[Competition 11] Minority Groups

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Alicorn
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[Competition 11] Minority Groups

Post by Alicorn »

Describe a minority group within your statelet. What kind of minority is it? How are they treated or mistreated by the majority? What stereotypes are there about them - and to what extent are these true?

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Kallinn Ynnetrrr
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Re: [Competition 11] Minority Groups

Post by Kallinn Ynnetrrr »

I suddenly feel bad for swnndyrrr people being so generic...
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Nathan
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Re: [Competition 11] Minority Groups

Post by Nathan »

Most people of Merveilles possess some talent to Wonder. Those that cannot, are generally called Receptives. They can perceive the force that makes Wonders possible, but they cannot manipulate it as the majority of the population can. As a result they usually make up the lowest caste in each House. They serve as laborers, able-bodies, field hands, any unskilled profession. House Matraques is the harshest, a Receptive newborn was usually put out. House Amours is the most liberal, allowing Receptives to work as they please.

No matter what House, Receptives faced strong prejudice. Sometimes it manifested physically, often times vocally. Most people perceive Receptives as deformed, ignorant, unimaginative, stupid, lazy or even the result of inbreeding. These stereotypes are all false. Receptives are just as smart and capable, however the educational opportunities available to them are limited. They are perhaps less lazy than Wonderers as they must do everything by hand. They are among the most imaginative people of Merveilles since they can perceive the actual forces that cause Wonder.

This prejudice is why Receptives banded together in remote areas if they were able. Many convents and monasteries cater to Receptives who are able to gain acceptance in the orders of the Church of Sasei.
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Re: [Competition 11] Minority Groups

Post by Orion »

The Mechanical Men of Apollantis

The Mechanical Men are essentially robots powered by steam engines that condense water vapor from the air with a backup tank for additional pressurization. Their automatonic brains are fueled by their steam hearts, which pump oil through their mechanical nervous system. The mechanical men of today are much more sophisticated than those of a few decades ago when they were first devised. Even though they have been around for years, and are an essential part of the Apolline military and social strata, they are still viewed with disdain by many commoners and even resentment.

The first mechanical men came about as steam power was developed and the automatonic brain patented by Apollo Robotics Inc. They were designed as a means to alleviate the common folk, the farmers who worked themselves to death in the fields. It was envisioned by those who invented them that the advent of mechanical man would ease man's labors that he might devote more time to science, and thus hearken faster to the goal of the recovery of the Apollantean city. At first they were very bulky and haphazard, large cogs and gears, sharp-jointed arms and legs. They were designed for practical purposes of labor, not aesthetics. But like all things designed in the image of man, refinement was ever an objective, and inventors strove to make the automatons more human-like.

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It wasn't long before all farmers and laborers began using mechanical men. Blacksmiths could use them in the forges without fear of burns or becoming tired. Farmers had their mechanical men tilling fields day and night. Bankers began using mechanical men for security; impervious to bribes and resistant to bullets. But with their expanded use and expanded numbers, people began to become weary of these self-thinking machines who were suddenly achieving a population of their own. It wasn't long before incidents occurred with mechanical men running amok in the streets. Regulations had to be laid down, the government became involved, and stricter controls were to be placed on the robots.

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In a deal signed between Apollo Robotics Inc. and the Apolline Government, it was agreed that the company would began producing an exclusive line of military robots for field combat, and that the company would begin producing its civilian lines under the auspices of strict government overview and regulation. It wasn't long before the primary focus of mechanical men became military, while their civilian role shifted to a lesser degree and traditional steam equipment - that which didn't think for itself - took over in the field. The first militarized mechanical men were likewise bulky. Military command had the epiphany that bigger would be better, although this didn't exactly pan out as thought. With their oversized arms and slow-to-load weapons, the 1st Mechanical Corps spent more time in the garage getting repairs than actually fighting Apollantis' numerous enemies. Even so, the sight of these mechanical men fighting in the field enamoured the Apolline people to them. Less were they seen as machines, and more as sentient beings. When a mechanical man would return home from battle, appendages missing, cogs shattered, steam leaking from its heart, and oil tears dripping down its face; the cold shell that had gripped the hearts of Apollantis shattered, and they saw the machines as people like themselves.

