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Patriarchs of the Nine Ruling Families (And Three Former Ruling Families)
Gonna talk about the Chiss Patriarchs of the Nine Ruling Families and Three Former Ruling Families. Some of these aren't OCs but the designs and personalities I'm giving are all non-canon soooo...
DISCLAIMER: Some personalities are off canon, kay? I'm very aware that they are, this is my take on them.
Nine Ruling Families:
First of: Patriarch Saarke of the Ufsa Family
He is usually the calm and collected one. And he's a traditionalist. He dislikes many things out of tradition. He doesn't have the strongest opinions on his rivalling families, but he treats the other Patriarchs with respect enough.
Next is Patriarch Zififirenc of the Irizi Family
He is the serious patriarch who cares only if protocol is being done correctly and smoothly with proper authorization. He can be quite a traditionalist himself but not as much. He doesn't fool around, hates lollygagging honestly
Next is Patriarch Kloirvursi of the Dasklo Family
He is light-hearted and usually open to new traditions but sticking close to old ones firmly. He is one of the wisest among the Patriarchs and is willing to give advice to them whenever necessary, or if it is in terms of either adding a new tradition. He dislikes breaking an old tradition, however.
Next is Patriarch Rivlex of the Clarr Family
He is an intelligent one, usually the one whose skills are tested in terms of solving the economic crisis of the Ascendancy. Though his skills are great, some still doubt his intelligence, but he shrugs off those doubts and murmurs about him and just decides to help if he wants to.
Next is Patriarch Furfursi or the Chaf Family
He is very vain and mostly cares about his fit in an event or so. He usually organizes the Ascending balls and is always seen to make sure everyone will look gorgeous enough to appear but never out stage him. He always had the tendency to steal the spotlight in any gathering and will immediately be an enemy of anyone who steals his spotlight.
Next is Patriarch Khtrinek of the Plikh Family
He isn't that much into tradition as the others are, though he is still accustomed to specific traditions. He speaks empty from time to time, barely showing emotion while he speaks and is most of the time lurking around planets when he has no duties to fulfil.
Next is Patriarch Ilarga of the Boadil Family
He strictly cares for property damage and worth than traditions. He makes sure that all of the allies of his family have the finest of the finest, and he hates anyone who even attempts to damage any of the properties he sends to his people and his allies. He has a strong dislike for his rival families, however, but says nothing about it usually.
Next is Patriarch Thooraki of the Mitth Family
He is usually a non-traditionalist, though he still respects tradition as much as a he could. He is a little Rebel from the strict traditions that he longed and usually breaks out from. He almost never raises his voice, but when he does, it sends shivers down the spines of his enemies and rivals enough to clamp their mouths shut.
Next is Patriarch Iceesat of the Obbic Family
He is a non-traditionalist to the core and the youngest among the Patriarchs. He constantly breaks his boundaries as a Patriarch and is seen prioritizing to style his hair more than care about his clothes or appearances. He is especially open to alien interactions, much more open and energetic and outgoing than the other Patriarchs
Former In The Ruling Families
This is Patriarch Yokado of the Coduyo Family
He is a traditionalist of his own family and usually keeps to himself. His words are soft and quiet, even as he argued. He is the only Patriarch to never lose his temper (yet) and is by far the only one approachable if the other Patriarchs throw a hissy fit in front of children.
Next is Patriarch Lamiov of the Stybla Family
He is a straight forward one who is always open to new traditions and suggestions. He tends to break some traditions and can be seen usually out of his Mansion rather than staying indoors. He immerses himself with nature at the most, allowing things to happen as they should and only giving little to no comment unless necessary.
Lastly, we have Patriarch Lakencill of the Xodlak Family
He is a bitter, self-centred Chiss who often challenges the opinions of the other Patriarchs. He is the oldest among them, but he doesn't use his knowledge to provide any sorts of wisdom. Instead, he wails and scowls, always claiming that the Xodlak Family should have stayed in the ranks of the Nine Ruling Families.
