>>1699740
Well I can only do so much in this format haha, but I will try my best on U18's limitations as a talking' thingy. But yeah, kick punch block, here we go!
Well everything is in our world, it's a whole breathing living world. The Zahra (Upright more humanoid anthros) originate in an area much like Kazakhstan, mostly steppes and with bands of taiga but mostly rolling steppes. We may change this up but yeah. It isn't exactly an earth parallel though as there are very large solitary trees that poke up out of the steppe, a unique species to our setting. Like the Tigirekskiy Nature Reserve, eventually going into a more denser forested region furthest north. They're on a large peninsula (almost a subcontinent)
The Zahra are the 3 humanoids are all cousins, and the big hunchie is more like what a Neanderthal would be to humans. I haven't named them yet and Arbuz can't think of one either. They might be labelled as Zahra to outsiders as they'll just paint them all with the same brush, but I want to differentiate the two to avoid confusion with the reader. In-lore racism sometimes doesn't come across as clear and people might see them as the same species. There will be feline, canine, cervidae, mink, and ursine are planned. Still tinkering all their looks but Arbuz feels happy with the latest ones. They have dimorphism but not quite like humans. Their females are active in warfare, hunting, labor, etc. Women at home will have differences in the sense of role when back home, at camp, etc. Women may gravitate more to certain "paths" which is what they call vocations.
Their culture has been extremely altered after a human/drow nation pushed their collective shit in and slapped them around for years. Taking Zahra at leisure and trying to make them into a replacement/competitor for "warslaves." Lots of backstory there, basically big ass humans bred for war. After Ohmes was repelled by the help of outside nations, the Zahra banded together in a confederacy. They're an extremely ritualistic culture which has a heavy focus on warfare. When a child comes of age they're allowed to choose a path that they are expected to master, once they pass that mastery they can "walk" down other paths as well, but there is a heavy pressure to move towards paths of the military. Failing to master a path is a huge knock to your honour and you may be exiled from your current tribe. There are rituals that can change the course of history even, if a tribe does something that is so against the agreed good of the Zahra or breaks the rites and rules of society, they may fall victim to a trial of absorption, where the heads of that tribe will be killed off and their people will be distributed based on contribution to the campaign. There is even a trial of annihilation, where if not only the leadership is to blame but the entirety of the people are considered so tainted and such a threat that they are killed to the last man, woman, child. Completely stricken from existence. Disputes by tribes can be settled via trials, and not all trials are to the death or even combat-based. A singular leading figure also can settle disputes, their rulings are held as absolute. An attempt is made not to interfere too much and to allow people and their tribes a degree of freedom. This is all born out of a fear of weakness to the outside world. The Ohmish expedition has given them a fear of outside kingdoms and is why they've banded together and became extremely hardened for warfare. Also, a plague earlier than that shaped their culture in ways that still affect them to this day. It kept outsiders away from their lands for quite some time too and isolated them from moving to the outside world. They used to be viewed as diseased beasts basically.
Right now the homeland tribes don't interact with the outside world much. There is some trade but it is extremely limited. Though there is a nomadic tribe that spends most of its time travelling the continent. They will travel to certain areas, set up, work the land briefly and even hire themselves out as mercenaries or labourers, they will trade with nearby cities etc. They tend to not move too close to the cities because they can get extremely pissed off by the strain on the local resources for while they visit. As for where you might encounter them in the game... not sure if we will have them in the game yet? We have ideas of how or where you might. A group from one of the nomadic tribes settling near Kaldea to hire themselves out and trade is perhaps one way. In the form of hired mercenaries is another... or the rarer but also likely "exiles," who were a tribe that managed to survive a trial of Annihilation and fled. The nomadic tribes original purpose was to hunt these exiles down... the exiles actually drastically differ from the homeland Zahra because the split was still when the plague affected them (briefly after Ohmes) so the Homeland and Exile Zahra mutated mildly from one another due to dealing with the plague in separate ways.
This is all very hard to keep track of on U18 haha, so I might have missed some, made mistakes, etc. Quite a lot of the lore is still being edited, I've held back on some lore as well for favour of exploring it in the game later. Etc. Here's a map of the world btw, but even it is still a work in progress!
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