Creature:Zith

The Uruie
Meaning the first in Zith language the Uruie is the earliest ancestor of the Zith.

The Yamayzzie
Meaning "small ancestor" this name is shared by several species that share the shame shape and behavior, generally a small game hunter.



Culture
The Ziths are a noble, traditional people, and as such, they are slow to change and hold old memories of the past in high esteem; because of this there are structures and artifacts with thousands of years of age across their world. Among the Ziths loyalty to family, contrary, and king is the glue that holds Zith society together. Because of this the Ziths are rather backward in technology, stone castle like buildings, primitive machinery est. This is true in there military, as they prefer slow and powerful weapons of war, tanks, artillery, est. to high tech weaponry. This is also evident in there society, they are ruled by a monarchy that was founded thousands of years in the past. As for religion, the Ziths are polytheistic (believe in multiple gods), and actually very lenient in religion, and as far as most care, what another creatures believe is not as important as what they themselves believe. Indeed it is because the Ziths believe in more than one god, that they are open to the idea of other gods existing. Religious wars were unheard of for the Ziths until they encountered other races and the Ziths find the prospect of fighting for religious reasons hard to understand.

They Zith have a very rich life style, the avrage Zith often goes to theaters, festivals, and other festivities often, although most Ziths do not travel far or often. The cultre of the Zith is filled with a complex working of guesters and symbolism. For example bowing is widly used in most Zith culters to signify everything from greatings to rank to showing veiws of others. For example if a Zith wishes to show he his a high ranking noble when he greats another Zith, he bends less than a lower ranked Zith, and extendes his frill further. The highest of all Ziths, royalty, do not bow when demonstrating their rank, but extend their frill as far as possible.

Language
The ziths have a multitude of languages, every kingdom having it's own language. But the major languages broadly cover cultural areas. The common language used between cultures is an old language, called Altuz, that predates the modern languages, and has an unknown origin. Zith legends tell that the language was the first given to the zith by the gods, but most scientific analysis dismiss such ideas. Regardless of origin, the Altuz is undoubtedly older than any other language on Inoria, and many ziths consider the language a sacred gift of the gods and a relic from the ziths most ancient past. The Altuz is a very beautiful landguage, it has far more descriptive words, adjectives, adverbs and a wide sort of descriptions and metifors. Many ziths state that it was made for poems and stories, but the language is ineffective in areas that requires precise and fast sentences, such as if you were to ask in English; "Were are you going?" in Altuz it would be; "Tickat pau ituze hiurm risha?" which would more effectively translate as; "Were (Tickat) do(pau) you(ituze) leave(hiurm) to(risha)".

When the ziths entered space stage and came into contact with other species, they had to quickly learn the standard galactic language, many zith merchants, diplomats and even ziths who never leave their world learned the language. When the ziths encountered the giliani and joined their fledgling alliance, they made gilian a widely spoken language.

Naming System
Because the Ziths are a people that retain all there history and legacy, they have an intraget nameing system that both identafies the Zith as an individual, and shows their family line. A Zith name follows this arrangement

Personal Name: Like a first name, is given at birth.

Family Line: Like a last name but includes the father's, mother's, and grandparent's last name, but grandparent's last name is usually only used in formal introductions.

Nations Mark: A name given to the Zith once they have grown old enough to take an oath of loyalty to the nation.

Bhelion       Daco         Imuzu         Kullu        Imuzu | Oukin | Kullu | Ruuz

Personal name| nation mark| fathers name| mothers name| grandparents name

When one zith marries another zith there names remain the same, indeed the only significatoin of marrage is wedding bands, and it is considered an offence to strip a zith of their family name as it is an identafication of that ziths leniage and inheratance. It is a favorite past time among the Ziths to try to trace their lineage as far back as possible. The farthest going as far back as the invention of writhing.

Philosophy
The Ziths are the essentially knights, as they are honorable and chivalrous in wartime, and hold noble values. They have high standers of every thing from their rulers, to there allies, to the honesty of merchants. Because of these high standards the Ziths have come into conflict with species with immoral actions. Ironically, if the Ziths come into conflict with a species that they consider unloyal and trustworthy, they can and will manipulate there enemies because they are considered "fair game".

''It is on three principles that our civilization is built. Truth, with out which distrust would tear us from within. Loyalty, a mark of noble people and with out which we would be untrustworthy brigands. Unity, the bond that holds all from the King to the farmer together, making us stronger than we would be alone.''-Zith Code of Principles

''What makes the Zith great you ask. Loyalty, bravery, and fine Zith metal.''-Huippa a Zith general on the flag ship Himmar.

