Kikai

It is the end of the eighth month,
And I have nothing to wear.
Black kites fly from the hillsides,
Over stone walls that we made.
I will dress my children,
In the only gown I have.
But I will wear vines,
Which I cut from trees on the mountain.

- Traditional Kikai Folksong

Appearance

The islanders almost universally have brown or black hair, nut-brown skin, and very dark eyes. They are around 5'10", and so would be considered tall, were it not for the fact that they never see outsiders.

Society / Government

Kikai is a lonely island of isolated villages, sharing a language, culture, and unifying religion. Rain comes too often, or not at all. The land of the lowlands along the coast is barren, and the high hills and mountains are choked with dense jungle.

There is no society or government outside of individual villages. The villages vary somewhat, but they are all similar in a few basic ways. They farm, hunt, or fish, and they rarely make more than is necessary to stay alive. They share a basic religion (see that section for more details). Many of them have a headman, or are "ruled" by a small group of elders, though often this is informal. With very few exceptions, they have a Noro, or shrine maiden, who is the real power in the village. For more information on the Noro, see their entry under "religion".

Children and Family

There is no formal marriage on Kikai. In more stable villages, men and women will live together and raise children together, but more commonly mothers raise the children alone. This can be either because the father left, wants nothing to do with her, or has been killed.

Despite the lack of close family ties, villagers treat each other as family members. The harvest is shared between all members of the village, for all of their labor is needed to get enough to survive. While a child may not directly be supported by their father (or indeed, the mother may not be certain who is the child's father), the father will be indirectly supporting them, as everyone who can works in the fields, or hunts, or fishes.

Role of Women

On Kikai there is a belief, called narigami, which states that women are spiritually superior. Women are said to possess greater ability to sense and connect with the other worlds. While at a local level this is consistent with practice (such as how every village has a Noro), this belief is contested by the Shamans of the island, who are equally male or female (or they could be considered neither; see their entry below). This suggests that there may have been a matriarchal society on Kikai predating the rise of the Shamans and the current religion - but there is no way to tell for sure.

Aside from the spiritual considerations of women, the sexes are largely equal, at least in village life. There is a division of labor, but men and women are equal partners. Women do often have to raise children alone, but they have the full support of the village. Though when bandits attack, women often get it worse than the men.

Warfare

There is no organized warfare on the island. There are no political entities to gather armies, and the land is too weak to grow enough food to support wars.

However, due to poverty and this extreme lack of resources, fighting is all too common. Most adult men go armed, even if all they can afford is a club. Bandits roam the mountains, attacking travelers and raiding towns. When a group of bandits grows too large, they descend upon a village en masse, killing all the inhabitants, and then either leave, or turn upon each other. The island is littered with empty towns, filled with piles of bones.

Religion

Kikaian life is organized closely around religion. The islanders believe that their land is a literal hell, a resting place for damned spirits from other worlds. Each one of them believes that they committed some great wrong in their previous life, and so were sent to this island to suffer for their sins.

They believe in three great spirits - the land, the sky, and the sea - but these are considered to be largely impartial. While offerings are made to these spirits, it is less a form of worship, and more a ceremony of thanks for surviving the past year with as little suffering as possible.

In addition, the island is infested with innumerable lesser spirits, ghosts, and monsters. Exact opinion on these creatures is divided. Some claim that the monsters, like the land, sky, and sea, are fixtures of this hell - native inhabitants. Some say that they are also damned souls, either from other worlds, or whose crimes were so great they were made to be inhuman.

Noro

Village priestess or "Shrine Maiden".

Shamans

Religious life on Kikai is dominated by the Shamans, though they do not take an active role in most affairs.

Other Worlds

Kikai mysticism states that there are two other planes of being, overlaid

Ne-no-kuni

"Land of Roots" - Shadow World

Takaikan

"The other face of the sea" - Spirit World

Economy / Money

The island has no economy to trade of. Villages have little to no contact with one another, and there is hardly surplus for trade. The little trade that occurs is done with a barter economy.

Skills

Craft

Societies differ in what technologies they have developed. Here is listed the normal maximum for skilled craftsmen in this society - a character coming from such a society would have no higher a modifier than this (modifier being the specialization in that division of craft).

Items whose craft DC is more than the given number +15 will be rare, potentially costing twice as much as normal, and those whose DC is the given number +20 or higher cannot be attained. This rule may be broken in trading hubs, where items have been shipped in that are not domestically produced.

A zero here means that this society has no knowledge of this type of craft.

While Kikai is not technologically advanced, and very poor, an abundance of iron and need for personal protection has made ironworking a relatively advanced skill. Other craft areas have been developed primarily because they help to provide food - either through hunting, farming, or fishing.

Division	Societal Maximum
Alchemy	0
Bowmaking	10
Calligraphy	1
Carpentry	10
Casting	2
Composition	1
Fletching	15
Forgery	0
Gemcutting	1
Glassworking	4
Leatherworking	10
Machining	0
Pottery	10
Sailmaking	12
Smithing	14
Stonework	12
Tailoring	4
Trapmaking	15
Weaving	15
Woodworking	12

Heal

Healing is widely practiced, but poorly understood. Long-term care is most common, as it is used to ease the suffering of disease and age. Combat tends to be so brutal that first aid is almost never useful, and surgery, while it has technically been discovered, is effectively useless.

The most skilled of all physicians in this society will have no higher than the ranks listed below (the ranks being family modifier+specialization). The average value will be significantly lower.

Division	Societal Maximum
First Aid	8
Long-Term Care	10
Surgery	1

Profession

Common divisions of Profession are:

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Knowledge

Common divisions of Knowledge are:

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Perform

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Common divisions of Perform are:

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Other

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Magic

Kikai is a very magical island, but it produces relatively few spellcasters.

There are no Wizards on Kikai, because there is no tradition of magical theory, so intelligence alone cannot lead to power.

Mages and Sorcerers are not unknown, but are rare. Those who are born tend to not be terribly powerful. Noro (shrine maidens) who have magical powers tend to be Mages.

Adepts are by far the most common sort of magic-user on Kikai. The majority of Adepts are Darkness adepts, or occasionally Life, and are taken to become Shamans as soon as they manifest their powers. See the entry for Shamans above, under Religion.

Magic-users who do not become shrine maidens or shamans tend to leave their villages and become hermits.