#she’s going through it right now | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

wallcreeper-and-oro · 3 months ago

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terminal.find(HIP 74890) terminal established connection.find(omni_net) connection established omni.id.vericode(Y/N) (Y) {vericode entered} connection verified - lancer 910372

[Coryander can be heard, she takes a shaky breath in]

fuck.

{audio recording pauses} {audio recording resumes}

[Cory takes a steadying and begins to speak in a detached monotone]

uh okay.

this is lancer 910371, callsign Ouroboros, of the Cypriot, Dido’s Divers Free Company.

[another slow breath in and out]

uh mission report regarding.. recovery from WASP-132c.

so not sure who i'm going to send this to and i don't care what the client said about confidentiality.. i just need to talk..

so we were sent to WASP-132c to recover some damaged tech from FirstCom era, old hard-suit models, not sure why the client wanted them. none of my business. i wish they’d- [she sighs]

whatever.

okay so we go down to WASP-132c, make landfall, fine. everything looks good, just like the Cypriot’s scanners said, some local fauna and flora but no sign of anything hostile.

….

got to the facility. everything is fine. buncha old FirstCom stuff there, nothing too weird. old research base i think? not sure, it doesn’t.. it doesn’t really matter. uh so we get the fucking. sorry. [her voice raises] no. no i’m not i don’t give a-

{audio recording pauses} {audio recording resumes}

[Cory resumes, voice back to flat neutral]

apologies. so we secured the payload, that was fine, base was so old we just walked in and out. walking back to the landing craft,

and then..

[she curses under her breath, voice muffled takes a few deliberate but shaky deep breaths, it doesn’t ease the strain in her voice]

then the hard-suits start leaking nanites

[her pace picks up, so does her breathing]

and-and suddenly there’s greywash everywhere and then out of the facility come people. like humans. actual humans. we-we knew there was organic life but not- but not humans. and they’re angry, i-i don’t know but they’re angry. they’re speaking in a dialect i don’t understand but they’re pissed, and they have guns and then fuck greywash was everywhere, and it’s- it’s eating through Liza’s fucking-

[her breathing is shallow and fast]

and then one of the humans got on her cockpit a-and i-i-i

i-i h-had to

[she sniffles]

i-i j-just didn’t know what to do and they were on top of her a-and

[Coryander breaks down, racking sobs can be heard for a minute or two]

[there is the sound of a door sliding open and rushed footsteps before Thebe’s voice can be heard, deep and soft, a clear note of worry tinged with weariness of its own]

heeey heey c’mere

[the sound of someone sitting down, bodies shifting closer]

i know ma belle.. i know

[Coryander’s voice is muffled by fabric as she’s racked by deep choking sobs]

i-i-i w-wanna g-go h-home

okay.. we can do that, i just need you to breathe right now okay?

[Thebe breathes deeply in. and out. and Cory does her best to match it]

great job, just like that, in… and out.

[the sobs slow after a few shaky breaths from Cory]

hey hey its okay alright, she’s okay, you’re okay…..

it’ll be okay..

[Coryander’s breathing begins to slow]

what were you doing Cory? you know you should be resting too..

u-uh

[Coryander sniffles]

i-i was tryna record a briefing, we gotta tell someone…

okay.. here let’s get that turne-

{audio recording pauses} {audio recording resumes}

[Coryander’s voice can be heard again, still raw but more composed, she sounds tired]

okay..

[she takes a deep breath]

okay uh sorry about that,

uh okay, okay.

things didn’t go to plan… the hard-suits are un-salvageable… in short they had some sort of HORUS tech i think? greywash. lots of it. the suits kinda disintegrated.. and anything left we coulda gotten…. there was an un-documented human presence on the planet the client didn't tell us about.. they got the rest..

[a pause then she takes a steadying breath]

Lancer Liza- uh callsign Sour Patch was hurt in the process, she’s recovering in the ships’s med bay, damage was sustained to the mechs of all lancers, uh.. next stop is a repair shop i guess… it’s gonna cost..