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After years of work by inventors, mechanical and human alike, the mechanical men of today are much improved. Years of exposure and interaction, as well as fighting side-by-side on the battlefield, have all served to greatly reduce the tension that used to exist between robot and human. There are still those who fear the machines. Fear that they will take over, fear that they will outlast man, resentment that they can do more than a mere human can. But that is a group that is quickly diminishing. With the advent of biomechanics and a greater use of mechanical amplification to human powers, such as the renowned Imperial Snipers, man and machine have never been closer. Of course, it has also been a two-way door. Mechanical men have seen a drastic improvement in aesthetics, as well as a great improvement in the neural functioning. Gone are the bulky haphazard robots of yesteryear; except perhaps in the private markets, and here are the sleek humanoid robots of today. They can converse, they can learn, they can interact, they can even feel a mechanical equivalent of emotion.

Although a minority, they have become an integral part of Apolline society. Man and machine stride arm in arm, fighting off the enemies of the Empire, striving for a better tomorrow.

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Harvey
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Re: [Competition 11] Minority Groups

Post by Harvey »

I like Ryan's a lot. It's a major D'AWWWWW feeling there. :)

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Illuminarch Nicholas
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Re: [Competition 11] Minority Groups

Post by Illuminarch Nicholas »

Anybody with Any Form of Religious Belief Whatsoever

Omega Complex is bustling with all forms of technology, society, and culture. One thing that Omega lacks, and chooses to not embrace, is religion.

Dating back to the days of the Illuminarchal Union of Eruditia, religion was tolerated, and even practiced (!) without any hint of stigma or judgment. However, after the Great Cataclysm which wiped out the majority of Eruditia and added it to the list of the other nations who fell during the Period of Destruction, many people felt a void in their cultural identity. Where religion had failed, science succeeded.

Religion did not bring people food and shelter.

Science did.

Science brought clear thinking and logic to a world of chaos and confusion.

Religion only hampered this process with zealots and radicals.

While many Omegans today can appreciate the actions and intentions of Illuminarch Nicholas I, almost all believe that he was grossly misled. With Eruditia's all-encompassing Ecclesius Eugnosis, it was an Omegan's worse nightmare. In a sense, the Cataclysm was the best thing that ever happened to science.

Omegans believe that only science can bring hard results and change; as a result, almost everybody in Omega is a scientist in their respective Sector. Religion is not banned in Omega. However, it is highly frowned upon.

Religious people in Omega are far and few, and most practice a personal religion, whether monotheistically or to a pantheon of deities. Normally, people do not publicly share or express their religious feelings or endorsements.

Nonetheless, religion still finds a way to permeate in Omegan society. There is one religion that has been gaining momentum over the past few years. Organized and growing in number, it is called Deus Ex Machina, or "Let God be the Driving Force of my Destiny". The Deus Ex Machina movement (DEM) began with the discovery of the Deus Ex Machina Tractate in one of the Antiquity Archives of Libra. The style and fashion of writing indicates an early date of composition; after dating analysis, the tractate was found to predate the Cataclysm, making it one of the few surviving records from before Omega. The author refers to him or herself as "a Gear" and states that "everyone is a Gear in God's Machine of Destiny". The writings of the Tractate are told in a variety of simple verse and parables, indicating how one is saved from the perils of chaos by upholding its edicts and describes the pitfalls of a purely empirical look on the world.

When the Tractate was first discovered, it rocked the archaeological world of Omega. Antiquitarians and archaeologists who had devoted their entire lives searching for clues of the Eruditian culture were thrilled to find a living relic of the long-lost Ecclesius Eugnosis. A record of this age hadn't been found since the discovery of the Origins Codex years before. Following extensive review and authentication processes, a team of historians and experts of the field, led by Head Historian Arcturus Frost, translated the text.

