Vahobu (va-hoe-BUH)
Zhoi vahobu va zhoi tara is the iethà translation of "The People of the Caves" and is the formal means of referencing all eight vabupathi, or tribes, of the Vahobu. Informally they call themselves the Jatara Vahobu, or just the Vahobu. No matter what they are called, the Vahobu are a willful and stubborn people. They thrive in the harshest mountain range in the Unknown - a deadly land known to most southerners as the Three Sisters. They themselves refer to the mountains of their homeland as the Few Mothers, which is Zhoupou in their tongue. They thrive living below the frostline of the dormant super-volcanoes by a combination of wit and skill, separated into eight disparate tribes united by their shared language and homeland.
In what they call jaoga mou, or a "Mountain Home", the entire tribe, called a baputhi, live together in a communal space. While each tribal home is jaoga mou, each also bears its own name - there is only one actually named Jaoga Mou. The original jaoga mou is the home of the first and eldest tribe called the Pamashu. In general, jaoga mou follow simple patterns: sleeping bunks are cut into stone walls, water flows down from the snow-capped crowns through small cracks in the mountain and streams down into a pool that serves as a bathing space. Overflow drains into another crack in the cave floor and boils up through a vent in the mountain to a small chamber that is used to cook the tribe's meals. The entire space is worked stone, finely engraved over generations with the stories of the baputhi from its beginning.
The Vahobu hunt the massive and shaggy Mulapahigie at night, and have taken to capturing the big beast to raise in the safety of Jaoga Mou. Alongside them are their faithful Riesawu, a species of reptilian creature that has proven smart enough to learn to hunt and act as a companion. Every journey outside must be made with one eye to the sky, watching for the silent death known as Ihapi. Ihapi, The Bird of Death, is a near mythological foe of the Vahobu va zhoi Tara since their settling in the mountain valleys in the earliest days before recorded history. None have ever been brought down, and all that is known is that its terrible screech heralds an even more terrible and gruesome death. But not even that will stop a hobu.
After reaching reproductive age, a hobu, or person in the tribe, can leave to make the journey to another tribe. This is rarely done, and only as a last resort. It is akin to a death in the tribe's eyes, as their departed hobu leaves, they silently mourn and the hobu begins a near suicidal journey to go from one Jaoga Mou to another that they may only know from a story carved on their former home's wall. The arrival of a wandering hobu is a cause for a month of celebrations, as the entire Baputhi entice the hobu to end the journey and join the tribe. It usually works too! Weary of travel, few hobu leave once arriving in a friendly jaoga mou.
The Vahobu are a sedentary people. They eat Tarathuzhu and the meat of Ogapapada. They raise Ogapapada in stone pens they carve and grow the huge cave-fields of Tarathuzhu. They raise and train Riesawu to use as hunting companions. They forage the valleys of the Three Sisters for wild green Ludu, various Ziezu that they dry to season food and cure meat, and to hunt Riezaja, like Zhufa and Koua, or Zuou, like Chouzha. While they hunt, the Vahobu youths seed the valley with the wild ludu seeds from the last gathering trip.Basic Information
Anatomy
The Vahobu va zhoi Tara are short K'vut subspecies with the standard number of fingers and toes. Over time the people have grown shorter to an average overall height of three feet, with variation based on tribal diet between the ethnicities. Muscularly speaking, though short, they possess the strength and mobility of a full grown human. Their bones are slightly denser, allowing them to shrug off the damage of small falls easier. Nimble fingers and toes have grown and are adapted to cave climbing, with their rough and thickened finger pads able to easily grip slick surfaces.
Biological Traits
Genetics and Reproduction
Jatara Vahobu have almost ritualized sexual reproduction, which is considered vastly different to recreational sex. The diet of the Jatara Vahobu is contraceptive in nature, meaning that in order to reproduce, one must change one's life dramatically and eat exotic dishes that increase the chances of conception.
The specific rituals and practices are detailed elsewhere, I'm sure.
After conception, a mother waits only seven months for a viable birth. The denser muscular tissue of the Jatara Vahobu makes birthing pains somewhat worse, but this is countered by the tiny size of the infant. Strong lungs and loud cries echo in the birthing caverns and each child is celebrated by the entire tribe.
Growth Rate & Stages
Infancy lasts for almost a year and half. After that stage the child begins to crawl and walk and enters the next stage of their development where it develops balance and strength. As the child grows climbing, and the accompanying falling, is encouraged heartily. As the child grows towards its fifth year it is taught the different fungi that the tribe grows, and practices nimble weaving with the fibers.
