For long ages and, indeed, even in our modern and enlightened era there has been much misconception of how someone becomes a practitioner of the High Arts. For most of recorded history, it was assumed that one needed to be born with a particular talent or genetic bloodline. The ancient sorcerers and sorcerous families encouraged this belief, and none more so than the Warlock Kings themselves. If the High Arts are only accessible to a select, special few, it therefore follows that such a select special few ought to have dominance over the others. The ancient Warlock Kings and the ancient magi who succeeded them were considered a species apart from the balance of humanity – super beings, if you will.  Their facility with the High Arts was used as proof positive of their superiority and they used such a belief to manipulate affairs in their favor.

This, however, is not the truth. Anyone has the capacity to learn the High Arts, assuming they are dedicated to the endeavor and possess a modicum of intelligence. Evidence of this fact is obvious with a visit to your local Hannite Church and with the presence of hedge wizards, witches, and mystics that dot the countryside. While the Hannite priesthood might prefer to think of the sorcerous acts they perform as some manifestation of the power of Hann, this is not actually the case – the Shepherd is merely performing a sorcerous ritual, just as any wizard might. Many are those who, through trial and error or ancestral instruction, know a handful of spells and rituals that they find useful. Such persons have a variety of explanations for such powers , crediting faith, blood, luck, or astronomical phenomena for their success. That they do not understand said ritual is what separates them from true sorcerers.

Such ignorance, it must be said, works to the advantage of those who rule our society – namely, those who understand the principles of true sorcery and can either invoke it themselves or have the resources to call upon those who can. Such elites have no interest in dispelling the myths of sorcery, as to do so would mean giving the common people a means to change their lot by manipulating the fabric of reality itself. This is a harrowing thought to any person of power or influence, and especially so to those whose power and influence is built upon the misfortunes and domination of others. The ‘Balance’ that the Defenders of the Balance protect, though it is said to be a metaphysical concept, can also be understood as a social, political, and economic one – historically, their regulation of the High Arts keeps those on top on top and those on the bottom on the bottom. Though recent decades have seen this purpose soften somewhat, any local witch can tell you of the hassles and harassment that must be faced when bringing on a new apprentice.

Of Titles…

Practitioners of the High Arts go by a variety of titles and, to common people, such titles are interchangeable. To those in the profession, though, they have distinct meaning.

• Wizards are those who can work with the High Arts to some extent. This is a catchall term that includes everybody from the talented mystic healer or gifted Hannite paladin to the shepherd who can ward his sheep against sickness. This is a lowly term, and calling a sorcerer or mage a wizard is tantamount to an insult to their intelligence.
• Sorcerers are those who have formal sorcerous training in the High Arts. They understand the broad principles of sorcery, have facility in at least two disciplines of incantation and ritual, and often are devotees to one or more philosophical schools of sorcery. These are true professionals and powerful individuals whose services are in great demand and to whom respect is warranted. Those who achieve their First Mark in the Chamber of Testing may be called Sorcerers, but they are not yet magi, and are called ‘apprentices’ by other magi until such time as they achieve their Second Mark.
• Magi (or mages) are those sorcerers who have achieved the Second Mark in the Chamber of Testing beneath the Arcanostrum of Saldor. They are only the most talented and skilled of sorcerers, taught by the true masters of the Arts, and are all under the supervision of the Archmagi and, by extension, the Keeper. Magi are technically forbidden from inheriting titles and may not serve as a head of state, though that ancient rule has been somewhat eclipsed by many centuries of work-arounds and technical loopholes.
• Masters are those magi who have achieved their Third Mark. They are persons of incredible power and often given great responsibility within the internal organization of the Arcanostrum.
• Archmagi are the five leaders of the Arcanostrum, situated just beneath the Keeper of the Balance in rank. There is one for each energy – the Archmage of the Ether, the Archmage of the Lumen, the Archmage of the Fey, the Archmage of the Dweomer, and the Lord Defender of the Balance. They reside in Saldor. If an archmage should die or retire, their post will remain vacant until such time as a Master achieves the Fourth Mark in the Chamber of Testing. Few can do this and many die or go mad in the attempt. The Archmage is also the Headmaster (or Headmistress) of their corresponding college in the Arcanostrum, and oversees the training of new magi.
• The Keeper of the Balance is an archmage who has achieved their Fifth Mark. They are sorcerers beyond equal, powerful and wise. When a former Keeper dies, the Archmagi select one of their number to ascend, and this person attempts to achieve the Fifth Mark. If they fail (and therefore die), a new archmage is selected. The experience of achieving the Fifth Mark is harrowing, but completely secret. All that is known is that those who undergo it are changed somehow – they are not the same person who went in, becoming more reserved and often reclusive – and it is for this reason that all Keepers take on a new name upon their ascension. There is never and has never been more than one Keeper at a time, though there have been instances where there have been no more archmagi to make the attempt, and so the office of Keeper has remained vacant for some time.

To Be Continued…

The heart of the Hannite religion, Rhond is a strong nation with passionate and spiritual people. In many ways the most important place in the world to the common peoples of the West, Rhond and its holy sites have been the point of contention between nations, peoples, and religions for millennia. Though traditionally neutral to all others, Rhondian internal politics is as chaotic and potentially dangerous as those of Eretheria, with new sects of the Hannite faith coming into being every few decades only to be followed by bloody civil wars of religious ideology. This is not a place for the indifferent, apathetic, or uncertain – in Rhond, your beliefs and your life are closely linked and, without one, the other will doubtlessly be lost.

Political Structure

Rhond is a theocracy, which is to say that its religious and political leadership are one and the same. The Church of Hann, with all its structural and bureaucratic complexities, is in control of both the physical and spiritual bodies of every man, woman, and child within Rhond’s borders. Unlike some of the more totalitarian governments of the Alliance, however, Rhond’s political system is more democratic than one might at first assume. The Church of Hann is an organization that is disinclined to deal with worldly matters, and therefore the day-to-day decisions on things like taxes, education, defense, and infrastructure are handed off from dignitary to dignitary in a bewildering and seemingly endless game of pass-the-buck.

Ostensibly, the Steward of Hann, who kneels before the White Throne in Rhond and is Hann’s representative until his return, is in complete control of Rhond as a political entity as well as the Hannite Church as a spiritual one. In practice, only the latter is true. Beneath the Steward, the Church separates into two distinct organizational bodies. The first, known collectively as the Hann’ari (Speakers for Hann), are made up of the priests and Lesser Stewards who comprise the Church of Hann on an international level. The second organization, known as the Hann’aras or, more commonly, the Templars, are in charge of Rhond as a nation. Though not technically priests, the Templars hold no less devotion to the Steward than any of their brothers in the Hann’ari, and are invested with a variety of spiritual as well as secular powers.

The Templars are organized in a similar fashion to a feudal kingdom, with the Grand Templar advising the Steward directly at the top of the organizational pyramid. Directly

A good representation of a Paladin of Rhond, I think.

below him are the Templars themselves, who act as regional governors or dukes over the seven different provinces of Rhond. Beneath each Templar is an array of Holy Paladins – knights in the sworn service of the Church who police their realm, collect tithes and taxes, and handle the majority of the secular matters in Rhondian life. Thanks to the reticence on the part of the higher-level officials to handle secular matters, the central authority in Rhond is comparatively weak to other feudal kingdoms like Eddon or Akral. Paladins are largely autonomous, and each parish is subject to wildly varying laws and regulations depending on the paladin’s preferences. The Templars themselves only intercede to contradict rulings considered blasphemous or heretical to the Hannite tradition, but other than that content themselves with the limited secular duties of tallying taxes and keeping the peace. It is important to remember that, in the Hannite faith, the physical world is dirty, sinful, and corrupt. Therefore, in order to maintain an aura of holiness to one’s followers, one must appear to be ‘above’ earthly matters. This holds true for the Templars as much as for the priests themselves, and those paladins who become Templars usually do so by ruling effectively without being unduly sullied by the blight of politics, warfare, or scandal – getting more by doing less, as it were.

