  Recursions, page 138
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  4
  The Thunderer: level 
  10; attacks with flashes 
  of lightning from his 
  eyes; if killed, reforms in 
  the clouds of the next 
  thunderstorm
  The Thunderer GM 
  intrusions: Actions 
  near the Thunderer are 
  reversed in target, effect, 
  or intent.
  The Horned Serpent: 
  level 10; gaze attack 
  causes victim to writhe 
  in pain and vomit black 
  earth; if killed, reforms 
  after one week beneath 
  the nearest lake
  The Horned Serpent 
  GM intrusions: The 
  area around the Horned 
  Serpent floods with water, 
  hindering the movement 
  of those around it.
  cures, and pity to the recursor whose ailment can 
  be cured only by a scale from the Horned Serpent.
  Other tellers specialize in retelling the stories 
  of those who have passed on, calling echoes of 
  departed spirits back into the narrative of the 
  present to take an empty spot around the ritual 
  fire and answer questions for a short time. A rare 
  few even have the ability to create story bubbles 
  of their own, places in which their own sort of 
  story logic reigns, just as the elder spirits do.
  A FRACTURED LANDSCAPE
  The Thunderer and the Horned Serpent have 
  been at war since time began. Their continuous 
  struggle, as regular and as unavoidable as weather, 
  is terrible and awe-inspiring to behold. Each 
  possesses a will so powerful that the very nature 
  of Ohunkakan cracks as their stories collide, 
  exploding in ribbons of amorphous blackness 
  across land and sky. Near these storms, threads of 
  separate tales freely mix and overlap, birthing new 
  horrors to slink off into the night and terrorize the 
  people. These broken threads must be woven back 
  together by skilled storytellers, lest their nullity 
  spread and open Ohunkakan to the Strange.
  The Thunderer: He lives in thunder, rumbling 
  in the distant light of the west. The Thunderer 
  appears suddenly, taking the form of a great 
  bird or a horned rider with a blackened face, 
  wrapped in flaming cloud and circled in rainbow, 
  to walk or wing or ride across the heavens, 
  scattering hail in his wake. His realm is the sky, 
  and a great wall of black clouds goes before him. 
  The Thunderer inspires bravery and punishes 
  cowardice, and his presence twists all things 
  backward. Not purely destructive, where he 
  passes life springs up vibrant and renewed.
  The Horned Serpent: It lives in lakes and 
  streams, and when it approaches, the water 
  grows choppy and boils with crimson light. 
  The Horned Serpent has been slain many 
  times—the hills are strewn with its bones—and 
  returned in many shapes, both lizardlike and 
  serpentine, but it is always sinuous and crowned 
  with horns. It slides from pool to pool beneath 
  the earth, whispering from deep places to lure 
  people to watery graves and shaking the land 
  with its thrashing. Not always fell and malign, 
  the Horned Serpent accepts offerings floated to 
  its realm to ensure a good bounty each autumn.
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  OHUNKAKAN: THE LIVING MYTHS
  5
  OHUNKAKAN ARTIFACTS
  FLUTE OF THE ELDER SPIRIT
  Level: 1d6 + 1
  Form: A delicate wooden flute with the symbol 
  of an elder spirit carved upon it.
  Effect: There are as many kinds of flutes as 
  there are elder spirits. When played, the flute 
  confers an ability of the elder spirit carved 
  upon it for one hour. The kinds of flutes 
  include (but are not limited to) the following: 
  Owl: Flautist’s Intellect Edge increases by 1 
  Wolf: Flautist’s Speed Edge increases by 1 
  Bear: Flautist adds 3 points to Might Pool 
  Hawk: Difficulty of all perception tasks for the 
  flautist decreases by two steps
  Snake: Flautist deals 2 additional points of 
  venom damage on a successful melee attack 
  Transformation: The flute transforms the flautist 
  into an animal of a specified type. The 
  flautist takes on the physical characteristics 
  and abilities of the animal for the duration 
  but retains his own mind. 
  Love: Flautist can specify one character. That 
  character falls in love with the flautist for the 
  duration of the flute’s song.
  Blood: Flautist can willingly inflict 2 points 
  of damage on himself. His spilled blood 
  coagulates and becomes a tiny man-shaped 
  construct that can communicate a short 
  message to anyone in the recursion whose 
  name the flautist knows.
  Sometimes the user of an activated animal 
  flute exhibits some of the behavioral 
  characteristics of the animal carved upon the 
  flute, even for non-transformational flutes. 
  Depletion: 1 in 1d20
  TRICKSTER’S CHARM
  Level: 1d6 + 4
  Form: A yellow stone painted with a bestial eye
  Effect: The incidence of foolishness increases 
  dramatically near the trickster’s charm. Any 
  d20 rolls the bearer makes provoke GM 
  intrusions on a result that is 1 higher than 
  normal, which usually means 1 or 2 instead 
  of just 1. This effect does not require a 
  depletion roll.
  The bearer also gains the ability to get a major 
  effect on any task roll, even a failed roll. 
  The player and the GM should work out the 
  details, but the consequences of failure can’t 
  be nullified completely. Usage of this ability 
  requires a depletion roll.
  Depletion: 1 in 1d10
  WIND COCOON
  Level: 1d6 + 1
  Form: A fist-sized butterfly cocoon, rattling with 
  potency
  Effect: The wielder activates the cocoon by 
  prying it open manually, releasing the 
  whirlwind trapped inside to manifest at a 
  location the wielder can see within long 
  range. The whirlwind buffets objects and 
  skews passing physical projectiles (modified 
  by two steps in the defender’s favor) within 
  an immediate distance of its origin point.
