Cultural Pillars pt2: Hunting - Labor

People trading Status and Goods in the Grooming Place of Food and Flower.

HUNTING

• It is widely believed that this world was once a heavenly paradise for hunters and predators, and that the gods influenced it as so.
• Dragon Wives are seen as the most saintly and skilled hunters, as they hunt Armageddon itself in the form of dragons.
• The gods have created hunting zones inside the city. Huge city squares are miniature forests filled with preserved and strange creatures. These are called Flower Graves, as the flower is a symbol of war, death, and the hunt.
• During certain seasons and months, different "Lodges of Men" are allowed to hunt.
• Many hunt to relieve stress or to forget that they are living in the end of the world. Others do so because they believe it is their sacred duty.
• Those who hunt the most effectively and bring back the greatest game are rewarded with social status, currency, and audiences with the gods.
• Everything that is hunted is eaten and used. The scraps of their souls are drawn back to the Flower Forest where the creatures are reborn, and the hunts begin again.
• Sometimes, men are hunted in the Flower Graves. Criminals are thrown into their, unarmed and naked, and Execution-Hunters track them and slaughter them. Criminal hearts are offered to the Gods to empower them.
• Every Flower Grave is different. There is the Garden of Bells, filled with birds whose flights disturb the countless obsidian bells; there is the Fathomless Lake, which digs deep into the world where any manner of aquatic creature can be hunted; there are even forests far bigger on the inside than on the outside where the trees are bamboo and where tigers hunt you.
• Flower Graves contain old treasures in them. They are created from taking pieces of the Heaven that were not destroyed and importing them into the city. Some may adventure into Flower Graves and come out richer then they could have imagined.

LABOR

• All souls must work to keep the city alive. This is the first law of the City, and the most important one too.
• There are many professions, but they all fall under categories: Farmers, Maintainers, Gatherers, Artists, Priesthood, and Hunters.
• Farmers are, naturally, the most ubiquitous. They farm on floating chinampas, or crop beds that float on the great lake that surrounds and flows under the City of the Dragon Wives. Seasons are strange now, and the Gods dictate when to plant and when to harvest.
• There are two groups of Maintainers. One group are Engineers who ensure the Gate Walls are secured and the city is not falling to pieces. The other group watches over and keeps control over the crops and other supplies needed to fuel the city.
• Gatherers are, as mentioned in other sections, those who travel out into the Heaven Bless'd & Burned and return with treasures and supplies.
• Artists, as mentioned above, are the communicators, the scribes, and half-priests of the City.
• The Priesthood includes sacrificing one's self to become a Handless Priest, assisting the Dragon Wives, or giving one's self to the gods to serve as their servants. It is very respected, but also tragic, as religious life is filled with bloodletting and agony.
• Hunters are two fold. You are either a Dragon Wife, or you create the weapons, armors, and other pieces of equipment needed for both their hunts into Heaven and the people's hunts into  Flower Graves. 
• There is no real currency here. One is rewarded either in object (nice hunting equipment, large amounts of supplies) or in social status. Social status is measured by feathers. The more feathers you have (up to 40), the bigger an "allowance" you have for food, weapons, clothing, luxury goods, etc.
• The average worker never grows above 10-15 feathers. The rich have 35+.
• There are markets across the city that offer different goods. A market is known simply as "the Grooming Place," is reference to the feathers worn. Different Grooming Places have slightly different names, such as "the Red-Feathered Grooming Place," (red light district) or "the Grooming Place of Loose Skin & Hurt Bones" (medicine & apothecaries).