Bullywugs

                                    

                                          
The area of the Willow Glades used to be famed for its beauty. In the past, it was a land of rolling, verdant hills and shady copses of trees. Elven nobles made it their favoured vacation spot, with elegant villas and restaurants, racing tracks and open air-theatres. But after the twin gods were killed, Echidna changed the area. The ground became muddy as existing streams started to overflow their banks and new ones sprung from the ground, creating an intricate maze of little lakes and rivers. The tall cypresses and oaks that once stood there, were replaced by a multitude of weeping willows and other swamp trees, and the elegant villas were submerged or overgrown with moss.
                          
The bullywugs emerged in this marshy environment. Small and froglike, with webbed hands, slimy skin and a long prehensile tongue, they do not cut an impressive figure. However, they can navigate the swamp perfectly, at home in both water and on land. It didn't take long for them to find the ruins of the old elven pleasure gardens, and even less long for them to move into them and start exploring, finding the manifold artifacts left behind by fleeing or dead elves. These precious artifacts became a symbolic currency. Those bullywug leaders who were the most successful and ruled over the widest area naturally possessed the most of these treasures, and they could use them to buy the loyalty of others. Moreover, the simple fact that they could give away such precious relics only increased their aura of power. 
                          
Soon, things settled down. The bullywugs started exploiting the marsh, creating fisheries and clay quarries. Meanwhile trade with other areas grew, with the natural resources of the Willow Glades traded for goods the area itself lacked, such as metals. The bullywug chieftains settled down as well, becoming a hereditary aristocracy based in the old elven vacation homes that had now become their courts. The old practice of buying their followers' loyalty through the redistribution of elven artefacts evolved with them. Gift-giving became the basis of bullywug society, and generosity became the highest virtue for these new lords.
                          
At the bottom of the bullywug social hierarchy are the many villages that dot the marshlands. These are led by a village head, usually either elected by the people of the village or appointed by the lord. Through her the villagers pay their taxes to their lord, although to refer to it as such would be seen as crude and impolite. Officially, this is a voluntary contribution by villagers grateful for all their lord does for them. While this is a bit of a euphemism, the lord certainly has obligations to the villagers. The most important of these is military protection, but she is also expected to sponsor religious festivals or public works.
                          
The lord uses the wealth from this taxation to secure her own powerbase. This is primarily done through the giving of gifts of food, clothing and entertainment to her followers, such as soldiers, advisors or servants. They are expected to show their gratitude for these gifts through loyalty and obedience. Alongside this, she also uses these resources to create her own sources of revenue in the form of artisan workshops, plantations or trade missions. These business endeavours are crucial, as the material demands on a lord are quite high. Followers and even entire villagers are happy to switch sides if they feel their lord is hoarding her wealth, so she has to ensure  a steady stream of celebrations and gifts to keep them happy. But this is not the only area where vast amounts of wealth are spent.
                          
Competition between the lords of the Willow Glades is fierce. These battles are sometimes fought on the field of battle but more often than not they are decided at the banquet table. The more a lord spends on frivolous things such as luxury products, celebrations or gifts to others, the more powerful she appears to be, since she can afford to do so. Those who seem the most munificent will gain the most followers. As a result each lord competes to have the most lavish court. Gift-exchanges between aristocrats are particularly fraught, as each tries to outdo the other with the value of their gifts, whether they are expensive food, antique elven artefacts, foreign metalwork or richly embroidered clothes. This is a high-stakes game, where rulers sometimes outright destroy valuables just to show they can, and where the line between generosity and bankruptcy is often toed.
                          
Over time a complex hierarchy has arisen among the aristocrats. Lords often become vassals of others, sometimes forced through military conquest or the loss of face caused by loss in a gift-battle, but sometimes voluntarily. To an extent the relationship is mutually beneficial. The liege-lord gains the prestige of having another lord under her control, she gains more authority in the Glades and her vassal has to support her during her wars. The vassal, meanwhile, not only receives military protection from her liege, but these relationships are accompanied by gift-giving where the liege must outdo her vassals in the value of her gifts to them to show dominance. Thus the vassal obtains an extra source of profit that can be used to keep their own power-base secure.
                          
Not just physical gifts are important, but symbolic ones too. Almost every aristocratic court has a complicated system of ranks and titles which the lord can hand out to her courtiers, vassals and even commoners. While these often come with other privileges such as the permission to wear a certain article of clothing in court it is the titles themselves which are eagerly vied for due to the prestige they confer on the bearer. This has an added benefit in that it keeps a lord's subjects from plotting against her due to this competition.
                          
This all paints a picture of a fractured realm of constantly feuding lords, but that is in some ways no longer the case. In the year 200 the Roka clan, a family of aristocrats from the north who made their fortune through a monopoly on the growing of the medicinal purple lotus flower, embarked on an aggressive campaign of subjugation throughout the Willow Glades. By now most lords in the Glades are their vassals, with only a few independent realms left in the south and east. In practice this is still a decentralised realm of competing lords, just under one overlord. Still, the Roka have introduced some innovations to secure their hold on power. Not only were they the first in the Willow Glades to claim the title of queen, they have reserved the wearing of red fabrics for themselves to emphasise their elevated status and have started a policy of ensuring they have an ambassador in each of their vassals' courts, to ensure their obedience. In response, the few independent lords left have also claimed the title of queen, though they certainly do not wield the same power as the Roka queen. 
                          
It is not only the upper classes for whom gift-giving is important, it permeates all layers of bullywug society. They do not have a commercial economy, instead they give each other gifts when needed and assume that it will balance out in the end. The only exception to this is trade with outsiders, in which case outright commerce is accepted, though the bullywugs do generally think outsiders are rather rude to use this sort of system. Gifts are exchanged on almost every holiday, and of course a bullywug who needs something done by a member of their lord's court will present them with a gift, just to prove their friendship and stimulate the process. Because of this, it is highly recommended that any traveller to the Willow Glades brings some foreign goods with them to use as gifts so they can navigate bullywug society without issues. 
                          
Bullywug religion can be divided into the religion of the commoners and the aristocrats. The commoners primarily worship the Council of Four. This quartet of deities represents the main staples of Bullywug agriculture and consists of the Queen of Rice, the Lady of Sheep, the Fly General and the Countess of Carps. Most villages contain a shrine to the Council and religious celebrations are held at important stages in the life cycles of each of these organisms in the hopes that the gods will ensure the villagers won't have to go hungry or cold that year. Alongside this, there are small shrines dotted across the Glades dedicated to various local nature spirits.
                          
For the aristocrats, religion is an area of mutual competition, just like everything else. Every lord maintains a long record of her ancestors and their great deeds, usually committed to memory but more and more commonly written down in chronicles. These illustrious ancestors, as well as any other significant figures in a family's history, are revered in large ancestral shrines located near the aristocrats' palace. It goes without saying that every lord prides herself on having the most illustrious pedigree and the most lavish temple of all.