Ula'thau'la (OO-la-THOW-la)
The Kelpeaters; Rulers of the First Age of Man
The Ula'thau'la are a Meranthic Humanoid species originating from the Gyre Islands of the plane of Lorgain. They were commonly called Kelpeaters due to their iconic diet.
The ancient Ula'thau'la were a dour and warlike people, dogmatic in their belief that the weak are ultimately the best off under control by the strong, even if the medicine sometimes tastes bad. They sought to bring their harsh enlightenment to anyone who could comprehend.
Under their warlord and eventual demigod Inum'indiron'aravaut (often shortened to Ina'ut), the Ula'thau'la would come to comprise the core of the great interplanar Kelpeater Empire, which would come to rule much of First Age Materia prior to the Great Fractionation, and later the Deluge.
Though lineages of Ula'thau'la spread to other locations from Lorgain and still exist, the Materian Kelpeaters were almost completely wiped out by the Deluge, or subsumed by Second Age populations. Remnants of Kelpeater genetics are the reason why Meranthic Peoples in modern Materia are frequently born with a tiny, vestigial, secondary set of arms.Appearance
See also: Kelpeaters Image Gallery (External)The Ula'thau'la are frequently called the Kelpeaters, due to a diet heavy with the reddish kelp that gives their skin their distinctive coppery colour. They "graze" constantly: it is customary to have a pack of dried seaweed on your person, and is not at all considered rude in Thaulan societies to be munching on a strip during other engagements. Many a speech has been made with mouth half full.
The Ula'thau'la are a stout and heavy people, shorter than a standard human or arakh but taller on average than dwarves or halflings. Hair colour ranges between blacks to dark browns and coppers, with standard greying with age.Vestigial Arms
Most noteworthy is the Ula'thau'la's secondary pair of vestigial arms below the main pair; shrunken and clumsy, they are good for little aside from making percussive sounds that are a part of their partly somatic language. For this reason, it is frequent among modern Waking Materians to be born with an (even tinier) set of vestigial arms. For most, they present as little more than a second set of shoulder blades.
Modern biologists accept this feature as being magical in origin and not a result of natural evolution: four arms have never been observed in Material humanoids, only certain celestials or outsiders. Rituals powerful enough to alter a group of people down to the genetic level are known, for example the Etiainen of Ancient Tassalit. As the Kelpeater lifestyle is heavily coastal-amphibious, the most likely explanation is that these arms were primarily to make them more powerful swimmers. They then de-evolved as the caloric demand for secondary arms outweighed the benefits with technology compensating for any shortfalls.
It was common among veteran warriors, wealthy with trophies or war and sport, to commission a permanent transmutation where the vestigial arms are returned to the size of normal ones. It is extremely difficult to train one's brain to fight with four arms, and so they gain great cultural admiration by perfecting the art. This is assumed to be the reason why some First Age artwork tends to portray the Material Gods with extra pairs of arms: a symbol of respect even to those not born Ula'thau'la.Warfare
The Ula'thau'la of ancient Lorgain and later Waking Materia were a solemn people who were at their most passionate when warring with a worthy enemy. Their military style was direct, simple and brutal; they didn't have the temperament for theatrics in warfare, and didn't want to insult their enemies by show of weakness or sport. Entire books are written about their frightening pre-battle displays, said to be heard kilometres away.
The attire of Kelpeater soldiers, especially the elitemost of God-Emperor Ina'ut's ishka’ri and tsuna’am, tended to vary greatly as the wearing of war trophies and commissioning of novel arms & armour was encouraged. The wealthiest of the Reiver King’s divine agents spent vaults’ worth of coin to pay for permanent transmutation magicks, the most popular of which was to restore their secondary vestigial arms to full size and function. It took intense training to reteach one’s brain the full use of four arms and master their use in combat, but the investment was worthwhile as they were among the most feared and sought-after warriors on adolescent Materia.Culture
While the military was undoubtedly supreme, a great deal of nuance about the lower castes has been unearthed in recent decades, as the the Sunken Expanse retreats and ancient ruins are revealed. As it turns out, one main issue with preservation was the fact that their cultural transmission was largely verbal or musical: while they had rich and unique cultures, the non-military castes had no access to printing presses through most of the First Empire's history. One tome on domestic etiquette has now been discovered which includes a long treatise on wearing colours appropriate to your social merit. Though rich in poems and plays and compositions, there was also a large preoccupation with avoiding Empyreal attention. Only those with direct connections to military personnel seemed to be given some level of social leeway.
The caste system was so strongly represented by worn colours that demand for imported dyes rose sharply across the planar region, creating a near-century-long epidemic of piracy and trade war in the Silurian Eighth, collectively known as the Dye Wars.
Though Inum'indiron'aravaut and the other Kelpeater Godlords were supreme, the Ula'thau'la also had a complex genealogy of ancestor worship, centred around their greatest heroes. The afore-mentioned four-armed warriors—who spend vast sums to have their secondary arms grown to normal size—feature strongly in this sub-pantheon. Even great warriors and demigods that were not Ula'thau'la were often portrayed with four arms as a standard symbol of heroism.
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