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At this point, religion hadn't been an issue in Omega. Everyone knew that science saved them from chaos in the Cataclysm's aftermath. But the Deus Ex Machina Tractate shook those foundations. Soon after, a cult following of the tractate formed itself. Radical ideals emerged from this group. Stereotypes emerged as well; people known to be DEM followers were labeled as "cogs", a derogatory reference to the "Gears" each of the members represented. Soon after, terrorist splinter cells developed from the occult fascination. In a matter of months, Deus Ex Machina went from the most exciting find in Omegan history to the most dreaded foe it had ever faced. To this day, religion remains a stigma. The actions of some radical DEM groups furthers the chasm between science and religion.

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The religious temperance and understanding Illuminarch Nicholas I strove to build died along with Eruditia, only to be replaced with something better: science.
Illustro est via

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Re: [Competition 11] Minority Groups

Post by Alicorn »

The Cosashi people are a racial, a cultural, and a linguistic minority. They are most of the population in provinces Greater Cosash and Lesser Cosash, and roughly half of it in Sedsesh province, but form far less of the population elsewhere (and where they go elsewhere, they are likely to intermarry with Mainlanders and Islanders, producing mixed children.)

Phenotypically, Cosashi are paler even than Islanders, and dramatically more so than Mainlanders. Sometimes they even have pale hair, although in most of them it doesn't get lighter than a dark brown and plenty have black hair like the rest of the population. Those of them who don't have standard green eyes may have blue instead of the more nationally common brown. They lack the epicanthal folds that characterize both, inspiring mockery by Islander and Mainlander children in the form of holding one's eyes open and staring glassily at one's playmates. Adults of either majority race (Mainlanders are more common than Islanders, but only slightly) are above such immature behavior, but may if pressed report discomfort around Cosashi because of how they "stare". Half-Cosashi children are pale (although not as pale as pure Cosashi) and usually inherit the wide-eyed look; most people take them to be Cosashi, possibly with a tan, unless they have more information.

[OOC: To an American's eye, Cosashi would look white, Islanders would look Inuit or East Asian, and Mainlanders would look Southeast Asian somewhere halfway between Burmese and Javanese - except that all three groups have medium to dark green as a common eye color.]

There are no discriminatory laws on the books, and if there is racism against Cosashi in practice, it's impossible to distinguish from ordinary harmless nepotism. Within Greater and Lesser Cosash, no statistical discrimination is visible; there is some in Sedsesh, but Cosashi numbers are too small to derive statistical meaning in other provinces. Nationwide, it is true that Islanders are most likely to become public figures of any kind, though it is politically correct to attribute this to their easier geographical access to Delo-Kyan. (Polling people anonymously yields the opinion from each race that Islanders are, on average, prettier and probably more competent than Mainlanders and certainly than Cosashi.) Mainlanders sometimes also achieve notoriety as well. Cosashi - even in writing, where their names will give away their backgrounds - are less likely to gain prominence.

History suggests that Cosashi are indigenous to at least the areas of Greater and Lesser Cosash and Sedsesh, whereas Mainlander populations supposedly migrated into the area covered by modern Mevwan from farther north. Islanders are believed to be native to Island, though, so suggestions that there is general discrimination against indigenous populations are met with incredulity.

Culturally, Cosashi are more socially conservative than their neighbors, and the provinces where they are common have some distinct patterns of provincial and municipal ordinance. They have adopted similar religions to Mevwan at large, although Hapheng is less popular and Elehaith more so among Cosashi than among Mainlanders or Islanders. They are less likely to follow multiple religions per person, and entire families or even villages are usually all devotees of a single faith. Cosashi mostly speak at least some Ekoin in addition to their own language, but bring with them characteristic speech patterns calqued into Ekoin and often have a nonstandard accent. (The prototype for "unaccented Ekoin" most resembles the way people from Bright Shore and southern Vith speak.) The grammar of Ekoin and Cosashi are actually very similar, and the languages are related, but they use different alphabets (Cosashi uses a syllabary and a large array of modifying diacritics, only some of which alter pronunciation, while Ekoin assigns letters to invidiual phonemes) and the two languages share almost no vocabulary.