The weapons officer of the Ratite. Family shame for their involvement in the “Battle of the Three Families” led elder Coduyos to put immense pressure on their enlistment-age Family members. Before joining up, he had wanted to become a textile artisan.
The illustration below was created using @/SOMNGOK's Picrew, which can be found here. Slight color adjustments were made in Photopea.
[Image ID: An illustration made using Picrew. The subject is a young Chiss officer, with dark blue skin and wide solid red eyes. His indigo hair is tied back in a low ponytail, and their bangs hang slightly over his forehead. Their smile is bright. He is wearing a black uniform, a black wrap shirt underneath a plain black robe. The background is a black square with a pale yellow circle behind the subject. End ID.]
I think it’s kind of interesting that Chiss can only call a family emergency if their family is one of the Forty and used to be one of the Ruling Families
Currently done with all of the Nu!Canon novels, OF & SQ yet to go. I'm excluding all words with super obvious Latin roots (ie Aristocra, Syndic, Patriel), though something might have slipped in.
I'm going to make this into a twitter thread but it's long enough to be obnoxious there, so here's my thoughts on what I think is a Chiss sociopolitical event we haven't heard about:
tl;dr a number of coinciding political happenings within the same century all pointing to increased nervousness about the surrounding Chaos indicates that there's some major political event that lead to the Chiss being the way they are, we just don't know what it is yet.
Since Chaos Rising, there's been allusions to assorted changes made between 110 and 50 years prior to the timeline in which the Ascendancy trilogy novels are set up. No reference is made to a specific event which sets this off, but here are the ones I took note of with the approximate time in history they happened:
It's mentioned in Chaos Rising that the Chiss Expansionary Defense Fleet (or at least the relative militarization of this operation) is relatively recent—approximately 50ish years prior to the start of the novel
(Additionally notable is despite the fact that the CDEF is relatively young, they already almost have a rival dynamic to the 9 despite also being influenced by politics—see: Ba'kif, Ar'alani, and Samakro's reactions to dealing with families)
Another event that happened around this time is that between 50 and 100 years prior to the novels, Sky-walkers stopped having Sky-walker caretakers, which leads to some not-great situations for them that I've made another post on. The reason for this is yet unknown and it puzzles all the characters we see express an opinion about this.
We also learned some additional abuses of power toward the Sky-walkers in this book that our dear Thalias is trying to counter, but the point is, the well-being of the Sky-walkers is considered to be far less important than military efficiency.
Finally, I forget exactly which ruling family was replaced when, but I believe the Coduyo were removed from the ruling families 130 years ago, and the Xodlak were removed 50 years prior to the events of the novel (I think somewhere between, the ruling families went from 10 to 9 as well)
So far, we have three significant sociopolitical events all happening within the span of about 100 years: militarization, a major shift in the Chiss' most precious resource (the Sky-walkers), and a major shift in its ruling body. Additionally, with Zhan helpfully saying that the Chiss may (at some point) have been prepared to deal with a threat but the way their culture is now they could not, it's via word of the author that we know a change happened.
This is where my theory gets more into guesswork, but we know that this change likely began politically brewing about 100 years prior to the events of the novels, and the actual changes started happening when the oldest of the cast were probably too young to remember, between that and 50 years ago. I also don't think it was one major event or entity that had attacked the Chiss—otherwise, given Zahn's writing style, we would have heard about it—so my biggest suspicion is that there was a fear of a more vaguely defined threat/entity.
I think that the changes brought on by this set of "cold" political fears would have been subtle enough for it to barely be noted among Chiss, even those who study war or history, since it's not an outright enemy to study and obliterate. Also, we know Chiss culture isn't exactly self-critical, so I don't think any differing points of view would be taught in their schools.
A "cold" threat also lines up with increased military presence, and a focus on efficiency (narrowing down the number of ruling families, making the training of a Sky-walker easier).
Point is, I think that something did happen, we just haven't heard about it yet and we will soon since the rifts created by this cultural change will lead to the Chiss' vulnerability against the Grysk and possible downfall.