Daxian people

Daxian people
天上的人

Total population
724 million approximate
Regions with significant populations
Daxia	689,254,654
Timbia	20,328,249
Rusana	8,668,650
Canpei	7,122,035
Tierrador	612,338
Languages
Daxian language
Religion
Chongbai, Christianity, Islam, Tianism

The Daxian people are an ethnolinguistic group native to Audonia who share a common language, culture and ancestry. They are the majority group in the nations of Daxia and a significant minority in Canpei, Timbia and Rusana. Several diaspora groups of varying sizes exist in other places in Audonia and overseas as a result of a mercantilist mindset. The Daxian ethnonym is a corruption of the name Da Xié meaning Great Harmony, which was the name of the first ever recorded dynasty to form in Daxia. The historical point of origin of the Daxian people is believed to be located in central Daxia where the first organized polities took shape and created the precursor states that preceded the Xie dynasty. The early Daxian people developed for the most part in isolation, shielded as they were by mountains to the west, the sea to the east and south and the vast distances of the empty steppes to the north. This isolation led to the development of a cultural insularity that permeates traditional 'Daxian-ness' to the modern day, and is expressed in many aspects of Daxian life and historic trends, from political concepts tinged with notions of superiority such as Zhangwo, to historical relations with other peoples dictated by Daxian need to dominate and subjugate them, to an intense dislike and distrust of foreigners even today and a predilection for inbreeding.

Culture

The essential cultural mores of the Daxian people can be said to hark back to antiquity and while not immutable through time, the patterns set down by the Xie dynasty were mostly upheld by their successors in power. The ability of a dynasty at the height of its glory to form and shape men of learning that could in turn elucidate and teach the favored philosophies of the time to the great masses, while staying within the margins of what was already established Daxian-ness, determine in great measure that dynasty's contribution to the culture of the Daxian people.

Social practices

Bigamy and Endogamy

Bigamy has been practiced in Daxia for thousands of years, going back to the reign of Emperor Chiliang of the Xie dynasty. An old man by the time he ascended to the imperial throne, Chiliang's progeny had suffered from great misfortune and he had no male heir. The emperor consulted with a great council of sages and their learned conclusion was that the emperor should be allowed to marry as many wives as he needed. Not lacking in wisdom himself, the emperor counseled restraint, were he to sire too many sons they would surely fight amongst themselves and tear the empire to bloody shreds once Chiliang passed on, and so two wives would suffice for his great need. So resolved, Chiliang set aside his aged wife and married two nubile maidens that beget him three strong sons to carry on his bloodline into the future. And so that none of his subjects had cause to complain that their emperor ate alone, he passed a decree that was carved in imperial marble: Let all the subjects living on my lands and under my sky secure the immortality of their names, as have I, let every man be entitled to marrying twice; this is known as Chiliang's Pact. This decree was studiously respected by all succeeding dynasties for a number of reasons, the vast majority of the population worked in agriculture for a long time, having two wives meant more kids were available to add to a farm's labor pool. Abrogating Chiliang's Pact would be very unpopular, especially if the emperor continued the practice himself, which they would want to do given the high rates of infant mortality even among nobility. Bigamy was codified into law by every dynasty from Yang to Qian, all of which also made legal provisions for the caring of the numerous abandoned children and laws on the payment of pensions by the state to widows with small children. Bigamy continues to be legal in the modern era and Daxians continue to practice it but not to the same extent as in the past. The rising cost of living, insufficient social services, marital breakdown and the onerous expenses of having many children and also of divorcing dissuade many men from fulfilling their right to be bigamous.

The two wives of Emperor Cao Meng, ninth emperor of the Yang dynasty

Endogamy is the practice of marriage within a certain ethnic, religious or social group. Daxian people have for reasons of history and tradition, always frowned upon unions with non-Daxians. A partial explanation to this can be provided by the Zhangwo ideology, the core idea being that the Daxians have been so successful at building a bureaucratic empire because the divine have ordained them as a superior race. This idea has been both a curse and a blessing for smaller ethnic groups living in areas that border the Daxian heartlands; a boon because the massive Daxian people could have absorbed and diluted them into the greater whole if not for the fact that it was seen as culturally repugnant to marry a foreigner, a curse because their inability to marry Daxians meant they would never be truly accepted in that society, dooming them to subservience, suspicion and cruelty. One well known example is that of the Degei people, a nomadic people that lived in the grasslands north of Daxia for hundreds of years and interacted with and were influenced by it in many ways. The anthroposcopy of the average Degei has historically been considered to be close enough to the average Daxian as to be distantly related, the pigmentation of the skin and the elongated epicanthal folds lending themselves to a certain compatibility, if traditional looks were to be preserved in offspring. And yet despite the physical similarities, the Degei people were never truly seen as anything but uncultured, foul and treacherous barbarians, useful in a fight if you could get them to obey by feeding them trinkets and lofty but meaningless honors. Some historians have posited that the great revolt of Darukh Khan started with his innermost, most secret insecurity, that he admired the Daxian people but could not and would not ever be accepted by them as an equal no matter what he did, leading him to despair and violence. The allure of endogamy within Daxian society has ebbed and flowed across history and its hold has not always been absolute or equally respected in specific geographic parts of the empire. The settlers who colonized Xisheng found themselves fighting the natives almost from the very start and this hostile reception shaped their own attitudes and sharpened their native xenophobia; Xisheng's Daxians took refuge in their redoubts and limited their contact with the Cronan peoples for three hundred years. Comparatively the explorers who discovered and colonized Peratra were received with no hostility and traded in peace with many tribes for a number of years, this coupled with the great distances to the homeland softened and cracked the allure of endogamy; Timbia today is an example of a society with a great degree of mixing between native Polynesians and Daxians.

