Physiology While not vital information, the following includes further detail on the race's appearance and biology. Rito have a distinctly avian appearance. They are a two-gender race and reproduce in the typical way. True to their avian nature, the child usually spends several weeks as an egg before hatching into an infant. A Rito ages at a rate comparable to a Hylian, usually reaching a state of adulthood after 15-20, with the maximum expected age being around 100 years. An average adult Rito tends to reach a height of 5-7 feet, but due to their slender frame and bird-like hollow bones, usually weighs only a third of the weight one would expect from a comparably tall Hylian or Gerudo (30 to 100 lbs, or 12 to 45 kg). A Rito’s body is fully feathered, with longer crested feathers on the head. Some Rito may be able to style their crest into less immediately avian appearances, a practice more common among female Rito. Rito colouration can vary widely but tends to remain in shades of brown, grey, white, blue and green; individuals may however have plumage of other hues. It is common for Rito to have body plumage in shades of brown with white crests and wings. Rito who have gained wings display long flight feathers; the arm feathers of those who have not undergone this ritual are much shorter and can sometimes resemble non-avian arms or stubby juvenile wings. Some Fokka (adult flightless Rito) may over time lose all feathers on their arms, exposing the scaly skin beneath. Rito have avian legs and taloned feet. Most Rito have three toes - two forward, one back - although it is not uncommon for individuals to have a fourth toe. The most common eye colour for Rito is red; however shades of yellow, brown, and orange are also common. Rito have prominent beaks; while most individuals have hooked, raptor- or parrot-like beaks, some individuals may have beaks that more closely resemble other birds such as songbirds, finches, waterfowl and even softbills. Regardless of the shape of one’s beak, all Rito share the same basic nutritional needs. Rito diet will preferably consist primarily of fish, or occasionally other game. They may also integrate wild greens, grains, fruits and vegetables that grow near their homes, but generally do not cultivate crops in their settlements. Trade with mainland races has increased variety in the Rito diet, with grains, sweets and baked goods considered a treat. Culture While not vital information, the following includes further detail on the race's habitats and society. For millennia, the center of Rito culture has revolved around their race’s Patron Deity, Valoo. Their homeland of Dragon Roost Island is even named after him. Since time immemorial, the immortal dragon has kept the race’s best interests at heart, and gone to great lengths to protect and guide them. One of the defining features of the Rito race, their flight, is reliant on the feathered dragon and is a cultural milestone. A Rito must personally visit Valoo and be granted one of his magical scales, enabling the growth of their flight feathers - a process known as “gaining one’s wings”. In return for all this, the Rito absolutely revere and worship Valoo, protecting him and providing all that he needs. He is as a god living among them, and any Rito who doesn’t revere Valoo is considered sacrilegious, ungrateful and even evil. It is largely for this reason that any Fokka—flightless Rito who have never visited Valoo—are seen as so low in the society of Dragon Roost. Their apparent unwillingness to visit Valoo is often seen as a terrible sin which cannot be forgiven. Rito often consider Fokka entirely separate from themselves, but the feeling is not always mutual. Most Fokka wish to fly and share Rito values, but either can’t or won’t make the pilgrimage. Rito speak their own language, also known simply as Rito; however, the influence of Valoo led to a period of time where the language that would later be known as Ancient Hylian was spoken on Dragon Roost Island. As the Rito population grew, it became unusual for common Rito to speak casually with Valoo, and so the Rito language re-asserted itself and became the language of Valoo as well. Remnants of both spoken and written Ancient Hylian remain for those who do spend significant time with the feathered dragon deity. Rito who have frequent contact with mainland races are also often able to speak modern Hylian. Although Rito revere Valoo as their deity, common day-to-day tasks on Dragon Roost Island are governed by the Rito Chieftain. Each Chieftain rules for most of his or her life, and is succeeded by one of their children who will in turn serve for most of their life. While the Chieftain is the ultimate authority on most subjects, past Chieftains have created parliaments and other organizations to run most matters. It is very difficult for a Chieftain to have absolute control over organizations established by his ancestors, and thus with each successive generation, the Chieftain becomes slightly less influential in governmental matters. The current Chieftain, Chief