The World of Tiesha
By Bree Heidenburg
King Virat
IV currently rules the world of Tiesha, consequently
making his son, Prince Keon, the heir to thrown.
Otherwise, the man lucky enough to marry his daughter, Princess Hana, would be next in line. Queen Eden, mother of Keon and Hana, passed away several
years ago. The king's three advisors are the three high priestess leaders of
the church. They oversee the masses on the other three continents of the world
while the king remains in the central location that is Maharat.
The King holds absolute and supreme
power over the people, and can overrule the priestess at any time. However,
there is almost no record of this ever being done. Most of the people follow
the priestesses. Generally speaking, the army dislikes the church (because they
don't like that the church has control over the king) and the rest of the
population lives for it. There are of course, the exceptions.
The line of succession for the
king is usually simple, in that the male relative closest to the King at the
time of his death inherits the throne. If there are no directly related living
male relatives then the husband of the closest female blood relative will
become king. In the horribly unusual case that there is neither a living male
nor female relative the new king is elected by the high priestesses and the
lords of the lands.
The Priestesses are elected
officials of the church, selected by the lesser-ranked people of the church
based upon how the girls serve their people, God and country. Of course, the
King oversees the decisions of high priestesses. Shockingly, the King has never
appeared to disagree with the church.
The priestesses and king all
gather on Maharat once a year to celebrate the exodus
of the people of the ancient civilization of Sorelia,
led by the savior, the late, King Brolen the first.
Though mainly for the ritualistic and spiritual requirements of the people,
this visit is also used for the king to meet personally with the overseers of
the other continents.
As far as the people of the land
are concerned, the king is in charge of the laws and of the army, navy, and
military forces. Also, the king oversees and funds the scientific research and
all technological advances of the times. Most trials (aside from those of
treason and the like) are held in courts judged by lords or nobles appointed by
the king. The king rules on the cases of treason, sabotage etc. Legally, the
church has little or no control over any governmental issues, such as the laws,
however, the people, kings included, tend to follow the teachings of the high
priestess (at least to some degree) and therefore most of the laws reflect the
views of the church.
Finally, should a king not
fulfill his duties, there is no way to overrule his authority aside from the
obvious conquest/assassination route. The priestesses, on the other hand, can
be impeached by either the other 2 priestesses or the lesser-ranked members of
the church. They cannot, however, be dismissed by the king as they are elected
officials.
This brings us to the religion
of Tiesha, Shantinism, which
is very closely tied to its politics. The three elected high priestesses serve
as the king's advisors as well as the leaders of the church. Being elected
officials the priestess advise the king in the wants and needs, spiritually and
socially, or the people.
The beliefs of the church are
simple. A god and a goddess, Devean
and Andecia, created mankind to live as they would on
the world of Tiesha. This is not, however, the
main focus of the religion. The church and religion mainly worship humanity,
while continuing to serve the gods, as they should. Essentially, the church
insists upon the respect of Devean and Andecia and of the world of Tiesha.
However, the church fully backs scientific research and reaching the
"intended potential of humanity".
The Shanti
code of ethics is, to put it simply a "don't know don't care" sort of
code. The church promotes intelligence, work ethic etc. in the people of Tiesha and frowns upon anything that would hinder or
prevent one from reaching one's potential. Basic rules of this, you cannot do
anything that would prevent someone else from achieving their potential. Example, no killing. There is no real book or scripture that
lists the code or beliefs, but it is preached every fourth day of the week (the
church found that productivity increased when a break was given in the middle
of the week, not that it matters anymore since there is no weekend and thus the
fourth day has become the weekend).
The laws of the world generally
tend to follow the code of the church, remembering that the priestesses advise
the king and always have. So, should you in anyway go against the ethics of the
church, you would be referred to either one of the priestess or the king
himself (depending on which continent you live on) and they would punish you
according. Typically, if you have done something wrong you are put to work,
generally under the church or the king, and used to help humanity reach its
intended potential.
In general, no one seems to
question the church, as it does work for the betterment of humankind. Of
course, there are groups of people that dislike the church,
they tend to keep to themselves about it to avoid punishment under the
"hindering the potential of others" principal. However, the ones that
do not like the way the church seemingly controls everything tend to join the
army (practically the only thing under command only from the king).
The society of Tiesha is very smart, very intelligent. During the day,
everyone above working age (25 years old) is working in some way shape or form.
Children, everyone below 25 and above the age of 3, are in school. General
schooling ends at age 15 and specialized schooling begins thereafter. Babies
from age zero to three stay home with their mothers**, who get the three years
off of work, paid, and their jobs is secure for when they return. Because of
this, generally, having more than 2 children, or
another child while the first is still a baby is highly frowned upon. Highly
frowned upon meaning it's legal, but no one does it...
well save those that never completed schooling.
