Hinath Tribal Zu'aan

History

The history of the Hinath tribal zu’aan begins itself right at the end of the third era, with the history of three siblings, all under the Hinath family surname, each sibling held quite prestigious titles when it comes to their individual vocations, Hileui the architect, Mimaimu a renowned writer and singer, and, last but certainly not least, Ogotu the weaponsmith; they were not only revered for each of their skills and abilities, but by how that trio represented an extremely strong leadership amongst one of the last refugee groups that were still within the ruins of the old Xenea Empire.

As the year 4E 346 arrived, the group was fleeing from the ruins of the old empire due to an invasion of kin'toni, that slowly but surely dwindled the tribe's number one by one, this happened for weeks on end as the group fled into the Osold Ominous Woods, where they at first impression found themselves worried and lost, food supplies were more abundant due to berries and fruits but the chasing kin'toni didn't allow the group to set up shop properly, and thus the chasing and deaths that slowly added to a higher toll continued.

As the volcanic winter caused by the Shattering Age intensified and the kin'toni did not cease, the three siblings decided to make a last stand, each of them wielding weapons made by Ogotu, even Mimaimu who wasn't the best at fighting still attempted to put on plans and music as to deceive the kin'toni force to buy time for Hileui to make a trap for the kin'toni. Their combined minds allowed the group to flee and the siblings to defeat a couple of kin'toni, but as the attacking numbers grew more and more.

After days of fighting, at the dawn of the year of 4E 347, the three siblings were defeated, though the refugees thankfully escaped and declared temporary oaths of silence as to keep themselves safe. As the years passed and the now safe group still roamed the Osold Ominous Woods, a group of unsuspecting children came across the resting group where the three siblings were buried, and in that year of 4E 350, they witnessed the blossoming of three unique plants from each grave; after warning the older members of the group.

It became a collective responsibility to take care of those growing sprouts, that, by the year of 4E 354 seemed to be growing into three different species of very unique trees. By the year of 4E 357, they had become full-grown adult trees, each one unique in their own disposition, a tree with bark as sturdy as iron over the grave of Ogotu, a tree with a beautiful set of silver-colored leaves over the grave of Hileui, and lastly, a beautiful hunched-over tree that was named a weeping willow due to its shape and also its opaque coloring.

Right over the grave of Mimaimu. Each of them bore not only unique fruit that were able to sustain the group fully, but they became living martyrs of the heroes that allowed the same group to survive and remain until this day. This made it so the members of the group named themselves the Hinath tribe as to keep the name of the siblings forever alive.

Psychology

The psychological outline that shapes the Hinath tribe is quite unique in nature, starting by how you're not even considered an individual from the moment you're born. To gain the right to personhood the individual zu'aan must first be able to prove their right to it by their maintenance of good behaviour, making it so the very fact of being zu'aan isn't something inherent, and this extends to an individual's rights to the very baseline needs of a zu'aan, such as being able to even express any sort of impulses or the very ability to utilize the pronoun "I".

Making it so the self is something that can be revoked psychologically, and thus so can one's right to existence. It is also naturalized within the psychological framework of the members of the Hinath tribe to oftentimes have the constant feeling of being observed regardless of their current environment, which contributes to them being obedient towards the social norms which determine what discipline is in the tribe. This sort of surveillance is translated to how they look at trees.

Seeing them as a natural set of moral witnesses that are incapable of misunderstanding intentions, so it's to the best of one's interests to try and avoid doing anything wrong at any moment, since, if they are to see an individual performing a wrongdoing, doubting their view is such as doubting reality, thus, innegotiable. Due to this logic, authority tends to exist silently, no one orders obedience towards what is seen as correct by the tribe directly, instead of doing so or reinforcing matters of direct and/or public punishment.

The main ideal of the tribe's way to deal with deviation bases itself in how faceless fear is, turning power into something absolute and invisible. Not only that, but this feeling of deviation extends beyond simple examples of dissent, but as plain pathologies that harm the tribe as a whole, which works as a tool to neutralize rebellion. Furthermore, when it comes to emotional expression, restrictions are put forward strictly, since the leaderships which shaped the social norms of the tribe tend to really appreciate the equalization between control of affect into that of thought.

And thus, feelings are collectivized in a way where emotional restraint is seen as the only sensible way to be able to protect others, leading to a society which sees strong emotions as a manner of contamination; extending it to the idea of privacy, just the thought of doing something completely hidden from others' eyes is seen as not only plainly selfish, but also deceitful. Most individuals tend to picture themselves as eternal debt payers. This is something that is done to create a heavy consciousness within every member.