Daxian Racialism

A topic greatly discussed among scholars both foreign and domestic is the origin of Daxia's racialism, how far back in history lie its roots and if ancient Daxians were even prejudiced against other races. While one the great sources and justification of Daxian racialism is always named as Considerations of Yang Imperial Expansion, written in 680 CE by Heian Xiujian, First Minister of the Yang court, most experts now agree that the true origin lies much far back, in ancient texts and rites of Daxia's native religion. While Considerations of Yang Imperial Expansion is the premier text used and expanded on at the dynasty level to inflame and denigrate the foreign, at the popular level it was the priests and men of the hedge who spoke to the commoners of the need to protect the purity of the lands from that which was strange, dangerous and unholy. Tablets dated as far back as 2,400 BCE contain religious poems and hymns extolling the pure and calling on the faithful to honor the Gods of the Earth and the Air by defending their Great Garden (interpreted to be the land of Daxia) from the Shadows beyond the Garden and their servants. The tablets include an addition in less prosaic language, a listing of the known servants of the dark including the names of city-states to the west such as Nasrad, Khaton, Turaq and Rilban; cities then under the rule of king Iyachtu, an ancestor of the later self-styled Highest of Kings, Xvim the Black. The power of religion and its hold on both the ancient ruling and popular classes in addition to a history of constant border clashes and raids resulted in the inevitable, a deeply ingrained hatred of those who were not Daxian, whose hearts were seen as full of black bile and who desired nothing more than to soil the Great Garden bestowed by the divine. The success of territorial expansion and rule over others brought the aspects of arrogance and manifest destiny and combined them with what came before. The result was the Daxian belief that not only were outsiders evil, but that Daxians were predetermined to defeat and subjugate them no matter what. In the modern era, these ancient hatreds and prejudices remain, mixed with and reinforced by modern causes for racism and resentment elsewhere: an influx of migrants from poorer nations who compete for low level jobs and depress salaries, perceived incompatibility with Daxian society due to cultural and religious differences, foreign criticism of Daxia for its international policies and the scapegoating of outsiders by the government.

Daxians use a litany of names to refer to non-Daxians, usually out of earshot so as to not dampen money-generating activities. A historical term was Guoyi, a term given to outsiders who paid tribute to a Daxian dynasty, the term roughly corresponds with Good Barbarian. It can be said to have a negative connotation only in the sense that it underlines the subservient position of the foreigner. Other more blatantly insulting terms exist such as Kakun, which is used against black-skinned peoples and compares them to excrement or dog feces. Specific national groups are not spared this treatment, Urceans are called Sheng-pigu roughly equivalent to 'Holy Buttheads' for their overweening piety, Burgoignesc are simply called Laoshu or 'mice' for their proclivity to appear anywhere they are not wanted. People of Sarpedon are referred as Pizhi or 'Gross Zits' for their perceived oiliness and swarthoid complexions. Many scholastic attempts have been made to fully compile the various insulting ways Daxians refer to others, experts agree the most complete is the 18th century's sage Guo Wuru's Big Book of Insults.

