The UHALE is a once-prosperous empire that is now a fraction of what it once was. Despite the fact it has shrunk rapidly as more and more of its territory has declared independence, it is still a somewhat major political force in the region. It has territory scattered all across the Local Systems, but most can be found in the Ewi Yerda system. The majority of the UHALE’s inhabitants are humans and Azi lana, with a comparatively small amount of lomanos and even beamen. Though the nation’s political power is dwindling, its art and music movements are at an all time high.
Once, the UHALE was the largest and most prosperous nation in the Local Systems. It controlled territory on Earth, Mars, Mun, the OSS, the Sun, Eina Yerda, Gi, Hayer, Arem, Pennacerti, Rhonnamin, Gias, and much more. But those times are long gone, and as other powerful nations sprung up, the UHALE’s control has dwindled.
Today, the UHALE has jurisdiction over parts of Gi, Arem, Pennacerti, Rhonnamin, the OSS, and a few other places. Though the people living in these places are technically part of the same nation, they are usually closer in culture to other nations on the same planet than other UHALE territories, due to the fact that instant communication is only possible on the planetary scale. This makes it difficult to generalise the different peoples of the UHALE, spread apart as they are.
As well as inhabited towns and cities, the UHALE has power over a variety of places dedicated to harvesting resources, like asteroid belts in the Ewi yerda and Ornis systems.
Because of its scattered nature, the nation can require more help from others to harvest and process resources, making it less independent and more prone to accepting unfair trade deals.
In all of the nation’s constituent parts, the majority of the citizens are humans, Azi lana, and occasionally AI. Lomanos are also found on Gi, Pennacerti, and Rhonnamin, and a small percentage of the UHALE’s Pennacertian population are beamen.
Because of its split nature, it’s not easy for a central government to control all of the UHALE’s constituent parts. It’s probably this that contributed to so much of its territory splitting off into new nations in the past, and why there is still a lot of political unrest among its remaining territory.
To mitigate the difficulties of maintaining a central government across several star systems, the UHALE is split up into several states. Each is composed of the territory on a single planet; for instance, the UHALE’s Giin jurisdiction is a different state than it’s Pennacertian territory.
While the central UHALE government, located on Gi, ultimately makes the most important laws, each individual state has freedom to make and enforce more minor laws.
The fact that each state has its own government and law institution mitigates the problems that come with enforcing laws over such large distances- though it does not rid of them entirely.
Each of the UHALE’s six states have slightly different laws pertaining to crime and justice. These states all adopt the common framework of putting criminals in prison, whether for punishment or rehabilitation.
One notable aspect of the UHALE’s criminal justice system is that, for particularly egregious cases, it allows the use of the controversial parshen bacterium. Originating as a terrifying pathogen, parshen is a bacteria that has been genetically modified for use in torture, and in some places, criminal punishment.
The disease has been modified to be non-contagious, instead only being contracted through injection into the spinal cord. It can just as easily be cured with a treatment of aggressive bacteriophages.
However, once it is in the body, the bacteria wreaks havoc on the nervous system. The main symptom is extreme pain that worsens the more one moves.
People injected with parshen quickly learn to move as little as possible, though even staying limp is incredibly painful. After weeks or months with the disease, most people will stop eating, drinking, or breathing, in an attempt to mitigate their movement and therefore the pain.
Those who survive until they are given a cure usually become either unresponsive or insane. The entire process is entirely inhumane- but many would argue that, for people who have shown just as little mercy, it is a fitting punishment.
In the UHALE, this punishment is reserved only for the worst of the worst. Serial killers, people who torture their victims, and those who use parshen itself in their crimes may all be sentenced to days, weeks, months, or even years with the bacteria in their bodies.
Given the small number of people who survive, and the even smaller number of people who retain their sanity, it is of course one of the most controversial methods of criminal punishment to date.
In the UHALE, food and goods are usually mass-produced or traded for.
Goods like clothes, toys, computers, and other tools are most commonly mass-produced in factories. Methods like 3D-printing are used to entirely automate the process, although it still has to be designed and overseen by people. Though more expensive than cheap factory goods, independent sellers also craft their own stock.
Food is also mass-produced; it must be, to sustain such a large population.
Plant farms are not as widespread here as they are in human-majority nations, because they number less than the carnivorous Azi lana. This means plant-based food can be on the expensive side, which has prompted many humans to keep their own fruit or vegetable gardens to mitigate costs.