On the other side of the political structure, the Hann’ari is no less pervasive in Rhondian civic life, however its role is far less ‘hands-on’. Beneath the Steward are two Lesser Stewards who hold dominion over the northern and southern regions of Rhond, respectively. Though only two among dozens of Lesser Stewards scattered throughout the world, the Lesser Stewards of Rhond are afforded a special place at the right and left hand of the Steward himself as those closest to Hann’s holy sites. Beneath these two is a network of priests and abbots who are in charge of organizing and guiding the spiritual lives of the common people and the monks, respectively. In practice, the priests have very little political power at this level – they cannot pass laws, they cannot dispute the secular authority of the paladin, they cannot collect taxes or tithes – but their control over the spiritual and theological teachings of the region is absolute. Therefore, while a priest may not take direct action against and unpopular paladin or templar, he may preach against the evils of the paladin’s laws to the people who, being good Hannites, may take up arms to depose him. The possibility of uprisings is very real in Rhond, and every paladin is sure to have a close working relationship with the priests who control the hearts and minds of the people. No matter how glorious a paladin’s castle may be or how righteous he appears, the people will always say that the priests are the ones who know best. Their will is the will of Hann, which is perfect and incorruptible. The priests do not, after all, sully themselves with the sinful practices of taxation and politics and war, preferring to approach enlightenment through peaceful and sympathetic means. Certainly they are all part of the same system, but the templars and their paladins are and always will be lesser engines in that system in the eyes of the faithful. Fortunately for the priesthood, this has beneficial effects for their chain of command. The central authority of the Lesser Stewards in religious matters is swift and absolute and, while the taxes and tithes may be choked with disorganization, new copies of the Book of Kroth and the Annals of Hann are efficiently distributed to every parish on a regular basis.

Advancement through the Rhondian political structure is done via a voting process known as ‘the Calling.’ Any time an official retires or dies, be it a priest, templar, paladin, or whatever, the former official’s peers get together and select by unanimous vote a new candidate into office. This can be any male Rhondian citizen who doesn’t currently hold an office higher than the one up for grabs, and numerous times through history humble farmers or woodsmen have been called into service as no less than templars or even Steward. The important thing for the Calling is for the most holy, righteous, and capable man to get the job, no matter what they do now. Though it is technically possible to turn down a position, it is rarely done, as the Calling is seen as the will of Hann as much as the will of his servants. Being a patriarchal organization, women are not allowed to hold office within the Hannite Church, though they are employed by paladins as civic authorities, tax collectors, constables, and other positions.

The Rhondian military, such as it is, is maintained by the Templars. Compared with its neighbors, Illin and Veris, the Rhondian Holy Army is tiny, maintaining a force of less than 8,000 trained soldiers to protect the entire country. These armies are made up of those men in the service of the various paladins throughout the land as well as a small group of militant monastic sects. Despite the heroics of certain Verisi and Galaspiner mercenary companied during the Illini wars, there are absolutely no mercenaries employed by Rhond or the Hannite church, as the business of taking money to make war on others is considered an evil of the highest caliber. The Holy Army is solely defensive in nature, and Rhond has rarely expressed any wish to expand its territory or attack another nation at all, not even during the Hannite Wars (where most of the armies in the field were from other nations sent to defend Rhond). It took a foreigner – Conrad Varner – to get them to adopt a more belligerent strategy during the Illini Wars, and it took him so long to do so the war was nearly lost. Still, the small size and non-belligerent nature of Rhond’s standing military belies both the nation’s defensive capabilities. In times of trouble, the Holy Army exists more as a stumbling block than the force that will actually win the war. While the Holy Army delays the invaders, the templars open their armories and proceed to levy troops from the peasant population itself. Unlike other countries, where levying troops can be a tiresome and awkward business as the peasants seek to evade the draft, in Rhond it is not unusual for every single man of fighting age (and many women) to volunteer and line up outside the templar or paladin’s fortress to be given a spear, helmet, and shield and sent off to fight. Though untrained and under-equipped, this unparalleled levying ability means that Rhond can field a force of 100,000 or more in a matter of weeks or even days, which is enough to give even the most brazen invaders pause. Varner himself has always cited the courage of the Rhondian citizens as the one and only reason the Kalsaaris failed to win the war (and has said so over Galaspiner howls of protest in the process). Despite this power, Rhond seeks to avoid conflict as much as possible, and has remained historically neutral through most regional conflicts.

This neutrality is also misleading, for the Rhondians, for all their Hannite faith, are not necessarily peaceful people. Frequent civil struggles and small religious wars are a theme in Rhondian history. There are always those who would interpret the teachings of the Church and the will of Hann in ways not amenable to the established dogma of the Church. Many times it is frustrated templars seeking to expose the hypocrisy or ineffectuality of the Church, or perhaps disillusioned or otherwise dissenting priests within the Hann’ari hierarchy. Greatest, and most destructive, of these religious disputes are those who appear claiming to be Hann Returned—a claim that, if true, would drastically upset not only Rhondian but Alliance politics as a whole. These uprisings and heresies are brutally crushed by the templars and paladins still faithful to the Steward, and the fighting is typically brief, if bloody. The punishment for starting such a religious uprising or preaching heretical beliefs is burning at the stake and, no matter who wins the struggle, the public squares and courtyards of Rhondian villages and castles are filled with blackened stakes, the smell of cooked flesh, and dark smoke for days or even months to come.

Lands and Points of Interest

The Theocracy extends from the Hannor River in the West to the edge of the Western Wastes in the east, and from the outskirts of the Swamps of Vair in the south to the Sea of Syrin in the north. This particular area of land is both fertile and mild in temperature, with an extended growing season and plentiful water for irrigation. The western portions of Rhond are heavily wooded, being in outer regions of the great Ahrn Forest that sweeps northwest into Veris. In addition to the lumber the forest provides, citrus orchards are numerous and prosperous here, and the Rhondian orange and lemon crops are the nation’s chief export. The further east one goes, the more arid the climate becomes until, finally, the eastern border of Rhond is a dusty and rocky area whose only economic worth lies in its quarries and livestock such as sheep, horses, and camels. Central to northern Rhond is heavily cultivated, growing rice in the south near the swamps and gradually shifting to corn, wheat, and barley to the north. The Artavi Mountains, roughly separating eastern from western Rhond, have a number of prosperous mines and even support some hardier crops in their foothills.

The Hannor River acts as the commercial lifeline of the Theocracy, and it is here that the majority of large cities and towns can be found. Running alongside the river is the Pilgrim’s Road, that journeys south along the swamps to Hurn and the Pool of Dawn. While still within Rhond’s borders, the road is a well-maintained highway that is covered by inns, taverns, and marketplaces seeking to make a few honest marks off the many pilgrims making their way through the holy lands. This is also where most of Rhond’s farmers bring their crops to ship north to the capital, and prudent merchants will frequently make a pilgrimage of their own to purchase the citrus fruits and plentiful grains at discount prices before shipping it overseas themselves.

Rhond is a densely populated, fairly wealthy, and civilized area of land for a country south of the Syrin, and it is, by far, the most visited of the three southern Alliance nations. For those who are devotees of the Hannite faith, the shrines, cathedrals, temples, and monasteries of Rhond are popular pilgrimage destinations. It was here, during the dark age of the Warlock Kings, that Hann first re-appeared to the human race and sought to establish a just Church in his name. The Stewards, in secret and later in the open, have sought to glorify their savior’s name ever since. Artifacts supposedly touched or belonging to Hann are at the center of dozens of holy sites throughout the Theocracy, and the historic places where some of the Annals of Hann were said to take place are, today, accompanied by the grandest places of worship ever constructed. Of course, one can hardly go a mile in Rhond without coming across a shrine or monument, but, then, it is well known that Hann’s very blood was spilled across the soil of this land and, in a very real sense, his spirit everywhere. This is a land built to the glory of humanity and its god, and it very much looks the part.