Self-Perception

Main Article: Zhangwo

The definition of who is and who is not a Daxian has been a matter of philosophical, historic and racial contention since antiquity. In times past it was commonly accepted was 'Daxian-ness' was inherited patrilineally, as in Daxian religion the Great Garden was passed on into the care of the first man, son of the gods. The burden and honor of protecting it flowed into the sons of each generation and so on, the role of women was a supportive and nurturing one but not critical. By the late Xie dynasty this perception had changed, under pressure by powerful Empresses ruling in their own name, the priesthood and men of the hedge were forced to relent, the foundational mythos of the world was altered so that the son's task was also to protect the first woman, his wife and equal, foundational pillar of his descendance. Henceforth anyone who had at least one parent of Daxian origin could be inscribed in the citizen rolls of the state as a true Daxian, although it was common to for delays and obstacles to be placed on those with non-Daxian fathers. The custom and the legal framework began to clash during the time of overseas expansion under the Qian dynasty, while the offspring of native and Daxian were accorded Daxian official status, culturally it was hard to reconcile that status with the new variations in appearances (brown skin pigmentation, melanated hair). The solution that was concocted was to introduce regional descriptive nouns, for example the mixed children of Polynesian and Daxian marriages in Peratra came to be known as Island Daxians in official records and census taking. Ostensibly the same, this new format allowed for maintaining of a degree of separation from something that was diluted, less pure.

As pertains to their place in relation to their government, the dynasties and the religious hierarchies under them have always emphasized the special destiny of every Daxian, to either rule in the Great Garden or rule alongside the Gods in the great beyond. But one of the indispensable keys to achieve this luminous destiny, a religious mandate even, is obedience to the sovereign. Existence is also a test, whether Daxians will squabble between themselves and fail to rise up to the task at hand, or will they renounce their individuality and subsume themselves and prostrate their wills before a greater whole and the guiding hand that shows the way at all times, the sovereign. Daxian cultural and religious conception of the role of the emperors was not exactly of divinely appointed monarchs although that was part of it, they were by their own personal qualities the best suited to lead the people. If the Daxian people was a choir then the emperors were the choir conductors and every loyal Daxian was called on to play his part without compromise, complaint or defiance. This great task has been handed down from emperor to emperor and then to the modern leaders of the nation, obedience does not fundamentally spring from man-made laws but from the belief in the shared great destiny and that those currently in charge know the way.

As pertains to the Daxian people's wider role in the world, the Daxian people have been molded by millennia of religious and state indoctrination to believe in their divinely ordained superiority. Daxians abroad will be the most self-assured people to the point of being deaf to all criticism from foreigners. Daxians living abroad due to myriad circumstances usually go down two roads, they persevere under great personal stress, mentally agonized by having to live among creatures so inimically opposed to proper Daxian-ness. Or they fully disconnect themselves from their identity, divorcing themselves from 'being Daxian' in order to find a measure of happiness; this is one of the greatest sins to Daxians, the sin of assimilation into a different culture. Many opponents of the PDD who've escaped the country have subjected themselves to various degrees of assimilation, very possibly forfeiting any chance of successfully appealing to their countrymen or gathering enough support for a real chance at power. To abandon Daxian-ness is to embrace social death and the deepest opprobium.

Gigantomania

Tower houses in Pingzi county

Daxians have a love for the monumental and fastuous, the country's landscape is dotted by remnants of fortresses that were just a bit too large to be defended properly and village houses that simply seem to grow towards the sky, rising upwards beyond all practicality. Researcher Congming Ren proposed the theory that the size of the Daxian nuclear family became so large thanks to Chiliang's Pact that families would literally need to transform their farm houses into literal complexes to have enough space. Cheap materials such as adobe and straw were favored in the countryside, the longevity of these buildings was not guaranteed without regular maintenance so there are few surviving examples. Townhouses in more affluent parts exhibit this architectural gigantism with houses five or six stories high.

Emperors were not immune for this fascination with size, as not only the size of their palaces was used as a way to display their power and authority but to set themselves above their predecessors. During the Yang dynasty, emperors tended to disassemble the palace of their predecessor and use the materials to build a new, bigger one. The Zhong emperors stopped this wasteful practice, choosing instead to forever be building new additions to existing palaces, the Qian Palace of Columns was undergoing its 22nd expansion when the dynasty was overthrown. Current governments continue with the trend of giant buildings, the current seat of the Ministry of Information being 51-stories high and covering 493,000 square meters of floor space. The sinking of several Daxian cities built in softer terrain is a direct consequence of Daxian Gigantomania.

Generational Greed

Part of a gold coin hoard found under the floorboards of a brick shack near Leng. The hoard is believed to have belonged to a silk merchant

In the words of the sage Qipian: Greed is good. Daxian attitudes towards money closely align with the stereotype of the red faced Daxian grabbing fistfuls of coins from a fountain. Alongside passing on their name, Daxians take great pride in passing on as much wealth as they can on to their descendants, and it is impressed upon the children from an early age that they too are responsible for adding on to the family hoard. A traditional will commonly leaves the fortune of the family to the eldest son, who is duty bound to section some parts off if he has any siblings so they can start their own piles. Unfortunately the greed aspect often rears itself during the proceedings leading to many younger siblings being given nothing by their elder brother, this is called a generational reset as they have to start over without anything to fall back on.

