The Marrow Flats Region

Regions

Marrow Flats: A large wasteland region on the Eastern coast of the Ekrysian Empire. The place is so named for the pale white composition of its soils, since it is seated upon a massive salt deposit left behind when the Scything Sea receded many millennia in the past. It's broken up in places by a range of low mountains known as the Saltspine, which was once believed to be an island chain; otherwise, the land is largely flat, occasionally marred by hills, pits or cracks. Though located well within a temperate climate zone, the dryness of the Flats can often lead to extreme temperatures, severely hot in the summer and chillingly cold in winter.

Apart from the hostile weather, there are a wide variety of dangers in the region which keep most settlers out. Winds off the Scything Sea can whip the top-soils of the Flats into a biting frenzy, and these 'saltstorms' can penetrate as far inland as the commune of Iosyne or the Haulix Prison Camp, so many of the structures there need to be protected. The saline properties of the coils can create strange mirages in the heat, and leech the moisture from travelers' skins at an alarming rate. There are a number of ruins and caverns which have claimed the lives of many who have attempted to explore them, including some left behind by the Huguelids, the human civilization which served as genetic precursors to much of the population of Euristaz. While some information about their customs and technologies have been gleaned across the continent, there is still much to be learned.

Lastly, the laxness of the Imperial garrison at Castle Autarkes has ensured that the region is still crawling with natural predators which can easily take out unsuspecting miners or soldiers. Ghost scorpions, giant vultures, death dogs and gnoll brigands are all common threats on the lowlands, while even deadlier beasts are purported to lie beneath the earth, occasionally striking out from the enigmatic darkness in which they reside...

Saltspine Mountains: Rumors have it that the Saltspines were once an island chain sitting just off the original coast of Euristaz, but after some cataclysm or natural event drained the land, they were suddenly sprung up as a series of low mountains circling and piercing through the Marrow Flats. The highest of these peaks is rarely 500' over the current sea level, but they are still large enough to dominate the landscape view from many miles away, and possess a stark complexity to all their sharp angles of slate and granite that they hide elaborate natural passages and cavern networks, including a few notorious mines and lairs that have given the Ekrysians trouble over the centuries.

While some of them are tapped for ore lodes, gemstones and rock salt deposits, the mountains are almost entirely uninhabited by men, with the exception of the Nine Idols' Rest reliquary built out of an ancient Huguelid keep up in the northern edge of the Flats. Like the wasteland below, the Saltspine is plagued with treacherous obstacles and dangers...razor sharp ridges, rockslides, collapsing tunnels, and they're also home to a collection of starving, desperate creatures including wyverns, dire bats, and giant species of cave insects that hide in wait for daring climbers and explorers to brave the heights.

Scything Sea: One of the largest oceans in the world, the Scything Sea is dubbed for its capacity to claim the souls of so many willing to traverse it. Chaotic whirlpools are known to appear from out of nowhere and harass vessels, while rocky reefs and mist-enshrouded islets abound in both the depths and coastal shallows. A myriad of formidable wildlife, from stinging jellyfish flotilla to schools of saw-sharks, giant squids and even the occasional kraken, occupy its waters, and if they weren't treacherous enough, fleets of Aylish reavers terrorize smaller coastal communities or those marine merchants with guts enough to cross. As far as pirates go, these are among the most highly trained in the world, employing time-tested naval tactics and weaponry that can run them head on against even a hardened Imperial naval detachment.

Settlements

Castle Autarkes (Pop. 100): With its 40' high walls, a quartet of 60' towers, and finely crafted defensive battlements stocked with anti-siege weaponry, Autarkes would seem a bastion of hope for such an isolated region of the Empire. However, due to the lack of serious strategic threats off the Eastern coast that aren't naval-based, the place has been left to only a skeletal garrison, with around 50-60 soldiers and a multitude of wives, families and castle staff stationed under one officer. As the ennui has set in, patrols have grown sparse, and thus monster populations have picked up, but one will occasionally encounter a small detachment of scouts. When requests for assistance are sent directly from either Iosyne or Ykklesias, the Imperial staff will occasionally send out a detachment of 8-10 mounted soldiers, but help is never guaranteed. They will, however, consistently refresh the guards at the Haulix Prison Camp, who work there in monthly shifts before swapping out for duty, and a lot of relaxation, at the Castle proper.