After its fifth year, a child is expected to speak Ietha and know the old legends. Periodically the Tribe will test the child to ensure the lessons of those stories stuck in its immature mind. Every child is considered an investment of the Tribe and regardless of gender is encouraged to learn as many skills as its many elders can teach. After the child turns ten, they are expected to begin foraging with the other youth. There is still danger outside the Few Mothers, and children are told terrifying tales to ensure they remember the danger and stay alert. As time wears on, the youth grow to maturity and take on a trade around fifteen. By then they have reached their full height, and have the right to choose a name of their own. This is their passage into adulthood, where they stay for an amazing sixty years.
Their long life span at that point is only three quarters of the way over, as their body slowly fails over the next twenty five years on average. Few make it quite that long, and none have lived much more than a hundred years, but that is impressive considering the dangers faced and threats overcome.
Ecology and Habitats
The Jatara Vahobu live their lives within the Three Sisters mountain range, as stated earlier, each of the different tribes has created a Jaoga Mou and live as a community within it. The dark, cool caves with their warm airflows keep a stable temperature throughout the year, allowing the tribe to reside entirely indoors with no real need for open fires save to cook their foods. Water flows through the cracks and seams in the mountains and is utilized to wash themselves. The water, as well as being the bathing water, is directed two ways: the first is into steam vents for cooking; and the second is to wash away filth and offal. The offal is washed into the deepest caverns where it is slowly converted into arable soil by the gasses, water, and heat of the mountain. That soil is brought back to the growing shelves of the Jaoga Mou where the small breeds of Tarathuzhu that serve to augment the tribe's diet are grown.
Dietary Needs and Habits
Jatara Vahobu eat a varied diet of cultivated fungi, called Tarathuzhu, foraged vegetables called Ludu, and meats from several different animals they hunt and raise.
Biological Cycle
The passing of days and seasons do not affect the Jatara Vahobu much. Their lifestyle exists within the ecosystem of the interior of the Three Sisters much of the time. During the warmer months, young people stealthily go hunting and foraging in the forested valleys between and around the mountains. Aside from that period outside, much of their time is spent within the mountains.
Additional Information
Geographic Origin and Distribution
The eight tribes exist in the mountain range known as The Three Sisters, which the tribes call the Few Mothers or Zhoupou. Sometimes they are referred to as the Few Mountainous Mothers, or Jaoga Zhoupou.
Perception and Sensory Capabilities
The Mountain People are darkness-adapted because in ancient times they were relentlessly hunted by daylight-aerial-predators that live in the upper reaches of the Three Sisters. Their need to hide in the dark caves and hunt only at night has led to an evolutionary visual advantage in the dark.
Civilization and Culture
Naming Traditions
Vahobu do not carry family names, and their names are constructed to be soft-spoken but easily discernable, and have between two and four sounds. Aside from that there are no real naming conventions.
Major Organizations
Average Technological Level
Major Language Groups and Dialects
Iethà is the language of the Vahobu and is actually uniform in how it is spoken through the entirety of the Three Sisters. This is thanks to the Watchers insistance on adhering to traditional speech. More than one Watcher has been known to thwack some little hobu hard enough to crack skulls after hearing some slang word used, or even an abbreviation of an Ietha word. The reason for this is because the Vahobu hold their language as a holy gift. The Waking Tongue is a myth that explains why.
History
The Vahobu don't dwell on why they are where they are, only taught that it is a tale of pain and loss and only some should know it. Those that do want to learn must learn at the feet of a Watcher. Watchers know the history and lore of the Vahobu baputhi, and they carry the myths with them, memorized and shared by oral history since the founding of the Pamashu which is told of in the story Few Mothers and Many Children. Since that time, each generation builds their story into the walls of their jaoga mou, etching in their harsh script the births and deaths of the baputhi but not bothering to record any but the events that affect the entire tribe.
There are the grey-skinned and darker-haired Third Mountain Tribe.
4.) The First Baputhi.There are the purple-skinned, light-haired, blue-grey eyed Fifth Mountain Tribe who gather the flowering-purple-vine-vegetable that has, over generations, tinted their skin.
6Terrified of the Great Water, the Zhoi Vapamopay Pawe are a deeply religious people who take omens and signs from the ocean that exists off the edge of the world. They have night-black skin, amber eyes, and are usually hairless but some have jet black hair that is ritually shaved.
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