Iviniv

The Iviniv are a nomadic community who can be found throughout the Teardrop Sea Islands and the Great West Sea. Their place of origin, the Iviv Strip, is notable for not being part of an island, which is rare within the Mirror Lakes, especially outside the central regions. The Strip was habitable only because it was so narrow, located between the Teardrop Sea and the Great West Sea.   Iviv has not been habitable since the early Age of Renewal, when it was destroyed by the largest flaming tempest on record, reducing Iviv City and the surrounding area to cinders. Hundreds of thousands successfully fled, either east or west depending on which coast was closer to them. Rather than settling in a new location, the remaining Iviniv became nomadic, modelling their new way of life after a mythical Firstborn called Viviv who gave their former home its name.   Today, the Iviniv people are divided into clans, but roam separately, in year-long patterns of migration. The Iviniv calendar is very unusual and very complicated. Within clans, certain dates are marked according to the birthday of the chief. Patterns of migration, however, are marked according to the individuals' birthdays. Therefore, within each clan, adults whose birthdays are close together tend to roam together. When couples marry, they agree upon a date halfway between their actual birthdays to be the couples' official birthday to mark their year from. (Except if marrying a non-Iviniv, in which case they adopt their Iviniv spouse's birthdate.) For children, their calender is their parents' until they turn of age.   Patterns of migration vary from clan to clan and may adapt over time. Different amounts of time are spent in different locations; the longer they stay, the more the numbers in the group fluctuate. Some locations are more suited to longer stays than others; as topography, landowners and laws change, so do migration patterns.   Each clan functions a little differently, and this also varies over time, due not just to the above factors but also different people with different talents. In the Teardrop Sea Islands, under the land laws (which were designed with protecting nomadic rights in mind) all people must pay rent and taxes to the owner of any land on which they stay overnight. There are certain jobs which Iviniv traditionally developed skills for that could be applied anywhere; it has however become more common for Iviniv young people to leave their clan to attend university, or adapt their personal migration pattern to work in one place for half a year and roam for the other half. Iviniv children are excepted from mandatory school attendance, but are required to sit standard exams in specific years of their life, so parents are supplied with the necessary materials free of charge, and specialist tutors are able to apply their skills on the road.   Iviniv travel with lightweight equipment, own working animals, and are skilled foragers. The rent and taxes they pay to the current landowner also grant them the right to forage and hunt on the land. The lifestyle is often romanticised by outsiders, but it is very demanding and requires skills and knowledge developed through life to thrive in. Despite the difficulties, most Iviniv wouldn't choose to settle in one place permanently.