[there’s a deep sigh]

uh Lancer Ouroboros signing off..

{audio recording ends}

#ooc: pfffff wow okay #she’s going through it right now #turns out killing someone has a bit of an effect…#she’d been in combat before.. but killing someone is different #there’s a difference between winning a battle by disabling someone’s mech versus seeing bullets you fired go through someone’s body #and she loves Thebe. love thebe but girl you are not helping her emotional state by calling her “ma belle” while she’s having a breakdown #anyways this is the start of some good character development and the start of a little fun arc and then probably gonna open it up and see #i've actually been waiting for so long to post this #yall have no idea #i got to ramble about this and about them to the lights of my lives the other day :DD so that helped #anyways girl is going through it... it's gonna be a bit rough for a sec but she'll get through #im so excited about this #lancer #lancer pilot #lancer ttrpg #lancerrpg #lancer oc #lancer rp #lancer rpg #forgot to put the proper tags :(

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serpentface · 2 months ago

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Here's the most current map (which will inevitably subject to change within a month or two), one showing elevation, one showing territorial divisions, and one showing major cultural groups.

Notes for the territorial map

'province' refers to directly ruled land beholden to Imperial Wardi laws and protections, divided into provinces. Most of these territories were established during the formation of the state, while some are under recent and direct occupation (most significantly the two off-shore islands and the western Cholemdinae lands that hold most of the Yellowtail trade route).

'tributary' refers to lands whose societies have been subjugated (by military force or intimidation) into agreement to economic tribute, and retain full self-governance and non-occupation in return for annual payments of goods, precious materials, crafts, and crops.

'functionally independent' refers to territories that are deemed Imperial Wardi land under vague ideals that all lands south of the Viper and west of the Sons of Creation are God's sacred soil for Its first people, but aren't actually under any form of occupation or tributary status whatsoever.

'treaty-independence' is the 1 nation in this claimed territory that is recognized specifically as sovereign and not subject to encroachment or tribute pay (by Ephenni provincial doctrine rather than law)

'disputed borderlands' are the edges of the provincial land borders, which are not well established or protected.

Almost all borders depicted are heavily approximate, both in the context of this map being very rough and also just in-universe.

EXTENSIVE NOTES FOR THE CULTURAL MAP UNDER THE CUT

Note that most of this map does not indicate literal boundaries or borders, and rather serves as approximation of dominant (sub)cultures throughout this region.

So anyway here's an overview of most of the peoples native to this region.

WARDI:

Wardi as an ethnonym is complicated, as it does not refer to people with recent common heritage but rather a collection of peoples who assimilated/were assimilated into a shared cultural identity, language, and religion. Almost all groups (not necessarily individuals) considered Wardi have predominantly proto-Wardi ancestry, though the majority also have at least Some proto-Finnic ancestry (stemming from a major migration event 1500 years BP).

Proto-Wardi is a broad descriptor of the peoples who had ancestry in this land stemming from the very initial human settlements in the late paleolithic, and by 1500 years BP shared a language family/some very basic cultural elements. They derive predominantly from waves of land migrants from the northeast who dispersed around the 'tail' of the Viper seaway, though their genetic makeup likely stems from at least a few distinct prehistoric human movements into the region. 'Proto-Wardi' does not exclusively describe ancestors of the contemporary Wardi groups, and includes other ethnic groups with ancestry here prior to proto-Finnic migration (Cholemdinae and the North Wardi peoples).

Most contemporary Wardi groups derive from societies along the western-southern coasts and river systems that agriculturalized and at least partially urbanized within the past two millennia. These were characterized by mixed subsistence systems- settled agriculture along the riverways and nomadic pastoralism of cattle and horses in the grasslands and scrub, with one supporting the other. Most eventually organized into structures of hereditary monarchy at the societal level, while others formed smaller chiefdoms (monarchies usually retained characteristics of the latter, with a monarch supported by localized chiefdoms whose members formed an aristocratic class).