Haulix Prison Camp (Pop. 50): While most of the Empire's most violent and dangerous criminals never survive long past trial in more urban settings, there are work camps strewn about the regions in which the 'lesser' offenders are placed, with a carrot of freedom dangled before them should they serve out some overblown labor sentence. Thieves, rapists, black marketeers, court martialed Ekrysian troops, and foreign spies often populate such camps, and the Marrow Flats has its own, located in the south of the Marrow Flats under the eaves of the Saltspine. The camp itself consists of a small tent village of several dozen structures, dominated by a large tower in which the Imperial guards exchange shifts and get a good view of the prisoners below. 'Inmates' are given a limited degree of personal freedom to wander around between work shifts at the nearby Slakestones mine, converse and prepare meals, but they are chained down in their tents at night. Rarely, prisoners will be sent along with a few guards to assist the salt miners of Iosyne when they're short hands or a particularly steep quota needs to be met.

Iosyne (Pop. 75): A small community centered entirely around its salt mining laborers, who make daily treks, divided into teams, out to satellite digs where they harvest the rock salt from the Flats. The workers aren't paid very well, but it's a living, and the Empire provides some amenities for their families, like a resident engineer who has built several architectural improvements. A covered stone duct runs fresh rainwater from the Saltspine into a series of sluices, and a network of tall pylons and hooks can be used to raise a tarp that can offer both shelter from the brutal summer sun, and a total lockdown against an encroaching saltstorm from the East. Iosyne also features a small inn, stables for the wagons and llamas used both by the pickers themselves, and the salt-drivers who take shipments along the road west, back towards the more heavily settled Empire, and bring back supplies and food stuffs in return. A Tribune and small garrison of soldiers are assigned to the village for long lengths of time, and they oversee any of the troubles or threats while leaving most of the work organization to the local foreman.

Nine Idols' Rest (Pop. 10): The most isolated settlement in the Marrow Flats region, the Nine Idols' Rest is a reliquary built out of an old Huguelid ruin in the northern Saltspine. Roughly 300' up the mountainside, it's accessible by only a treacherous, narrow path and a pulley system which lowers a cage capable of carrying 3-4 visitors. Too few have seen the structure up close to really describe it. Little is also known about the monks and scholars at the Rest, but they have either been exiled or assigned to the place to pursue some long lost knowledge, and often receive sealed shipments from couriers sent specifically to the site. Once in a great while, one of the residents will be seen out on the Flats, or even visit Iosyne or Ykklesias, but these are usually just to pick up specific supplies, and while polite, they don't say much about their purpose.

Ykklesias (Pop. 500): The largest community in the Marrow Flats area, Ykklesias is a fishing village built primarily from Saltspine stone and some imported timber. While they're too distant from most other coastal towns and cities to do much direct trade, the harbor of the village features a 75' high lighthouse which helps pierce the oft-foggy nights on the coast, and it can easily fit a couple dozen small ships including a few Imperial vessels. Like Iosyne, the village is governed by a Tribune who is attended by a score Imperial soldiers, and the populace is largely self-servicing, with a number of small businesses that meet their needs, and if not, collect goods from the visiting trade and fishing vessels who stop over there. Trade between the salt miners, fishermen and Castle Autarkes is scarce but it does happen when necessary.

Other Sites

Alpha Dig: The primary site where the salt miners of Iosyne extract their product from the earth before bringing it back to the village, for breaking up and shipping off to the Empire. Northeast of Iosyne. There are some tents set up for shelter and a place for a fire pit and cooking, and it's all located about 20' deep in the ground, so some protection from the elements is granted. A ramp has been carved out to allow access for the wagons that move the rock salt crystals in their larger form, and there are a few dozen tributary tunnels leading off the main ditch which haven't been fully tapped or explored, some of which were natural, others the product of a few too many pick strikes on the walls of the Dig. In general, 50% of Iosyne's laborers will be assigned to this dig.