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Harvey
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Re: [Competition 11] Minority Groups

Post by Harvey »

Children

All Favored spend the first fifteen years being grown using genetic recombination in stasis tanks while their minds explore and are educated within the Basin dreamworld, very much similar to how the earliest colonists from First Bastion did. In addition, all Favored, both men and women, are sterilized using nondestructive techniques. Without getting too much into it, the body is fed a certain chemical that encourages it to produce a certain protein, and that protein induces sterility - it can be reversed using very minor surgery, but historically rarely is. While this sort of upbringing has wide-reaching effects on Favored lifestyle - they still fall in love, of course, but marriage closer resembles a business union complete with signed contract - it does mean that there are no Favored citizens under the age of 15 anywhere in the society.

Small numbers of foreigners live in Real Diamond. Some are there for business, such as a man or woman who trades locally and brought his family to live with him. Though rare, the culture of the Favored appeals to a few outsiders. And there are some people simply wishing to disappear; for all their faults, the Favored can be relied on to protect their citizens or registered foreigners from other outside interference. These people did not undergo mandatory sterilization and naturally started to have children, for which the Favored society was totally unprepared to handle. After a brief period of near violence where the most traditional factions called for the immediate sterilization of any current and future registered foreigner, the expulsion of all foreigners, or the death of them all (depending on the extremity of the faction yelling their demands,) a compromise was reached where women would be required to undergo mandatory sterilization after the birth of their second child and men would at the age of 45. The foreigners weren't particularly happy about this, but given the alternatives, it was accepted with minimal fuss.

The Favored react to the presence of children in a variety of ways, but the most common one is general distaste. While the right to bring children into many public places is unrestricted by law, it is a common trend for businesses attempting to appeal to the masses to put in sound disruption limits, designed so a crying baby or whining toddler may exceed a certain maximum and be asked to leave. Further restrictions, such as height limits to enter certain areas, were deemed illegal and disrupted. Still, many Favored become uncomfortable or upset if children are nearby, and some will refuse to conduct business under those circumstances.

On the other hand, there are those that absolutely adore the little tykes, becoming friends with families that have children, setting up businesses such as daycares and schools in the foreign quarter to appeal to the economic needs presented by them, or otherwise doing whatever they can to be around them. Despite centuries of a parent-less society, Favored still have the knack to be caring mothers and fathers, even to someone else's baby. Genetic, some say. Animal instinct to protect and care for the vulnerable, or human instinct to protect the weak, others claim. Having a job that involves children is generally seen as a sign of lower status (having a job that serves mostly foreigners lowers it automatically) and it doesn't make very polite dinner conversation to bring up working or being around the little brats, but those that love their work with the kids generally don't mind what others think of them, and there's no reason for any Favored to go into it if they don't love it.

Currently, the AURA government doesn't see children as a large enough destabilizing force to require further action and is publicly satisfied with the current arrangement. But the Basin genetic facility will be online for the indefinite future.

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Re: [Competition 11] Minority Groups

Post by Shyriath »

The majority of the Deep Singers share a system of belief centered around the Voices of the Earth and the roles of light and darkness in the soul; although they themselves have no formal name for this, or even feel the need for one, Outsiders tend to refer to it as Earthcalling. Earthcalling demands several basic beliefs, but has almost no requirements or structure beyond them, and this flexibility leaves most individuals satisfied with it.

Nonetheless, people being what they are, adherence to Earthcalling is not universal. Those other religions and belief systems that populate Kennerext are collectively referred to as "the cults". They are, with a few exceptions, generally small and quiet enough that many never bother to learn about them separately, or have only passing familiarity with them, and these people tend to think of their adherents as either misguided or mildly deranged. The more charitable have learned to distinguish between cults and form opinions of them on a case-by-case basis, although in no case are they as highly regarded.

