Lilinuk

Lilinuk was the largest settlement on the Great Glacier.

Geography
Lilinuk was located on a plateau south of the Nakalpgotak Sea, about 150 feet (46 meters) above the shore, and west of the Novularond mountains.

Description
Access to the village was afforded by a series of ramps of ice that spiraled up to the top of the plateau on which the village was built. North of the plateau, at the shore of the sea within a bay, the village maintained a small fleet of kayaks and larger umiaks. Pens made of ice blocks held herds of caribou and muskoxen for food.

Everything in Lilinuk was meticulously kept in good condition. Even snowhouses were rebuilt every year. The villagers stored a year's worth of food in pits in the ice. Even the dogs and kupuk lived in relative luxury, having their own snowhouses, called jititip, in which to live.

The center of the village was a large area with space dedicated for the yearly sukkiruchit festival. It included five communal feasting houses (quaggi) and a large two-domed rewqugi, where visitors could warm themselves by fire.

Government
Like most large Iulutiun villages, Lilinuk was advised by a village council, or iquemelum.

Trade
Lilinuk was famous for the quality of its clothing, kayaks, and dog sleds, and its people were excited to trade. It was also one of the two settlements&mdash;the other being Jukum&mdash;where the annual sukkiruchit trade fair took place. This festival attracted craftsmen and hunters from all over Alpuk. A typical sukkiruchit would gather over a thousand attendees.

History
In the Year of the Great Flood, year 1790 of the Ulutiun calendar, which corresponds to -760 DR, a warm summer caused the water levels of the Nakalpgotak Sea to rise, flooding the villages around its shoreline. Lilinuk, however, was spared, since it was built atop the high plateau.

Around 1260 DR, a group of citizens of Lilinuk were exiled for plotting to murder the iquemelum. These exiles joined together with similarly banished Angulutiuns from the east and formed the village of Eghagu.

Rumors & Legends
Around 1340 DR, hunters from Lilinuk discovered the journal of an explorer whose body had been magically turned to ice. The journal described a hidden castle within Mount Okk in the Lugsaas Chain. This castle was supposedly the headquarters of a cabal of evil wizards from Vaasa who were trying to develop new spells of great power and failed.

Inhabitants
Lilinuk had a population of about one and a half thousand in 1359 DR. Its people were hard-working and perhaps the most industrious people of the Great Glacier.

Luftuk was the shrewdest trader of the village, and in 1359 DR, he was the one responsible for organizing the sukkiruchit.