Cartonia
Cartonia is a realm inhabited by 2 major intelligent species. One is a species called the Wooken or the Woorken, sometimes also referred to as the Wookern. This is actually the word used by the beings themselves, they have no written language and pronunciation by the human tongue varies widely. The presence of fangs in the Wooken has lead to a great deal of difficulty by the human race to communicate in that language and few Wooken bother to learn the common tongue of man.
This lack of communication is far from the primary reason that the two species have historically been at war. The two largest reasons have historically been a prolific birth rate by the Wooken. Massive and constant birth rates combined with rapid maturity have left the Wooken with a much larger population than they have resources for. They remained little more then a pest to be handled by boarder cities for many centuries as they primarily warred between themselves and were contained inside their mountain caves. Shortsitedness of the human race lead to this enemy being considered someone else’s problem when they still could have been dealt with.
The rise of the wizard class to dominance inside the clans saw a drastic change in both the Wooken society and their approach to population control. They saw a strict breeding protocol set into place with coloration of ones fur setting ones life on its track. Brown to wizards, Greens to scouts who also serve as their archers, and black to the warrior class serving as tanks and warriors both. A fourth coloration being white has been severely limited in its population with many males being castrated at birth to keep their numbers down and some females euthanized as well. They are seen as a useless section of the race and good for little more than manual labor. This was done partially because the white had primarily been the ruling class before the wizards rise to prominence, they having the best advantage in their snowy homelands but the worst among the lower lands where the humans lived.
Theirs is male dominated society with females being left primarily for breeding. They raise their pups in segregated camps after weening according to their social and color status. The wizard class began to throw excess warriors in large murading armies at the humans, this serving both to expand territory and to deal with the problem of too many Wooken. Scouts were sent deep into enemy territory where few returned but they helped to send any supply lines into chaos and reduce population burdens simultaneously. Meanwhile the leading class instead bread themselves for smaller litters and send out of favor members with the scouts to reak havoc behind enemy lines.
The boarder cities soon found themselves overrun, the inner and far to the east cities being too slow to offer aid. They still saw this primarily as a “their problem” situation. When further city after city fell among the rocky, hilly, and forrested terrain of the west the Wooken began to be seen as a much more serious threat. Eventually the humans abandoned the west and struck upon a system of defense using the great stretch of the plains in the eastern section of the middle lands.
They erected large cities with great stone walls and large fortifications. These are primarily supplied with food and raw goods from more rural eastern sections and in turn trade back many finished and worked products back to the east. Warrior Wooken send wave after wave against these fortifications with little to show for it except a more manageable population. Similarly, scouts have a harder time of the terrain then they did the hilly and forested area. Here the gras is only truly green and high enough to hide in full summer. In fall it is golden and often burned in great swaths during the dry season. This means that in spring it is very short.
For the past thousand years the war has been very stagnant with few humans being willing to venture into the hills when they can only respawn in their walls. The wizard class of Wooken has also been primarily hesitant to leave their strong holds where they too would respawn in order to assist in taking down walls. Instead they create great and horrible Magic’s with large groups of mages. They create spells which fling out into the human lands and spawn great beasts and pervert nature. These must be dealt with in order to allow trade but fortunately they create far less impressive monsters the further out they must fling the spells. The result being that many of the eastern monsters are easier to deal with and the greatest majority of the humans warriors, archers and wizards are concentrated out east to deal with the greater threat.
This lack of communication is far from the primary reason that the two species have historically been at war. The two largest reasons have historically been a prolific birth rate by the Wooken. Massive and constant birth rates combined with rapid maturity have left the Wooken with a much larger population than they have resources for. They remained little more then a pest to be handled by boarder cities for many centuries as they primarily warred between themselves and were contained inside their mountain caves. Shortsitedness of the human race lead to this enemy being considered someone else’s problem when they still could have been dealt with.
The rise of the wizard class to dominance inside the clans saw a drastic change in both the Wooken society and their approach to population control. They saw a strict breeding protocol set into place with coloration of ones fur setting ones life on its track. Brown to wizards, Greens to scouts who also serve as their archers, and black to the warrior class serving as tanks and warriors both. A fourth coloration being white has been severely limited in its population with many males being castrated at birth to keep their numbers down and some females euthanized as well. They are seen as a useless section of the race and good for little more than manual labor. This was done partially because the white had primarily been the ruling class before the wizards rise to prominence, they having the best advantage in their snowy homelands but the worst among the lower lands where the humans lived.
Theirs is male dominated society with females being left primarily for breeding. They raise their pups in segregated camps after weening according to their social and color status. The wizard class began to throw excess warriors in large murading armies at the humans, this serving both to expand territory and to deal with the problem of too many Wooken. Scouts were sent deep into enemy territory where few returned but they helped to send any supply lines into chaos and reduce population burdens simultaneously. Meanwhile the leading class instead bread themselves for smaller litters and send out of favor members with the scouts to reak havoc behind enemy lines.
The boarder cities soon found themselves overrun, the inner and far to the east cities being too slow to offer aid. They still saw this primarily as a “their problem” situation. When further city after city fell among the rocky, hilly, and forrested terrain of the west the Wooken began to be seen as a much more serious threat. Eventually the humans abandoned the west and struck upon a system of defense using the great stretch of the plains in the eastern section of the middle lands.
They erected large cities with great stone walls and large fortifications. These are primarily supplied with food and raw goods from more rural eastern sections and in turn trade back many finished and worked products back to the east. Warrior Wooken send wave after wave against these fortifications with little to show for it except a more manageable population. Similarly, scouts have a harder time of the terrain then they did the hilly and forested area. Here the gras is only truly green and high enough to hide in full summer. In fall it is golden and often burned in great swaths during the dry season. This means that in spring it is very short.
For the past thousand years the war has been very stagnant with few humans being willing to venture into the hills when they can only respawn in their walls. The wizard class of Wooken has also been primarily hesitant to leave their strong holds where they too would respawn in order to assist in taking down walls. Instead they create great and horrible Magic’s with large groups of mages. They create spells which fling out into the human lands and spawn great beasts and pervert nature. These must be dealt with in order to allow trade but fortunately they create far less impressive monsters the further out they must fling the spells. The result being that many of the eastern monsters are easier to deal with and the greatest majority of the humans warriors, archers and wizards are concentrated out east to deal with the greater threat.