Some of the more prominent of the cults follow.

The Returners: The classification of this belief system as a cult is contested, as in most respects it is consistent with other forms of Earthcalling. The mainstream of belief holds that the World Inside - that is, caves and the rest of the subterranean realm - is the natural home of the Deep Singers, given to them by the Voices of the Earth as a refuge from the Apocalypse. The Returners, however, note that their ancestors, before they were changed at the hands of the Shapers, are rumored to have been like other humans, and lived aboveground. They hold, therefore, that since the Apocalypse is long past and the surface is clearly habitable, the Deep Singers should all return to the surface, rejoining humanity, and the caves should be given back into the possession of the Voices.

Most consider them to fall within the spectrum of belief that includes the mainstream, albeit at a further extreme than those who merely encourage colonization of the surface. Nonetheless, more conservative adherents of Earthcalling insist that they are a cult, and and that their beliefs are particularly insulting to the Voices. Nonetheless, there is little contact between members of the two extremes; most conservatives refuse to go aboveground, while most Returners who are able migrate to Xalt or the other Beacons beyond the mountains.

The Crown of Stone: One of the more widespread cults, the Crown of Stone is roughly equivalent to the animistic religions aboveground in that they believe that particular natural features (in this case, caves and chambers, stalactites and stalagmites, undergound rivers and pools, and so on) have souls, and that they should be worshipped as deities. Most Beacons have no more than three or four percent of their population as adherents, and generally less; but they form a majority in the Beacon of Chanlaxir, which is nearest to the physical Crown of Stone for which the cult is named. This ring of stalagmites is the holiest object of worship in the faith, and the throne of the shaman-kings of Chanlaxir is set in its midst.

It is assumed by followers of Earthcalling that the cultists are innocently (but severely) misinterpreting what they hear from the Voices, and that they are therefore odd, but generally decent. Some further commonality is encouraged by the fact that both faiths, albeit for different reasons, tend to venerate the same places or features; the Crown of Stone itself is regarded as a wonder of the Voices by most Deep Singers, and the cultists for their part take care not to distinguish between faiths for the purposes of pilgrimages.

The Growers: A small and thinly scattered faith, the Growers believe in the sanctity of organic life. They hold that since life is so sparse in the environment of the caves, it is the duty of every thinking being to nurture it, tend it, and encourage its spread in every way possible. The faith is most common among those who work the fungus and moss farms, to whom their occupation is as much a holy work as it is a means of livelihood, and also holds some sway among medics and Technologists who study cave ecology.

Despite the passive and unassuming nature of this cult, its practitioners are viewed with mild suspicion. Partly this is due to their utter lack of lip-service to the Voices, but it is also due to the subject matter of their faith. An undue focus on biology, whether in the scientific or the spiritual sense, brings back uncomfortable memories of the Shapers, whose power over life was their hallmark, and who were responsible not only for the current state of the Deep Singers themselves, but most of the organisms to be found in association with them.

The importance of the Growers' usual professions and their dedication to them makes them valuable to society, and open hate is rarely directed at them. Nonetheless, there is some friction, and to avoid increasing it most Growers tend to refrain from emphasizing their beliefs publicly.

The Cult of the Shapers: This cult, although extremely small, is one of the best-known, and the most reviled. Luckily for the members of other cults, few lump the Cult of the Shapers in with anyone else.

A cultural element common to nearly all Deep Singers, even the Growers, is the memory of their experiences at the hands of the Shapers and a mistrust of their powers. Though it made them what they are today, legends handed down from those times recall, albeit vaguely, severe hardships and physical agony; whatever the Shapers had once been, before their end they had become monsters, and their powers unholy.

The Cult of the Shapers is as reviled as it is precisely because it rejects this framework. Its followers proclaim the Shapers, as those who made the Deep Singers, as creator-gods to be venerated and emulated, and that they never died, but that they survived and wait to be reunited with their creations. They also call for actively working toward discovering the power to Shape life and using it to Shape themselves, which they believe will hurry the day of reunification. They are rumored to kidnap people and experiment on them in following this belief, although it seems impossible to verify.