Still, for all that is holy in this land, the bones of what once was very evil still smolder in its darkest corners. The Warlock Kings of ancient times ruled here for ages, and many destructive wars were fought on this very soil. Even today, the crumbling spires of long-forgotten strongholds can be seen poking above the tree line in the deep forests, and farmers routinely discover ancient artifacts when tilling their fields. The Church is very serious about keeping these sites and these wicked items out of the hands of the imprudent, greedy, and ambitious, and treasure hunters heading here are likely to find a very rude welcome from the local authorities. Paradoxically, thanks to the templars’ vigilance against looters, this means that Rhond is home to some of the best preserved Warlock-age sites in the world, and it is becoming increasingly difficult to keep the fortune seekers out. Fortunately, the hazards afforded by the sites themselves have rendered the success rate of such adventurers pretty near to zero.

The City of Rhond: Reputedly the most ancient city in existence, Rhond is certainly among the most beautiful. Situated on a broad peninsula jutting into the turquoise waters Gulf of Hann and along side the mouth of the mighty Hannor River, Rhond is a paradise of palm trees, white beaches, and gorgeous, lime-stone paved streets. In the bright sunlight of a summer’s day, the entire city gleams like a diamond along the coast and the thousands of canopies and awnings mounted along the waterfront buildings seem like flocks of rainbow colored birds pruning on the pristine shore.

Rhond is home to approximately 450,000 people, but every spring that population surges to near double that number as hordes of pilgrims descend upon the city for the Festival of Arrival, where the entire city breaks into an unparalleled number of parties, parades, fairs, and religious ceremonies. No stranger to visitors from all over the world, Rhond is filled with inns, boarding houses, hostels, and special ‘pilgrim camps’ where travelers are welcome to stay (for a price, of course). Furthermore, Rhond’s restaurants and taverns are without parallel in the West for the quality of their cuisine. On the downside, those looking for a more racy brand of fun will find Rhond to be an inhospitable port. The crackdown on ‘immoral behavior’ by the Church has virtually eliminated the brothels, fighting arenas, and gambling houses in the city, and the local city watch is ruthless and effective at keeping criminals under control. The public stocks are continually full of minor offenders and the prison of Rhond – the feared Stone of Perdition – lurks like a desiccated skull on the northern horizon, a mute warning to those who would cross the law one too many times. Sentences there are seldom for any period less than twenty years and reputably no one has lived longer than five.

Unlike most cities in the West, Rhond is not divided into discernible sections. The Great Temple of Hann and its attached administrative buildings occupy most of the central city and the enormous domes and steeples of the temple are among the largest structures ever built by man. Circling the Great Temple and running down the center of the entire peninsula are the public gardens. Filled with quiet fountains and serene flora, the gardens are a place for the faithful to find refuge from the bustle of city life and meditate in their free time. They are open all day but, like the rest of the city, they close for curfew shortly after sundown.

Poverty is a serious issue in Rhond and the poor are evident all over the city. Though the Church maintains numerous poor houses and orphanages to accommodate the disenfranchised, the city’s lack of segmentation means that the ‘rabble’ can be found almost anywhere in town. Though this can be disconcerting to dignified guests from places like Akral or Eretheria, where the poor are kept in their place, it is calmly accepted by the locals, who see them as a chance to do good to their brother men in the form of alms. Indeed, Rhond can be a beggar’s paradise, and it is rumored that some unscrupulous caitiffs have even gone so far as to feign homelessness while the alms they receive have gone so far as to purchase them a house, clothes, and more.

Despite the Arcanostrum’s steadily cooling relationship with Rhond, spacious and beautiful grounds were deeded to Saldor in more cordial times. Known as ‘Wizard’s Point,’ the very tip of the Rhondian peninsula is home to a four-hundred foot tower of pure mageglass and enchanted violet stone which, in addition to serving as a beacon for ships at night, is rumored to be part of the city’s maritime defenses. Locals, echoing their Church’s attitude towards the proliferation of sorcery among the common population, have a variety of cruel rumors of what the magi within do to those poor unfortunates who wind up there. If there is any truth to these rumors, it is not evident from without.

Besides Wizard’s Point, Rhond has only one defensive fortification of note, that being a modest twenty foot stone wall with attached barracks that blocks off the base of the peninsula. Though structurally sound and adequately manned, its defenses are far inferior to those of most capital cities, and popular myth among the Alliance nations states that this is intentional. Rhond, they say, would sooner surrender to an invader than risk having their precious city damaged. If the wall is easy for an invader to breach, so too is it easy to re-breach when retaking the city.

Culture and People

Rhondians are lusty, colorful, and passionate people who both work hard and play hard. Known for fiery tempers, strong opinions, and undying loyalty, they are a people that are both exciting and difficult to get along with, but in either case a visitor is sure to get a good story out of it. They are popular among the other nations of the West, as Rhondian good cheer and exuberance are welcomed by the well-to-do and downtrodden alike.

The key word in Rhondian life is passion, as Rhondians are a culture of true believers. They throw their heart and soul into every enterprise, be it prayer, war, romance, or even just taking a nap. Rhondian parties are loud, raucous affairs, their funerals are unbelievably sad, and their dances are scandalously sensual. They live for the moment, stick closely to their honor and their families, and never give less than 110%. All this, of course, makes Rhond sound like an exhausting place, but nothing could be further from the truth. Rhondians believe in living a good life, not living life to be good. Unlike Galaspiners or Saldorians, Rhondians see idleness, relaxation, and meditation as important to life as running around building things, learning things, or selling things. So, while a Rhondian may be dragging you by the arm to a party one night, they will be sleeping late and refusing to go out the following day – remember, they give everything 110%, even laziness.

The two centers of Rhondian life are the family and the Church, though not necessarily in that order. Rhondian families are more than just one’s parents and siblings, but everyone who is even remotely related to you, from your great, great uncles to your third cousins and their wives and children. Every Ozdai’s Feast and every Hearth Festival in Rhond finds thousands of Rhondians returning to their ancestral homes to attend what amounts to a bi-annual family reunion. There, news is exchanged, gifts are given, immense quantities of food is consumed, and business is conducted between distant relatives. There is a saying in Rhond that goes “A business in the family is a family business.” Just about everybody in Rhond works, plays, and lives their lives in the context of their extended family. There is almost no such thing as an entrepreneur here, since to start one’s own enterprise is to say to your family that what they’re doing isn’t good enough for you – a grave insult. Just about the only exception to the ‘staying in the family’ rule is the Church. The Church of Hann is revered by all Rhondians, and joining its ranks, whether to be come a templar, monk, or priest, is an honor to the family. By the same token, leaving or being expelled from the Church is a grave dishonor, and many Rhondians who have faced such a fate have found them not only disavowed by the Church but also disowned by their own kin.

It is important to note that, though all Rhondians believe in the guidance of Hann and expect his return, and all Rhondians treat the Church with the utmost reverence, their faith is not a blind one. More than one Illini visitor has been scandalized to hear open criticism of the Church’s policies in Rhondian taverns and town squares – and not the kind of criticism whispered in doorways or behind backs, mind you, but open, yell-in-your-face criticism, full of insults, tirades, arguments, and even the occasional fistfight. Every Rhondian adult has very definite opinions about various Church policies, including everything from a priest’s attire to various interpretations of the Book of Kroth and the Annals of Hann themselves. Of course, this critical opinion of the Church does have limits beyond which are considered heresy (which all Rhondians fear and oppose), but the exact nature of those limits are difficult for a foreigner to comprehend. Calling the Steward himself a witless fool or a illiterate bastard can be just fine, but claiming a single phrase in the Book of Kroth is ‘exaggerated’ can be enough to put the speaker and his entire family in the flames. On the whole, foreigners try very hard not to get into religious discussions with Rhondians, as one can never tell when one has crossed the line from debate into grave insult.

