The dwarven peoples are more divided today than they have been since the Great Dwarven Union was established under Emperor Thule. Their stalwart support of their allies has ground down their wealth and status. Their great coal mine is now exhausted, limiting their steel production, and leaving them a poorer people struggling to maintain their cohesion.
Many dwarves never joined the Union, and these other dwarves more frequently make their way about the world. Some dwarven races who were once hidden have emerged into the public, such as the Loam, who quietly supplied their brethren with food for centuries.
Dwarves themselves are a compulsively maker people. If they are not making something in some way, they grow unhappy and restive. Most dwarves usually have some project that travels with them. Stone carving is a very favored pastime among dwarven males.
Dwarven society itself is an amalgam of caste, guild, and social status.
In addition to being a race, Hadean is also a functional class. To be Hadean is to be noble. Hadeans hold all the highest offices in the Great Dwarven Union, and all the most powerful guilds are Hadean.
The "unwanted" dwarves are the various tribes that make up the dwarven underclass. These peoples have little power under the Great Dwarven Union. These are the Loam, Kalts, and Flintlanders. The Malachites, even though they are the enemy of the Great Dwarven Union, are not agslavit.
Many dwarves identify themselves by their guilds, rather than by their origin.
Horsebreakers are not among the highest guilds of the Union, but they are among the most visible, driving wagons full of dwarven goods all over the world. They are primarily Kalts.
The Ironmongers are devotees of the Iron Duke, and earth-lord rival of the ruling earth-lord. They know the secret of mass producing steel. They also have among the toughest of all private armies in the Union.
Jadecarvers carve the holy material, jade.
The Legionaries are the professional soldiers of the Union.
The Metallurgists are the only guild which require that all members be Hadean. These are the personal attendants to the King of Earth in his deep forges under Mount Perma.
Kommisars are the enforcers of dwarven law, and any contract entered into by a dwarf. They protect traveling dwarves from those who would take advantage of them, and punish anyone who does not keep a contract with the Great Dwarven Union. They also enforce orthidoxy and law inside the Union.
Stonehandlers build buildings. They are among the highest ranking of all guilds.
These are dwarves of mixed ancestry. Literally, "road" dwarves or "traveler" dwarves. They are the most numerous dwarves, but also the least politically powerful.
The Hadeans originated in the lands near Carmarthen, but eventually moved to the Hadean mountains and established Jura City. They successfully formed the Great Dwarven Union, and came to dominate the politics of that Union. They are the most recognizable of all the dwarves, focusing on metal and stone.
Hailing from the Flintlands, a nominal territory in the northern Malachite Empire, the Flintlanders live a hand-to-mouth existence. They are experts in knapped stone and improvised tools. They are hunters, fishers, and opportunists.
Originating in the mid-northwest, the Kalts dwell in a harsh land of desert and stone called the Flintlands. They are quite adept at producing flaked stone tools, primarily from flint or similar materials, and creating items from skin and bone. They sided with the Transgressors over the last few centuries, putting them at odds with the Great Dwarven Union.
Agricultural dwarves. A quiet, introspective people, tolerant of others, and willing to bear great hardship. Most live and farm amid the Hadean mountains. Most are pacifists towards all other speaking creatures, except dragons.
The Malachites are a tribe of dwarves claiming descent through Charyastos. For as long as time is recorded, they guarded the rulers of Charyastos. In recent times, they rebelled against the Emperor, made war upon him, and usurped his territory. They now rule the Malachite Empire. Other dwarves look upon them as oathbreakers.
These are the dwarves of Fort Resolute and Fera Nea. They are best known for their skills in logistics, administration, law, and alchemy.
Vitreans live near Schanderna. They are experts in glass and other vitreous materials. They make their armor and weapons out of these materials. The Vitreans split from the Great Dwarven Union during the Southern War. Vitreans are also known perl divers.
Elves races share many traits in common, often causing outsiders to confuse them. In truth, elves are from two cultural stocks as different as a Gelts and a Rhakotians. Each population reached Endhaven separately, settling in their own areas, and creating their new cultures. The one group settled in the magnificent Glittering Vale while the other settled in Carmarthen.
The elves of Glittering Vale, now mostly extinct, were a highly civilized people, steeped in the arts and sciences, with a strong tradition of sun worship. They were the most extroverted of all elves, playing strongly to the games of international politics. It was the elves who lent their best minds to serve the Emperors. Some Valites were away when the Vale burned, and now live in perpetual exile. The largest population of Valites live in Charystos near the Palace of Eternity.
The elves of Carmarthen are a tribal people, highly factionalized, with a strong tradition of nature worship. Their homeland is Carmarthen, in the old Griffon Empire. They have a king with great religious authority but weak temporal authority. They backed the Oathbreakers during the Crusade of Light. They paid deeply for their support.
The Schan are descended from the elves of Glittering Vale. They followed Lady Plasm, goddess of passion and the new Queen of Fire, to her home in Schanderna. It is there that the Schan lead lives of great extremities, pushing all boundaries, pushed by every passion. Most remember very little of their life in Glittering Vale.
Humans are the predominant race in Endhaven, although that preeminence has come under siege in recent centuries. It was the humans who built the great world-spanning empires, and humans who shed each other's blood forming those empires.
Humans belong to four major populations: Gelt, Charystan, Uma, and Rhakotian. Each society has a memory of some great cataclysmic event that brought them here to a new world. In simplistic terms, the Gelt most resemble Europeans; Charyastans middle-eastern Asians, Uma northewstern Asians and Native Americans, and Rhakotians Africans and southeast Asian.
The Charyastans are the most civilized people on earth. Charyastos is the largest of all the cities. Many never leave its borders. Education here is nearly universal. The most manly men are schooled in arts and diplomacy. Their art is highly formal and geometric. They prefer bright colors where possible.
The Gelt are a tough people, leaning towards self-motivating and self-directing more than any other. Even though the lands of the northwest have been settled for generations, the land itself constantly descends back into its wild, primordial nature, leaving the Gelt acting as constant frontiersmen, always resettling what was theirs.
The Rhakotians are the most learned people on earth. For them, learning is religion. They dwell near the great library, which they claim is older than the world. Their art is highly ornate, so much so that no part of their great buildings are not decorated. They highly revere fire.
The humans of Uma are tenacious beyond tenacity. The land of Uma, once the seat of a great civilization, is now wracked with floods and earthquakes. Little remains of their once-great civilization. Yet, these people stay, making themselves among the most determined of all peoples.
Underlings are artificial people created during past wars. The Phoenix Emperor employed experts who designing living forms. All underlings are born with a desire to serve and to do their jobs. In place where Underlings have rebelled, it is because they began serving a cause over serving a person.
Many races have few or no other members of their race. These peoples are called "interlopers" by scholars, who theorize that new peoples are continually appearing in this world as the gods continue to save others from their destroyed worlds. Some other believe that there are lands beyond the lands that we know, and that the interlopers from from those lands.
The northwestern lands of Endhaven are known for their savagery more than any other. These lands have always defied civilization the most strongly. The people who move there grow more and more savage over time, until, after generations, slowly lose their humanity and turn into therions. No people or species is immune, as dwarf and elf alike have also descended into savagery.
Therions develop their bestial aspects after birth, slowly acquiring their forms as they mature. They grow heads of tigers, horses, buffalo, hawks, and many other types of creatures. (The term for part man/part animal is therionthrope.) Although they look different, most hold themselves as one nation: the Feral Nation, beholden only Samael, the god of slaughter. They seek only to live free, fight their neighbors, and destroy any government that would stand above them.