Although the Beacons are usually content to punish crimes with fines, or labor, or even exile, every one of them known to exist considers membership in the Cult of the Shapers, or belief in its tenets, as grounds for immediate execution. For the cultists' part, it is known from the few interviews that have been done that they bear as terrible a hatred for the structure of society as that society bears toward them.
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TOTUS MUNDUS TABULAM RASAM EST

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Scott Alexander
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Re: [Competition 11] Minority Groups

Post by Scott Alexander »

Most of the commerce and government of Galinomai takes place on the sky islands, the great plateaued mountains that dot the landscape. Most of the philosophy and science take place in the eyries, the monastery cities perched on tops of gigantic mountains. Only a tiny minority inhabit Galinomai's most forbidding and inaccessible terrain: the ground.

Sure, some people need to do some work on the ground, if only to catalog its plants and animals, build some basic infrastructure, and mine a few natural resources not available on the mountains. A few tried to make roads, once, before people decided the zip lines were less fuss. These people are dutifully respected and given extra hazard pay. After all, if the spiders and snakes and wild animals don't get them, the heatstroke or water-borne diseases might. They serve their time, get amply rewarded, and end up with nice houses in Arborvine or Oceanfree or one of the high peaks.

But then there are the other ones, the ones who the highlanders alternately romanticize and condemn, the ones who live on the ground because that's where they want to be. They have many names: lowlanders, greenlanders, and most curiously "mermen" and "divers" - because to the highlanders, their mountains seem like islands in a sea of green, and the lowlanders like magicians who can live underwater.

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Every diver will have a different reason. Some are tired of the hubbub of society, so much so that even one of the more remote eyries will not satisfy their need for solitude. Some feel a religious calling to the Garden, to get to know its animals and plants and to live with them and among them. Others find a life picking limes and pomegranates straight from the trees more attractive than doing paperwork indoors in the cities for money. Almost all say that they just saw the jungle once, and they were saturated with its beauty, and they found no reason ever to leave.

The divers are theoretically under the jurisdiction of the nearest city, but in practice no one goes into the jungle to enforce their rules. But though divers are mostly solitary, word spreads in their community, and if anyone is abusing their common home - killing animals needlessly, or lighting fires, or whatever - their justice is swift, and no one from the cities ever comes down to warn them against such harshness.

In recent years, as the generation that went through the Dark Passage has been dying off and leaving the world to their children and grandchildren, the jungle is no longer a darkness to be feared, but a new land to be explored, and so more and more of the cityfolk are becoming divers, and vanishing into the trees.

And in a few places - Oceanfree and the Raknumve monastery, for example - parents are deliberately sending their children out into the jungle, where they live and study under experienced divers. Maybe feeling guilty themselves about barricading themselves on their mountains and neglecting the treasure beneath them, they hope to make their children comfortable in both worlds, so that even if they choose the cities it is a free choice, made without fear.

Those children who come back to the cities come back different, as if the jungle has marked its own. They are quieter, and less able to take the norms and the subtleties of the city seriously, but they have a solemn tranquility, and a connection to other former divers that no one else can break. And the older folk remember their god's promise - that the garden will garden its gardeners - and wonder what is being made from their people.

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Re: [Competition 11] Minority Groups

Post by Shyriath »

Scott Alexander wrote:Some feel a religious calling to the Garden, to get to know its animals and plants and to live with them and among them.
(OOC:

We are stardust, we are golden,
We are billion-year-old carbon,
And we got to get ourselves back to the gaaaaaaarden...


...Sorry. Musical memory got activated. Carry on.)
Shyriath Farstrider (aka Shyriath Bukolos), KD MOU OLH XBH
Viscount Farstrider of Erysisceptrum, Count Bukolos of the Condo, Harbinger of Cheese

TOTUS MUNDUS TABULAM RASAM EST

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