Ysau

Overview

The Ysau are a species native to the Large Magellanic Cloud, a galaxy on the fringes of the Milky Way in the Local Group. They are tall humanoids with eyestalks, and claws that possess extendable tendrils in place of hands. They are able to condense water vapor from the atmosphere naturally, and can also store water to keep them alive for three terran weeks. The species can be found in many places throughout the universe, but the majority live in the Large Magellanic cloud, with smaller populations in the Small Magellanic Cloud and Milky Way.

Biology

As previously stated, the Ysau possess claws and tendrils in place of hands, and eyestalks in place of eyes. The species also possesses three lungs, and their lungs serve a special secondary purpose.

Over half of their homeworld, Ysi's, atmosphere, is made up of water vapor. It's what the Ysau breathe. However, the lungs also feed some of this vapor into a specialized organ. Roughly translated from Ysau, it is the Condayrar. The Condayrar is an organ within the body that is kept insulated from the rest of the internal organs so that it can maintain a much lower temperature. It uses this temperature to condense water vapor back into liquid water, a necessity for life on Ysi. The temperature is regularly above 150 degrees Celsius, and lifeforms need large amounts of water to keep themselves alive in the broiling heat. This is also why the Ysau possess a large storage bladder for water that can hold enough liquid to keep the individual alive for about three terran weeks on their homeworld, or more than two months on a more temperate world.

History

The Ysau first emerged as small groups of hunter gatherers, using the sharp points of their claws to tap into the bark of massive alien trees on their homeworld, so that they could drain water from them. They hunted other prey animals and set ambushes for larger predators. For many years, their communities were nomadic and small.

by 10,000 BC, the first Ysau cities had begun to form. They subsisted off domesticated animals and tightly packed groves of water-catching trees, supplemented by analogues to terran grain. Not long after this point the first kingdoms arose and began to war with one another. For about 4000 years the Ysau were split and disunified, warring with other small nations. Technological progress was slow, and a certain king Ysander saw his people wasting their potential.

Ysander was a good king. He had encouraged technological growth, especially related to how the Ysau might expand into the deserts of their homeworld. Over the course of fifty years, he conquered an entire forest of Ysi, a feat that had only been achieved four times in Ysi history. Then he did what some thought mad. He set about building a palace in the desert as a waypoint for an invasion of another forest. Of the four empires that had managed to rule a forest before Ysander's, one had fallen to violent rebellion, and three had slowly disintegrated after failing to invade a second forest. However, Ysander had a simple yet brilliant plan. Using his new desert survival technology, he would build a city in the desert as a supply base and safe point to retreat for his armies. Combined with a site that sat upon a large underwater ocean, Ysander had the prefect recipe for a booming city. Ysander sat quietly building up that city for sixty years, making sure he did not leave the rest of his empire to wither. Once it had become an unassailable fortress, e set out and invaded another forest.

This endeavor would take Ysander eighty years. He only lived to see his conquests for six years after he'd won them. But the empire he'd established would go on to conquer the planet, and even over a hundred thousand years later, it was still an heir of Ysander who ruled over all Ysau.

The empire Ysander formed would eventually, around year zero, reach rudimentary space flight, and set up colonies only a century later. It would come to be known as the Interstellar Systems of Ysau, and it would survive all the way until the end of the First Magellanic War, over 30,000 years.