This money driven instinct has reflected in an adventurous streak of several Daxian generations who have embarked on dangerous and unsavory activities in order to generate more wealth, from the creators of the slave cartels to the colonists who hoped to plunder the gold studded cities of Ixa'Taka. At the dynasty level, the ruthless enforcement of the tributary system was also a form of dynastic wealth accumulation, much of the tribute went directly to the pockets of the imperial family. The generational greed of Daxians has had an important influence on the Architecture in Daxia as before the creation of electronic banking, the Daxian family hoard was an actual physical pile of currency and valuables. Therefore people, in accordance with their means, sought to protect and hide their accumulated patrimony. Those without great means would often simply transport their money to the wild and bury it in so called treasure hives, so named for they glittered as gold as a beehive full of honey. Those with more means would build secret alcoves, hidden basements and carved chambers; many old houses on the market still feature these old additions. Daxia stands at the top of world charts for the personal savings rate, banks are very accommodating and charge no handling fees for savings accounts.

Numerology

Main article: Daxian Numerology

Wedding rings with the number eight, an auspicious number associated with the God of Greed

Numerology is the idea that the existence of certain numbers in certain combinations appearing in life is a way of understanding the universe and even predicting the future, this belief is reflected in the old Daxian adage: there is power in numbers. Daxian Numerology has religious undertones, the practice is believed to have originated with the belief that the gods had created the Great Garden according to strict mathematical exactitude. It then became priestly custom to recite the purported numbers that described the size of the Garden as a benediction and from that flowed the idea that numbers could have hidden, divine meanings that could be revealed into the world through the use of prophesy and ritual. Daxian emperors are known to have had secret names that were simply a string of numbers. Numerology was also an important practice due to the sheer size of Daxia's agriculture since ancient times as everything worked on dates and calendars. When to plant, when to harvest, when it was safe to let your animals graze, and when to stay inside to avoid the horrors. To mistime any one of these narrow windows was to starve to death or worse.

Numerology now extends beyond the strict confines of religious practice and into hitherto unrelated aspects of daily life, many Daxians favor names that are associated with good numbers for their children, one's date of birth can be cause for great celebration beyond the addition of a new family member, women have been known to die by either trying to delay or accelerate the birth of the child just so it can be born in a highly specific date. Trained 'numerologists' pullulate and offer consulting services, guiding people on the best day to have sex, which lottery tickets to buy or how many raisins to put on sweet bread. Some of these practices veer dangerously into the realm of quackery and scams, nonetheless numerology has sustained its popularity with the public, even members of the upper levels of the Party are known to 'consult the numbers' regularly.

Social Hierarchy

Daxians live in a society that is highly regimented, there is an ancient saying that goes: Not everything that glimmers yellow is gold, this suggests without much subtlety that there are stark differences between Daxians of different strata. Different authors have attempted classification throughout Daxian history and there is far from an existent universal consensus. One of the less criticized attempts at classification is Mae Kwok's Pyramidal Sociological Schematic that divide the Daxian people into four broad categories. These categories are informal, the lines between them can blur and social mobility is not uncommon.

The Amorphous Mass

Mae Kwok places refers to the most basic and lowest rung of Daxian existence as the Amorphous Mass. He also compares it to the vastness of the ocean, a particularly large mass of school fish or a locust swarm. The great heaping mass of people is composed of the unnumbered farmers, the throngs of factory workers, the urban and rural poor, the unemployed, the illegal immigrants, the micro entrepreneurs and the politically inactive. This mass of people will not move against the system unless under great, constant and unbearable pressure; or under the snake charm seductions of a demagogue from a higher rung. All great upheavals of Daxian history have required a significant part of the Amorphous Mass to be mobilized and once this has taken place, the tide of change has been as sure footed as a flat roller. Leaving the Amorphous Mass typically requires the right educational path and connections; membership in the Party is an unattainable dream.

The Cog in the Machine

The second rung of Kwok's diagram is called the Cog in the Machine. Kwok names as part of this group, the common soldiery of the army and the members of the organs of terror and order such as policemen, the white collared salaried men and women who keep the economy running. Also the large group of bureaucrat drones that man the state apparatus such as clerks, secretaries and assorted minor functionaries. The professional class and the small and medium plutocrats can be said to be closely associated with the cogs, while not truly being part of the category; they have more independence and leeway for autonomous action. The cogs can be relied on to do their jobs in dutifully and with minimal complaint, turn out to government rallies with only superficial threats required and overall be obedient parts of the system; their devotion to the national cause and the path set by the leadership is among the strongest. They are also the most surveilled strata, and they can also be cajoled with money and advancement. But even the cogs can be made to work against the system, usually if their continued physical existence is under threat by revolutionary forces from below. In such a scenario the cogs will prefer to either defect en masse or remove themselves from the conflict. During the fall of the Zhong dynasty, the educated classes that maintained the functioning of the state defected to the Qian after the Battle of Hong Shan to ensure their survival in the new regime, the following precipitous fall in tax revenues going to Zhong coffers sealed their fate.