The modern Zith philosophy, is currently dominated by the Natchicu (which translates, Search for Wisdom) which has spread throughout Inoria, and the colonies of the Zith.

Fundamental Views
The following is a list of the most important subjects in zith philosophy.

Interconnections: The zith believe that actions are universal in their effects, and because all living things are connected, every action has consequences to everyone, regardless of involvement. Actions behave similar to a ripple on a pond, each action spreading out and affecting other living beings, and will eventually rebound back to its point of origin. For example if a being dose a good thing, the action will spread and touch other living beings and affect them in, hopefully, a positive way; but what is good for one may not be good for another (see good). This concept also works in reverse. If a person commits a action that brings harm to others, it will touch all living beings in one way or another and eventually bring that harm back to it's point of origin. It is because of this idealism that the ziths do not tolerate the "evil" actions of others, regardless if they are involved.

Good:One fundamental aspect of the Natchicu is in in the way that the Natchicu, treats the idea of good. In the Natchicu, the good is any positive thing that improves the physical or spiritual well being of a living thing. In this term of good, it is divided into two types, the pure good which is any good action that brings good (or dose no harm) to others. Then there is the tainted or impure good, which is an act that improves the good of one, but brings harm to others. There has recently been a new trend in thinking that there exists a few, pure goods, which brings prosperity and happiness to all involved. The number of these pure goods has fallen after the Ziths encounter with aliens, but many believe that there is a handful of good deeds that all would consider good. So It is because of this mentality of what is good for all is good for the individual, that the majority of Ziths do not tolerate any wrongdoing even if they are not directly affected.

Freedom: Freedom is considered an important aspect in zith thinking, however few ziths call for revolutions or changes to their living styles. Instead, the ziths believe freedom is not something that can be fought over and won or lost. Instead freedom is part of each and every living being, In their own words: We are free, and no power, not even the gods, can change that fact. It is because of this zith rebellions are rarer, and wars for freedom are unheard of. It is also because of this that the ziths believe that control over any other living being is impossible, and anyone who tries to control another is foolish in trying to complete the impossible.

Dark Heart Zith
The Ziths are a very emotional race, and when they experience a complete heart break (loss of entire family, friends est.), most Ziths would die from the pain due to heart failer, (a similar effect exists in humans called broken-heart-syndrome). However, some Zith's will to live is stronger than their grief, and instead of dieing, they lose nearly all feelings; mostly positive feelings, however some negative emotions have been known to remain,(hate, revenge, est.). Zith scientists who have studied these Ziths have discovered that many parts of the mind and body that effect emotion become inactive. These Ziths are known from then on as Black Heart Ziths. Many Ziths in this state believe that they are mere shells of their former selves, and so many completely dedicate them selves to service for others, usaly their nation, not caring what happens to them. Many serve as soldiers, assassins, executioners, interrogators, things that most Ziths could not bring themselves to do.

Government
The Zith are divided into a series of kingdoms ruled by a signal king and queen, with a body called the 'Counsel of Nobles' below them, who act as advisers and leaders on the battle field, in war time, and in the royals ambiance, in peace time. The Counsel of Nobles is made of Ziths who have reached the position of Noble either by being born into a noble house, or earning the position by proving his worth to the king. Although the royal family hold the majority of power tyrants are rare, as the Ziths are often more interested in the welfare of the nation than there own desires ie. most Ziths have little ambition, some times to a harmful point. The Ziths have high standards of their kings and any sine of a despot and the Zith council of nobles and the general populace will come together and decide if the ruler should be removed from office. There is undoubtedly corruption in their government, and most Ziths are willing to admit it, but the level of corruption is small and not majorly damaging. The royal family run the overall management of the country, but bellow the royalty, the Zith nobles class run many of the aspects of government. For example the Zith legal system, which varies from cutler to cutler, is run by a court of nobles who deacate their lives to serving in that position, giving it up when they reach a certain age or they can no longer hold the office. When the Ziths reached space and the planet was on the verge of unity, a problem arose. No Zith would accept any lord other than their own royal family. So a new system was developed to solve this problem. Each royal family would maintain their places, but they would all form together to form a senate-like group, that came to be called the "Court of Kings". The court of kings come together every year to discuss maters of importance, such as social problems, impending wars est. In the court each king's vote counts as one vote, however if a vote is passed that one or more kings highly disagree with, they have the power to vote to remove the agreement as long as at lest half of the kings agree. The kingdoms are orgonized into culteral circules, and minoraty groups are represented by a miniture group of high ranking Zith of that group who seend a representative who acts as their "king" in the Court.