Assimilation into a singular identity was originally external under two periods of Imperial Burri occupation, most significantly the first (in which basically the entire region save for much of the Highlands and the innermost grasslands was directly occupied). The word 'Wardi' itself was a Burri exonym first externally applied to the western-southern peoples who were organized into monarchies and practiced settled agriculture. The name was taken from the Wardinae people, who at the time were allied with the Ephenni and ruled much of the south. (The term 'Wardi' would have originally translated to 'good land' in reference to rivers, 'Wardinae' would have meant something along the lines of 'people of the river land' to distinguish from Cholemdinae 'people of the wide land').

No two nations at this time would have considered themselves the Same people, and some labeled 'Wardi' could not even be classed as 'proto-Wardi' in origin (the population of present-day Erub stems predominantly from proto-Finnic migrants who adopted settled agriculture and urbanization; Lobera was an entire Wogan kingdom). But with endemic monarchies toppled and the land being restructured into one province under which native inhabitants all occupied a sub-citizen class, many cultural distinctions were partially reduced over about 400 cumulative years of direct occupation.

This period also marked the beginning and spread of the Faith of the Seven Faced God, which originated as syncretic semi-adoption of Imperial Burri state religion mixed with older practices, and would develop on its own until it became a unifying element associated with the applied 'Wardi' identity.

The completion of this identity unification came in the birth of Imperial Wardin ~270-230 years ago, stemming from another alliance between the then-kingdoms Ephennos and Wardinnos that enveloped their neighbors during a period of post-occupation upheaval. With most already sharing (variants of) the same religion and having Some sense of shared identity, 'Wardi' as a self-applied name for the people of this state came to completion in the years that followed.

Cultural divisions don't disappear overnight (or even over centuries), and Wardi identity is heavily multipolar in ways that roughly resemble ethnic/state boundaries prior to Imperial Wardin existing as an entity. There are also notable subcultural divides between 'urban' and 'rural' Wardi populations, given the significant distances between the heavily populated coastal/river areas where most urbanization/agriculture happens, and the more sparsely inhabited plains that surround them. (It gets said that if you ride a day straight out into the grassland, the people you find don't know who the current Usoma is. You ride another day out, and the people there don't even know there IS an Usoma. (This is an exaggeration, but the spirit of things has truth to it)).

The map indicates VERY rough divisions of the most significant Wardi subcultures (not counting rural/urban divides).

CHOLEMDINAE

This refers to a group with predominantly proto-Wardi ancestry that did not practice settled agriculture and never assimilated into Wardi identity at a cultural (rather than individual/community) level. This group has broadly retained individual identity and practices a religion that branched off before the progenitors of the Faith of the Seven Faced God, which venerates God who is the sun and a myriad of spirits of animals, plants, crops, land, waterways, and weather). The Cholemdinae spoken language is very closely related to Wardi and is mostly mutually comprehensible.

Cholemdinae society is organized into houses, which are networks of allied clans governed by the patriarch of a leading clan. Housefathers are hereditary, though the status of the leading clan depends on wealth in livestock and the faith and support of their dependents, so may shift with time. Marriage usually only occurs within a single house, and is the bedrock for maintaining lasting clan ties.

Their ancestral land is wide swaths of grassland and scrub surrounding the major Yellowtail and Brilla river systems, where they subsist primarily as nomadic pastoralists of cattle, horses, and khait, supplementing intake with hunting and foraging. In the contemporary, they are split into two major groups, one that is seasonally settled (migrating between permanent settlements along rivers and in deep grassland on a seasonal basis) and one that is khait-nomadic and forms no permanent settlements (instead following annual migratory routes). These two divisions of subsistence are not quite separate cultures, and both would acknowledge one another as a brother people.