Komali, is the son of the man who established the Postal Service. While Rito tradition and history is centred on Dragon Roost Island, the flighted nature of the species means that the Rito diaspora was able to spread far further than other races would typically venture. Most settlements on the mainland did not last due to the logistics of bringing young back to Valoo to gain their wings, but in particular the village of Medli, also known as Rito Village, has long been a mainland home for the Rito people. Located in a lake in the foothills of Rolling Ridge, Medli maintains much of the same culture of Dragon Roost Island, albeit with a separate chieftain. The ongoing exchange as young and adult Rito travel to and from Dragon Roost allows this culture to remain current rather than stagnating in the past. Rito from Medli often have higher priority on warriorship than their brethren from the homeland, largely due to the higher incidence of monsters surrounding the mountains. Rito from Medli highly prize the pilgrimage to Dragon Roost Island as a coming-of-age for their young, the longer and more perilous journey to gain one’s wings is seen as a sign of bravery and belonging. Very few Rito in Medli are flightless. Rito as a whole are known for their sense of duty, and their courage. This perceived trait is bolstered even more by the fact most of the world only sees Rito in the form of Postmen, one of the most dutiful and intense jobs in the Light World. History While not vital information, the following includes further detail on the race's origins and development. Ancient fossils suggest that thousands and thousands of years ago, an ice age tore through the ecosystem of the planet. It is believed this sudden change in climate caused an unnamed aquatic race to divert into a branched evolution, which at the very least created what eventually would become five separate races: Parella, Tokay, Lizalfos, Zora, and the Rito themselves. While the aquatic races kept to the seas, and the reptilian races adapted to jungles, the race that would become known as Rito wandered onto the shores of a mountainous island and evolved into an avian form to meet this ecosystem’s demands. It is on this island that the dragon deity Valoo was first believed to reside. For reasons lost to history and seemingly the deity’s own memory, he became the Patron Deity of this race, though many presume it is because he gave them the gift of flight to match their avian bodies. Even today, thousands and thousands of years later, every single Rito must venture on a pilgrimage to meet Valoo, and gain one of his scales in person to gain their wings. Rito evolution and adaptation seems to have even adapted to the use of these wings, as their bodies have become drastically lighter than any of the other races who share their ancestry, making it easier to fly. At some point well after meeting Valoo, Rito began to write and record their own history. Centuries of extensive records are archived and available to the current chieftain. For numerous generations, the people have lived peacefully here, but were long isolated from the rest of the world. Even with the gift of flight, it was foolish for them to attempt to fly into open oceans. Most Rito lived their entire lives on Dragon Roost Island and among the Great Sea. Within the past few centuries, Rito were beginning to construct larger and more capable sea-faring vessels from which they could make perch. They knew from Valoo that other islands did indeed exist, and were becoming increasingly interested in finding them – but even as their ship technology was rapidly advancing, numerous expeditions found little evidence of Valoo’s proclamations. It was around this time of expansion that, ironically, a foreign ship came upon Dragon Roost. The Gorons of the vessel were abandoning a land they had called Hyrule in search of an island they believed to be to the east of their homeland. It was through this meeting that the Rito finally were able to learn of the vast world which existed in the seas beyond their coasts—from Hyrule, to Labrynna, Holodrom, and other even more exotic locations. A handful of these Gorons wound up staying on Dragon Roost to teach and learn from the isolated Rito tribe. Now that they knew the nearest continent, Hyrule, was west of them a Rito expedition set out for the continent. By making shore near the Hyrulean settlement of Windfall Island of the coast of Hyrule proper, Rito were able to make firsthand contact with Hylians, Zora, and the numerous other friendly races of Hyrule, and eventually the lands beyond it as well. Trade routes were soon set up between Hyrule and Dragon Roost, allowing not only mercantile exchange, but even tourist travel. As positive interactions connected their two races, Hylians became friends with Rito, and vice versa. This even resulted in the founding of a Rito home village on the mainland, known as Medli. Medli began as a trading post that steadily developed as a live-in home for many Rito, and eventually became a year-round roost and a