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Many birrin, being pleasurably susceptible to many of the psychoactive defence compounds found in their planets’ plants, have developed complex rituals around recreational drug use.
The practices are not universally accepted, and many societies have strict controls to reduce their economic impacts. Others embrace them to such an extent that they have become an essential part of the daily ritual, as is the case with the Southern Chey nations: Before and after work many Chey stop at their local smoking bars to partake in a variety of substances both inhaled and ingested. As community focal points, smoking houses are also places for social interactions, and as a way to prepare for, or wind down from, the days’ pressures.
Smoking houses have a long history, this example predating the widespread collapse of birrin society millennia ago. Restored by wealthy locals as civilisation recovered, the interior was painted a calming blue to lend an air of tranquillity. To avoid the smoke damaging their garments, many regulars wear blue smoking suits infused with years of volatile chemical scents.
These ruins represent the height of Birrin pre-industrial engineering, and continue to impress tourists from more recent, technologically complex societies today.
Part city and part fortress, this gate was built to defend one of the few entrances to a lush, steep walled floatforest valley beyond, in which a society of several million inhabitants flourished for centuries.
Initially a natural stone monolith with only a narrow passageway dividing it, generations of craftspeople and slaves hammered away at the stone to perfect it into its current form, before finally coating it with a resin/sand mixture to protect it from further natural erosion.
The guardian statues warned foreign armies and traders of the power and capabilities of the valley people, who maintained a massive standing army at all times, based in a garrisons built into the gate walls.
Too heavy to themselves be created from stone, the guardian statues were built from the interlaced and cemented trunks and roots of local float-forest and other imported plants. Treated with resin to prevent decay, this meshwork was then coated in the same substance used to smooth the wall standing behind them.
Ultimately, the civilisation responsible was conquered by a society that had developed steam powered warships, and who attacked from one of the seaward entrances of the valley.
Left to ruin by the conquerors for several centuries, it is now of prime interest to archaeologists attempting to reconstruct the history of the valley society.
Seen here, a small camp of nomadic locals pitch tents in the evening glow of the great gate.
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