This justifies how they must follow the ideals left by the now ancestral sacrifice which invoked the safety of the tribe, but also so the past remains unchallenged; this not only makes it so gratitude and guilt are nearly inseparable, but creates a notion where any attempts of questioning tradition are an act of clear betrayal to those which sacrificed their lives for the tribe's well-being.

Culture

When it comes to the culture of the Hinath tribe we often see the remaining notion of emotional restraint being expressed in diverse areas of their livelihood, even in the simplest everyday things such as the little expression in individuals walking around, eating, working out or producing any sort of materials; how? simple, many of the movements are often economical and rarely questioned, an example would be their extremely inefficient way of folding clothes that takes way longer than a more common method, but it is never questioned.

This sort of cultural value is placed into the tribe's members ever since their childhood, making it so their behaviour is reinforced at a mundane level commonly. When it comes to their language, it follows a logic that is constantly edited and phrases or expressions are often treated as irrelevant, dictionaries are oftentimes "updated" as to remove those redundant terminologies, which makes it so there is a very reduced room to self-reference and emotional sort of speeches.

This is done because it is nearly impossible for the "pathology" of emotional expression to exist if the zu'aan in the tribe don't have the knowledge to even put what they feel into words, instead creating a society that sees silence as a sign of maturity and refinement; even storytelling is very limited, elders when trying to explain past stories tend to place it all in fragmented matters that are alienated from their sense of selves, even when talking about something they experienced directly they often narrate it from a third person perspective.

When it comes to the many forms of artistic expressions such as painting, drawing, crafting, it is rarely done in any institutionalized or competitive level, instead it is done not only within a minimal level but while carrying a minimalistic art style. The most common place to be able to observe any sort of expression such as this would be small carvings hidden in wood bark, where a very small number of trained artists are able to create patterns which are only observable when light hits a tree at a very certain angle.

The same sort of logic can be placed on, for example, music, that is mostly ambient and instrumental, rarely anything other than the whispers of the Osold Ominous Woods. When it comes to social bonds we observe very indifferent manners of interaction, even one of the biggest examples of intimate kinship, family structures, are rarely seen to express any affection, it even evolved to the level that in the rare cases that a family is affectionate it is looked at poorly, which makes it so many of the members of the tribe are extremely emotionally distant in practice to the other members.

The biggest examples of bonds are those expressed through the sole purpose of protection; even romantic attraction is heavily discouraged, only done oftentimes with the purpose of reproduction made to sustain the tribe's population at ease.

Government

When it comes to governance and its style within the Hinath tribe, it follows most of what has been discussed about in their naturalization of the desired social norms as a population controller. The philosophy of their government's purpose follows not one of ruling, but the objective of maintenance, it is given legitimacy due to its very purpose of regulation, and to not create doubt in the way it regulates things, it is associated not only with their cult-like religion, but also as a means to prevent the incoming collapse caused by the invading kin'toni.

Which makes it so power exists as a way to preserve continuity instead of actually representing the people of the tribe, and it doesn't even need to act like that's its purpose, even avoiding allowing any sort of building up of charisma and public leadership just by how controlling it is on the members of the tribe. The government body follows a structure that is about as faceless as the witness woods that are able to judge every move of the tribe's population, it is a small council whose members' names are rarely even displayed to the public.

In fact, authors who have been given the task of analyzing this tribe are unsure if this council even exists. It is said to contain members that act as custodians of various functions, following a very normal assignment of roles around the critical practices needed for any tribe, such as survival logistics, military coordination and social correction, except that in this example it's rare to see who is doing all this regulation, or with what direct objective, especially for those members who live within the Hinath tribe.

When it comes to law, it is all tied back to the tribe's members' psychological state of a constant paranoid feeling of observation, where the legal philosophy doesn't focus on punishment not because it sees it as a more humanitarian manner to handle issues, but because it doesn't need to, the common member of the tribe is already extremely terrified to do as much as to kiss a partner; this is illustrated by how the tribe lacks a formal criminal code, and by how there exist very few actually practically applied laws.

And those that do exist focus on the forcefulness of religious indoctrination towards the young, ecological respect, and notions which focus on the regulation of noise, it is also necessary to note how things such as any sort of universal rights, be them privacy- or citizenship-related, are basically non-existent. Disciplinary measures aren't done via the formalization of acts such as trials or accusations, the very act of being declared as untrustworthy by the government or the regulators of the religion is enough for punishment.

And the punishment, as was mentioned in their psychology, isn't jailing or even death, it is losing the right to be, the punished zu'aan loses their right to speech, to eat, to drink, or to even sleep amongst each other, any attempt to be recognized or to have the right to exist again is often treated with execution or exile.