The Imperial Bureaucracy

If the cogs are the working stiffs, those who are part of the 'Imperial Bureaucracy' are the overseers and foremen of the system, the executors of policy and reaching fingers of the regime. In ages past these would be the imperial leadership cadres such as Grand Secretaries, viceroys, governors and the bureaucrat-sages working directly under them as well as the generals and admirals directing the imperial war machines. What the leadership commands is translated into orders, directives and action through the Imperial Bureaucracy, their loyalty is essential to the system and an organized revolt from within their midst can be deadly to their superiors. Today it can be said the Imperial Bureaucracy is synonymous with the Party, who have monopolized every perch in high places and elevated highly ideological and paranoid cadres to these crucial postings.

The Commanding Heights

The Commanding Heights's existence as a distinctive group is a newer development according to Kwok. Whereas before the Imperial Bureaucracy answered solely to the Emperor, in modern Daxia the exercise of the highest power of state has been at times of a collegial nature. The presidents emanated from the NRF were not, by and large, unipersonal dictators, but delegated some powers and decision-making to a close coterie of advisors and colleagues, in addition to consulting with the richest plutocrats and syndicates. The leaders of the Party have continued this trend, they have in essence remade the old imperial court of the Qian, replacing the court sages and imperial favorites with Party elders and influential billionaires. The fifty or so individuals that are considered part of the Commanding Heights are the wealthiest, most powerful and informed people in all of Daxia, puppeteers of a nation of over 700 million people.

Political Culture

Power Struggles

18th century depiction of the poisoning of Lady Mei, Regent of the Wang Emperor; her sister and suspected poisoner, Lady Shu, looks on in the background

As in politics in any other country, the struggle for power between rivals with competing interests is and has been a feature of Daxia's political culture. To hold onto the mantle of national leadership in Daxia has always required a healthy dose of gumption and paranoia, others are always waiting in the wings for a misstep. The transfer of power between dynasties was always realized through war and the elimination of the previous family. A war for the imperial throne in past eras could be, and often was, claimed as a war of religious legitimacy which the new dynasty was claiming from the old. The lust for power was therefore a veiled and muddled thing, something that could not be accurately traced to the new dynasty's founders. Outside of the field of battle, Daxian dynastic history is filled with frequent poisonings, murders under the cover of night and unexplained disappearances of personages in high positions. These 'tragedies' often brought with them great upheavals and calamity, such as the murder of emperor Huichen which ended unraveling the Zhong dynasty; they were also opportunities for men of ambition to climb beyond their station.

Under the one-party systems of the NRF and the PDD, the factional infighting has obviously been less conspicuous, conducted in secret and away from the public. But the accepted consequences of competing for power have remained the same, death is not ruled out. Numerous defectors and anonymous sources speaking from within the bowels of the system describe an implicit agreement between the big players that anything goes even acts that are illegal under the law, actual legal repercussions will only occur should anything become public knowledge. Some of the most important Daxian political leaders of the 20th century are believed to have climbed to the highest office through poisoning their predecessors, Qiu Heng is suspected of poisoning Dai Hanjian with arsenic and Linge Chen may have been poisoned with mercury, courtesy of his intelligence chief, Prib Dodd. Far from being seen as egregious crimes and disqualifying of high office, while there is no solid proof, these whispered notions are seen as proof of cunning and determination; traits most worthy in the nation's top leadership.

Glorification of Leaders

Ovations during Linge Chen's era could go on for two to three hours, recordings of clapping were played in the background so people could rest their hands.

