40K System - Matastelsel

Bawahayat - Ag World suffering from racial tensions

The only planet of any note in Matastelsel is Bawahayat and it's the sole planet that is life-sustaining, despite it's inhospitable atmosphere. With a frozen and airless surface covered in with large crystalline structures. These are the equivalent of photosynthetic organisms, but they pump oxygen into the soil and not the air. This has allowed the evolution of massive fungi-worms, slowly crawling through the tunnels and chasms below the permafrost.

The planet is in an uproar because of racial and religious tensions between the surface (Mataknecht) and underground dwellers (Gelapknecht). The Mataknecht man the few spaceports and crystal-harvesting operations, they live in sealed and buried domes under the machinery and so see light more frequently. They tend to be the Emperor's Divine Specter Sect like those on Hiveworld Chiron.

Gelapknecht traditionally harvest and process the enormous fungi-worms into high-quality tallow (candles) and lower-quality protein-starches (food). They live in the dark tunnel-cities and don't use light beyond the faint glows of machinery, fire and bioluminescent. They have a few cults about the Emperor being the source of light and the Emperor speaking not just for or through Humanity but the worms as well.

This is maybe within the tolerances of the Ecclesiarchy/Adeptus Ministorum for the Imperial Cult, though some of the Mataknecht think the later may need to be checked. As the Emporer speaks for the holy human form and only at a stretch should cover terran animals, let alone xenos. An attempt to request a synod on the matter from Vito has gone nowhere, due to more important matters.

To forestall recruitment tithes for Warworld Ajax. The governor (Mataknecht) commissioned a genetics report that the Gelapknecht may be progressing into a Nightsider abhuman type and should therefore be exempt.

This started the riots. The Gelapknecht have long been told the tallow they make is for the benefit of humanity and it's their duty to labour in the dark. Now they demand they also get a share of the candle shipments to forestall their degradation. This also fuels the preexisting violence and mistrust between the two communities. Lynching of Voiddwellers as mutants has prompted the system's Chartist Cartels to demand action be taken or they will slow shipments of candles first, then food.

Also 5,000 years of intensive biomass extraction means new critical nutrients are needed. Asteroid bombardment or guidance is best option. This is naturally the purview of the Chartists, who feed off the asteroids and comets while also supplying crews for the few spaceships used as system patrols. But the risk is for the govenor, that such life-bearing asteroids could "slip" and strike a settlement or area of the Cartel's choosing.