Military

Now, attempts at declaring the Hinath as a tribe that requires brainwashing are going to gain a hefty amount of arguments when discovering their military philosophy. When observing their training, one of the first steps that are enforced onto volunteers is that of identity erosion, which is the practical process of deleting one's name and personal history, done by a series of processes which seek to increase emotional inhibition through heavy exposure to a troop's biggest fear and strongest moment of grief in a torture-like method.

The deprivation of sensory well-being through exposure to overloading cycles of dysregulatory aesthetic manipulation, through quick switching between absolute silence, misleading echoes, and chaotic screeches and painful roars without any specific orders, all to selectively train the forces' attention and their perception towards life as a whole.Away from psychological reshaping, the military's structure follows fighters that are organized into various strata that are identified only by temporary function-based names that hold the objective of simple identification within the battlefield.

Auch as a watcher, invader, or a planner, which prevents identity from existing; furthermore, troops are organized into cells of 3–7 members that organize themselves into those mentioned roles, each of them operating nearly autonomously, which actually oftentimes hinders the tribe's ability to act in strategically coherent manners. The absence of a supreme military authority has historical examples that show its uses, but, in the case of the Hinath, their official lack of cohesiveness amongst troops makes it difficult for their structure of rotational authority.

And even in critical times when the council takes control of the armed forces, they still tend to fight poorly.When it comes to their weaponry, they often seek weapons that are able to blend with the Osold Ominous Woods' gloomy atmosphere, which makes it so they avoid not only obviously flammable materials, but also any weapons that tend to create obvious sounds or flashes, instead they divide them into different categories, such as silent neutralization tools (short blades, garrotes, and other types of traps), and sometimes environmental weapons (collapsing ground spike pits, fungal toxins, and false trails).

These hold the objective of keeping the enemy in place or misleading them, and the main category used against the kin'toni, those being disruption tools (which utilize sound to distract or at least convince kin'toni to not keep advancing, such as vibration traps and sound-redirection apparatuses). Historically, their military shows examples of failure after failure, their only hope being the tribe's natural geographical isolation; even despite their well-developed weaponry against kin'toni.

Their lack of formal organization hinders any ability the tribe has to operate in coordination when an attack is actually occurring, examples might be seen in how even if they manage to distract and incapacitate kin'toni, their movements to land finishing or neutralizing blows tend to lead into all sorts of embarrassments; such as the time where three cells of the Hinath tribe decimated each other while fighting in the dark without any kin'toni threat in the region, simply due to the lack of formal communication.

Religion

Religion is one of the most crucial parts of the Hinath tribe and their identity and functioning, and its core premise doesn't rely around gods, they venerate instead the eternalized endurance of the three Hinath siblings as the core principle which makes survival become something sacred and irrefutable. Speaking of the three Hinath siblings, they were, as was briefly mentioned in the history section, martyrized as the basis of worship that the tribe takes as the examples for salvation and cosmical well-being.

Those three siblings transcend even the idea of being human, instead becoming states of being that are able to represent states of being; each of the trees that sprouted from their bodies (that phenomenon in itself also becomes their foundational miracle that justifies the siblings' eternal worship) being a perfect response to the challenges offered by this fallen world:

Ogotu's tree, first, is seen as the living representation of endurance, resistance and the necessity of containment, his steely bark becomes the signal for every individual to become the hardened zu'aan that is necessary for the defense of the tribe.

Hileui's tree used to actually represent structure and liberty, but over time, it evolved into being the state of nature related to foresight and accurate planning, something necessary to be the cold individual that the social norms of the Hinath tribe demand, which, ironically, contributes to throwing all of her efforts while alive to give purpose to buildings in the trash.

And Mimaimu's tree, due to how she was the most expressive of the three, is seen as what to avoid, basically being the tree that represents misdirection, this is also related to how the tree seems to be leaning downwards, a clear example of moral failure; she religiously still keeps her title as a sacrificial basis that allows for the well-being of the tribe, but not an image that should be imitated ever, instead an image that the zu'aan of the tribe should measure to be different from.

Furthermore, this faith extends itself to the Osold Ominous Woods itself, since the ecosystem is believed to have absorbed the intentions and the sacrifice of the siblings, every single one of the trees stands tall and is given the ominous attribute due to how they're witnesses, always listening to anything, be it footsteps, be it the spilling of blood, or even hesitation to act within orders that come from the heartbeat of a zu'aan. The three trees are the clearest memories that teach every other tree in the biome how to measure the right to existence of every member of the tribe.

This whole religion was at first shaped as the usual, three individuals crucial to the tribe that serve as examples to live a fulfilling and good life, however, it evolved, due to the political protagonism of the religion, into what can only be compared to a cult, that is indifferent to the actual well-being of the members as long as they remain obeying, morality is arbitrary, and even things such as mourning are secondary to one's existence if they didn't fulfill their determined role when alive.

Miscellany

Nearby Groups

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