Warwikhamp

A small hamlet on the fringes of Kingdom society, Warwikhamp lays on the foot of Kol Horn Mountain in northern Portshilia near the border with Tarburland and Hrim. It has existed since its founding in the 32nd century. It is remarkable for just how unremarkable it is, having maintained between 50 and 3000 residents over the millennia, growing and shrinking from a variety of factors in the region. The people of Warwikhamp are often devout followers of the Monarch in Throne and have been content to live in solitude.

Demographics

The people of Warwikhamp are primarily humans with some variation therein. As of the 9040 Kingdom Census, the demographics are as follows:

78% Human
12% Dwarf
8% Elf
1.5% Aarakocra
0.5% Genasi

Government

While a small part in the apparatus that makes up the Final Kingdom and Ducal systems, the town of Warwikhamp elects its local leader every 5 years. The Mayor of Warwikhamp is a very practical and utilitarian position, as the population of the town is typically small. The mayor is able to delegate tasks, set agendas, pass ordinances, and manage the local judicial system. Every year, the mayor attends or sends a proxy to a local leader assembly in Balsearenta with the Duke/Duchess of Ulana to represent the town's interests in the greater Kingdom. The current mayor of Warwikhamp is Maude Man-Eater, a beloved official who has run unopposed for the past 49 years. Her rumored penchant for cannibalism is overlooked each election, mostly due to her extreme effectiveness in running the town. Her policies have included great expansion of municipal budget to improve various aspects of the town such as the community center, inter-faith temple, and slaughterhouse. In addition, her desire to keep her people safe has resulted in great degrees of safety measures across town, including planned evacuation drills in which all the townspeople participate. She holds several other positions in town, such as butcher, physician, and judge, among others. She is viewed as a pillar of the community, both in and out of town, with a reputation at the Local Leader Assembly as a firebrand who gets what she wants.

History

Warwikhamp was founded in 3102 as an outpost along the road from the new city of Balsearenta to the mountains of Tarburland and its Dwarven cities. Its location was selected due to its proximity to an underground river that briefly surfaced near the mountainside which provided a strong source of clean freshwater with minimal effort. Initially only a small saloon and a stable at the foot of Kol Horn Mountain, investors from the burgeoning port of Balsearenta began investing in the land, purchasing surrounding plots from the Ducal Estate. Believing it would eventually evolve into a robust trading settlement, investors poured millions of gold into establishing businesses and infrastructure in the area. Seeing the potential for opportunity, citizens from Balsearenta moved in droves to the new settlement, reaching a population of nearly 400 by its third year of existence. In 3105, the settlement was christened Warwikhamp by the first mayor, Lord Ral, using an amalgamation words from a long-dead language he was said to have studied as a hobby meaning "Town of the Underground River."
As the flood of investment continued, so too did the influx of prospective citizens. By the end of the 32nd century, the population was nearing 2500. In 3209, mayor Heinrich Anvil devised a project to fully realize the "Dream of Warwikhamp," which was to bore a tunnel for trade into Kol Horn Mountain to connect Warwikhamp to the Dwarven Fortress City of Alterporton, the capital of Tarburland. The King of Expansion personally endorsed the project in 3215, causing a massive influx of immigrants, ballooning the population to over 3000. However, the stone of Kol Horn Mountain proved to be incredibly difficult to cut, even with advanced tools and magic. When the difficulty delayed the project significantly, the bubble burst on the expanding economy, leading to dozens of businesses closing and livelihoods ruined. Citizens left the town in droves, believing it to no longer be worth their time or investment. The population after the Warwikhamp Bubble Burst never reached the numbers it had at its height. In 6743, a wyvern began destroying parts of the town after flying down from the upper slopes of the mountain. After days of deliberation, Mayor Klimpus Borton allowed one of the citizens, Lawrence Goldenbrow, to hunt the wyvern to keep the town safe. To assist him in the task, Borton commissioned a shield and sword from the local blacksmith. Goldenbrow took the sword and shield into the mountains and hunted the wyvern for a month. The town had believed Goldenbrow dead by the end of the month and had begun deliberating on alternative solutions when Goldenbrow limped back into town, dragging the wyvern's head on the shield. He collapsed in the town square with three crescent moons overhead, dead from exposure of his wounds. The people of Warwikhamp celebrated his victory, incorporating symbolism of the events into the crest of the town. They also commissioned a statue of Goldenbrow, which currently stands on the site of his death in the town square. His shield became a precious heirloom of the town, acting as an emblem of pride to be given as symbolic gesture to prominent individuals of the town. Goldenbrow's sword was never recovered, evolving into a fairy tale for which children of the town would often search for as a game. Over the course of later centuries, the population shrank and grew at random intervals due to investors attempting to jump start the economic potential of the region and continue work on the Great Tunnel. A partnership with dwarves of Tarburland led to a near-completion of a proof-of-concept tunnel, which officially was never completed due to a lawsuit over zoning permits from the Mountain Folk in 7423. By the 86th century and after hundreds of on-and-off attempted rounds of long-term investments over centuries and hundreds of investors, the project was abandoned, never to be attempted again. While the efforts all ended in failure, the town of Warwikhamp remained, stabilizing at a population between 150-500. It gained a reputation as a backwater as it existed off a small backroad to the mountains with no major exports. Its people became far more insular and communal in nature and it became a haven for folks of the Kingdom, and even the Crag and Hrim, to escape their problems, keeping a regular small influx of immigrants every few decades. By the mid-91st century, Warwikhamp was a forgotten corner of the Kingdom with an intense sense of local community. The most prominent mayor in centuries was elected in 8999, Maude Man-Eater. After a series of murders and alleged cannibalism swept the town, her leadership was viewed as a needed source of stability in a strange time. In 9047 during the Crag invasion of Portshilia, due to its lack of guards or military encampments, Warwikhamp was quickly taken over by Hrim-Crag military forces. During its occupation, it was used as a supply depot for the invading force. In Dying Light 9047, a small group of covert anti-Crag individuals from Balsearenta infiltrated the town to help evacuate the citizens. After successfully emptying the town of its inhabitants, the town was set ablaze, killing the occupiers and denying them critical infrastructure. The town of Warwikhamp was then abandoned as the invasion force had no resources to spare in reconstruction and the locals were nowhere to be found. The people made it to the Fortress City of Alterporten unscathed, settling there as temporary refugees.