Geography
The country of Thessagamau is a great line of mountains shaped like a Wyvern’s tooth. The northern mountains tend toward warmer weather while the southern peaks are typically white, capped with snow. Where they meet at the tip has a full spectrum of seasons and mixed customs. Those mountains have been around since before the great calamity, surviving the brunt of its damage, and coming out of it stronger than ever before. Neighboring countries do not try to take on Thessagamau in battle due to their severe disadvantage when trying to invade the mountains – the natives will always have the high ground. More than that, there is another group that lives deep within the mountains which has a full system of tunnels that can reach nearly any peak or mountain base. In the center of the Wyvern’s tooth is a great crystal lake.
The Northern mountains make up the Thundering Mountains. They are home to a clan of wyvern-riding warriors, trained from childhood to ride for work, pleasure, and battle alike. The clan of the Thundering Mountains is the strongest among the eastern countries of Lasteriel. The name comes from the sound the hundreds of wyvern wings make while training along with the drums that are used for festivals, training, and war.
Festivals
Summer Solstice
Like the name entails, this is a celebration of Summer Solstice on the longest day of the year and reminder that the sun will continue to rise. They celebrate with fireworks, art, food, and confessions of love. Many of the Thundering Mountains will propose on this special holiday in the hope that their love will be as lasting as the sun.
Thunder Fest
This holiday celebrates the wyverns which they ride and the bonding of wyverns to their riders. Each wyvern has only one rider which is chosen on this day through a combination of choosing and trials. Both rider and wyvern have a sense for the bond and are drawn to each other. Then, they go through trials of trust, weaving through the mountains, and ending with a steep drop of the cliff’s edge to come as close to the ground as wyvern and rider dare before spreading it’s wings to glide and catch the updraft back to the top. Not all wyverns and riders survive this trial, but those who do make it a competition for war-band position.
Festival of Lights
Once per year, natural lights grace the sky with ribbons of light, ebbing and flowing like water overhead. The natives celebrate with light viewings from town centers. They reduce all lights in the town and in their homes to get a clear view of the lights from anywhere on the mountain. Some fly to the highest parts of the mountains to watch the lights cover the land from their peaks, across the tooth point peaks, and over the southern mountain tribes. The lights are especially beautiful when reflected in the crystal lake below.
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