  If used outdoors, the whirlwind also raises a 
  cloud of swirling dust that obscures sight 
  and chokes breath. Living creatures that 
  breathe that are caught in the cloud suffer a 
  fit of coughing that renders them unable to 
  act in the following round.
  The whirlwind lingers for a number of rounds 
  equal to the artifact’s level. Normally, it 
  then rushes back into its cocoon, but if the 
  depletion roll indicates that the artifact is 
  depleted, the whirlwind instead spins off in a 
  random direction, to wander the world of its 
  own volition.
  Depletion: 1–3 in 1d20
  TALES ACROSS GENERATIONS
  Iktomi’s Web: Iktomi, the trickster-spider of many tales, knows of other 
  worlds and desires to travel to them. He struts bandy-legged about 
  Ohunkakan spinning a thousand snares, weaving a web to catch world-
  walkers so he might pry the secrets of translation from them. Had 
  he access to an inapposite gate, he would wreak unpredictable and 
  terrifying havoc on the fabric of other worlds with his narrative powers.
  The Spreading Silence: In the distant east a hole rips across the 
  world, growing as legend and speculation fly to swallow up stories 
  in a star-filled stain of night-blue absence. Around its edges reality 
  devours itself and spits out horrors: trees with serpent branches 
  writhing themselves apart, animals giving birth to monsters, and 
  blood spilled across dust accreting into manlike shapes that sprint 
  off on rabbit legs. The hole will unravel the world if not woven an 
  ending of its own.
  Iktomi: level 6, trickery 
  and deception as level 
  8, resist trickery and 
  deception as level 4; 
  anyone ensnared in a 
  trap woven by Iktomi 
  must succeed on an 
  Intellect defense roll or 
  act as the trickster-spider 
  directs for up to one day 
  after being released from 
  the trap
  Inapposite gate,
  page 135
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  6
  GM Intrusion: The 
  double face’s entire 
  body shudders and 
  shrugs as its cackling 
  secondary face swims and 
  stretches across its form, 
  immediately subjecting 
  all within short range to 
  its gaze.
  There also exist 
  “manyfaces” with three 
  or more faces swirling 
  about their form, each 
  allowing an additional 
  gaze attack each round.
  Two visages mark the double face. One it displays on the front of its head, kindly and calm. The second 
  it hides elsewhere on its body, grimacing, hideous, and hateful. The beast is otherwise well formed and 
  pleasing to look upon, able to conceal its monstrousness behind a human façade. Its loathsome nature 
  becomes apparent only when a second face emerges to gaze into the eyes of its intended victims.
  The double face is a creature of human ills. Greed, impatience, lust, and gluttony define it. It 
  lures human prey deep into the wilderness or back to its smoke-stained home to cook them alive in 
  boiling kettles of human gore. Despite the creature’s preference for solitary hunting, these dwellings 
  are often home to human relatives and degenerate cohabitants who assist the double face in the 
  preparation of its gruesome meals.
  Motive: Hungers for flesh
  Environment (Ohunkakan | Magic): Out on the plains, alone and beckoning
  Health: 18
  Damage Inflicted: 6 points
  Movement: Short
  Modifications: Trick and deceive as level 6 as it lies from one mouth while smiling with the other.
  Combat: The double face strikes with ghastly strength, using fists, claws, or whatever weapons are available.
  As part of the same action it uses to strike one creature, the double face can also attempt a gaze 
  attack against another creature within short range of the initial target. Victims must succeed 
  on an Intellect defense roll or become paralyzed for one round and suffer 4 points of Intellect 
  damage (ignores Armor) as their face and limbs twitch in exaggerated paroxysms of fear. The 
  faces of those killed by this attack are frozen in grisly inhuman contortions.
  A double face corpse that has been burned, gutted, or rotted away leaves behind many unspoiled 
  tools and treasures. Carrying any of these allows the ghost of the double face a chance to 
  possess the holder’s body and drive him to evil if he fails an Intellect defense roll. A possessed 
  victim is eventually distorted into a new double face.
  Interaction: A double face will say anything to ensnare its victims, offering food, shelter, flattery, or 
  declarations of eternal love to lure them into a position of vulnerability. The creature displays a 
  gentle teasing manner that slowly gives way to impatience and anger.
  Use: The double face appears in the wilderness when the PCs are at their most desperate, offering 
  to lead them to a place of respite.
  Loot: A double face’s lair is filled with the former possessions of its victims, hidden among their 
  cleaned bones.
  CHILDREN’S BOOKS
  Tasunka: A Lakota Horse Legend by Donald F. Montileaux 
  (South Dakota State Historical, 2014)
  A young warrior discovers an entirely new type of animal. 
  Based on a traditional story told by elder Alex White Plume.
  The Star People by S. D. Nelson (Harry N. Abrams, 2003)
  Somewhat loosely based on the original, but has a surreal 
  vibe that works well as inspiration.
  Uncegila’s Seventh Spot: A Lakota Legend by Jill Rubalcaba 
  (Clarion Books, 1995)
  Twin brothers (one of whom is blind) set off to fight the 
  Horned Serpent.
  STORY ANTHOLOGIES
  Stories of the Sioux, New Edition by Luther Standing Bear 
  (Bison Books, 2006)
  A go-to for Lakota legends. The language is somewhat 
  dated, but the stories are very traditional.
  Old Indian Legends (Zitkála-Ša, 1901)
  Another good but dated resource. Includes six Iktomi 
  stories. Difficult to find in print, but archived at: 
  http://web.archive.org/web/20080907033833/http://
  etext.lib.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/ZitLege.html
  DOUBLE FACE 
  4 (12)
  SUGGESTED READING
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SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Cypher System/Campaign Settings/The Strange/Supplements/Ohunkakan The Living Myths.pdf