Frojier

Summary

Frojier is the homeworld of the Frojien people. It is a an arctic shard with year-round snowfall and freezing temperatures. For millennia, this shard escaped the notice of other, more technologically advanced cultures, until the first accidental encounter with @Arcassia, when two Arcassian air ships crashed into it in the midst of a battle.
The shard is very sparsely populated. Though there are some exceptions, most of the Frojien live in the city of Hûile. Others might live alone or in small bands outside of Hûile in the wild. In total, there are only about 50,000 Frojien, and infant mortality rates are high. Frojier has a long, well-documented history, and is one of the few shards that is in possession of relics from when the world was whole. Government and religion play a large part in the lives of the Frojien.
Since the Arcassian air ship incident, diplomats have welcomed outsiders to visit, but do not accept permanent residents unless they have direct familial ties to someone of Frojien descent, meaning that spouses and children of Frojien are welcome to take up residence, but may face some stigma, and find the climate difficult to deal with depending on their biology.
Life on Frojier is a hard one. There are two seasons--one is harsh, and the other is simply cruel. For the Frojien, it is difficult to survive. For others, it is nearly impossible.

History

Frojier, as all other shards, was once part of a whole planet that was torn asunder by the unexplained phenomena that shattered the world. For as long as any Frojien can remember, it has always been known that they were but one small fragment of the shattered world, which they refer to as Aetuine. This word predates the Frojien culture and the birth of the Frojien people, as evidenced by texts discovered by explorers.
What they understand of their own origins, are that they were once part of a northern-dwelling bronze-age people on Aetuine. They weren't so dissimilar from humans, and often traded and mingled among them every now and then, despite extreme isolationism. As evidenced by their ancient texts, they weren't simply cousins to humans, but they were themselves red-blooded humans as well, with somewhat fair hair, eyes, and skin, adapted due to their environment.
Texts describe the tearing apart of Aetuine as gradual at first. Earthquakes shook their region for centuries, increasing in frequency over time. Towards the end, however, earthquakes erupted quite suddenly and violently. The ancestors of the Frojien saw many casualties, and many tried to flee, but within nights, the fissures surrounded them, and the land across the fissures drifted away. Their climate became extreme and inhospitable. It had been cold before, but now it was untenable.
Only hundreds survived the breaking, and survival became priority. The elderly recorded all they could by pen and paper, and by stone tablets, and sealed the texts away in iron vaults, hoping to preserve their way of life for future generations, while the younger survivors focused on food and shelter. Their numbers dwindled severely over the next century until there were no more than a dozen remaining.
By this point, they were not writing or recording their history any longer. The following myth was passed down orally, through story and through song, as the people of this shard fell back into the old ways of tribal life as a necessity and a natural survival instinct. It was said that the last tribe of survivors sought shelter from the harsh cold in a cave, but they were surely moments from freezing. They had run out of firewood, and outside of the cave existed only howling whiteness.
There were three men who were neither children, nor elderly, nor sick. Sensing sure extinction around the corner, they decided to risk an early demise if only to help their families and tribe survive a day longer, and they ventured out into the blizzard in search of firewood. They wandered for hours, pushing themselves to the limit, limbs stiff and skin burning beneath thick furs from the stinging cold. Having lost their way, they were on the verge of giving up. Then, they saw a faint shape in the whiteness. It seemed that the snow and ice wasn't touching the figure on the horizon, only swirling around it.
They approached meekly to find a man standing before them, his eyes like ice, hair and skin like snow. He looked young and severe. The man told them he had been waiting for them, to which one asked how and why. Who was he? How did he get here? Were there others?
The man confirmed there were no others left in the Frozen Land -- the Frojier, in their tongue. Not its formal name, just yet. He introduced himself as Aeslar of Aetuine. The god of frost. They appealed to him to stop his onslaught for the sake of their families, and offered him devotion in exchange. Aeslar asked of them to give him their furs--without which, they would surely die. They did as he asked, and stood in only their woven garments before him, chattering, sure to freeze to death at any moment.
Moved by their trust, he gave each of them pearls of cerulean ice, beaming with light and energy. The snow didn't touch these either. Aeslar bid them to swallow the pearls. As they did so, they drifted to sleep in the snow, certain they had died. A few moments later, the three men awoke and looked to one another. They felt chilly... but not cold, and not in pain. Their blonde hair had turned white, their skin appeared as porcelain, and their eyes were bright blue, bright red, and white respectively. In the snow, they found a small pouch with nine more marbles.
The blizzard itself seemed to speak to them: "The cold will grow colder, but you are of and once with the Frozen Land^[1]. You have been given Ice Blood^[2]. Now go, live, and thrive."
It's said that the men returned to their families who had been crying for them, and whose tears had frozen on their cheeks. They gave them each the marbles and had them swallow, and watched as they fell into their brief rests, gradually losing the color in their flesh and their hair, and awakening with new, bright eyes.
Only generations later did they understand the power of the Bïté -- the Ice Blood. With a thriving population of hundreds, sages came out of the woodwork, learning to perform blood letting ceremonies and shape their now cerulean colored blood into solid tools, dense as diamond and resilient as titanium. In time, newer generations learned that they didn't need to cut themselves to perform such magic, and that they could conjure it sparingly. When their population swelled to thousands centuries later, they began to fortify their ancestral land with steel and Bïté smelted together, producing a sort of glowing sky-blue metal. They began construction of the first portions of their new home, simply called Home^[3]. In the millennia to come, their society would grow. Their devotion to Aeslar would grow strong, and their way of life would be secure and preserved.
The founding of their society was largely based on the legend of the last tribe. Twelve branches of government to represent the twelve who remained. Three representatives to a branch, to represent the voyage of the three men who appealed to Aeslar to save their people.
^{[1] - Frojier
[2] - Bïté
[3] - Hûile}

