Nidari

A populous tribe of jellyfish-infused humans, native to the Nidari Reach.
Common capabilities of this species:

• Water-breathing
• Levitation
• Stinging - tendrils sheathed at the wrists.
• Phasing?

Weaknesses:

• Thin vulnerable skin (bruises/cuts easily, blisters from walking/riding, etc) and generally fragile. infected cuts and blisters are a common way for Nidari to die.
• Need immersing in water regularly to maintain their skin.

some Nidari are more centauroid, with jellyfish bells and tendrils replacing their hips and legs. they are generally very capable levitators and lifters.
Iconic weapon – trident (with 1 long middle tine and 2 smaller side prongs, like a sai on a stick). Used for trapping and turning aside other blades - for allies to attack if in formation, or to close for staff-strikes or sidearm (dirk/hatchet) attacks.
Culture:

• Non-lethal sting-duels are used to resolve disputes - Nidari Duellists carry this out.
• Tend to specialise into narrow skills. A common model for specialised professions is for training to be provided in exchange for a share of future profits (personal franchising).

Slice of life: let's say you're a minor Nidari orderly at one of the colleges in Rithnidloi . You rise before the dawn in your small mid-terrace bamboo hut, not feeling the slight rocking motion of the Bell that is as natural to you as breathing. Couples sleep apart where possible in Nidari culture, so you greet your partner as you dress in hose and a loose-woven shawl of treated kelp. Breakfast is probably fish, squid, seaweed, or bread milled recently from grain siloed since the last refueling stop; you might cook this yourself, or you might spend a Stem or two acquiring one from a street-vendor. If you have the time, you stop at the salt-baths - Nidari skin is delicate, and dries quickly - but by the time the sun is up you are at your college, a cluster of wooden buildings located near the edge of the bell. You get a view over the tiered green beds that stand on the edge of the Great Twin, growing vegetables, herbs and spices, and medicinal plants to supplement imports. You assist a herbalist professor, helping her tend to her collection of exotic plants, as well as corralling her hungover students and putting up with their jokes and jabs. You stay there until well after sundown, before heading for a meal and a longer soak at the baths, gossiping and gaming with your partner and her acquaintances. There is a duel this evening, but the result is a foregone conclusion and you're not interested in that type of trial, so you make your way home down the narrow, meandering alleys, performing the Witnessing, the traditional Gyrist mediation-prayer, before turning in for bed.
The Nidari value excellence in a certain narrow field; a profession, a hobby, even a minor knack. Rather than use formal surnames, Nidari go by nicknames tied to their talent - Spearthrow, Cardwise, Loudtendril. Though this striving is positive, it has aspects that other cultures lack - Generalism and being a jack of all trades isn't held in high esteem, and if you find a rival in the same community who clearly defeats you, it's considered completely proper to change interests or to leave and find a community where you can be considered greatest at that particular thing. This is tied to the eternally reincarnated folk-hero knows as Eginego, who dedicated a single lifetime to mastering every skill the Nidari possess. Conversely, if you want something done that you're not en expert in, one is expected to pay, barter, or call in a favour from someone better, rather than learn yourself. (Question: how do you dabble and try new things in such a society? You have to approach things with an unserious attitude, perhaps?)
Settlements in Nidari are amorphous things, based around a particular spot - an atoll, beach, Bell, or seamount - but with a large part of the population floating the surrounding leagues in boats or semi-submerged House-Rafts of bamboo, harvesting the sea. It's pretty easy to move from one community to another, at least in theory; you can simply balance your debts (or take your chances with the Bailiffs) and sail off to a new settlement.
The main thing ties this society together is debt. Ship-debt, dock-debt (aka "taxes"), training-debt, and even crime-debt are used to exert control over the populace and to facilitate exchange and power. Independent Bailiffs who track down fleeing debtors are a fairly common part of life, and one of the major forms of "state" violence. They rarely injure or kill - though it's neither unknown nor frowned upon - but instead report the debtor to the local magistrate, who negotiates a debt-exchange with the debt-owning entity (plus a solid additional bit of crime-debt) to extract the money themselves.
To demarcate debt, metal torcs and armbands, as well as tattoos on the arm, are widely used - in imitation/reference of the bonds created by bondcasters. These also double as marks of status if the debt reflects certain training - e.g. educational.
The settlements can more than double in size and population on the regular market days, as ships moor up to exchange items, news, and to celebrate together.
Types of mariculture practiced by the Nidari:

free-floating or anchored nets that act as permanent seafood farms

Harvesting and farming on shallow sea-floors

nets mounted to sea-cliffs and canyons to catch food from upwellings/downwellings/currents

natural and artificial lagoons, and other shallow-pool farming

open-sea fishing

Land near settlements is often farmed in a more conventional manner, and trade in food items from neighbouring regions also adds some variety to the diet, which already includes many different fish, molluscs, crustaceans, echinoderms, and sea-plants.
Questions:

