Sarisen Mountains (Sar-reh-sen)

The Sarisen mountains are a massive mountain range in Southeastern Samvara that are a mystery to most outsiders. To the South are the equatorial kingdoms of Sumaren; to the West are the fractured lands of Tianar; to the East are the healing waters of Sebikahd; but in between them is only a blank on the map, maybe with a few hand-drawn peaks. The huge crags and canyons make travel difficult, and there are only a handful of reliable roads in and out of the mountains. These roads, known as the Diamond Roads, are maintained by many small villages, prism-holds, and Sumoxa monasteries, and while they are difficult for non-prisms to travel they are arteries of great wealth. Great cartloads of steel, rubber, gold, incense, and Kilusha move through here, and tell stories of great cities of gold and impossible gates to other worlds.
Do not let the tall tales of travelers deceive you - this is no realm of magic, no one lives in golden palaces. The treasures, mysteries, and monuments here are mostly those of great achievement made by great effort. And the people here are hardly all mystical hermits. 

The Lands of Sarisen

Breaking down the geography here, there are two economic-cultural cores of the Sarisen mountains: the Northern region of Balinzar, and the Southern region of Sariden. A large circle of unstructured regions known as Mivera surrounds these two cores. 
Balinzar is the smaller, less populated, and more commercially-connected of the two core regions. There are two ranges of particularly high mountains that host Balinzar's two greatest Kima Cities: Onivasara and Ulijanta. Onivasara has the greatest druids of the region, and is ruled by a traditionalist regime that divides itself between surface and underground (each with their own castes and governments). Ulijanta is a fiercely Sumoxan city that blends the teachings of Virtue Saraja with the order of Akadism; it is ruled by an order of anonymous Dhampiric monks. The two great Kimas work together peacefully to host the Balinzari League, the loose federation that maintains the Northern roads and the prevents wars between local rulers. 
Sariden may be less connected to the outside world than Balinzar is, but it is more minerally rich and densely populated. Many Kima Cities dot the landscape here, and extract great wealth from deep in the earth. There are many populous prism-cities here, each independent. There is one power that rises above all others, though: Chushana, the city of the Four Peaks. Chushana keeps the roads working using its "Order of the Diamond Road"; it expands the infrastructure and keeps the peace. Chushana's rise to power has been meteoric, thanks in part to their new connections with the Darzan University - Chushana now has the finest technologies of the world, the finest spellcasters, and trade contracts that span continents. 
Another famous site in Sariden is the legendary city of Dwekeva, inspiration of countless myths and folk stories. Dwekeva was once a metropolis of prism cities, complete with an enormous gold mine, built right next to a massive volcano. In 1409, that volcano erupted in a big way and fast-cooked the entire city in minutes. For some reason this event produced more ghosts than typical natural disasters, and numerous ghosts emerged from the wreckage, traumatized by the memory of the eruption and the end of their world. And, strangely, numerous Gluttonmaws descended on the ruins, led by an exceptional powerful and charismatic leader of some kind. Whether the monsters have somehow tormented the spirits of the dead or recruited them into some dark cult is unknown - but the city has become a death trap of howling creatures and malevolent spirits. Exorcists who tried and failed to scout and cleanse the city have reported that someone has been rebuilding the ancient ashen city and gathering its great treasures. To many beyond the Sarisen mountains, Dwekeva is a gate to the underworld; to those who live here, it is a haunted ruin filled with treasure and danger both. 
As for Mivera, the fringes of these two regions, the land is too fragmented and locally unique to make any broad descriptions.

Geography

The Sarisen mountains are a massive range, 1182 miles North-South and 1147 miles West-East. They bridge the entire gap between Tianar, Sumaren, and Sebikahd. The mountains of the tallest cluster - those surrounding Dwekeva, the mountain of fire - reach 20,000 feet tall. 
Within the Sarisen range, there are two particularly tall and dramatic regions that are mineral-rich and densely inhabited by Prisms: Sariden (whose empire gave the mountains their name) and Balzinar. Beyond these two regions, the mountains become more reasonably sized (though still definitely mountains). 
North of the Sarisen mountains are the Gekrev mountains - another range that does have some overlap. To the Southeast, the Sarisen mountains branch off into smaller sub-ranges, which eventually turn into the tropical region of Jatri.

Fauna & Flora

The truly staggering number of bird and shrew species live in the Sarisen mountains. These are joined by small mammals - notably mongooses, minde (small round mountain antelope) - as well as a number of mountain gorillas and other apes common in Sumaren.

History

Early History

Little is known of the region's history prior to the Akadist migrations of the 300s ME, which brought a wave of conquering prisms with new technologies and social structures into the region. These prisms organized themselves and their subjects into Kima Cities, which ruled over the surrounding lands.
The Akadists in the North largely kept to themselves, though they did squabble frequently. Those in the South were more militaristic - they were brought together by a now-mythic emperor named Koparta, who subjugated both the local prisms and the other Kima's with a shocking ruthlessness. Koparta was careful to avoid making too many enemies, though, and the offered some non-prisms freedom and status in exchange for cooperation. This first empire was focused on making a handful of Kima truly massive, at the expense of everyone else; the cities Koparta built were legendary in size and wealth. The greatest was his capital, Dwekeva, the City of Gold, built into the great volcano in the highest peaks of the Southern range. But these mega-Kima eventually waned in power, and turned on each other; in a great civil war in the 600s, Koparta's empire collapsed.