Drastor's Delve: Drastor was the first Tribune assigned to Iodyne, sixty years past, and oversaw the salt mining operation for a solid decade before disappearing mysteriously while outside the village gates. Some time later, notes were discovered that incriminated the officer as a smuggler who was excavating and exporting gemstones from a nearby site, possibly with the help of local soldiers, or even a handful of slaves, before that practice was abolished. An official investigation was launched out of Triskelos, and many of the current families' grandparents or great grandparents were among those interrogated harshly by the Imperials. Whether or not Drastor's secrets were fully uncovered is not known to the public, but a somewhat hidden cavern network south of Iosyne was later collapsed by the soldiers, and until only recently remained sealed. Then, about five years ago, someone or something managed to clear out the rubble at the entrance...

Foothold: As its name states, this is a camp located at the Western slope of a detached segment of the Saltspine in the midst of the Marrow Flats, due East of Iosyne, across some of the wasteland's more rugged, hilly terrain. It's set up much like the Alpha Dig, only with less tents, since there are rarely more than a half-dozen men assigned to work here. Unlike its larger sibling, however, excavation takes place directly into the mountainside. The rock salt crystals here are not in as much abundance, but richer and finer when broken down back at the village, and this product is usually shipped off to more affluent regions or families of the Empire. Laborers usually consider it a punishment to be sent to Foothold, as the heights of the Saltspine are thick with giant buzzards here, and there is suspected to be at least one family of cave giants living in the area...who are often hungry for something other than raw vulture.

Huguelid Ruins: While the ages have worn most of its architecture away, the foundations to an ancient, moderately sized Huguelid settlement lie within a salt pit roughly the size of the Alpha Dig. Explorers and scholars have long since come and picked what they could find dry, and much of what remained has been defaced by the salt and climate, but the place is still the subject of many curious rumors, and the leaning stones and empty verandas that remain are plentiful enough that they might harbor some remaining mysteries. One must be careful picking through them, however, due to the propensity of such structures to collapse, and of the more monstrous Marrow Flats denizens who enjoy the shade and privacy that some of the more intact buildings still provide them.

Mereside: This small camp site is an 'exploratory' dig site for the residents of Iosyne, since the local engineer and water runner are interested in coming up with ways to dredge the briny Brack Tarn and extract its wet salt. They will often make journeys here for research, accompanied by a wagon and a handful of laborers who can carry their samples and perhaps score some good salt while they're out there. Though it's not good for drinking without purification, the waters of the Tarn are peaceful and fed by rainwater runoff from the surrounding Saltspine. That is, until larger predators show up and decide they'd also like a 'drink', and maybe a 'meal'. Basilisks, death dogs and other beasts are often prowling the banks for just that reason.

Old Azuredark: Considered off limits to most locals, the Old Azuredark is a network of caverns which is reputed to be the lair of a centuries-old blue dragon, whose name is either unknown or forgotten across the years. The creature itself has not been seen for at least a decade, and thus might have died off or flown to take residence elsewhere, but the savagery such a thing could inflict on such a small population is a major deterrent to trespassers. Which is a shame, because some whisper that the Old Azuredark contains a number of sapphire deposits that could make a salt miner mighty rich, mighty quick, should he or she risk the place. But those few who have attempted it have either not stepped back out the cavern entrance, or been caught in advance by Imperial soldiers and sentenced to some punishment to dissuade them, perhaps even a stay at the Haulix Prison Camp.

Slakestone Mines: These mines are another one of the Empire's local ventures, producing no salt whatsoever, but a steady stream of ore, some of which is reportedly silver, and possibly even some gems of moderate value. Most of the 'proceeds' of this dig go straight to Castle Autarkes with the changing of the guard from the Haulix camp, and what happens after that is anyone's guess. The Mines are supposedly several levels deep, having been tapped for close to a century, and they've also claimed their share of laboring prisoners. Whispers have it that some of the walls and ceilings of the place seem alive, and can snatch up and devour a man before his shift-mates even know he's gone. The Imperials wave these away as idle chatter, and claim instead that men have tried to run off deeper into the unknown, to unknown fates, or even that a few escaped successfully to the woodlands south of the region after giving some incompetent soldiers the slip. Either way, the Haulix inmates do not seem overjoyed at the prospect of working them, and consider it almost a privilege when they are instead sent to complement the salt miners out of Iosyne.