For the uncertain, the best way to gauge a Rhondian is still through his family reputation. Ancestry is almost as important here as it is in Akral or even Eretheria, but for different reasons. Whereas those others see family as a platform for political and social influence, for the Rhondian it is an indication of their character. The patriarch of any given family is the moral compass of the whole, and what he declares as acceptable to him is acceptable to all. These traditions are passed down from generation to generation, and it is rare for anyone – even following patriarchs – to go against the tradition. Every Rhondian carries the reputation of their family with them wherever they go, and their actions are a direct reflection on the quality of their parentage. It is for this reason that many Rhondians will fail to let even the tiniest social transgressions or personal insults slide, for to accept them is to accept an insult to all of that person’s relatives, as well. In general, if one is respectful of a Rhondian, the Rhondian will reciprocate in kind by showing respect to you and your family. That is, of course, unless you cross the line. Though honor and decorum are valued among the natives of Rhond, honesty and integrity are valued much more. If someone is acting in a shameful manner, the Rhondian will be certain to let them know about it and, most likely, attempt to cure them of their evil ways with Galaspiner-like tenacity. There is nothing worse (or better, depending on your point of view) and a Rhondian friend who thinks you are making a mistake and is trying to help you. They will argue until the sun stops shining and they will pester you until your hair falls out before they will allow you to sully your name and the names of your fathers before you – tooka-addicts beware.

Beyond their passion for moral rectitude, however, is also the Rhondians’ love for food. Having the advantage of being in an area of immense fertility coupled by its proximity to the crops of its Western neighbors and access to Kalsaari trade routes, the diet of an average Rhondian is varied and plentiful. Kalsaari spices are mixed with Eddon beef and local rice and fruit to make delicacies touted by all the most discriminating palates in the West. Dishes prepared here are spicy and exotic when compared to much of the diet of the West, and to a visiting Northon the sheer variety of flavors is enough to overload their senses. Food is of great importance to any self-respecting Rhondian, and every one of them has particular recipes that are their family secret or personal specialties. Meals are enormous affairs, even among the peasantry, and frequently involve three to five courses, and the arrival of guests or local holidays can give rise to feasting that can last up to three days. Fortunately for the Rhondians, food is both plentiful and cheaply available to all but the most poor, and the Church is very willing to feed those who are in need.

Recent History

While Illin was nearly destroyed by the Kalsaari invasion of twenty-seven years ago and it’s name graces the historical accounts of the war, most of the biggest and most pivotal battles of the war were fought on Rhondian soil. The great southern city of Via Durano was conquered by the Kalsaari Legions quickly, and the desert outposts along the Rhondian border were easily toppled. The city of Otove, along the Hannor River, was besieged, and the Duke of Galaspin, fighting in Illin, had his supply routes along the Old South Road to Rhond itself. It was here, in a small mountain town called Atrisia, that Conrad Varner earned fame and glory by charging from the gates in a reckless sally against a legion of Kalsaari heavy infantry and, in that one move, changed the momentum of the war. Today, war monuments can be found in every Rhondian graveyard, and veterans of the war populate every town and village. The bitterness towards the Kalsaaris is almost undiminished here, which has had an adverse affect on Rhondian cooking. Anything imported from Kalsaar has a heavy tariff applied to it, and so locals have made due by substituting some ingredients with local herbs. The results are spotty, and many an older Rhondian laments the forgotten, heady flavors of saffron and curry.

On a more recent and significant level, the dramatic increase in sorcerous materials in the past decades has driven a wedge between Rhond and the richer northern countries of the West. By relaxing the controls on sorcerous materials and the practices of alchemists, thaumaturges, warlocks, and the like, the Church has seen its power shrink. Now, rather than going to a Hannite Church for sorcerous healing from the local priest (and the attendant donations and prayers needed to secure such a ritual), people can just buy illbane powder or bloodpatch elixirs from their local alchemist without the attendant ritualistic folderol. Attendance to Hannite churches in the northern nations of the West is down significantly, and Rhond feels threatened. It is a conservative power, clinging to its traditions as many of its neighbors move on. Though not in serious danger of isolating itself as of yet, the secularization of life in the West could potentially lead to a time where Rhond is left behind.

Caught between the Alliance and the Kalsaari Empire, Illin is a place where cultures clash and history has marked the land in blood and ruins. Exotic and dangerous, the Principality of Illin is one of the poorer and weaker states in the Alliance, with most of its efforts placed in maintaining what little land it has from the encroachments of the hobs to the south or the ever-threatening Kalsaari Empire to the southeast. Relying heavily on the support of its neighbors, especially since the end of the war that bears its name three decades ago, Illin is as much of a crossroads in the south as Galaspin or Freegate is in the north. The difference, however, lies in tone. Whereas Galaspin is bright, loud, and straightforward in both policy and people, Illin is a city of dark mysteries, dangerous secrets, and long nights. Lock your doors and bar your windows, for in Illin your enemies never sleep.

Political Structure

Illin is ruled by its Prince, who controls all aspects of the government. As Illin has relatively little territory, the Prince is able to achieve a level of control here that exceeds its other autocratic neighbors, such as Veris or Ihyn. The eyes of the Prince are everywhere, and his Black Guard is never far away, and as such the common citizenry are careful to obey their ruler’s every whim, lest they be dragged off to the foul dungeons below the city, never to be seen again.

In Illin, the military and the government are one and the same. The Prince acts as leading general of Illin’s not-inconsiderable armed forces, known as the Black Guard. Beneath him are three Lord Commanders – of the City, Border, and Sea, respectively – and beneath them are a series of Knight Captains, each of whom command a company of soldiers. Though small when compared with the armies of Akral or Eddon, Illin has the largest army in the Alliance in proportion to the size of its population. It is estimated that one in every ten Illini is a soldier or agent of the Prince in some capacity. The Prince issues laws and his Black Guard enforces them with much dispatch. Unlike the more ‘civilized’ nations of the Alliance, Illin’s ‘legal system’ borrows a page from its Kalsaari neighbors in that there is no legal system. There are no trials, no appeals, no delays in the execution of a criminal’s sentence. Punishments are likewise harsh. Those accused of murder will be executed as soon as they are caught, while thieves or violent criminals will be relieved of their right arm in short order. The ‘lucky’ ones are taken to the Prince’s dungeons, a place from which very few prisoners ever emerge alive.

Constantly wary of political assassination, uprising, or invasion, Princes of Illin have had a reputation for being harsh and uncompromising rulers. However, this ruthlessness was tempered in recent centuries by the establishment of the Alliance, which led to the posting of a company of Defenders and a Magetower to the Principality. Though few in number, the Defenders represent a political and military power far greater than that of Illin – a power which, if angered, could very well withdraw its support and, therefore, endanger Illin’s very existence. Thanks to this, a constant game of cat-and-mouse is played between the Prince’s thugs and the noble Defenders as the one seeks to appear benevolent while still maintaining control over the people while the other is constantly seeking to bring justice to the region. During the brief (and unusual) reign of Prince Landar the Holy, the Defenders and the Black Guard worked seamlessly together to save the population from the Kalsaari occupation, but this is merely the exception that has proven the rule. Landar’s successors have been a return to the brutality of the pre-war age, arguably becoming even more corrupt and autocratic in the face of reconstruction. The result of this has been that fewer and fewer ‘good’ men and women are finding employment with the Prince and, instead, joining the Defenders. This has made the formerly imposing but incorruptible Black Guard into a nest of bullies, sadists, and thieves who will accept bribes, oppress the people, and overall hasten the decay of the system while the Defenders have ostensibly become the ‘good guys,’ fighting for the people and defending them, not from exterior threats, but from their own government. All this places the Princes (there have been six in the past thirty years) in a very awkward situation, as economic support from the Alliance is necessary to support the lifestyle they are used to, but any exercise of their power using their designated agents risks alienating their own patrons.

