Uriel

The settlers who were stranded after the terraforming failure were forced underground by the harsh surface conditions. The temperature being slightly warmer near the core, the families spent decades carving out a meager existence in dark and densely packed caves. The struggle for resources lead to significant in-fighting during those first years and resulted in a society built on strong family ties with dividing lines clearly drawn based on which warren you lived in. One of these warren families, known as the Echo, attributed their strength of faith to their group’s survival. The planet’s name is said to come from their often repeated saying that, “in the darkness of the tunnels, God is my light.”

As difficult as life on Uriel has been, it got significantly worse in the 27th century when one of the warrens introduced the chestnut beetle to the world as a farmable food source. It worked well at first, with their seventy year dormant, six months active cycle, and their ability to eat almost anything making them easy to care for. However, that did not last when the inhabitants realized that the insects had found a way to survive on the surface and were spreading to other warrens. What started as a welcome addition to the locals’ diet quickly turned into a serious pest, with the beetle population growing into the millions. Now like clockwork, the beetles emerge every seventy years and sweep across the planet, devouring anything they can. Most of the warrens have developed methods to help seal up the tunnels during chestnut season, but the invasive species has seriously hampered any attempts to settle the surface. In recent years several above-ground communities have sprung up, but with the chestnut threat looming they have kept relatively small. Some consider this fortunate, as the casualties from the recent Vanduul attack might have been much worse if it wasn’t for the chestnut beetle keeping the population below ground.