Most do not practice intensive agriculture due to their movement patterns, and instead otherwise modify the land (particularly maintaining savanna along riverways via controlled burns, and damming/diverting rivers to create wetlands) to cluster reliable sources of edible plants/crops and habitat for game animals.

This map does not convey the scope of khait-nomadic Cholemdinae lands and only shows areas in which they are the majority ethnicity, as annual migratory routes take many clans well into Wardi provincial territory or North Wardi land, if not further east past the map's borders.

[The Wardinae tribe that is ancestral to most of the South Wardi demographic were originally Cholemdinae that split in establishing permanent settlements along the Brilla river and practicing intensive agriculture.]

CHENAHYEIGI

This population does not have a collective endonym, with the most common exonyms being 'Hill Tribes' and 'Highlanders'. Chenahyeigi instead describes a spoken language that is shared by most inhabitants of the Highlands region in the northwest, who comprise related peoples with shared cultural elements distinct from their neighbors.

The majority of Chenahyeigi peoples descend from proto-Finnic migrants who originally inhabited the (once larger) island chains to the southeast of mainland Finnerich. Their dispersal occurred as a wholesale movement of peoples over a period of about two centuries, fleeing to rising sea levels, conflict with mainland proto-Finns, plague, and famine. Upon arrival, some settled the offshore islands, some moved along the coasts to the northeast and ultimately merged with proto-Wardi populations they encountered, some moved to the southeast and were driven into the western Highlands in conflict with powerful agriculturalist proto-Wardi nations, and some dispersed into and through the Highlands directly and ultimately displaced or absorbed the sparse populations of proto-Wardi pastoralists who lived there.

The initial migrants were already comprised of at least a few separate peoples, the stark geographical divides of their land further fragmented this population into discrete groups seen today.

Each group represented on the map represents the largest form of cultural division, the word for which translates to 'People' as a proper noun. These are allied collections of tribes who share the same dialects, close cultural identity, and regular trade connection, and usually occupy contiguous lands, but do not have centralized leadership (each being separately governed by their own current ruling clan's patriarch). Peoples are prone to fragmenting and shifting membership over the centuries. Tribes represent networks of clans that are closely affiliated via marriage and kinship, are based upon discrete cultural identity, and have strong territorial aspects to their identity (though territory shifts with time). Personal identity is based around the ancestral line, then the clan, then the tribe, and only extends to the People at most. Separate Peoples usually are not allied and are often in territorial conflict.

All groups share the language (though not all dialects are mutually intelligible) and baseline cultural practices, and most share very similar societal organizations and subsistence methods. They are at least seasonally settled (most form permanent villages at low elevation), practice low-mid intensity agriculture, and are heavily reliant on seasonal transhumance of cattle and horses. Very little of their lands can be considered 'urbanized' outside of villages large enough to be labeled a town (with the chief exception of the heavily populated and low elevation Yellowtail River valley, which hosts a small city).

Most Chenahyeigi speaking groups retain a significant degree of separate cultural identity and language from surrounding groups in large part due to geographic isolation. They have not been altogether unimpacted, having adopted many minor cultural practices from their neighbors and some major ones (the biggest and most obvious is in a cattle-associated agricultural deity being named Od and having dredged up fertile earth from the sea during creation, as well as animistic facets of the worldview (to an even greater extent than any recent proto-Wardi groups, ascribing discrete spirits to even manmade objects). The core religious practices of most Chenahyeigi peoples differ otherwise, acknowledging a small pantheon of creator gods and being entirely centered upon ancestor veneration.

The islander Chenahyeigi groups are notable as an exception to much of this description, as many of them have existed in complete geographic isolation from their mainland cousins (much less Wardi groups) and have developed independently in the millennia since their settlement. Their languages are in the same family but not mutually comprehensible with mainland dialects, and islander Peoples largely have different religious practices, with most lacking both ancestor worship and animistic elements (except where they have emerged independently) and instead centering on veneration of pantheons. Their subsistence methods also differ depending on conditions, ranging from similar patterns of mixed agriculture-pastoralism, to pure settled agriculture, to predominantly hunting/fishing and foraging.