Kings
Zith kings hold near absalute power in most zith cultures. New kings comes into power when the previace king dies or passes up his crown to his chousen heir. Heirs are often chousen by the king, but the "defalt" choice is the eldest child. Female ziths can and have become rulers, and have all the powers of their male counterparts, indeed the ziths find few differances, in their language queen is mearly a feminen version of king.

Allies
Giliani: A race of diplomats that founded the Gilian alliance. The ziths and giliani have forged a strong alliance, the ziths finding the giliani a respectable race and the giliani believe the ziths dedication to stability and peace in line with their own views.

Werewolves: The technological and traditional races have formed a strong alliance, often going to war for one another. The ziths and werewolves share many of the same morals and views of the galaxy, and despite their differences, have forged what started as a shared military conflict to a strong alliance.

Religion
The main Zith religion is polytheistic, meaning that they believe in more than one god. They have many gods but surprisingly they treat their gods as more of a high and powerful race rather than a invincible deity as they can both be born and killed. The Ziths also are very open to the idea of other deity's existence and indeed there scholars say that it would be a near impossibility that there are only a hand full of gods that created the countless beings of the Galaxy. Because of this open believing of other forms of religion, wars over religion were unheard of until they meet other species, and there for the Ziths find religious wars both hard to understand and barbarous.

The gods are as following


 * Yisamar: Creator of the Zith world of Inoria, and the father of the other gods. In Zith religion Yisamar gave the crown and leadership to his eldest son, Zaton, and then departed to parts unknown.


 * Zaton: King of the gods and the god of unity, loyalty and truth. In Zith mythology Zaton created the Zith race and Yisamar's oldest child. He was charged with the creation of the mortal races that would inhabit Inoria, along with Alteno.


 * Alteno: Queen of the gods and the goddess of life and love, oddly Alteno is said to not have come from the family of Yisamar, and came from elsewhere. When asked of her origins her priests say that she came from a high and noble family of gods. Other than this nothing is known. Alteno and Zaton were charged with the creation of mortal races.


 * Fravo: God of metal and fire, in stories he makes weapons, armor and tools for the gods. He was created by Yisamar to help in forging the world of Inoria, making him Zaton's brother.


 * Raisi: God of war and the captain of the armies of the gods in war time. He is mostly worshiped in wartime to give strength and support in hard times. He is the oldest of Zaton's three children.


 * Yirma: Goddess of Freedom and wild things. She is one of the odder gods to worship in Zith society and all her shrines are in the wild. She is the second eldest of Zanton's three children.


 * Urrmshi: The Messenger of the gods and the youngest of Zaton's three children.

Irtan: The god of treachery and the dead. Irtan was created as the dark side of Yisamar's creation, and therefor a steep-brother to Zanton, and uncle to all his children. He was at first only the god of treachery, but was slain by a mortal, and so he created his own realm of the dead for his soul to inhabit. It is said that when evil ziths die, especially if they were treacherous, they will follow Irtan into his death land; and join in his plotting to bring ruin to others.

Warfare
War is a cruel lord, giving ruin to all and glory to few.

-Zar General of Daco armies, 165 Second Age.

The Ziths are not necessarily a war like species, however they are no strangers when it comes to war. The Zith's approach to war fare is almost exclusively a state of total war. The Zith military is built around the idea of overwhelming their opposition through blunt might. For example a common formation involves the Dragons Horn Tank forming up next to each other to form a moving wall of steel while faster more maneuverable units move ahead to clear anything that could pose a threat to the tanks allowing the rest of their forces to flatten any resistance. The Ziths can be described to use shock and awe, because their displays are so spectacular that they can scare their opponents into submission, rather than actually defeating them. The ziths are also especially effective in defense, even more so on rough grounds of hills and mountains. A large sized zith force can lay layer after layer of infantry, tanks and artillery to slow or stop any attacks. The ziths skill in masonry and metal working means that they can build fortresses relatively quickly, combined with the ziths natural stumborness makes any defence hard to crack. An interesting point to note is that despite the great importance they put on loyalty, they are known to exploit any disunity among their enemies to their advantage. This is because as far as the Ziths are concerned anyone who can be manipulated to betray their ruler and nation is in truth untrustworthy and there for, "fair game".

Warfare Bettwen Ziths
Prior to the zith introduction to other speceis their form of warfare was very different. The zith's wars were very symbolic and ritualized to limit the number of ziths killed on the battle feild. For example often the aremies would march in the open with bright colors and making lots of noise. This was a show of might, and often armies would try to imrpess the opponant into ether surrenduring or avoding battle of another day. IT was also considered a rule of war for the apposing sides to show respect bettwen them, such as giving medical aid to wounded soilders, giving importaint items taken form enemy dead back, and generaly avoiding the formation of grudges. Becuase of this form of ritualized warefare the ziths dispised urben warfare, becuase of the unthinkable colatoral damage that would be cauesed. Often cites would surrender rather that fight street combat, however if a city did not imidiatly surrender it was considered the rule of war to beisedg the ciyt rather than take it by storm. These rules were strickly followed by almost all kingdoms on Inoria, the failer to follow the rules of combat would earn the longlasting anger of the vitim nation, meaning that the enemy would be less likely to surrender, and fight all the harder and feircer to avenge a wrong. When the ziths first encountered another species they were confused that they did not have the same ritualized war fare that they did, causing great anger and bitterness bettwen them.