Middle History

The ashes of Koparta's empire were not yet cold when a new Empire began to rise: that of Saridem, the most famous and long-lasting of any imperial state in these mountains. Koparta imagined empire as a cluster of hyper-focused points, while the Saridem saw empire as roads and broad spaces: instead of vaccuuming people and resources inwards, they blossomed outwards. From the 600s through the 1200s ME, the Saridem empire expanded and prospered. Their secret: roads, tunnels, and bridges! Using a grand central bureaucracy, they mapped the mountains, built outposts to project power, and build irrigation canals to channel water. Where Koparta was demanding, the Saridem were tolerant - they expanded the class of outside collaborators into a whole series of vassals and autonomous subject-castes.  
In the North, the Kimas remained independent until they were conquered from within by an ambitious warlord named Nulaxa, who led a militaristic mountain tribe known as the Balinzari. She named the North's mountains after her people (the name has stuck), and eventually became a vassal of the Saridem. While the wars were terrible for the North, unity did bring prosperity. The Balinzari Kimas, forcibly opened by Nulaxa, became quite wealthy as they reached out to trade with outsiders in Invara and Sebikahd. They became the "face" of Saridem, trading the massive amounts of gold mined from Dwekeva for all sorts of luxuries. A Kilusha boom contributed to this as well. The Balinzari Kimas also were very welcoming of druids - they wanted magic of any kind, as well as new technologies, to enrich their realm. Onivasara, the capital of these Kimas, became particularly well known for its druids. This also brought Halikvar missionaries, however, who preached that the Kima cities and the surface tribes must divide themselves. The new religious sowed civil conflict, which led to the Northern Kimas closing themselves off. 
With the closing of the Balinzari trade routes and a number of internal problems in the Saridem heartlands, the empire began to fragment in the 1200s. The North seceded entirely in 1228, and retreated into a repressive regime. In the late 1300s, a group of Theian paladins overthrew the regime and re-opened the country, which quickly fragmented into many local powers. In 1409, a massive eruption in the city of Dwekeva suddenly destroyed the capital of the Southern Sarinem overnight - drowning the leadership in ash and finishing off the empire for good. 

Late History

From 1409 to 1500, the South languished and the Northern Kimas squabbled. The roads broke down, the Halikvar in the East cut the prisms out of the Kilusha business, and the old world seemed to slip away into oblivion. Efforts to refurbish the roads periodically occurred over the 1500s, but most of these efforts were highly local and didn't bring back the old Sarinem network. In the 1570s, a new religious force swept the mountain tribes: Sumoxan religion, preached by Pirna, Apostle of Hope. Pirna was a prism, formerly Akadist of the Western tradition, who wanted to softly deliver her message to the people of the mountains. She preached an accommodating version of Sumoxa, syncretic with local Akadism while still giving a voice to non-prisms and those who resisted the caste system. Pirna spent twenty years in the mountains, mediating disputes and consecrating temples, before she ventured East into Sebikahd to be martyred by the Halikvar. 
The Sumoxan religious turn connected the mountains back to the broader world of Samvara, and Sumoxan monks and merchants began coordinating the restoration of the old roads. But the Kima were also embracing the spirit of change on their own terms. In 1630, a priest known as Kidazara brought together a cluster of the four rising Kimas in the East (Ofkopar, Kifkiwar, Nasakima, and Telimpasa) along with the surrounding surface communities to create a mega-settlement known as Chushana. Chushana was a utopian project, the city of everybody - all peoples could negotiate a place in the great collective. It also invested a great deal in the old roads. This new moment of openness and interconnectedness was not entirely peaceful though. Cities fought for dominance of the new wealth. The chaos drew the Halikvar resistance back out of hiding, and the Halikvar druids launched another campaign against the Sumoxans and Akadists. When new powers began to emerge in the 1700s, their response to this was brutal - massive purges of Halikvar communities from 1760 to 1850. 
The chaos began to subside in the mid-1800s, and a new order settled into place. In the North, a League of Chambers formed to rebuild roads and keep the peace; in the South, the many individual city-states met together to agree to mutual non-aggression, and created an organization known as the Order of the Diamond Road (largely controlled by Chushana) to reorganize the trade routes. Chushana only rose higher in the South over time - even though they didn't formally rule, the Order projected power far and wide for them. In the North, the League has also become more institutionalized. Now, a new age of prosperity seems certain, as long as a sudden disaster doesn't occur.

Alternative Name(s)

Mivera

Type

Mountain Range

Location under

Samvara

Included Locations

• Chushana