These represent the biggest swaths of land and peoples that are neither directly occupied by Imperial Wardin nor subjugated as tributaries to it (with a big exception being the Yellowtail River Valley People being a major tributary, and the Lleniwir island being under direct occupation as a fortified base). This is in large part due to the upland geography being too hostile and the potential yield of favored tributary goods being too low to be deemed worthy of the effort and maintenance of attempted subjugation.

Notably, the West Rivers People and the province of Ephennos have an explicit border treaty that has been upheld for two centuries, owing to their moment of cultural brotherhood while under Imperial Burri occupation and their joint efforts in restoring sovereignty. The two regions still maintain amicable trade connections. On the cynical end, the respected boundaries still mostly come down to the land and its resources not being deemed 'worth it', the West Rivers peoples having a very developed and well-known warrior culture, and Imperial Wardin having recently failed miserably in a war of subjugation against mounted archers utilizing guerilla tactics on difficult terrain.

NORTH WARDI

This is, again, an exonym that refers to multiple peoples who have no collective endonym, and exist in distinctly separate societies. These groups descend from a complete cultural merger of proto-Finnic and proto-Wardi populations, and have developed relatively discretely from most of the contemporary Wardi population since then. Most speak dialects of Hnaimale as a first language, which derives from both of their ancestral language families but shows more Wardi influence.

Most 'north Wardi' groups are have a historical practice of clan-based Houses somewhat similar to that of the Cholemdinae, but have very different political organizations and subsistence methods. Most practice a mixture of settled agriculture and pastoralism, and the Llema depend heavily upon fishing. The Atig Weryanni, Hundinae, and Wermani peoples are organized into monarchist states, the Llema and Brunai are organized in smaller House chiefdoms.

Most Atig Weryanni have adopted variants of the Faith of the Seven Faced God, while (outside of individual/house-level conversions) the Hundinae, Llema, Brunai, and Wermani mostly practice related monotheist-animist faiths centered around a deified sky (with the latter of the four also having core practices of ancestor veneration).

This group includes the only current tributaries to Imperial Wardin that are monarchist states. The tributary dynamic allows for retained self-governance and no direct occupation in return for supplying annual tribute (mostly crops and livestock, along with precious materials, clothing, pelts, etc). Surrender to this tributary status is generally submitted to as a better option than full conquering and occupation (if not outright destruction), but this condition is still an act of subjugation that creates profound social and economic hardship. Among the monarchists, this has been seen in deepened social stratification and upheaval, and all groups are in intensified resource conflicts with their (mostly also tributary) neighbors. The Llema are the only one of the five that are not a tributary, but have still been victimized by this system via the Brunai and Wermani increasingly encroaching on their lands in response to their own economic hardships.

The Sons of Creation crater lake that was historically sacred to many Wardi peoples and is currently sacred to the Faith of the Seven Faced God is Also sacred to the Atig Weryanni and Hundinae peoples (and Cholemdinae, AND some Wogan peoples to the east), and is currently under the direct provincial control of Imperial Wardin, with a temple and shrine built along its shores. This site has been a center of conflict for centuries, and has been particularly potent in the Imperial Wardi era. This came to a head recently (13 years ago) in an event where a party of Hundinae warriors raided the temple, killed its guards, priests, and pilgrims, threw the sacred meteor-iron icon of God into the lake to be consumed, and set up positions in the highly defensible geography. The men put up a considerable fight in the following two day standoff against Wardi forces but were vastly outnumbered, and those that were not killed in combat were captured for ritual execution. The reprisal was exceptionally brutal. A small army led by three of the elite Wardi warrior orders was dispatched into Hundinae land to siege the capital hillfort unless the king Asawani (deemed responsible, whether this is true or not is unknown) surrendered himself, and to raze and slaughter any villages along the way. Asawani ultimately gave himself up rather than face a sacking, and was brought back to the crater lake to be executed in retribution and the re-consecrating of the shrine. His body was never returned to his people. The consequences of this massacre are still unfolding.