Also of concern for the Prince is the role of mages in his city-state. Traditionally, Illini magi were appointed to high-ranking positions in the military – the equivalent to the nobility in other nations, complete with hereditary titles. This was a practice that the Arcanostrum disapproved of strongly, as magi of any power were forbidden from holding political office according to the decree of the earliest Keepers. After the Treaty of Syrin, the Arcanostrum required Illin to rescind any titles granted to a staff-bearing magi. Unfortunately, thanks to the unique structure of the city of Illin itself (see below), magi were critical to maintain the city’s operation. As a result, Illin has become even more dependent on exterior aid, a fact which the princes of the last two centuries have regretted bitterly and even Landar the Holy himself was said to object to.

Of course, the entire structure of Illini politics is based around the military for one reason and one reason only: the Kalsaari Empire. The present Illini government was established some 1400 years ago after the conclusion of the Hannite Wars, where the Kalsaari Empire was driven out of Illin by Eddonish troops. Structured as a buffer state more than anything else, it was Illin’s purpose to keep the Kalsaaris from invading the west ever again. In this regard, it did its job well until it folded in the face of Kalsaari attack thirty years ago.  Illin wasn’t built to be a smoothly functioning governmental institution as much as it was built to be an efficient militocracy, with the end result being a crippled, paranoid, and oppressive regime poised on the edge of a warzone. This, once it had decayed to a certain point, was easy for the Kalsaari Legions to topple. It took Landar the Holy to put the country back together, but since his disappearance the country has slipped once more into its old habits.

Land and Points of Interest

I see this as an Illini outpost at dusk. Click to see original image.

Situated along the southeastern coast of the Sea of Syrin, the lands of Illin are rocky, dry, and heavily guarded. Only 100 miles deep at its widest point, it is difficult to be more than ten miles from an armed post, fortress, or castle of some sort. If there is one thing the arid land of Illin has in excess, it is quarries, and the white limestone facades of Illini guard towers are both numerous and imposing. Along the nation’s border with the trackless sands of the Western Wastes, such towers could once be seen for miles, occurring at regular intervals, welcoming visitors to Alliance territory and warning away would-be despoilers. Now, one is largely welcomed by the hollowed-out bones of their ruins – a reminder of the wrath of the Kalsaari Legions.

The sandy soil of most of Illin doesn’t sustain much more than patches of tough sand grass and the occasional bush or gaunt tree. The weather here is almost universally dry and hot, with the winters tending to be short and with very little precipitation of any kind. Winds blowing in off the Gulf of Hann keep the coast significantly cooler than the inland areas, and some 75% of the population makes its home there, with the next 20% living along the Tassad River and the last bit being scattered among the rocky wildernesses of the inland areas.

Apart from the quarries already mentioned, which are rich in both limestone, sandstone, and the quasi-magical lodestone, Illin has little in the way of viable products or industry. Along the coast, Illinians fish for their living and what few live inland make their living off of herding goats and sheep. Only in the floodwaters of the Tassad river is there any degree of agriculture, and that is largely focused on the production of tooka leaf—a plant whose leaves, when dried, make a potent narcotic. This, along with the stone, comprises the bulk of Illin’s exported goods and, while certainly found all over the world, it is frowned upon in most good society in the West as a disgusting, godless, and indulgent practice.

If there is one thing that makes the lands of Illin famous, it is the ruins. This region of the world has been the site of so many ancient wars, that ruined and half-ruined fortresses abound. Most of Illin’s current defensive fortifications are built on the remains of some ancient castle, and many villages are constructed in or around the remainder of a wall or keep. Some of these remnants date as far back as the Mage Wars, though almost none of them retain any riches or artifacts from ages past, having long since been looted by conquering armies, wandering bandits, and opportunistic travelers. Still, if one wanders beyond the borders of Illin itself and into the Wastes, it is still possible to find untold riches hidden in the secret vaults of long-toppled citadels. Of course, transporting those riches back into Illin may prove difficult – many Black Guard officers have been known to amass collections of such treasure for the purpose of ‘preserving history.’ It is no doubt due to their civic conscience and commitment to their cultural heritage that they seem to be paid much better than an average officer.

The City of Illin: Once universally considered to be one of the great Wonders of the World, the city of Illin, also known as the Dreaming City, is still a sight that defies logic. Separated into two (once three) sections known as ‘partitions,’ Illin is the only city in the world where a third of the city’s area floats in the air a full thousand feet above the steeples and roofs of the buildings restricted to the ground. Engineered by the magi of the Arcanostrum shortly after its the Hannite Wars, the floating partitions of Illin represent only the most obvious effect of the terrific magical forces pulsing through the city streets that give this place its equally wondrous and horrifying reputation.

The two Partitions are known as the Undercity and the Crecent. The Undercity includes everything that actually rests on the ground, and makes up about 2/3 of Illin’s total area and is home to most of the city’s 600,000 inhabitants. It is a complete and functioning metropolis entirely on its own, with its own barracks, governmental institutions, infrastructure and so on. No walls encircle Illin, but the Tassad River empties into the Syrin along the city’s northeast and southwestern edges while the Syrin itself covers the Undercity’s northwestern border, leaving the southeast only approach to the city by land, and only then after crossing the fortified Illin Bridge to the south. Furthermore, the Crescent floats over the southeastern portions of the Undercity, allowing it to more easily bring its destructive magical defenses to bear. Thanks to the Crescent, half of the Undercity is bathed in shadow at all times as the floating partition blocks the sunlight. The narrow, winding streets of the Undercity, originally designed for defense, take on a more sinister appearance in the permanent gloom, especially when considering there are large portions of the city that remain in ruins after the occupation and liberation of the city during the Illini War. It is in these dark parts of the city that most of Illin’s extensive criminal underworld conducts its business alongside shadowing tooka dens and sinister, black market talismongers. It is said that there are more than five different criminal syndicates operating in Illin today, and their bloody turf wars are a constant trouble for the Black Guard. On the sunnier side of the Undercity are most of the more well-to-do homes of the merchant classes as well as the docks and warehousing facilities of Illin’s extensive port district. Here the Black Guard keep the peace with an uncompromising hand, and it is this part of Illin that most visitors see upon their visit and here that they are advised to remain.

Six hundred feet above the Undercity, on a quarter-moon shaped platform of stone and mageglass, rests the area of city known as ‘the Crescent.’ About three miles long and a two thirds of a mile wide at its widest point, the streets of the Crescent are wide, clean, and beautiful. Only the richest merchants and most respected of Illini society are privileged to own the spacious and airy mageglass palaces that line the Crescent’s streets, and it is here that Illin’s university, Hannite cathedral, library, and magetowers can be found, as well as the quarters for the majority of the city’s Defenders of the Balance. Bathing in the sunlight and the airy breezes blown in from the sea, the Crescent is a paradise floating above a dark, hellish pit. Magic enhances the gardens that form every intersection, and conjurers have created fountains that never run dry, despite the lack of any natural water source—the Crescent is the pinnacle of luxury in a land not known for its riches. Still, the Crescent serves a practical purpose for all this decoration – the edges of the Crescent are affixed with nine great War Orbs, created by Arcanostrum magi in ages past. Should they be called into action, each orb is capable of throwing incredible amounts of magical destruction in the form of massive etheric deathwaves. The only time these orbs have been battle tested, the entire Kalsaari army was decimated in a single day.

In addition to these two parts, there was once a third partition, floating five hundred feet above even the Crescent, known as the High Citadel. This was the seat of the Prince himself, and it could alter its orientation over the city – a drifting sentinel. It currently rests at the bottom of the ocean, just off the coast of the city, where it fell during the liberation of the city. It is now a bleak and abandoned ruin, its towers jutting at a shallow angle above the waves, crumbling as the tides dictate – just one more dead place of many thousands that dot the land.