The relation of Daxians and their leaders is a complicated and one fraught with nuances. As mentioned before the principle of obedience to the sovereign was of paramount importance in religious terms and as part of the attainment of the special destiny of the Daxian nation. The Emperors cast themselves not as gods themselves, a foul overreach, but as hierophant-kings who ruled aided by a special connection to the divine and the mysteries beyond. In this way the emperors were both divinely inspired earthly rulers and high priests of Daxian religious life. These two axis commanded the absolute obedience of their subjects for thousands of years. One notable anomaly is the Chen dynasty that ruled for a mere sixty years, by far the shortest lived dynasty. The Chen mysteriously sought to downplay their relation with divinity and instead emphasized their role as rulers of the world, a position they felt made them equal to the gods, not subordinate or inspired-by. This unorthodox and some say even heretical view of traditional Daxian statecraft may explain the rise of the Four Great Impostors and the calamities that brought down the Chen in record time. The Zhong and Qian dynasties returned to orthodoxy in this regard for the most part until hyper centralization efforts began by the Qian in the 19th century. Important thinkers and bureaucrats began to coalesce around the idea that to surpass foreign nations the figure of the emperor was vital as the guiding hand and rallying point of the country. An intellectual current began that proposed that emperors actually underwent apotheosis upon being enthroned, becoming the living avatar of the God of Earth, Diqiu. The Qian imperial court saw these efforts with good eyes and embraced the new conceptions, therefore all emperors from 1840 and after count God of the World as one of their foremost titles. A new state sponsored cult was also inaugurated, fittingly named the Cult of the Living God, of which each reigning emperor was the center. These ideas although popular with the imperial court were not universally well received, many sections of the priesthood and the men of the hedge were disturbed to say the least by these claims of outright divinity, who they saw as not grounded on scripture and precedent but on simple mortal ambition. The Cult of the Living God was abolished by Dai Hanjian almost immediately after overthrowing the Qian dynasty.

Dai Hanjian did not live long enough to develop a cult of personality but he was fond of pomp and toadyism so it is possible he would have attempted to start one around him. Qiu Heng however did quietly foment one around him not necessarily out of vanity but as a tool for political control. With every passing year in office, his personal qualities seemed to grow to include an endless list of positive adjectives. The man was honest, diligent, far-sighted, compassionate, luminous, sagacious, persevering, unbending, towering, etc. Qiu Heng became a veritable sun around which orbited the nation, paeans in his honor were composed and then sung by schoolchildren, works of art were commissioned to depict his likeness be it paintings, sculptures, statues. His face was used in postage stamps, money, lunchboxes and a plethora of other items of daily use. The increasing fervor and pitch of the cult suddenly dropped with Qiu Heng's death in 1964, and it seemed to die after his entombment. And then the malformed remains coalesced back into the very same thing, this time for the new president Chi Long Qua. It became the prerogative of each successive leader to be treated as the Sun God during their time in office, being at the apex of their power and luminosity at the start and waning as power slipped away towards the end of their terms. Some Daxians believed the propaganda but most apparently simply went through the motions as part of their jobs, thus the cult of adoration of the leaders became more and more hollowed out as time went on and the fortunes of the NRF dwindled. By the end of the NRF's rule, its last president was complaining that his political rallies were only half full and that attendees began leaving before he was done speaking; the reverence was gone and he was just a man.

The adoration of the masses, now again real and potent, moved as a wave to fall at the feet of the demagogue Linge Chen and his vociferous party of extremes. The hangman of the NRF, Chen had no need for artifice and elaborate background work, the masses came to him willingly to lap from the fountain of energetic and direct despotism he represented, anything to do away with the crawling inaction and overripe corruption of past governments. Unlike the party that preceded it, the Party of Daxian Democrats has so far not attempted to build an extensive cult for Prib Dodd, who despite his steady leadership is seen as a guardian of Linge Chen's legacy, who is still by far the most popular politician of Daxia's modern history.

Demographics

Diaspora

The Daxian diaspora refers to people who have left Daxia proper to live elsewhere in the world due to economic, social or political factors. Ethnic Daxians born and living in foreign countries are not typically included as part of the diaspora population, while they do have economic and political ties to the mainland they are not nearly as controlled as the diaspora. The diaspora serves Daxia in establishing commercial beachheads in exterior markets and as a useful probing utensil. Diaspora members are well regarded at home as some of the bravest and hardiest of the race due to successfully resisting the double pressures of assimilation and of existing and even thriving the among lesser races. The majority of the Daxian diaspora belongs to or is associated with the General Association of Daxian Residents Abroad, a "non-governmental" organization with the stated aims of representing the diaspora interests in other nations and preserve their cultural traditions, independently from official Daxian diplomatic and cultural organs. While the General Association claims it has no official ties to the government, investigative journalists have revealed at least 40% of its employees may have ties to Daxian intelligence services. Kidnappings and assassinations of dissident figures abroad have on occasion been tenuously linked to figures within the General Association leading to the organization being placed under police surveillance for periods of time.

Relations with the Daxian ethnic minority in Canpei are conducted at the political level between various government envoys and business associations and minor political parties dominated by Canpei's Daxians. Canpei's opposition routinely accuses Daxia of violating the nation's sovereignty by dictating who ethnic Daxians must support, a charge denied by the government.