JAZAIT

This refers to the elowey inhabitants of the Elumuqi island chain. They descend from a settlement event that occurred ~3000-2500 years ago, during which a wave of seafaring elowey groups spread across the White Sea. Other related groups from this settlement event are known to have reached parts of the Wardi mainland's coast during this period, but were ultimately driven out or eradicated in resource conflict with the proto-Wardi over the next several centuries.

Jazait themselves likely replaced one of the relicts from the Cairn-Builder proto-Wardi culture (a widespread and ancient group whose very last remnants went extinct in the Highlands about 1600 years BP). This would have been in the form of conflict, as both groups had similar subsistence methods and would be in very intense competition for resources. The Jazaiti migrants ultimately won out and have remained the sole inhabitants of these islands since that time.

Jazait society is deeply decentralized and built upon clan systems with strong territorial boundaries. Some of the smaller islands are entirely inhabited by a singular clan. Clans are very large networks of affiliated families that are maintained by marriage-based matrilineal kinship, and most marriages only occur within the same clan. Each clan is led by a singular clanmother, but ultimately governed by all the mothers (sole reproductive female per family unit) of each family in cooperation.

Jazaiti religion centers around two deities, a solar/sky Mother and a lunar/sea/land Father (the latter being her husbands, as a three-as-one deity). The Jazait are their firstborn children, and the Mother is a collective clanmother to all their people. The mothers in a clan are responsible for spiritual leadership and direct intercession with the gods, while other members of the community maintain household shrines and perform crepuscular prayers with prayer beads. Jazaiti religion does not share historical tendencies for animal worship or animism with their mainland neighbors, but recognizes the existence of ghosts and sea demons, and honors certain animals (particularly the tuna) as special gifts from the gods.

The Jazaiti people recognize their collective as a single people, but the de-centralized makeup of their society lends towards strong cultural and linguistic differences between (and sometimes within) each island. Separate clans are not necessarily in allegiance and often compete for resources. Jazait society does not have a distinct warrior culture, but violent conflicts are not uncommon due to limited land area and variability of good fishing grounds. This has been further exacerbated by subsistence issues derived from conflicts with Imperial Wardi groups over fishing territory, two of the Elumuqi islands being placed under direct occupation for their strategic position near the coast, and many clans being placed into tributary status in return for being 'allowed' to fish in their waters.

Jazait society has developed in isolation from nearby Wardi groups for the majority of their history, with both mostly avoiding each other save for small scale conflicts at sea (which would have been occasional, as few proto-Wardi groups were seafaring save for near-shore fishing stints). Most close interaction has been in very recent history (past 400ish years), with a clanless Jazaiti diaspora growing on the mainland (in large part as a matter of searching for work in response to aforementioned subsistence pressures). Many of these communities have developed a distinct syncretic partial adoption of the Faith of the Seven Faced God wherein the Wardi god Od is recognized as the Mother and Father in full interplay as one, some individuals have fully converted, and many retain their own practices.

#The size estimate has definitely gotten bigger. Not going to make an estimate right now but bigger than my last guess of #'approximately the land area of contemporary Spain????'#But remember. WAYYY THE FUCK smaller than you're thinking if you have like. Rome in mind (also at this point in its history it #would be EXTREMELY debatable as to whether it qualifies as an actual 'empire' by many definitions). But pretty big in the context #of the setting where most state societies exist on fairly small scales.#Faiza was present at the standoff at the Sons of Creation and the march through Hundinae lands btw she's a fucking war criminal

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