Meat, on the other hand, is in high demand. Growing ‘true meat’ substitutes like Mars’ eckale colonies would probably be cheaper, but the majority of UHALE residents prefer ‘true meat’ and other animal products, and so the nation’s livestock industry continues to thrive.
These animals have been both bred and modified for higher yields, and though they live in crowded, dirty conditions, their highly modified, shrunken brains don’t seem to mind.
When resources are traded for, it is usually with other nations that control portions of the same planet or star system. For instance, Gi’s UHALE might trade with Giina or the Azi gi. They usually export food, machines, spacecraft, wood, and artworks, and their imports include metals, animals, and certain technologies.
Their largest import by far is energy- something necessary for a civilisation with so much tech, but harder to come by when you don’t have a dyson sphere. Rather humiliatingly, the two largest local sellers of energy- Mars and the Eina jarn- are both nations that formed by declaring independence from the UHALE, taking plans and infrastructure for dyson spheres with them.
The UHALE has a variety of diverse architectural styles spread around its constituent territories. Most of these are derived from traditional human and Azi lana cultural styles.
On Gi, Azi lana architecture dominates. Old and even ancient buildings tend to conform to the miinaan style; these homes are composed of several smallish buildings surrounding a central square or atrium. Each building is home to one adult member of the family, a nursery, or a utility room such as a kitchen. The largest building faces the street, and contains a lounge and perhaps a shop.
In urban centres like cities, these traditional buildings have been done away with. Instead, skyscrapers loom eight to fifteen stories above the streets. Though they’re not nearly as tall as traditional human skyscrapers, they’re much wider. The top floor is usually decorated with an ornamental garden. Other, less common styles are also sprinkled in among these buildings; blocky houses, wide towers, and even some traditional human buildings.
UHALE’s Pennacerti is more of an even blend, however. Tall, thin towers emerge from a canopy of short, wide ones. A diverse range of cultural styles from across time and space have combined in a variety of ways to produce all sorts of types of houses, gardens, and decor.
One consistent theme in these bustling cities is street art; detailed drawings made by both commissioned and rogue artists. These are often made with luminescent glow-paint, and so shine at night alongside neon lights and warm lanterns.
Even space stations in the OSS and around Rhonnamin have their own architectural flairs. Though they are diverse and varied, many of them utilise natural designs, numerous plant pots, and even small or large gardens. These are all measures taken to prevent so-called ‘wall fever’: a state of boredom, irritability, and sometimes aggression caused by a lack of natural features in one’s environment.
This has always been a common problem in space stations and dense cities, and can eventually lead to more serious mental illness.
In cities- most of UHALE’s Pennacerti and much of Gi- trams meander the roads, surrounded on both sides by bike paths. Trains and planes bridge the distance between cities, and country can be navigated with cars or high-speed trains.
The UHALE is divided by space much more than many other nations, with its constituent parts not only being located on different planets, but also in different star systems. Because of this, it has a robust network of starships to port citizens from one state to another. UHALEn starship companies also provide services for other nations, making them an important part of local travel infrastructure.
Matters of growing up can be complicated in the UHALE, because the different sapient species in the nation grow and learn at different rates. While human children take 4-5 years to reach school age, for instance, Azi lana only take one year, and lomanos can take less than a few months. Sometimes children can become upset as their alien friends grow and mature and even graduate faster than they do, leaving them behind both socially and psychologically.
Humans begin life rather underdeveloped, but still require social interaction years before they’re mature enough to attend school. Thus, there are many groups and services that allow human toddlers to socialise. Azi lana children are also sometimes sent to these groups between four and twelve months of age.
Schools not only provide formal education, but socialisation and life experience. Thus, the main philosophy of UHALEn schools is to provide a space for children and teenagers to grow, sometimes to the detriment of their formal education. Students spend exactly the years of their childhood in school- no less and no more.
For humans this is from 5-19 years old, for Azi lana 1-14, and for lomanos this is a minimum of 3 years, due to their odd way of aging. Students are not required to score well on their tests to progress to the next year, or to graduate, though how well they do in their final year often determines the quality of their secondary education.
Secondary education is structured much more like traditional schools- do well or fail. These courses- the UHALEn equivalent of universities or colleges- prepare people for their career of choice.
There also exist more casual secondary schools for people who merely want to learn more about a certain subject, but these aren’t free.
In the UHALE, humans are legal adults at age 21 and Azi lana at age 19. Adults are allowed to do certain extra things that children aren’t- have sex with other adults, take legal drugs, vote, and such.