Gûntăria

Gûntăria is a larger planet with a quite thick rocky crust that is particularly dense with precious metals and jewels. Its largest industry is mining, but a lot of the mined resources are used by the natives, who have a flair for giant cities with lots of decoration. Still, the mining is so extensive that even with the heavy use on-planet, they are still a major exporter on the galactic market.

The primary civilization on the planet is the Gûntărian dwarves. They are about 1.5 m tall, more slender than is typically associated with "dwarf"-type beings, and have dark skin and hair, with more pointy teeth than most humanoids. They are renowned for their magnificent cities both in their extravagant ornamentation as well as their incorporation with natural geologic features. For instance, they have a keep that is built on a hilltop entirely out of red granite. Their greatest city is Aren-arn'rák, or The City of White Stone. It is built into the side of a giant white mountain; on the slopes are giant terraces mostly for farming and residential areas, and at the top is an 8 km-radius dome carved out of the mountaintop itself. The central thoroughfare is over a kilometer wide, with many great arches spanning the entire width. At the city center is a solid gold statue 1450 m tall of a native eagle-like bird. Even down to smaller homes on the edges of any Gûntărian city, building materials are metal and stone, anything soft is leather, fur, or silk, and an arrangement of precious metal or gemstones can be found in every room. The dwarves consider plant matter to be uncivilized, and it is rare to see any dirt, wood, or leaf in their well-kept cities. Their diet is carnivorous, their art is of heroes and not of nature, their writing is on stone or animal hide rather than paper, their heat comes from geothermal systems or radioactive rocks, they more often cure meats than cook them, and their light comes from windows and mirrors for all but their deepest mines and most majestic halls, where elaborate networks of pipes feed torches with natural gas.

There is, however, one nation of dwarves that defies this aversion to plants. They call themselves Aren-Bor, the City Aflame. According to Aren-Boric mythology, Gûntărian dwarves were originally forest-dwellers whom the great Spirit gifted with fire, but upon their discovery of gold and diamonds they converted their society to mining and forgot their skill or need for fire. They believe dwarves' life-force is sustained by fire, and that therefore the rest of their civilization is in danger of deterioration due to the dwindling amount of actual fire present in most cities. It's hard to prove this since most dwarves do encounter flames on their regular visits to the great halls and monuments, but it must also be said that these lamps are quite meager in comparison to the bonfires and torches of Aren-Boric culture, and the Aren-Bor boast many communities thriving in the wild where the lifestyles of cities would be impossible. This is not to say the Aren-Bor are a wilderness people; most of them live in communities near or even within large cities, but in such cases they are little more than dissenting minorities.

Gûntăria is also home to the Earthen, which are native neither to Earth nor Gûntăria, but were the result of an experiment by Dios, which he considered a failure. The Earthen are sentient piles of sand, naturally able to shape-shift and whose bodies are made up of constantly shifting and churning sand, which has an almost hypnotic effect. They are friendly enough with the Gûntărian dwarves, and as such will usually adopt a humanoid form around any organic life. Since the Gûntărian dwarves' mining craft is so advanced, the Earthen are of little help to them in productivity, and since the Earthen have little need for anything the dwarves have to trade, they usually content themselves with wandering in nomadic groups. Normally disinterested in the affairs of other worlds, they did once make the acquaintance of Lithionator, and a group of Earthen traveled off-world with him to act as a personal strike team, specializing in stealth missions in other sandy environments.