Zith Soldier: The standard rank and file of the Zith army. Although these Ziths are the rank and file of the Zith army, they are nonetheless well armed and armored. They have extremely effective armor, and will outlast many other species. The Zith empire covers multiple cutlers, so the solders vary from nation to nation.



Kings Swords:The elites of the Zith armies, the Kings Swords are chosen from the finest and most loyal of the Zith forces. They also have command over other troops, and they can be seen leading other Ziths into battle. They wear there symbol on their order on their chest, a sword above a mountain. The Kings Swords are common across the Zith cutlers, but there are variations across nations.

Fears
Most Ziths do not consider themselves a paranoid people and not cowards. However there are things that nearly all Ziths fear and many species may find their dread to approach near unrealistic levels. The one thing that nearly all Ziths fear is water. Not the substance it self, but the creatures that might live in it. This is particularly true for oceans, but Ziths are hesitant with any body of water that they can not see the bottom of. This is not a paranoia or unrealistic fear, and is caused by the fact that the oceans of their home world is filled with creatures of huge sizes, many of which hunt Ziths when it's opportune to do so. This is also true for murky rivers, however the creatures are much smaller. There are exceptions however, such as the Ziths who inhabit the southern end of the continent, have conquered their fear of water and were the first of their kind to sail the oceans. Another and possibly greater fear is mental rather than physical, which is the removal of a Zith's name from history is considered one of the worst offenses that one Zith could inflict on another. Although Ziths do not believe there after-life being affected by the loss of their place in history, but nearly all Ziths feel that they need to leave a legacy behind them not only through their children, but also through their name in the history books.

Tribal Stage
The early years, also know as the years of prosperity, where marked by peace and prosperity, for Zith civilization and a strong alliance with their neighbor the Claws. Then with the appearance of other tribes the land became crowded, and one tribe of Monkyboys began to gather together in huge numbers, and launched raids agents their neighbors.

Physical Description
The Ziths are bipedal reptilians that have adapted to their mountain regions were they evolved. They are also extremely durable and are the biological equivalent of a tank. Having thick scales which, on its broad side, will only break at above one thousand pounds of force (a human leg bone breaks at around eight hundred pounds of force). Underneath their scales they have a white blubbery substance that the body uses as a shock absorber, which can save a Zith from a high fall from a mountain side. These physical traits make the Zith incredibly resistant to blunt trauma such as that caused form falling off the mountain side and smashing agents rocks. For example a fully grown man could beat a Zith with a bat for hours on end with out any serious damage to the Zith, although heaver metal weapons such as a mace, for example, could seriously injure a Zith. Because of this, blunt weapons: clubs, hammers, maces, est. are almost nonexistent in Zith history, and cutting weapons, swords, spears, and axes, are widely used. Internaly the zith spiecies have an interesting biuld. Their

Coloring
The Ziths come in many different colorings, depending on which region of there world they inhabit. This happens because of the fact that ziths need to digest certain minerals from there local environment, and each region of their home continent has a different color, thus different colored ziths appeared. For example the Ziths in the central mountain range of there land, have a light blue coloring, while the Ziths of the east have a bright green. In all there are five major groups:

Central Mountains: Light Blue

Northern Tundra: From White to Dark Blue

Eastern Mountains and Steeps: Bright Green

Southern Lands: Bright Red

Western Mountains: Vary due to the fact that this area has a long history of outsiders settling in this land and mixing with the local population, however the most dominant color is a Bright Yellow

Home World
Inoria, is a relatively warm planet with two continents. One continent, which is called Guzu, is covered with thick jungle like growth and has the larges number of mammalian and bird like animals on the planet. The other continent, which is named Zait, is the evolutionary cradle of the Ziths, this land mass is much farther north of the equator and is very mountains, making it much cooler in climate than it's southern cousin. The continent of Zait is mostly dominated by reptilian creatures.

Taxonomy

 * Kingdom:
 * Phylum:
 * Class:
 * Order:
 * Family:
 * Genus: Zithia (Haghog999, 2008)
 * Species: Zithia bleumuseaumonstre (Haghog999, 2008)