Transportation between the partitions is difficult, and it is rare that a resident of the Undercity ever sets foot on the Crescent. It is known that magical portals exist in the Undercity to take people directly to the Crescent, and there are a series of lifts situated on the edges of the Crescent, but these are either expensive or very dangerous (and sometimes both). Furthermore, the original connection between the two sections – the ancient Tower of Spirits  (a 1000-foot tall column that was the only structure to reach from the ground and connect with the Crescent above) – was toppled when the Kalsaari’s sacked and occupied the city during the opening stages of the Illini Wars. Once engraved with immense runes of magical power and decorated with gargoyles of both gruesome and heroic shapes, the Tower’s grandeur is now reduced to massive piles of rubble that crushed entire neighborhoods of the Undercity. Only the very base of the tower remains intact, but it has long been sealed from entry. Only once a year, on the Hearth Festival, do the Prince and the High Priest of Hann along with an select group, journey into the Tower Base under close guard. Done in the dead of night, it is said that the Prince brings gifts to placate some mighty force within the Tower Base. These gifts are carried in a mighty strongbox, larger than a man, and engraved with gold and mageglass inlay. To the rest of the city, the ruins of the Tower and its base are places of unspeakable power and terrifying evil, and the source of much of the wickedness that afflicts the Undercity. It is said that, after night falls, dark things creep out of the ruins of the old Tower to steal away the souls of the living.

It is for this reason (and others) that, after dark, everyone in Illin with a head on their shoulders is inside with the door locked. It is a known fact that demonic spirits infest the city, though there has never been any definitive evidence linking their presence with whatever dwells in the Tower Base. Demonhunters are a sought-after and daring group of professionals that walk the streets at night (or even during the day in the Dark Quarter of the Undercity) and try to hunt down particularly troublesome ghosts, demons, or spirits. A fair living is to be made in this racket, so long as you live long enough to capitalize on your earnings. Successful demonhunters have even been granted positions in the Illini military and retired with style, though this is rare. Most demonhunters either quit after a year or vanish in the night, never to be seen again. The accepted opinion among the magi and the demonhunters is that these malevolent spirits are drawn to Illin thanks to the enormous magical energies at play there, and that their presence is simply the price that must be paid for having a city in the sky.

Culture and People 

The people of Illin are a strange mix of Kalsaari and Western blood, making them among the more enigmatic and mistrusted peoples of the Alliance. Though they do not suffer from the scandalous reputations of the Ihynish or Verisi, the Illini are thought of a mysterious, exotic, and downright foreign by many of their neighbors. For their part, the Illini are fatalistic and dour, accepting that there is more evil in the world than they themselves can defeat. In this sense they can be seen as defeatist or pessimistic, but, if taken in another light, the Illini ability to subvert the forces of evil in order to insure their survival is nothing short of miraculous.

Life in Illin is hard, but hard in a way that does not mirror the hard, frontier lives of an Eddoner or Benethoran, for instance. While Eddon and Benethor’s enemies are clear and notably foreign to their land, Illin is a land populated by one’s enemies. An Illini is as likely to be killed by his own town guard as he is by a hob; he is in just as much danger from the demons that lurk beneath the street as the Kalsaari armies across the river. Death, evil, and danger lurk in every nook and cranny of Illin, and for a native Illini to survive, they need wits, cunning, and, more than anything, faith. Nowhere is the common populace as devoutly Hannite as in Illin. Even Rhondite religious fervor is nothing to the white-knuckled, grasping need the Illini have for spiritual protection. Here every man, woman, and child wears a Hannite talisman around their neck, and every Hannite temple is packed back-to-front every evening to offer up their thanks and prayers to Hann the Great. The Hannite church is seen as the one place where the average Illini can be safe from the dangers that surround him. In times of darkness, Hann’s light fills them and, in times of great need, Hann will protect them from the spears of their enemies. Few are the Black Guardsmen who will violate the sanctuary of a Hannite temple, and even fewer are the families that do not dedicate one of their sons or daughters to the Hannite priesthood. Religion in Illin is not a matter of politics, it is a simple matter of survival.

Outside of the church, which acts as the social hub of every community, most Illini are reticent and gloomy in mood. Unlike most of the West, foreigners are not so much welcomed as they are tolerated. To the average Illini, foreigners represent trouble, and trouble is one thing they don’t need. In a land that has long been the pawn of international politics and is the victim of a harsh and, at times, arbitrary regime, the Illini motto is most certainly mind your own business. If a problem presents itself or if trouble is brewing, most Illini will prefer not to address it straight on, but sit back and watch how it unfolds. If they can reasonably avoid the problem without risking their well-being, they will do so, but if confrontation is inevitable, they are cunning and resourceful in their method of attack. The Illini play their emotions and opinions very close to their chest, which, while it makes them appear dour and unfriendly, is merely a reflection of their innate caution. To them, the element of surprise is the best hope for victory in any situation, and it ought not be wasted through hasty or ill-advised action. Nevertheless, though they are slow to warm up, Illini value friends as much if not more than any people under the sun. They take the bonds of companionship very seriously, knowing full well that the world is full of enough enemies that a true friend should be treasured above all things save Hann himself.

Though few Illini have the luxury of free time, they are well known for their affinity for tooka and their passion for a game known as t’suul, which is very similar to dominoes. Though smoking excessively is declared as a sin by the Hannite faith, every male Illini has a tooka pipe and will smoke when the occasion permits a few hours of lounging and relaxing with friends. Every Illini tavern or inn is filled with the sweet smoke of the dream-leaf and, while Illini booze is world renowned for its poor quality, its tooka weed has no equal, not even in Kalsaar. It is in these taverns that t’suul is played among men, women, and children. A game of wits and finesse, the clacking of ivory or bone tiles can be like rain on a shingle roof on busy nights. The Illini do not gamble on t’suul—it is a game of honor, machismo, and skill, not money—but the game is used to decide disputes between friends, family, and even rivals. Since dueling is forbidden in Illin without permission of a Black Guard officer, and few Illini are willing to risk speaking to the Guard (and, hence, draw attention), t’suul is played. In a particularly grisly form of the game, used when two rivals agree to play to the death, the loser of the game is forced to ingest poison by the winner’s second. Homes and estates have been lost to the tiles of t’suul, and lives have been broken beneath the weight of its 36 rectangular tiles—it is a serious game, and it is played by a serious people.

The so-called nobility of Illin, while outwardly much different than the solemn people they rule, are not as different from the masses as they might imagine. Those in Illin who might be considered ‘noble’ are very few—limited to the Prince, his three Lord Commanders, the Magi of Illini origin, and a select group of wealthy merchant families—and, while they are far more gregarious than the peasantry, are still a clannish and self-conscious group when forced to socialize with the elegant Eretherian and Akrallian upper classes. They are intensely aware of the poor state of their small nation, and seek to compensate as best they can. Noble visitors to Illin will find themselves lavishly treated, and most people of ‘quality’ who visit are never even permitted to see the seedier, more grungy aspects of this dusty, rocky land—the lower class in particular. A house on the Crescent and a few griffon rides later, it is hoped that foreign dignitaries will totally forget the dark and squalid conditions that the Illini people suffer so bravely and without complaint year after year.

Current Events

Illin, once thought to be invulnerable to siege, was seized by the Kalsaaris twenty-seven years ago with sorcerous rituals of such power, the world has not seen the like since. This conquest of the Illini peninsula was the notice to the peoples of the West that the world would be, henceforward, forever changed. The harsh occupation that followed and the bloody war that ended it saw sorcery used on an industrial and military scale for the first time in millennia. Illin paid the price in blood, violence, and destruction. Prince Landar the Holy, the mercenary turned hero who unified the routed Black Guard and organized a guerilla campaign that eventually broke Kalsaar’s hold on the region, did an incredible job in the years immediately following the war to clean up and rebuild, but his sudden disappearance (and presumed death) led to his lieutenants fighting over the spoils of his legacy. Illin became even weaker than it was before the war, and the rest of the nations of the West have been forced to step in to rebuild. The Illini people are intensely bitter at the interference of foreigners, often equating their ‘assistance’ as not that much different than the treatment they received beneath Kalsaari rule. While this isn’t precisely accurate, it does paint a picture of a people who remember better days and are forced to watch their country crumble around them as the Principality falls under the rule of corrupt bully after corrupt bully.