Diseases due to inbreeding

The aforementioned Daxian tendency towards endogamy, consequently a sizable percentage of the general population especially in the old empire is vulnerable to manifesting certain genetic congenital defects. Out of all of the nations of Audonia, Daxians are overrepresented in sources that reference genetic mutation and related disorders; the heroic Daxian haplogroups and their limited admixture are both a godly boon in traditional Daxian xenophobia and a curse in practical genetic survivability. In ancient Daxia, offspring born with crippling defects were often seen as 'a divine blunder' who were nonetheless not normally abandoned to starve or given to temples, dwarves were also spared these fates. These diseases and malformations affected the upper classes more frequently than they did the peasant ones, given the larger mating pool available to the latter group. For example the Yang dynasty members were known to suffer from a form of adrenal hyperplasia that resulted at times in infertility, children born with ambiguous genitalia and masculine looking women due to an excess in androgen production. The Yang dynasty deformities were less concealable as the years went by leading to a loss of prestige and legitimacy. The genetic problems of the Yang were partially alleviated by the Chen dynasty with their creation of an imperial harem that included voluptuous women of varied stock and race, injecting much needed outsider genes into the imperial pool.

Modern medical advances allow people afflicted with some of these diseases to carry on with mostly normal lives, the availability of abortion has also severely curtailed the spread of genetic malformations in the population. Whereas before abortion of a child, even a diseased one was perceived negatively by society, a grave sin against the purity of the Daxian race, government health campaigns have helped reshape the perception into a positive one, that is abortion of the unhealthy is a public service to the nation.

Racial Paranoia

Daxian predilection for intermarrying with close blood-relatives at certain levels of society for hundreds of years has given rise to the prevalence of inbreeding-derived cases of paranoia and diagnosed schizophrenia in large segments of the population. Colloquially known as the Lurking Sickness due to the reported feelings of people lurking out of sight, it especially affects individuals with a purity gradient above 8, which tend to be people of upper class status. The Lurking Sickness may help explain some of the otherwise inexplicable policies of certain historic emperors, who might otherwise be catalogued as unhinged madmen. The Lurking Sickness is rarely discussed and its effects poorly researched, those affected tend towards secrecy of the condition out of shame and the inherent paranoia imbued by the disease. The known effects include feelings of persecution and of being stalked at all hours of the day, inability to properly sleep, feelings of distrust towards the motivations of other people, assuming others wish harm upon the affected, hallucinations and hearing things that are not there. In extreme cases the affected might choose to take action to liberate from his perceived oppressors and stalkers through violent action. Cases of people going on public rampages wielding makeshift weapons have seen a marked increase especially in the capital. The impact of the Lurking Sickness coupled with Daxian racism has an outsized impact on foreigners, partners of foreign origin might find themselves the victims of hostile plots by their Daxian partners more often.

Religion

Jinya is the Daxian God of Greed, he is typically represented as a clay pot with a sinister grin

Main article: Chongbai

Chongbai (崇拜) also called Worship of the Deep is the ethnic religion of Daxia and is practiced by a majority of the Daxian people. A polytheistic religion, the Chongbai pantheon is composed of dozens of gods and hundreds of minor deities and aspects of nature. Aspects of Chongbai have influenced the cosmovision of Daxians and their sense of special destiny; Daxian racialist theories are deeply enmeshed with Chongbai religious doctrines. The Emperors were considered to be the heads of the Chongbai religious hierarchy thanks to their special connections to the divine, in their absence the Custodian of the Grand Temple of Diqiu and Grand Hierophant is considered the senior most and preeminent religious figure. Out of favor after the end of dynastic rule, Chongbai has begun to see a revival in its popularity during the last two decades as resistance and agitation against 'foreign' religions is on the rise. The number of Chongbai adherents hovers around 350 million people as of 2035.

Chongbai holds that the Underworld is the abode of the gods and the ultimate resting place of the spirits of the dead. Unlike in other religions, in Chongbai heaven is only another layer of the mortal world and holds no special significance. All blessing and spiritual guidance come from communing with the Deep. The Deep is the domain of Diqiu, God of the Underworld, his realm is divided into eight divine layers, which constitute the afterlife.

Chongbai followers do not carry out traditional burials of the dead, Chongbai doctrine dictates that to truly pass on to the afterlife the body must be fully destroyed by being incinerated and the ashes scattered in the wild. Keeping the ashes of the deceased is seen as unorthodox and sinful, an attempt at tying down the spirit to a physical object. For this reason there are no Chongbai cemeteries, people might use the same place to spread ashes for generations and these spots might gain the appellative of 'respected ashery'.

Traditional Pantheon

Beneficent Deities

• Diqiu is the God of the Underworld, creator of mankind and chief deity of the pantheon. Commonly represented as a bearded old man sitting in a cave.
• Tian is the God of the Sky, associated with dreams and prophecy. Depicted as a large cloud with lightning bolts coming out of it.
• Sangu is the God of the Sea, he is depicted as a large crab.
• Ziran is the Goddess of Nature, creator of the Great Garden and guardian of the natural world. In ancient times she was worshipped primarily by the Men of the hedge. She is often depicted as a serpent with feathers.
• Mingje is the God of Fortune, his domain is luck and games of chance; he also has ties to Daxian Numerology.

