The Ma’ab & Greylands Influence on Miurag
MA’AB ORIGINS
The Ma'ab people of Ennikar exalt their ancient necromantic ancestors as god-like entities. As such, their descendants enjoy the status of their 'divine' birthright. Unlike most Human-based races, the Ma'ab don't look forward to the afterlife. They believe that the Greylords are usurpers who stole the Greylands from the Ma'ab and turned it into the planar wasteland it is today. They believe that when they die, they will be drawn to their homeland and into the waiting blades of their ancestral enemies.
The latter is mostly true: their essence will naturally return to the Greylands upon death, but the reason is because the Ma'ab were created by the Greylords, to be used as a working and fighting force. The Ma'ab ancestors, now worshipped as the Seven Ascended were originally the ones to lead the Ma'ab slave rebellion against Abalok and escape out of the Greylands as a Nexus people free for the first time.
To avoid this fate of their race, the exalted ancestors developed techniques to imbue the faithful into a sacred shard or even into an effigy by which they can interact with their people still. The nobles practiced necromancy under the air of religion, for if the strong control the weak, so why not the body and soul? They go to great lengths to preserve themselves, including becoming liches and mummies. If they should need to devour the souls of the lessers to preserve themselves, then it’s their right, and they 'saved' that person from a more gruesome fate in the Nexus.
The Maknuut, on the other hand, are the slum necromancers of the lowest caste who often had to bargain and steal for their knowledge. Many of them practice forms of self-mutilation as a means to focus their talents. They often enter into bargains with Greylords, demons, and the forces of Chaos. Regularly, they're purged by the noble class, who in turn study and dissect their techniques. Thus the nobles learn what the lessers discover while never sullying their hands with the difficulty of experimentation.
MA’AB CASTE SYSTEM (basic)
The Ma'ab are ostensibly a matriarchy, primarily because of the initial difficulty of achieving conception and giving birth in the new world. The death magic with which they have been gifted by the Greylords at first prevented these most powerful leaders from having any offspring. Only the "low born" Ma'ab with far less inherent death magic were able to breed, most successfully with the capture and assimilation of the native Humans, especially the Noiri, Kurgan, and Paxian, with later targeting of the Yungian.
Thanks to this uncovered fertility and aggressive empirical expansion, the wealthiest Ma'ab have never lacked for slave labor and servants. The first fertile offspring born of the top caste immediately became sacred, and the body of a noble female necromancer was deemed untouchable unless she willed it, and many will instantly come to her aid if she'd under threat.
Because the Ma'ab people bear an unusually strong sexual dimorphism -- with tall, bulky males and diminutive females often half their height and a fraction their weight -- the men have always done the heaviest work and provided protection alongside the exploring and fighting to expand the resources and territory of their mistresses. The women make all top civil, political, and military decisions while their favored defenders will see their will done. It is not unusual for a wealthy Ma'ab woman to have five or more dedicated defenders who double as sexual partners, using rituals designed to increase her ferility.
MA’AB CASTE STRUCTURE
Based on the rough breakdown of a body
Spirit- the Seven Ascended, their bloodline, and some of the upper noble families who interbred.
Bone- Military
The only group within the Ma'ab army explicitly named so far are the Hellhounds, an elite, magic-using, well-disciplined special force that often lead an invasion into foreign lands. They are said to be terrifying and brutal, and have also been known to track down traitors or deserters from their own army by any means necessary.
“Marrow”-Not a true caste, but a insult to a person seeking to rise from Flesh caste into Bone caste. The idea being that their Bone is a simple veneer that will crack revealing the 'softness' that denotes them as being Flesh at heart.
Flesh- Nobles and Guilds
Guts- Peasantry and work force
Blood- Mages, a class with the most potential mobility between Castes. The unspoken aim is to ascend the ranks to Spirit.
Maggots- The slum, unclean class. They either lack talent or have done something to ensure they are unlikely to rise.
Maknuut - Mages in the Maggot Caste, a native slur meaning ‘bitter blood,’ as they are treated as of little more than tools to be used by one more talented and educated.
