Histanite

The Histian Empire.

An empire spanning two large continents which border either side of a large strait which is known as the Hispan Sea.

Two massive capital-sized cities dominate the larger of the two islands, and mark the locations where the governments, economy and expanse of colonization have flourished the most. 

A total of twenty-five cities decorated with marble, stone and other precious building materials cover the two continents together, and a population of millions call the Empire their home.

And as the economy bustles endlessly, they produce and trade goods and send them away on countless ships across the sea to trade, export and import goods to keep the Empire and the surrounding continents alive for another day.

There are two main exports that the other continents value, which the islands of the Histian Empire provide to them, but at a high and practically unbeatable price. 

These are Uushmedel Mead and the invaluable Histian Silk, but of the two, Uushmedel Mead is far more superior, and is coveted across the globe for it's flavor and the valued price at which it can be purchased.

Uushmedel Mead was first created in the late eighteenth century by Pius Carinus Uushmedel and his friend Hadrius Sura after they had been spending the last three months sailing the seas in an attempt to fashion what they hoped would become the ultimate Sailor's beverage. After passing through the Islands Of Moth, the Aswarian coast and even as far as the open ports of Vibricanth - of which at the time were extremely few - they finally stumbled upon the cities of the Histian Empire, and eventually landed in Birth, a city lying just down the coast from the empire's capital city of Histagon. They spent the next month working in the city to perfect their beverage mixes and after several failed attempts, they stumbled upon the perfect mix.

Uushmedel mead is made with Honey fermented in water, flavored with Usmor Deepsea Salt, O-Berries - which are a common berry plant found on almost every continent save for the north and south poles - and the well-known Ataya fruit, which is similar to a melon but has a sweet and tropical flavor to it. This fruit comes explicitly from the Moth islands, which are a caldera centered around a barren and dormant volcano in the center of a wide and nearly circular sea. To give the mead a kick, the legendary Saimon Pepper can be cut into slivers and boiled into the drink to provide a hot kick to the drink, should someone at a bar become brave and in need of an adventurous challenge - and maybe a dose of extreme humbleness to combat an extreme ego.

Ever since then, Uushmedel and Sura's beverage empire has expanded across the globe, and although the duo created many more mead and beer-based beverages as time went on, Uushmedel proved to become their most valued export. Millions of gallons and barrels worth is exported from the Histian Empire every year, and on average, an estimated twelve-million pounds worth of the mead is consumed across the world every year, with a possible margin of calculated error of about two to three percent. It is most common amongst shipping captains and their crews as an after-voyage beverage, and a rite of passage for sailors is to make it through three large cups worth of the mead before their first voyage as a registered sailor.

The world record for the most cups of mead drank in a row is thirty cups in just forty-five minutes, which was nearly beaten by the technically-victorious thirty-two cups in forty-five minutes, had it not been for the sudden evacuation of the challenger's stomach at least twenty seconds after drinking the last cup.