• boiled-water baths?
• how does bathing (blend-pools, Terize) fit into the religious practices of the area?
• divide between predominantly wet and predominantly dry communities?
• consequences of freshwater consumption (if it's a thing): holding fresh water on Bells; having access to fresh water in oceanic communities ties them to land or other freshwater source (plant/animal/geological/magical).
• general features of Nidari Culture: specialisation, at individual and community level; travel, freedom?; how serious/casual?; right-to-use over ownership?; decentralised, low-hierarchy?; possibly a broad, distributed network?; either very insular or not at all, depending on community?; gregarious, based on changing social groups or fixed communities (found families)?; travelling as you move through different life-stages?
• did they develop Cofamiliars (with Deep-dwellers,Urchins)?
• games, and where they are played (terize or not)? Elephant tiles, dive/climb races?

Naming Traditions

Feminine names

• Mendil

Masculine names

• Ghellim

Culture

Common Dress code

Holey, non-functional shawls, occasionally threaded with cloth-of-gold, are worn by all especially on special occasions. These are often made of kelp-rope.
Do the holes increase or decrease drag?
Hose are universally worn, rich or poor – top-heavy shapes.
Poor and water-dwelling tend to wear more streamlined clothes; rich and belldwellers tend to dress baggier, sometimes ostentatiously frilled etc.
Fashion is currently swaying away from excesses of frills etc in recent years

Common Customs, traditions and rituals

Bathing

as Nidari skin needs to be kept well hydrated - at least every few days - to prevent serious health consequences - bathing is a major part of their culture. it is present in three major facets.
Sleeping-pools These shallow pools - most often simple hollows in the ground - are used for sleeping in, and are generally able to meet the moisture needs of skin in that time. the water needs to be changed at least every few weeks, but preferably every couple of days, or else it grows stagnant. this is no problem in places where access to seawater is widely available. in fact, sleeping-pools can be located in the ocean, in basements or separate pools. however, in exclaves, inland communities, and Bells, seawater (or salted water) is brought in and sold by specialised water-merchants. 
in some places, elites are able to sell or donate their used bathwater (they have it changed every day) to merchants who can resell it at a cheaper rate than fresher water.
Blend-pools communal hot-tub like pools, which are laced with pufferfish toxins that produce euphoric and even hallucinogenic effects, and can be loud, social, raucous, or conversational, or intimate and profound. they're infrequent but prolonged events, and produce hangovers/comedowns. seen as very odd, even illegal, to do alone. in dryer places, they are often used as near-religious experiences, whereas in more traditional watery communities they're see as an elite decadence.
Terize Literally Teri (good/clean/healthy) ze (current), Terize are public communal bathing experiences that are physically and spiritually purifying. they are traditionally natural places, where healthy water helps clean the skin and the soul. the crucial element is that the water feel different from the normal environment - in temperature, salinity, current etc. wild Terize are often seen as religious/spiritual; but even artificial ones are seen as healthy and peaceful. can also be used as a hangover cure (especially after a blend-pool session). depth is often associated with quality.
Natural Terize are generally public and held in common, or protected by temporal or religious laws; the landowning elite may have secure private Terize as well. artificial Terize can be created by community effort, be bread-and-circuses affairs funded by nobles flaunting wealth and/or benevolence, or run as business propositions with memberships or entry fees.
Bells may have artificial Terize, but can also stop off at various natural Terize as they move.
natural examples:

• narrow channels with strong currents
• deltas/outflows from rivers/streams
• upwellings and downwellings

artificial examples:

• streams/waterfalls (especially with salt)
• pools with salt added, with currents running from towers or large paddles - water often changed infrequently. an obvious outflow is a sign of healthy water. where there are towers, the water may be raised by chain-wells, lifted by hand, or even by magical means.
• boats that are trailed over the water, especially behind Bells.

	easy water access (terize-based culture)	poor water access (blend-pool based culture)
wealthy	private blend-pools	private tubs, possibly private terize
upper-middle	access to blend-pools (rented)	blend-pools in house (group)
lower-middle	tub in house	tub in house (small, stale)
poor	rely on public terize	bathe wherever they can

Specific communities' Terizes:

• Rhythonze: 
• Port Tendari: 
• Rithnidloi :

Ideals

Beauty Ideals

not prudish, with nudity neither censored nor inherently eroticised, but instead treated very matter-of-factly.

Courtship Ideals

in Nidari culture, couples sleep separately if they an afford to, for instance, Caziyel sleeps in a hammock while Ghellim sleeps in a water-trough.

Encompassed species

• Bells