settlement in its own right. Rito and mainlanders were each fascinated with the other, but interactions were not wholly positive. Rito as a whole had become dependent on the ability to fly, and thus dependent upon their deity Valoo. As Rito explored and inhabited lands further and further away from him, some began to lead lives where they could never make the pilgrimage back to their patron. As if to separate themselves from these ‘lower’ and ‘sacrilegious’ people, Rito called them Fokka—“flightless”—and as a whole treated them as second-class citizens. Fokka in time became alienated from ‘proper’ Rito, and the influence of the more populous flyers spread their negative view of Fokka throughout the world, causing them to be seen as low and dirty for no reason other than their inability to fly and inability to make a pilgrimage. By pure happenstance, in their avian exploration of the world beyond their borders, a Rito re-discovered a race of people long believed to be mere myth. The Wind Tribe, an elusive and highly-magical race that had once been Hylian, was rediscovered—of all places—in the sky. They inhabited a single slab of floating earth christened Skyloft, which no purely terrestrial people could reach. The Wind Tribe preferred to remain as isolated as they had been for countless generations, believing themselves to be physically and spiritually above the rest of the world. Perhaps because Rito themselves were people of the wind, they did willingly interact with a few select diplomats of the race—a condition which remains to this day. Shortly after the Wind Tribe was discovered, a century ago to this day, a civil war broke out between Northern Hyrule, Southern Hyrule, and the Gerudo Kingdom. In this conflict, Dragon Roost and indeed most Rito sided squarely with the northern forces. Infamously, Fokka sided almost exclusively with either Southern Hyrule or the Gerudo Kingdom, deepening the rift between Fokka and Rito which continued even in the aftermath of the war. When this war, the Imprisoning War, finally came to a close, the majority of Rito and all of Dragon Roost Island had yet to experience battle directly. Compared to their allies in Hyrule who were still recovering, the Rito of Dragon Roost Island were able to spend the next few decades in complete prosperity, although those living in Medli were more impacted. By order of the chieftain, the Rito of Dragon Roost Island eventually founded and began to maintain an artificial series of structures—platforms—which together became known as the Rito Bridge. These platforms extended in strings both east and west from Dragon Roost Island, another tiny platform was erected in the open sea for a Rito to rest its wings, and possibly rest the night. This “bridge” extended both east and west, effectively connecting Dragon Roost Island both to Windfall Island in the west, and the recently-settled Goron Island in the east. The Rito Bridge forms an essential part of the pilgrimage from Medli to Dragon Roost. While the Rito Bridge was still in progress, a joint effort between the governing Chieftain of Dragon Roost and the current King of Hyrule in Castle Town was proposed—an organized system of carriers to deliver letters or small parcels quickly over long distances, useable by anyone. This system was eventually founded as the Postal Service, headquartered in Dragon Roost, but with offices eventually serving throughout Hyrule and gradually expanding into much of the Great Sea. It begun service almost as soon as the Rito Bridge was functional, consisting of many flying postmen who made use of the new route. As the Hyrulean Kingdom was both downsizing and struggling to recover in the war’s aftermath, most postmen ended up being Rito. Over time, other races would join in the service, with most of them either utilizing Mounts, Loftwings, or Wing Tunics to travel great distances quickly. In the years which followed, the Postal Service expanded to eventually include lands as distant as Isle of Frost, Labrynna, Holodrum, and even Crescent Island. Rito and their culture expanded as well, and the economy of Dragon Roost was entering a golden age of growth. Nearly two decades ago today, Ganon’s War broke out in Southern Hyrule. Unlike the previous conflict, Rito were much more heavily involved, even if they were not frequently on the frontlines. Rito postmen were instrumental in carrying intelligence and orders between allied forces, and their abilities of flight were put to use as scouts and sentries. Most famously, a Rito scout squad directly enabled the mission which recaptured Ruto from Ganon’s forces. Most infamously, many Fokka have once again joined Ganon’s forces against the allies of Dragon Roost. Not all Fokka have joined Ganon, however, though there remains a powerful stigma against them. Many peaceful Fokka rightfully fear the possibility of internment camps for their kind, but, thankfully, this has yet to happen. As the war simmers in the modern day, Rito continue to be instrumental in the allied effort, and are renowned as dutiful postal workers.
