The Monks of Gith

The city of Gith is dead and fallen, save for the walled monastery. The looming ziggurat at its center can be seen from some distance across the desert and surely accounts for most of the city's visitors. Some have come in wonder, having heard the tales that the ziggurat was built atop the grave of a vessel fallen from the void beyond. 

There are two people consumed by old hatreds and locked in an unending feud who claim the city and what is buried beneath as their birthright. Those left at Gith, built the monastery and devoted themselves to asceticism and contemplation. Those who went to dwell in the deep desert, became nomads and raiders.

The Gittite monks and nuns, who call themselves as a people yehirai, are ascetics and contemplative in their rites, it is true, but also seek to hone their bodies through martial arts.  They live off bland fare grown in underground gardens, perhaps within the buried vessel. They supplement their simple diets with a powder, invigorating to the mind and body, made from the ashes of their dead.

After the water has been reclaimed, the desiccated corpses of their folk are placed top the ziggurat and pipes are sounded to summon swarms of carrion insects for excarnation. The bones, save only the skulls which are stored in a subterranean ossuary, are then processed for the good of the community.