Now, almost thirty years after the Fall of Illin, aspects of the nation show sparks of life, but the rot that caused it to collapse the first time has only grown. Only time will tell how long the Kalsaaris will wait before trying their luck again.

This looks a little bit like Ihyn, I think.

The smallest of the nations of the Alliance, the County of Ihyn rests upon the Isle of Brasori at the center of the Sea of Syrin. A nation of sailors and merchants, Ihyn has a reputation for being a theif’s paradise, where respect for the law and moral behavior take a back seat to greed, lust, and gluttony. Universally mistrusted by the other nations of the Alliance, Ihyn has a reputation for switching sides with reckless abandon during any conflict, always sailing where the wind is fairest. Still, the mercantile skills and shrewd business dealings of the Ihynish have earned them grudging respect from their fellow Alliance members, rating them just one step above the Verisi in diplomatic esteem. Wealthy, decadent, and treacherous, Ihyn has been a haven for those who dislike playing by the rules and like to live by their wits. Proceed along its docks and canals with caution.

Political Structure

Officially, the political structure of Ihyn is among the simplest in the Alliance. Being a small nation with very little actual territory, the Count of Ihyn is supreme ruler of all lands, people, and waters surrounding the Isle of Brasori. There are no knights beneath him, no viscounts to dispute his edicts, no council of advisors to temper his moods—the Count is in complete control. Beneath him are a series of civic posts — constables, judges, tax collectors, etc. — and the military, which consists of a very small force of county guards and an enormous navy. The title of Count is hereditary, passing to the eldest child of the Count upon his death or premature retirement. Should no heir be apparent, one is named by the Count prior to his death. It is a simple, elegant, and efficient system for a small territory.

Unfortunately, Ihyn hasn’t functioned in this way ever since the Akrallian Wars led to the assassination of Count Otho Boorth — the last of the strong Counts of Ihyn. Since that time, the Counts have been little more than puppets for one faction or another within the city of Ihyn itself, being consistently bribed to look the other way or simply assassinated when they proved intractable. The most powerful of these factions (and the one that currently holds the Count’s leash) is the Thieves’ Guild, also known as the Smiling Barbers or simply ‘Barbs’ by those in the know. The Barbs, through the Count, control almost every aspect of city life in Ihyn, from the docks to the palace and back again. Their only competition comes from several wealthy merchant families that make their homes on the island. Controlling the balance of the nation’s merchant fleet, these families (also known as ‘cartels’) run both the countryside they live in and regulate the flow of money that moves into and out of the city itself. In an almost constant state of silent war with the Barbs, these families maintain fortified estates and private armies to keep themselves safe from the famed ‘Smiler’s Mark’ — a bloody smile in the form of an ear-to-ear throat slash that is a Barb assassin’s trademark.

Corruption is rampant in every level of Ihynish politics, and anyone with a large purse will find it very easy to do whatever they want on the island, making it similar to Freegate, only more criminal (if that is possible). Crime has become so commonplace that the Count has had to assign parties to dredge the harbor for bodies every morning. Once, centuries ago, Ihyn attracted a large number of Eretherians, Saldorians, and Akrallians who would vacation on the scenic island, but the clientele has changed significantly since then, thanks in large part to the failure on the part of the Counts to do anything about the thieves, criminals, and plutocrats who run everything.

If one has money in Ihyn, one can find life here to be highly agreeable — a large bank account is equivalent to a knighthood here — but the poor are downtrodden and oppressed, forced to pay extortion money to keep their businesses open are terrified for their very lives should the Barbs take particular notice of them. It is interesting to note that Ihyn is the only place in the Alliance where slaves are sold openly at market and where slave ownership, though technically illegal, is commonplace.

Land and Points of Interest

The Isle of Brasori is eighty miles from north to south, and only about twenty miles wide at its widest point. The terrain is rocky and thickly wooded, with the only indigenous crops being grapes, pears, and oranges. Most of the population lives along the island’s long, rocky coastline, where there are plenty of deep inlets and harbors to allow sizable fishing fleets to come and go. Fish is the staple food of all Ihynish, with the only other meat readily available for consumption originating from the flocks of goats that are herded inland along the stony ridges of Brasori’s low, central mountain range.

The climate of Ihyn is mild and warm, with moderate rainfall occurring all year long. Every fall and winter the island is battered by a series of tropical storms that brew in the east near the Needle and rage westwards, with one or two hurricanes being among them. These storms, though rare, cause enormous damage to coastal settlements from which it sometimes takes years to fully recover. By and large, however, the weather on Ihyn is warm, peaceful, and nurturing — a paradise of palm trees and crystal-clear water.

Of particular interest in Ihyn, on both Brasori itself and the several smaller islands over which Ihyn practices eminent domain, are the rumors and legends of ancient ruins dating back to the time of Rahdnost the Undying, greatest of the Warlock Kings. It is a commonly held belief that Ghola — the unholy capital of that dark monarch — once stood upon an island or group of islands somewhere in the vicinity of Ihyn. This has been backed up somewhat by a degree of archaeological evidence. Goatherds often find the ruined pieces of pillars or the foundations of long-razed buildings in the steep hills of Brasori, while larger, more intact ruins stand on other islands. The Barbs and the merchant families, for their part, have very little interest in these ruins, knowing full well that they have long since been picked over by centuries of treasure hunters and thieves. That does not, however, stop them from selling ‘secret maps’ and having special ‘guides’ in their employ that will relieve the gullible treasure hunter of their gold by leading them on a merry gnome hunt through the scenic Ihynish isles.

The City of Ihyn: The city of Ihyn has been referred to as ‘the floating city’, and rightly so. Wedged up against the steep hillsides of inland Brasori, only about one third of the city’s population of 240,000 actually live on dry land. The city is constantly expanding as more and more people seek to feed off the river of wealth flowing through the heart of this thief’s paradise, and, as a result, it is among the most confusing and crowded places west of the Dragonspine.

The city is loosely divided into three sections. The first, known as the Old City, dates from the founding of the city, some 150 years after the fall of the Warlock Kings. Surrounded by a crumbling and mostly overgrown wall, the Old City is the only portion of Ihyn still located on land. Home to the Duke’s own fortress — known as the Crag — the Old City is primarily occupied by the wealthiest members of Ihynish society as well as the most upscale gaming houses, brothels, and hotels. Each home in the Old City is a fortress unto itself, complete with walls and private guards (this is, after all, a city of thieves), but none are so large as the Crag itself. A great, hulking, crumbling carcass of a castle, the Crag is five times larger than even the largest of the homes in the Old City. Built by the original founder of Ihyn — a pirate king called Rovanni — the Crag sits on the edge of what would be the harbor, were it not now filled in by the rest of the city. Added to and added to and added to over the centuries, it is unlikely anyone living knows all the ins and outs of the massive fortress, and most of it remains uninhabited to this day. It has never been attacked save once by the Akrallian fleet some 1200 years ago, and it seems unlikely it shall ever be attacked again. It shall succumb, instead, to the steady march of time and the lapping of the ocean — a fitting rotten center to a rotten city.

Beyond the Old City is the New City — a network of docks and wharfs that extend outwards from the Old City into the enormous Ihynish harbor. Magically reinforced to remain stable and sturdy enough to hold entire city blocks of buildings and people even in high seas, winds, and waves, the New City is where most of Ihyn lives, works, and plays. The waters in the many canals are deep enough to accommodate all but the largest of ships, who, therefore, have the unique privilege of pulling right up to the warehouse or shop into which their cargo is to be unloaded. Marketplaces can sell their goods directly to sailors on passing vessels, fishermen can walk out their front door to find their skiffs waiting, and thieves find it easy to leap from a rooftop to a passing mast and make their way into the hold for some prime looting. A crowded place, the ‘streets’ are constantly teeming with merchants, travelers, constables, pick-pockets, performers, and more. Beneath the baffling network of docks also exists a labyrinth of pilings and moorings known as the Underbelly — it is here that Barb agents can move silently and without notice to almost anywhere in the New City, and many a hapless victim has found his last trip to be in a small boat in the ever-present darkness of this foul, stinking place.