On Tiesha,
you do not want to be some one that doesn't complete schooling. Those people
are the petty workers, looked down upon and generally ignored by the rest of
the population. This is because they are essentially useless to society.
Everything "easy" is done by computers or machines. There is,
however, a sort of welfare for these people, paid for by the king (which is
really, of course, tax money). No one is happy about this tax, but the church
insists that perhaps that is his or her intended potential.
Now, based on all said
previously, one can assume that no one takes sick days or vacations, no one choose not to work, and everyone puts a high value on
intelligence. Complaining, whining, etc. is nearly unheard of. The workweek is
6 days with the seventh being off for church service. And everyone (with the
exception of those in the armed forces) get a week off for Brolen
(the celebration of the exodus of the people of the ancient civilization of Sorelia, led by the savior King Brolen
the first).
So, the act of people
interacting with other people is generally intelligent production conversation.
This does not mean there is no fun anywhere. After the workday is over people
relax and give their brains a rest. Plays, singing etc. and of course dinner
are common after work activities. But basically, as long as you aren't
hindering your potential or anyone else's you can do whatever you want.
Therefore, anything in excess, drinking etc. isn't generally done.
This brings me to how the people
interact with the king. The king is respected by the people, who will bow and
remain standing in the king's presence unless told otherwise. Most people have
not seen the king and see no reason to do so. The king enforces the laws, and
since most educated intelligent people don't break the laws... well... they
don't need to worry about the king.
Now, people and the priestesses
are very different, at least in church circumstances. Recall, the priestesses
are also the law enforcers on the other three continents. That aspect aside,
(because educated intelligent people don't break the laws) every Wednesday, the
people, well at least most people, are at the church. Services are usually
given by a head priest or priestess for that particular location. Everyone
sits, the person giving the service included and everything is very relaxing
and informal. Now most people have seen one of the high priestesses personally,
but it's more of a mentor advisor type of setting, also very informal, despite
the immense respect for the priestesses.
The uneducated people, as said
before, are generally ignored by the other people. The king and the
priestesses, however, tend to pay close attention to them. The king sees them
as the troublemakers or the ones that break the laws. This does not mean they
are murders or thieves, thought some of them are. But, recall that the goals of
the church and likewise the laws are to reach the intended potential of
humanity, and since they are not educated enough to work they are more likely
to do something that would hinder the efficiency of others. The army and the
king have little tolerance for this and these people have frequently personally
seen the military or the king.
The priestesses likewise know of
these people because they are frequently requesting audience. In a world like Tiesha, these people have literally nothing to do. So, they
go to the church and the priests find something productive for them to do. This
working for the church is a way to avoid punishment under the law (which was
usually some type of work anyways).
The economic system of Tiesha is capitalist, but only if you had to classify it as
something. Due to the philosophy of reaching humanity's intended potential,
what we would perceive as lower class jobs (Store clerks... etc.) are all done
by computers, entirely automated. Because of this the government... well a team
of economics paid for by the government set the prices for most good based on
average income and the necessity of the item.
Money is of course credited by
the government and paid to people generally in the form and sheet of metal
imprinted with government signature of an alloy impossible to duplicate outside
of a laboratory and it is, of course, illegal for any laboratory to create such
bills. The king backs the money with the world's supply of precious metals.
As you can imagine, given the
main industry of the world as technology most of the world's money comes from
exporting such technology (because lets face it what would one man need with an
abundance of computers or things run by computers) to other planets.
The jobs of Tiesha
are fairly similarly paid, mainly because they are fairly similar jobs. They
all are engineers and scientists of some form. Everyone does research in his or
her field as well as practice. Practice to reach the
potential of the world itself and research, likewise, to reach the potential of
the science and combining those things, humanity itself. Patents are
irrelevant to a society that desires to expand humanities potential and
therefore inventing something leads to some sort of reward from the king,
usually money, and perhaps your name is being recorded as the first to make
such an item.
Women are treated as
intellectual equals to men and participate in the economy just as much. While
they do take the 3 years off work for child raising this is expected and half
of the time women will insist to work from home, if only so they are not bored.
While there is a lot of
synthetic food, made by chemists and nutritionist generally, there are also a
few farms. Not typical farms though. Farming is done entirely by machine,
supervised by a scientist with programming knowledge, who sees to it that the
computers/robots do exactly what is necessary to optimize the crop production
and quality.
So, life on Tiesha
is very simple, work as much as you can, and go to church every fourth day of
the week. Shopping is done at night along with singing dancing etc. for fun.
**Mothers also mean wives. Marriage is typical in this society at
around the age of 30.
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