Sometimes, strange discoveries are being made unexpectedly. That was also the case here. While looking for the answer about “What is Unjaga” I came across a cavemen tribe inhabiting caves in Zao mountains which separate Zao steppe from Vengoth. We visit the tribe once during the New Frontier Quest and Unnatural Selection Quest. I didn’t manage to find any connection between the tribe and mythical Unjaga, but I discovered some very interesting facts which seemed to remain unknown from the Tibian community for more than 10 years.
History of the tribe
The tribe consists of 6 inhabitants and two out of them can speak broken English and it also serves as their priests’ language. These two NPCs are the tribe leader Lazaran and priestess Ulala. Others are able to speak only the tribe language called “cavemen language”, which up to this point we didn’t know anything about. The history of the cavemen is quite sad. They were forced to escape the Zao steppes when the war between the Dragons and Lizards broke out.
According to priestess Ulala many of the tribe members died.
Finally, those who survived found their refuge in caves of the Zao mountains nearby the Farmine outpost.
I have prepared some interesting dialogues of Farmine and Zao inhabitants about the tribe. The word to trigger this subject is “humans”. Surprisingly many NPCs have something to say about this topic.
The cavemen are not as primitive as it seems to be. They were forced to inhabit the caves as a result of the evil that befell them. Perhaps the buildings retrieved by the orcs on Zao steppes are the former home of the tribe?
If we take a closer look at the buildings above, we can easily notice that these are ruins partially rebuilt by the orcs. What makes it even more interesting is the fact that the technique used by the orcs to rebuild appears to be more primitive than the original. Orcs filled the gaps in the walls and roofs using only the wood and leather.
It is worth mentioning that the tribe members are very friendly, kind and sometimes even very funny. 
They live from the cultivation of fungi, herb gathering and hunting. Probably they don’t even know about gold and its value. NPC Lazaran gives as 3 types of daily tasks, but the rewards are not worth mentioning.
The beliefs
Interestingly, the primitive tribe has a highly complex belief system. We can mention four gods worshipped by the cavemen. These are Pandor Uzroth, Krunus and Fasuon.
If we ask Lazaran and Ulala about each of them we should quickly come into conclusion that we know their gods quite well: Fardos, Uman Zatroth, Crunor and Suon. Interestingly, Tibia Fandom describes Pandor, Krunus and Fasuon as separate gods which in my opinion is wrong.
Apart from their beliefs, the tribe has its rituals and the “great hunt” is an interesting example. We learn more about it during the Unnatural Selection Quest.
Strange language
Let’s move to the most interesting subject. I have already mentioned that the tribe use their language. Four NPCs can speak only this particular language and these are Kito, Tatak, Namasa and Makao. What was already known was the fact that any logical conversation with three of those NPCs was not possible. That’s because if we ask them about any word, they answer with a random and incomprehensible line. The only exception is NPC Tatak who reacts to the words “job” and “name”. On the other hand, if he doesn’t know the word he answers with „No, no. No. No, speek!”. Let’s try to ask NPC Makao about his name.
As we can see, every time he answers with a random and awkward line. I have managed to accidentally find weird dialogue mechanic which was implemented by the developers to NPCs Kito and Namasa. Apparently, these NPCs speak random lines every time, regardless of what we will ask them about. But that’s only seemingly. To explain you better the system behind this strange mechanic, I am going to use an example of random dialogue with NPC Namasa. Let’s start the conversation and end it straightaway with „bye”.
What has just happened here? It took me a few good tries to finish the dialogue with Namasa and what is more she used unique dialogue line to do so! It means that this NPC properly reacts to our “keywords” only once in a while. According to my calculations, we have a 10% chance for the NPC to react with a proper answer. Most importantly, if Namasa doesn’t have programmed answer to given word/line, she replies with: „No, nono. No.” on average once per 10 tries. That’s an important hint. That way, we can try various keywords, lines to find out for which words the NPC has programmed answer or not. I hope that I managed to explain to you this mechanism in an understandable way. How about asking Namasa a few things.
The second NPC to use mentioned mechanics is Kito. I presented some of his unique dialogue lines below. If Kito doesn’t have any programmed answer for a keyword he will reply with „Not know, not know!” on average once per 10 tries.
As you can see both Namasa and Kito react to a few words. Nevertheless, we have to agree that their statements are quite enigmatic. Unfortunately, as of now, the cavemen language has not been deciphered yet. With the knowledge we already have and through analysis of tribe members dialogue lines, we can come to some interesting conclusions:
Unfortunately, I’m not a linguist and decoding this language having so little information about it, is an impossible task for me. Anyway, reading the lines spoken by NPCs, even a layman, like me can notice that these are not some randomly mixed words. At least some parts of the sentences are consistent and appear to have some kind of grammar which leads us to the point that the cavemen language is perhaps more interesting than it seems at first glance. Maybe if we would have some more broad knowledge about it, we would be able to translate it.
The Internet is full of mentions about the 469 language or Gharonk. It’s peculiar that the cavemen language has been totally ignored and even after over 10 years since the implementation to the game there hasn’t been a single publication about it. I didn’t even manage to find any post about it on popular Tibian forums. The only mention which I found can be seen below:
Other interesting facts
It’s not the end of the interesting facts about the cavemen today. Take a look into the conversation below.
The act/ritual of smoking the peace pipe with the tribe leader can be repeated infinitely. We can also refuse to take part in the ritual. Isn’t it strange? Perhaps there is something more to it?
Our team member Haishen discovered even more intriguing thing.
As you can see above, Ulala happily takes any quantity of beer pots which we bring to her. She calls it “Strange Water”. We give the pot of beer to Lazaran during the Unnatural Selection Quest, but donating this item to Ulala doesn’t seem to be connected with any known quest.
NPC Tatak is a drummer and plays the War Drum. We can buy this instrument along with the digeridoo from the NPC Cael, which resides in nearby Farmine. Is it possible that these items have some other purposes?
It’s worth to try asking Ulala and Lazaran about various things. They can answer with something interesting and even include some words in their language into their speech.
What else?
Let’s sum it all up. We can smoke the peace pipe with the chief multiply times. Ulala takes an infinite amount of pots of beer from us. 2 apparently negligible NPCs has unique and very odd dialogue mechanic which was hidden and ignored for more than 10 years. All of the words which the NPCs react to are yet to be discovered. What we managed to find can be seen on the screenshots above. But it’s, of course, possible that there are many more words to be found. NPC Makao appears to speak only some random lines in cavemen language, but… Maybe it’s even more complex dialogue mechanic? The existence of 4 NPCs from one fraction, who seemingly don’t have any practical role in the game seems to be very suspicious.
What are your thoughts about it? Is there any additional riddle to be solved here? In my opinion – sure, there is. I think that many experienced mystery hunters should turn their attention to the Zao mountains. Even though the tribe exist in the game for more than 10 years, I hope that our discoveries will inspire you to conduct your own investigation. The secret is here waiting for you.
Ungh! Ungh!
Sources:
https://tibia.fandom.com/wiki/Unnatural_Selection_Quest/Spoiler
| Name | TC Amount |
|---|---|
| Sabin Rene | 1000TC |
| Cavaleiro Kyon Efusa | 600TC |
| Anonymous | 550TC |
| Hegal | 500TC |
| Pala Thebs | 250TC |
| Acolyte Rain | 250TC |
| Vall Astaoldana | 150TC |
| Parrilla | 100TC |
I love how articles uncover more content in Tibia and help me understand Tibian universe better.