Climate

The shard is trapped in perpetual winter, though with the obliquity of Aetuine, there certainly exist seasons. Frojier is located near the polar north of the planet, so the axial tilt of the planet has relatively little effect on them. They have two seasons, called Lonyk and Hivor respectively. For just about half of the year, they experience mostly light, the sun never setting, and for the other near-half, they experience mostly dark. The light, or summer equivalent, is Hivor, and the dark, or winter equivalent, is Lonyk. The time in-between, where day and night seem to co-exist is referred to as Midtide, but isn't considered its own season--only an overlap of the two.
During Lonyk, the average temperature shifts between -40°F to 0°F. During Hivor, it shifts from 0°F to 40°F. When the weather is warm enough to melt ice, Frojien become uncomfortable. Heavy snowfall typically occurs more in Hivor than it does in Lonyk, but Lonyk experiences less frequent, yet more severe cold storms.

Civilization

The only known civilization on Frojier is the Frojien civilization, based in the one and only city on Frojier, Hûile. For more information about the culture, beliefs, government, and society of the Frojien, see the article on the Frojien people.

Geography

Frojier is a frozen, largely mountainous shard, adrift near the Northern pole of the globe, in quadrant N-1. It is far from most civilized and populated shards, and as of present, is the coldest shard known to support life and civilization. Like most shards, its surface is nearly completely framed by mountains formed from the violent fissures that occurred when the world shattered. One stretch of land, about 20 miles long, exists that is not framed by mountains. This region is flat and frozen, made completely of ice, arching like a waterfall and hanging suspended from the edge of the shard, wrapping around its underside. It is very possible to fall off the edge if one were to venture there, though it's not something that is intentionally tried by people nor animal.
There are three volcanoes on the shard, and a large Y-shaped mountain range that stretches across the middle of the shard, nearly separating the shard by halves. There is a flat passage to the far south, and some arduous paths up through the mountains. Carved into the side of one of the inactive volcanoes in the south western portion of the shard, the only known Frojien city stands. It blends seamlessly with the mountain itself, encased in what appears to be snow and ice, but which is actually constructed of steel and luminescent Bïté.
Most of the shard is sea water. A good portion of it is speckled with fresh-water lakes, mostly kept from freezing completely through due to naturally formed thermal vents at the bottom of the lakes. That said, the lakes are more often than not covered in at least a few inches of ice.

Fauna & Flora

For such a cold and small shard, the biodiversity is impressive. There are many kinds of flora that are resilient in the cold, mostly encompassing fir, pine, and cypress trees. Some grass plants and cacti-like fruit-bearing plants occur in the wild, and many of the trees bear nuts. Edible plants and bi-products of plants have been cultivated and experimented with by the Frojien people, resulting in some modified agricultural flora that only thrive in the relatively controlled climate of the enclosed city of Hûile. The vast array of cacti-like plants can typically be harvested for medicinal use. Some trees that are not part of the evergreen family do still stand, and their leaves bud thick and sturdy for half a year. Birch trees of a sort exist as well, and bear dry, white leaves with the consistency of bark that many herbivores rely on for food.
Of the fauna, most of the life that survives in Frojier is aquatic. Hundreds of species of fish, octopus, and water-dwelling mammals make the sea of Frojier home. Most are herbivores, but large sharks dwell in the deep as well, and often harvest on seal-like creatures. There are many seal-like and walrus-like creatures, though most of them have a thick layer of fur to keep them warm when above water. Arctic canines also dwell on the shard. Mammoths, although somewhat rare, also traverse the tundras. Wolf-like, coyote-like, and fox-like creatures stalk small prey on dry land. The apex predators of the frozen shard, besides the Frojien themselves, are tigers and bears. The Frojien tiger is impressively large, often weighing over five hundred pounds, and large enough to ride upon. Their stripes, rather than being patterns in their white fur, are actually ice-like and bio-luminescent, like Bïté, and their eyes often match. They have sabre teeth, and long tails. Bears are much larger, standing at three to four times the height of a human. They come in all shades of fur but are all part of the same species. They have two rows of teeth, and long tufts that rise from their ears and travel down their backs. Some species of bird make their homes primarily in the mountains. They feast on seeds, nuts, leaves, and small worms... while raptors like owls and falcons often prey on them, fish, and cadavers.

Capital

Hûile

Size

112,839 mi²

Class

F

Quadrant

N-1

Type

Landmass

Location under

The Shattered World