Blancians

On the eastern borders of the continent of Keoira,  The Croskin Plague was particularly rampant, killing thousands and frightening the populace. When the panic of the failed cure settled somewhat, several leaders gathered to decide what should be done to attempt to get rid of the sickness. It was decided that anyone who showed even a slight sign of sickness would be put on a ship and sent to La’knin, the islands to the East of the border.
Most went willingly, relieved that their families and friends might have a chance to live, but those who did not were forced by other plague victims who were going. Old ships, doomed to sink soon, were loaded with victims and sent toward the island. If they sunk on the way, no one except the victims themselves would care. They were going to die anyway.

On the island, a volunteer nurse began studying the old cure that had failed and soon found the problem, curing thousands. In great excitement, the islanders gathered, loaded onto the refurbished ships they had occupied their time building, and a group of them sailed back to the mainland. Their hair, which had fallen out, had grown back in a distinctive white. Officials refused to allow them entrance, disbelieving their health. Devastated, the people sailed back toward their island, and on the way attacked a ship for their supplies. They hadn’t accounted for a sail back when they’d left the island. Superstitious sailors made up tales that soon began to spread and exaggerate, and the Ghost Pirates were soon invented—something the people on La’knin would later use to their advantage.

Meanwhile, more and more plague victims were arriving on the island and receiving the cure, and the island was beginning to be filled, so some of the people began to sail about, finding new islands and filtering into the unsettled parts of the mainland in the mountains where no one ever saw them. The mountain men, a rough, hardy folk, were not a large group and accepted the belief that the people were cured, allowing the islanders to settle near them. Many married the mountain men, and soon the Blancian people were talked of because of their distinctive white hair...at least in their first generations.
Even after all the white-haired ones died, they were still known as the Blancians.

The ones with white hair were never again allowed into their mother countries. The leaders even banished anyone with white hair, thinking they might be falsely cured plague victims.

by Perchance AI Generator

This painting was not seen by any outsiders until decades after the Blancians had settled. It is now considered a masterpiece, as it depicts the distincitive white hair they were first known for.