There are multiple distinctive sub-castes which can distinguish members that work alongside two castes at once. These can be important liaisons which prevent Ennikar from getting stymied in status.
The History of Ma'ab Expansion on Miurag
When the Ma'ab slaves revolted in the The Greylands, their leaders brought the entire race to Miurag. Once here in approximately 2500 S.E., only those least touched by death magic were able to breed the next generation using the native Humans. Those with the strongest affinity to death magic on Miurag needed to extend their lives, because these mages still insist on their nobility, claiming all ways to buy time searching for solutions to have children.
Because of this inverse fertility, opposite of their existence in The Nexus, a strong need arose for a rigid caste system to preserve their magic rather than see it be "diluted" and decline to the level of the native Humans. In addition, the harsh cold of The Far North required sheer numbers for their population to both survive and work as a people while also feeding life essence to the ever-more-demanding noble class.
This desperation for greater numbers led to the Ma'ab swiftly becoming one of the most aggressive militaries on the continent, taking captives in any way possible, a broad slave trade blooming in their wake.
First to face the "life hunger" of the burgeoning Empire were the Noiri, who shared the Far North mostly as traders and sailors of the icy waters. Their appearance made them unexpectedly familiar to the newest race, possessing similar coloring of pale skin and darker shades of hair and eyes. These unsuspecting peoples suffered first and worst; some tribes and cities still survive but mostly as vassals or puppets for the Empire. Those Noiri who could fled the Far North and began to settle around The Great Lake alongside the Paxian and Yungian Humans.
Soon after, the Ma'ab encountered the nomadic Kurgan upon the Steppes. Both peoples boasted warriors of similar size, though the Kurgan bore much greater variation in their coloring. The Steppes people were greatly desired by Ennikar for their strength and strange magics, yet put up the toughest and most consistent resistance to the Empire expansion into their lands. With no large settlements to conquer and a people seemingly with the elemental forces of their home on their side, the Ascended have yet to claim the Steppes or gain much of the Kurgan blood into their population. In some ways, it was easier to go around them, skirking the Great Lake for potentially easier life essence.
The widespread Paxians, seasoned travelers and traders to the south of the Great Lake, were next to find themselves in direct conflict with the Far North. Although not unified enough like the Kurgan to push the Ma'ab out by force, the distance from their invaders' snowy homeland and the speed in which the Paxian cities had learned to communicate with each other worked in their favor to wear the northern army down.
In addition, the ancient Dwarven Clans did not take kindly to the disruption of their trades and crafts. Having longstanding agreements with the Paxian cities, the Tundar Dwarves provided many of the tools which prevented Paxian lands from being overrun. Thus far, the Empire has not been able to settle in the south, always having to retreat after taking what captives and spoils they can grab.
The notoriously dense and dangerous Blackbark Forest long blocked land expansion from the Far North to the massive and fertile Peninsula of Yung-An, but eventually the battered Noiri and their fishing shipcraft would show the way to the Yungian lands to the north and west of the Sea of Fish. Much smaller in size and not nearly so combative as the Kurgan, the Yungian peoples suffer raids along their shores from the Ma'ab yet have not collapsed like the Noiri. More like the Kurgan, the Yungians rise when needed to expel invaders, also seemingly with the essential forces of their homeland on their side. Thus far, no foothold from Ennikar has lasted long enough to take root on their rich soils.
The Dwarven Clans and the Paxians collectively refuse trading their secrets of navigating the deepest waters and building the ships capable of withstanding them. With no sailing knowledge from the Greylands, the Empire of the North has little more than shore-hugging crafts from the Noiri capable of threading inbetween ever-threatening icebergs. The Ma'ab people have not yet achieved an armada capable of transporting the Black Army east and south, where they would have to survive the turbulent Green Seas (with watchful and hostile Kurgan on the shores) and then endure the hot, barren Sea of Fire. Thus, the Ascended have yet to reach the south or west of the continent and has not laid claim to any significant Zauyrian - aka Sal-Zayr lineage.
But, as some say, "With liches, it is always only a matter of time."
