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Born in 2437 during the height of the People's Republic of Adhomai, Ruzha lived with her parents in their small, though modernizing, village during her childhood. As Zhan-Khazan, they were the backbone of their community, performing tasks such as farming, logging, and ranching, which Ruzha was expected to help with from an early age. However, as their village grew and expanded, adapting using modern (human) technology, there was less need for hard labor and more need for skilled labor. To avoid being replaced, they begrudgingly saved up their funds to get her a mediocre education in botany, to the extent that her circumstances could provide. This meant that she could hold her own compared to the other workers, and thus her family was able to save their farm.

For a while, at least. They were eventually bought out by the government, who nationalized it and used machines to more efficiently grow food on their land. They were hardly compensated for it, leaving her family nearly destitute. Despite this, they remained in the village; her family seemed content with having to perform the unwanted jobs around the village just to get by. Ruzha, however, made her displeasure with the situation clear to all, which would come back to haunt her. Shortly before the harvest of 2451, the crops developed a severe blight and died, leaving many hungry and the village angry at the loss of their crops. Looking for a reason for this, they connected her complaining, the death of the crops, the assassination of Hadii by a Zhan-Khazan radical, and her dark, shadowy appearance and accused her of being a Raskariim who cursed their crops to die. The young Zhan-Khazan denied it, but was forced to leave the village regardless, eventually ending up in a large city.

As a destitute vagabond, she fit the stereotypes of Zhan-Khazan at the time perfectly, making her nearly unemployable except in the most unwanted of jobs. However, she perservered and whether through luck or the interference of something beyond her, she managed to get a job as a cook, often preparing hearty stews and soups for the Republic's soldiers who were stationed in the city. Despite this, she was still heavily in debt, and took to working extra shifts and stealing leftover scraps to make it through tough times. Unfortunately, or perhaps thankfully, the chef who she worked under suffered a tragic accident and died; the only one qualified and competent enough to replace him was her. Only a few years after the assassination of Hadii, the other cooks were still wary of working under a Zhan-Khazan, but she proved to be a good chef, though her demeanor worsened as time went on. She eventually only showed up when desperately needed, instead drinking and gambling in her spare time.

Through a combination of luck and labor, she managed to save enough money to secure a flight to the NTCC Odin in Tau Ceti, purchasing a ticket on a whim and leaving her almost penniless when she arrived. Thankfully, her education, while not exceptional, proved adequate for her to pass the certification tests necessary to be a NanoTrasen employee, and she returned to her previous passions of cooking and gardening. However, her debts still weighed heavily on her, and her attempts to drink and gamble it away did nothing but exacerbate it. She's lost and afraid in a strange nation owned by megacorporations and unfamiliar aliens, with her past haunting her in more ways than one.