Ruinous Powers

• Yeenog is the God of Shadows, Decay and Strife, he is also called the Dark King.
• Jinya is the God of Greed, hei is represented by a clay pot with a sinister grinning face
• Abotur is the God of Tremors and Disasters, he responsible for earthquakes, volcano eruptions and other cataclysms. He is commonly represented by a mountain with one eye.

Lesser Religions

Christianity

Church of the East's Shinan chapter; most modern churches tend to follow an architectural style designed to blend with their surroundings.

Christianity has existed in Daxia since the early 17th century when it arrived with three missionaries. Following bitter disputes on canon and a lengthy epistolary debate with Pope Urban VIII, the priest Quintulo Batiato broke off all relations with the Holy See. He declared the throne of Saint Peter was vacant, due to Urban's 'Devil-induced insanity'. He sent letters to the College of Cardinals urging them to convene in session and elect a new pontiff, Church authorities responded in 1635 by branding him a heretic and excommunicating him. Batiato accused the College of Cardinals of 'being in the throes of sin' and decided then to form his own separate church to be the rightful successors of Saint Peter. Batiato's self-styled 'Church of the East' quickly gained adherents over the mainstream churches created by Batiato's fellow missionaries, especially because he had no qualms about playing politics with local governments and engaging in quid pro quo. In short order Batiato managed to get the mainstream Catholic Church outlawed, seizing their parishes for the Church of the East. From then on the Church of the East monopolized Christianity in Daxia and its theological foundations drifted away from mainstream Christianity significantly. The role of the Sarpedon-origin founders was recognized and the first self-styled Popes were also non-Daxians until the Qian dynasty forced a change that instituted ethnic Daxian primacy.

Islam

Daxian Muslims during a street festival

The hundreds of years battle against the forces of the Oduniyyad Caliphate and later its successor states cemented Islam in the collective imagination of Daxians as the religion of the enemy. Despite this ingrained prejudice, the forced coexistence of Daxian and Muslim communities in border areas resulted in mutual understandings and generally smooth social cohabitation. As the influence of Muslim states receded and Daxian imperial power began to assert itself westwards, inevitably Muslim environs began to fall under its control. The relation between Muslim religious structures and figures such as prayer leaders, imams and religious scholars and the new authorities varied between fraught and engaging in quiet resistance to accommodation and acceptance.

Calls for resistance began to be phased out when Daxia's Emperor Canren sent a representative to meet the ulama and offered to extend his protection to the Muslim community provided it recognized his lawful authority over them and that his name be mentioned in the call to prayer. Canren funded several mosques and at least two theological seminars and prescribed that Muslim worship be undisturbed as long as it was confined to the mosque, for these treatment Canren is called 'Friend of God'. Post imperial governments began a period of repression upon organized religion during which most mosques were shuttered in western Daxia and extreme measures such as banning halal establishments and mandating the shortening of beards were commonplace; these repressions were codified in the Law of Superstitious Orders of 1971. The abolishment of this law in the late 2010's has seen a revival of Muslim religious life in the western provinces, even some conversions of ethnic Daxians.

Judaism

Judaism was brought to Daxia by the Zorfashazim Jewish refugees. At the end of the Third Oduniyyad-Qian war, the victorious Emperor Fanqie included among his conditions for peace, a demand to be given the remaining Jews over as subjects. The exact phrasing has survived in historical texts and is as follows: that the cruel Arab who is blind in one eye by zealotry, pass unto me the Jews from his care so that my realm will benefit from the work of their minds, their hands and their hearts. What remained of the Jews in the eastern parts of the caliphate then journeyed to Daxia under the leadership of Shimon of Bardabeh, being settled in then uninhabited lands in the Pachin valley. Approximately seven thousand Jews in total were settled in that first period. The Great Edict of Protection of 1242 was promulgated by Emperor Fanqie of the Qian dynasty to establish over the Zorfashazi Jews, the protection of the state. Jews spent a great deal of time in relative isolation as they did not wish to miscegenate with non-Jews and they were only allowed to work certain professions outside the Parchin valley area. Various Jewish scholars were employed at the imperial court and also as political officials and servants but they were the exception, Zorfashazim society remained mostly closed off until the mid 19th century. The results of the small genetic pool of the Parchin Jews eventually led the community to open itself to limited number of converts, many of whom would eventually start settling in other parts of Daxia.

See Also

• Zhangwo