Finally, stretching out from the edges of the New City like a teeming swarm of parasites is Flotsam — a chain of small boats, barges, and rafts that comprise a makeshift neighborhood of poor workers, orphans, refugees, and black marketers. Constantly shifting with every ebb and flow of the tide, it is very difficult for the uninitiated to make their way through Flotsam without falling into the water, getting lost, or being stabbed in the back. Universally avoided by all but the bravest or most desperate, Flotsam is the seedy underbelly to an already seedy city, and it is unlikely visitors will see poverty this abject anywhere in Alandar save in the slums of Kalsaari cities. Flotsam is destroyed on average once a year, when the first major storm of the season rips through the shoddily constructed boats and tears apart the flimsy supports and lines holding them in place. Hundreds die in this kind of catastrophe and, though something ought to be done to prevent such things in the future, neither the Count nor his superiors show any interest in helping.

Culture and People

Say the word ‘Ihynish’ to the average Westerner and a few things come to mind: liar, cheater, thief, and merchant. While this assessment of the people of Ihyn is not entirely accurate, it is also by no means a baseless accusation. Many of the Ihynish are morally bankrupt individuals with poor reputations and less-than-pure intentions but certainly not all of the nation’s people deserve such a stigma. On the whole, the Ihynish people are both clever and adaptable, willing to roll with the punches in order to come out on top later on.

The population of Ihyn can be effectively separated into two cultural subgroups, the first being those who live in the city of Ihyn itself and the second being those who live without. City-dwellers are easily identified by their street savvy lingo, their quick wits, and their familiarity with the extensive Ihynish underworld. By contrast, those who live outside of Ihyn are provincial herders and fisherman, accustomed to the roll of the waves and a day of hard work, but not well acclimated to the dangers of city life. The Ihynishman of common myth is largely the Ihynishman of the city, whereas the rural Ihynish fail to resemble their urban cousins in almost every way.

Rural Ihynish consider the city the den of iniquity and unrighteousness that it is, and seek to avoid going there as much as possible. In the fishing villages and orchard towns of Brasori, the Hannite faith has a strong hold, and the excesses and sinful acts of the urbanites are viewed with unadulterated religious scorn and, in many cases, fear. The crops and catches of the rural Ihynish are brought to market in Ihyn, but are usually sold to peddlers and grocers that wait without the gates of the city proper or direct from the boat to the docks of the New City with nary a rural toe being placed within the confines of the wicked capital.

Urbanites, for their part, reciprocate their rural cousins’ prejudice with enthusiasm. To them, rurals are the worst kind of fools, suckers, and low-grade ignorami. Though Hannite temples exist in the Old City, very few urban Ihynish give the religion more than a second thought and almost none have anything polite to say about its superstitions and moral conscience. While the rurals will never be anything but fishermen, the urban Ihynish see themselves as constantly trying to ‘make it’ in the world. The draw of the city, despite its poverty, violence, and corruption, is that the only thing keeping an Ihynishman from the good life is a few years of hard work, quick thinking, and ruthless determination. Ihyn is a place of opportunity and wealth, whereas there will never be anything in the country but hard work, poverty, and boring routine.

For all their disdain for one another, however, the urban and rural communities are hardly exclusive peoples. Every year rurals come from the countryside to the city, seeking their fortune, and every year urbanites who have had it with the backstabbing world of the city seek to retire to a simple life in the country. As much as both groups hate to admit it, the populations are fairly fluid and all Ihynish, urban or otherwise, share the same cultural heritage. The Ihynish are a people who value their wits above all other things. Ihynish folklore is filled with tales of the small, intelligent man beating the powerful, dull man through tricks, cunning, and outright lies. To an Ihynishman, one is only as good as one’s mind, with stupidity being equated with evil as much as anything else. If you got yourself conned, tricked, or stumped by someone that means you probably deserved it and should take it as a lesson for being a dunce. Honesty is not valued by Ihynish society as much as it is in other places, and even the rural Ihynish, with their reputation as being simple, are sly and devious in their dealings with their neighbors. Practical in their way, the Ihynish see no reason to remain loyal to someone who isn’t doing them any good or to tell the truth to someone who means them harm and, while this trickery isn’t always for the purpose of harming others, it is universally designed to benefit oneself. Not all Ihynish are thieves and killers, but almost all of them are slippery and cunning, whether it is in the field of fishing or of swordplay.

The overriding motive behind all of this trickery and double-dealing is, in the end, survival. Ihyn is a very small place, and there are a lot of people who are trying to make a living here. If everybody went around telling the truth and playing fair, nobody would be living comfortably. As it stands, only the select and lucky few do live a life of luxury in Ihyn, but rather than be bitter, most Ihynish admire these sorts for their resourcefulness and agile minds (though it is doubtful they would hesitate for an instant if they could pull one of them down to allow themselves to rise up.). Ihynish cultural beliefs do not allow for one to blame another for one’s own lack of success—it’s their own damn fault for being a sucker, and that’s all. What is expected of the loser in these situations is to find a way to get back at the one who tore you down by tearing he or she down in turn, and showing to one and all just how clever you really are. For a person with intelligence, luck, and determination, the sky is the limit in Ihyn just so long as little things like ‘morals’ don’t get in the way.

In many ways, life on Ihyn is much more harsh than it is in many other Alliance nations. Though, as a nation, Ihyn is exceptionally wealthy, its people are comparatively poor. The average person in Ihyn lives in a one-room hut or in a small boat with their entire family, and the vast majority of their diet consists of fish and goat’s milk with the occasional piece of fruit. Work is hard, extortion is rampant, crime is almost legal, and one must live by their wits or end up starving, dead, imprisoned, or worse. To pass the time, the Ihynish will tell one another riddles and brain-teasers as well as play at cards and dice. Gambling is something of a national pastime here, and gaming houses are almost as common in the countryside as they are in the city itself. Religious holidays are regularly observed in the country as well as in the city, though the urbanites have made the holidays more into excuses to act even more raucous and depraved than usual rather than recognizing their grander, religious purpose.

Economically speaking, Ihyn is a middle man for almost every good or ware transported across the Syrin, though it produces and sells very little of its own. It is known for its fish oils, used both for lubrication and for lighting lamps, and its alcoholic liqueurs made from the various fruits that are indigenous to the island. Almost the entire population is connected somehow to fishing, and the sea is the lifeblood of the country. Though Hannite by day, many are the rural fishing communities who hold secret ceremonies sacrificing live animals to Azhar in the hopes that she will grant them large catches in the coming weeks. A immoral practice to some, but to the Ihynish it is just another means to an end.

Current Events

Ihyn provided logistical and economic support to the war effort during the Illini Wars, but only after the Kalsaaris refused to make a deal with them. This latter bit, while not public knowledge, is known by enough diplomats and statesmen in the West to guarantee that Ihyn enjoys very little esteem from its neighbors. The increase in access to sorcerous goods has been put to good use in Ihyn, as they have taken to revolutionizing their modest agriculture with a variety of sorcerous techniques. Now, Ihyn produces a fair amount of saleable goods – tabacco, hard liquors, wine, and so on. These goods, however, are basically copies of higher quality goods from other countries. Ihyn has flooded the market with, essentially, sorcerous clones and magical knock-offs of many, many things. This adds to the wealth of the Barbers and the cartels, but has done little to help the common citizen. For the average Ihynishman, their life thirty years ago and their life now remains basically the same – do what you have to in order to stay alive, and live by your wits.