[@Duck55223] or [@keyguyperson] or [@ophidian], here are the derpy spacejellyfish as promised.

[hider=The Ivrosi Remnant]
[b]Name of nation:[/b] The Ivrosi Remnant

[b]Species:[/b] [hider=Puffsprites]
[hider=big image feat. Aria’s inability to draw!] [img]https://images.discordapp.net/.eJwVzEEOhCAMAMC_8ACqaQX0NwQJkogltJ6Mf1_3Ood5zD1Os5lDtcsGsFdJPHYryiOWbAtzOXPsVWziBlE1pqPlSwVwJjcHCpPHlQI6Wj_yGAjdB4tfyCFBbf-mX8W8P8F2IeQ.5HNVQ8Doap3A0jP-aI4tAjxL6xE?width=573&height=430[/img][/hider]
Puffsprites are small photosynthetic organisms that vaguely resemble jellyfish. The average sprite’s cartilaginous body “pod” is 1 to 1.5 cm at its biggest dimension, though their mantles can be up to 10 cm in diameter, and elder sprites can be up to five times these dimensions. The radially-symmetrical sprites have numerous light receptors on their bodies – four large receptors which process a wide range of the electromagnetic spectrum. They likely started out as eyes though no one knows for certain.

Across the rest of their pear-shaped bodies are smaller receptors which have high concentrations of the photosynthetic cyanobacteria which provides the puffsprite with all the energy they need.

A puffsprite’s mantle is probably its most valuable feature. Its surface area will be massive as compared to the rest of the sprite’s body. This translucent mantle serves many functions – as part of the “sail” that the colony constructs to travel, as a net to catch food, and to some degree as a social symbol of success (for the most “successful” puffsprites will likely harvest the most particles and will therefore have the most food, and so the biggest mantles over time. The mantle is a highly sensitive sensory organ that has peculiar reactions depending on what compound it comes into contact with, effectively allowing puffsprites to, by touch, identify materials they’ve come into contact with. It is also very sensitive to any sort of “vibration” or very-low-frequency electromagnetic pulse. The mantle is made of many fused layers of a hydrocarbon lattice that is actually highly stable – while it will “melt” and eventually combust, it would more than likely take an absurdly high temperature thanks to the trace elements that are woven into the lattices as individual puffsprites collect them.

Puffsprites reproduce asexually. They will grow a spore pod from the long hollow antenna sprouting from their “top”, which will develop for some period of time before growing its own mantle and detaching as a genetically identical sprite. 

The internal anatomy of a puffsprite is somewhat confusing. The vast majority of their cartilaginous body cavity is taken up by a complex neural net, which can hold a shocking amount of information given its tightly packed fractal structure. A small portion of the “bottom” of their body is reserved for the digestive organs that break apart small bits of space dust into useable molecules.

Most notable of a puffsprite’s external anatomy are the two barbed feelers sprouting out of its top. These feelers are used between two puffsprites to transmit information, thought, and memory – puffsprites have perfect memories (of the few senses they have – their extensive “sight” of the electromagnetic spectrum, and highly sensitized touch, but they have no other senses to speak of) and can transmit this information between each other. They do not have a “language” but have stolen concepts of them from the various civilizations they’ve encountered over the years. In the past these antennae have been used to transmit memory and thought to and from other species that the puffsprites have encountered.

The final distinctive characteristic of a puffsprite is the four tentacles sprouting from their base, close to their mouthparts. These are their “arms” that are used to interlock with the rest of the colony. Each of the spade-like tips is slightly sticky and can be used to pick up any bits of food that may have gotten stuck in ones’ mantle, and deposit them into the mouthparts.

It should be noted that puffsprites do not seem to die of old age – they do not seem to die unless they are physically torn apart. It should also be noted that while all puffsprites share that instant touch-communication, the elders have a very limited hivemind – they can communicate to one another across the width of the colony, and can also communicate one-way with the other sprites in the colony.
[/hider]
[b]Description of government:[/b] The government is entirely communal, and overseen by the handful of elders – Everything must be done for the good of the colony. It has to be, with the scarce resources of deep space being all that they have. You must obey the commands of the elders – or be torn mantle from tentacle and have your carbon chains consumed again to fuel the growth of the masses. Existence is a privilege, not a right.

[b]Description of military:[/b] Nonexistent. Unless you’d call a swarm of a billion spacefaring jellyfish any sort of military power.

[b]Technological Overview:[/b] In terms of what they actually possess? Nonexistent. They do, however, hold the memories of the great cities of the Ivrosi – the octopus-like race that destroyed their homeland. They remember the great cities and the great war machines and the battleships and they even remember watching them be built – they remember how they went together. They stole the Ivrosi memories of how all of these devices were assembled. But given that they have neither the resources, nor the opposable appendages, to make such constructions, such technology remains a distant memory for the moment.

[b]Cultural Overview:[/b] The Remnant is foundationally built on fear and revenge. Fear of planet-killers like the races that warred themselves to extinction in their home system, and revenge for the destruction of their idyllic sanctuary (though logically speaking, who is there to exact revenge against? All the perpetrators are dead. Nonetheless, logic seldom comes to their minds when speaking of their beloved, forgotten homeland.) Above all, however, the Remnant want to find a peaceful planet that they can colonize as their own, so that they can begin again and hopefully recreate the paradise that they once had.

