Rootless

Subject: Rootless (a.k.a. The Untethered)
Classification: Ethnic Origin Group – Non-Anchored, Non-Earthborn

Rootless are individuals who have no confirmed origin within the known realms of the Mosaic. They are not Earthborn, nor do they trace their lineage to a realm that successfully fused with Earth during the Convergence. Some simply appeared during or after the event—others may have come from unreconciled realities that never fully merged. Their lack of geographic or metaphysical anchoring defines their social and existential status across most zones.

Biologically and culturally diverse, Rootless often possess traits or memories that cannot be traced to any known realm. This has led to widespread suspicion, spiritual theorizing, and bureaucratic exclusion. Many Rootless are denied citizenship, inheritance rights, or even stable residence in established zones.

Despite this, Rootless communities have formed their own unique identities—often hybrid, improvisational, and highly adaptable. While some seek inclusion or explanation, others embrace their untraceable nature, claiming that they represent the Mosaic’s future: a people born of the world that now is, not what it used to be.

Feared, misunderstood, and sometimes mythologized, the Rootless are the Mosaic’s most unpredictable children—and perhaps its most essential.

Culture

Culture and cultural heritage

Rootless culture is not inherited—it’s constructed. Without a shared homeland, ancestral pantheon, or recorded history, Rootless individuals build their identities from fragments: scraps of dreams, adopted customs, trial-and-error survival, and the communities they form in the wake of rejection.

Some Rootless cling to mimicry, borrowing traditions from Earthborn or Anchored cultures to gain stability or social acceptance. Others embrace their disconnection, viewing themselves as the first true natives of the Mosaic—a people shaped by its uncertainty, rather than bound to its past. Among themselves, they often create new dialects, rituals, and symbolic systems rooted in shared experience rather than shared origin.

Many Rootless communities are nomadic, improvised, or decentralized. They organize around practical needs—shelter, food, magical stability—rather than heritage. Still, their cultural output is increasingly distinct: hybrid art, spontaneous festivals, found-family structures, and urban myths passed among border camps and leyline roads.

While not all Rootless share a single culture, they often recognize each other through a quiet understanding—the feeling of having no place that remembers you, and making one anyway.

Historical figures

• Salla Vint – The first known Rootless to publicly speak before the Provisional Continental Assembly. Her testimony, both passionate and pragmatic, sparked a political wave that led to limited citizenship rights in several Earthborn-aligned zones. Considered a hero by many Rootless enclaves.


• Crosley Thorne – Founder of the Free Mosaic Assembly and a former leyline surveyor who discovered he had no recorded past. Instrumental in establishing cross-zone Rootless advocacy networks. Vanished mysteriously while crossing a still-mapping Fracture line.


• Mire of the Nine Days – A Rootless philosopher and spiritual figure who traveled barefoot across multiple zones delivering impromptu “found sermons” on identity, impermanence, and freedom. His teachings inspired the Echofall Cult—though whether that was his intention remains debated.


• Jett Coil – Tech-smuggler and co-founder of the Patch Market Compact. Jett is known for orchestrating one of the largest unauthorized trade summits in the Mosaic, which ended in a zone-wide standoff with Earthborn authorities. Vanished but widely believed to still be active under a new identity.


• Ariya Threadwake – Cultural organizer and co-leader of the Found Kin. Responsible for the Mosaic-wide storytelling campaign that gathered Rootless myths and songs into a communal archive. Seen as a stabilizing figure and advocate for Rootless children born after the Convergence.

Major organizations

• The Free Mosaic Assembly – A decentralized political network advocating for Rootless rights, land access, and cultural recognition. While often peaceful, some factions within the Assembly have been linked to civil unrest and defiance of zone-based legal systems that exclude the Untethered.


• The Pale Caravan – A nomadic alliance of Rootless wanderers, guides, and salvagers who travel between Fractures and unstable zones. Known for their survival knowledge and willingness to escort others through reality-warped regions—at a price.


• Echofall Cult – A secretive, borderline heretical movement that believes the Rootless are the Mosaic's chosen, and that memory and identity should be abandoned entirely. Often active in Fractures and rumored to engage in metaphysical experimentation.


• The Patch Market Compact – A loose confederation of Rootless traders, hackers, artificers, and smugglers who operate outside of major zone control. They trade in forbidden artifacts, hybrid tech, and zone-unstable materials that most governments prohibit.


• The Found Kin – A cultural collective that documents Rootless oral histories, supports art, music, and story-sharing, and builds identity frameworks for young Rootless born in the Mosaic. They often act as diplomats and cultural mediators in mixed-zone settlements.