Niirdal-Poc

Long before the Calamity, a great civilization called the Qoniira made Rifenmist their home. During the Age of Arcanum, the Qoniira Tetrarchy grew from a loose coalition of towns led by arcanists, clerics of the Wildmother, and druids who spoke with the jungle around them. These towns were inhabited by humans and the animal-bodied humanoids of the jungle. The first stones of the Qoniiran heart-city Niirdal-Poc were laid by the broad, towering elephantine people, and places for new settlements were scouted out by catfolk seers whose eyes glistened with starlight.

Surviving the Calamity

In time, the Qoniira civilization grew into a Tetrarchy, with four great satellite cities and the central heart-city of Niirdal-Poc. The tetrarchs established their cities with mathematical precision. A constellation of the night sky guided them—Surrac's Shield, a four-starred diamond with a fifth star in its center. The constellation still shines over Rifenmist and southern Exandria today. The four outer cities of Qoniira match the points of Surrac's Shield precisely, and Niirdal-Poc is aligned with its center star.
The Calamity struck at the peak of Qoniiran civilization, yet rather than take up arms against gods and mortals, the tetrarchs opted to remove themselves from the world—not unlike the elves of Syngorn to the north. Something happened in Niirdal-Poc, some sort of magic that even the Qoniirans of today do not understand.

Magic Beyond Reckoning

Magic suffuses the city of Niirdal-Poc. Its magic is something older than the gods, or the Calamity, or anything wielded by mortals today. However, the mortal mages of Niirdal-Poc wield the same arcane force gifted by the gods, and its druids and clerics touch upon the power of the gods behind the Divine Gate, just as Exandria's other mortal peoples do.
Both ancient and modern magic mingle in Niirdal-Poc, for the patterns of the ancient powers are mysterious and its methods are unknowable. Some call it the Light of Fate, others the Blessing of the Stars. The most common name is simply "the Gift". It was the Gift that protected Niirdal-Poc in the Calamity. It is the Gift that causes miracles to occur, like a person surviving a fall from the heights of Vedrim's Pinnacle to the streets of the city. It is the Gift that causes the Hexahedron of Sarqet to hover mysteriously; it is the Gift that surrounds the Statue of the Observer, a four-winged feline humanoid figure in the city's center, with a broken halo of ashen-gold light—and that causes that same light to flicker within the lamps of the city.

Demographics

18% humans, 17% goblinkin, 12% elves, 12% loxodons, 10% half-elves, 7% genasii, 24% other races

Government

The Tetrarchy of Qoniira, in ages past, was ruled by four tetrarchs, each of whom ruled one of the civilization's four outer cities. In times where the fate of Qoniira was at a crossroads, they gathered within the heart-city to guide the course of their civilization together.
The relative autonomy of the four outer cities and the looseness of the coalition that bound them seems at odds with the perfect precision with which the cities were built, so precisely matching the stars in the sky. The Qoniirans have always been an easygoing people who typically follow the flow of fate rather than fight it.
Today, the tetrarchy survives, even though the four outer cities are inruins. They gather daily in the Hakredic Dome, an architecturally magnificent granite rotunda adorned with an outer layer of grayish-purple porphyry stone and lifelike reddish porphyry statues. There, the tetrarchs and their advisors work to keep life simple and content for their people.
The tetrarchy is a hereditary office, but city-wide elections are held between eligible heirs to determine which heir should take up their parent's mantle. Elections are also held when a tetrarch's line ends without heirs—often giving advisors a chance to gain power by virtue of their service to the city.

Geography

Today, only the heart-city of Niirdal-Poc survives. Its satellites are little more than crumbling ruins. Something shifted in the magic of the jungle when the Qoniirans chose not to fight in the Calamity. The Rifenmist Jungle closed its boughs against the world, shielding the city. When the Strife Emperor died on the Beynsfal Plateaus to the south, the Qoniirans knew nothing of it. All the tumult of the world passed them by.
The Rifenmist Jungle sunk Niirdal-Poc into a deep basin, and its thick canopies shield it from above, while its intertwining boughs hold the heart-city tightly in its embrace. Few are permitted by the protective, ancient magic of the Qoniirans to enter the city. Its people live contentedly within Niirdal-Poc, only occasionally traveling outside their basin to trade with Orroyen nomads or, in mythically rare instances, with the town of Byroden.
The four ruins which surround Niirdal-Poc are:

Niirdal-Gan

This outer city to the north of Niirdal-Poc was the agricultural hub of Qoniira. Some farmers have opted to live outside the basin and tend to these still-fertile lands. They are few, for magic is able to supply food for most people of Niirdal-Poc.

Niirdal-Teek

This outer city, east of Niirdal-Poc, was an academic center of the Qoniiran civilization. Most of the city is one vast university that once was populated by over 30,000 people. Some explorers venture into these ruins to find lost knowledge.

Niirdal-Sarqet

Located south of Niirdal-Poc, this outer city was a center of faith for the Qoniirans. All that remains of the city is a vast, floating cube called the Hexahedron of Sarquet. It is adorned with statues of the Prime Deities and the Betrayer Gods alike, and none living know what is inside its unbreachable walls. Even today, modern Qoniiran priests teach that balance is the true way of the world, telling their people to invoke the names of the Prime Deities for blessings and of the Betrayer Gods for curses.

Niirdal-Hup

Precious little remains of this fortress-city, the heart of the Qoniiran military. A common parable reminds those who hear it not to fight fate—for of all the ruined cities, only the city of warriors was reduced to dust.
All of these ruins are filled with statues from the height of the Qoniiran Tetrarchy. Some statues have been known to move under the light of the stars, illuminating hidden runes upon their bodies as they patrol like sentinels of antiquity.

Type

City

Population

15,442

Location under

Rifenmist Peninsula

Storms bring death, but rain brings life. Storms are power, the power of the distant gods, on display for all to see. Climb into the Stormpoints, young one, and shout your  fury into the relentless wind and booming thunder. Your prayers may not be answered by the gods, but you will feel them echo in your heart.

-Cloudwriter Ix Eghruy of the Orroyen