Memory is sacred above all to the puffsprites. The memories of their homeworld, of what they witnessed, are reverently passed around the population from the elders. No one knows how old the elders are – but some of them are rumored to have been in the colony since the original exodus. They have seen many civilizations in all phases and treasure the memories of all of them.

In more concrete terms – the community is everything. The newest sprites are fostered and nurtured and fed so that they can take their place in the sail sooner, and the oldest sprites are revered for what they remember and what they teach (for they hold the language and knowledge of several cultures that have been encountered over the millennia). This being said, the community is also brutal. If a sprite does not do their part, or is selfish (and this selfishness can range as anything from depriving another of food to being disrespectful to an elder or violent against any other) they are torn tentacle from mantle, their organic matter resorbed and used to create new members of the colony. 

[b]History:[/b] [hider=Wall of text history, sorrynotsorry]The planet Ivrosa was an idyllic paradise – in a stable orbit with almost no wobble, it was continuously a balmy 67 degrees fahrenheit with no wind and bright sunlight – it was summer all the time. Diverse flora and fauna flourished all across its many biomes. Its atmosphere was exceptionally dense, humid, and rich in oxygen and water vapor.

With this elysian environment, sapient life had taken root and many diverse cultures began to bloom. Foremost among them were the flying octopus-like creatures who, being the first to develop language, had the honor of naming the planet after themselves. Ivrosa.

The Ivrosan people quickly developed, outcompeting many others. Their technological development soon outpaced their environmental conservation efforts. Massive factories dumped pollutants into the once-fertile oceans, industrial logging felled millions of trees. Acid rain began to fall and their planet began to warm, the oceans drying up and the thick, dense atmosphere thinning and being filled with dangerous levels of toxic compounds. Within two thousand years the planet was a toxic wasteland.

The Ivrosi redoubled their space industry, determined to get their people off of their planet. They’d thoroughly probed the rest of their system and had found that the planet closest to them, the one they named Pefspera, was almost identical in terms of gravity and climate – but it was already inhabited by another species.

Rather than strike diplomatic negotiations they were going to go in guns blazing and forcibly take the planet.

It is at this point that puffsprites become relevant to the history. These creatures (who were at this point known by another name entirely) had been more or less left to their own devices. After all, how much damage could these photosynthetic pollen-eating fluffballs possibly cause?

Their council of elders hatched a plan. Several of them, those who possessed all the collective knowledge of their people, would stow away aboard the Ivrosi ships to make a new life for themselves – and their species – on Pefspera.

When the Ivrosi arrived on Pefspera, they were greeted by a people who were nearly as technologically advanced as they were, but were far wiser. The Pefsperans were all for peace negotiations, even being willing to offer their world’s resources in rebuilding Ivrosa. The Ivrosi did not want to hear it and began a systematic slaughter of the Pefsperans…. Who in turn directed their guns at the Ivrosi. It was an absolutely devastating war that lasted less than two months and ended with both civilizations burned to ash on a ruined, radioactive planet.

And the puffsprites? They adapted, as they always had. One crippled Ivrosi deserter ship had managed to launch and get off of Pefspera before the nukes went off, a few hundred puffsprites clinging to the sides, and to each other, under the heat shielding. It was a huge shock to realize they had made it to space and not died…. And at that point the group of them made a collective decision to detach and float, together, wherever the lack of gravity would take them. They needed a better home than the wasteland that their home system had become.

As they traveled, they became fixated on – fascinated with – their memories as the only means of entertainment to split up the murky, monotonous black. They became downright fanatical, deciding to name themselves “The Ivrosi Remnant” after their homeworld, and call their species “Pefspera” after the world that was wrongly destroyed. They took a vow that, while they would share the knowledge of these civilizations, they would not ever share the details of any of the technology that led to the demise of their worlds – only the technology that had been created in the futile effort to save the ecosystem. Perhaps another species on a planet that was not as far gone would find the information beneficial.

This was well over a hundred millennia ago. Over this time the colony has grown from a few hundred, to a few hundred thousand, to what is now hovering somewhere around a billion members. Now they have sufficient number, and therefore surface area, for their combined mantles to serve as a sort of sail, harvesting the solar wind and gradually accelerating the colony in the direction they’ve chosen. They have since been traversing the galaxy, sensing for a stable system with an ideal planet for them to settle.

Over the millennia they have met many infant civilizations and several more well-developed ones. Many have been curious – they have offered an exchange of information, showing all they know of the culture of the Pefsperans and Ivrosi, of what happened to their homeworld, in exchange for knowledge of the language and culture and history of these other races. Never is the technology of the Ivrosi discussed in detail, the puffsprites living by their promise. Perhaps over time the sharpness of the memories have dulled – the puffsprites’ new species name has been corrupted into something that was universally easy on the tongue.

In addition to the many curious civilizations there have been many hostile ones. One encounter about eight thousand years ago with a particularly warlike race resulted in the colony being absolutely decimated and many of the elders killed. But they, and their memories, still endure.[/hider]

[b]Other:[/b]  N/A[/hider]