Ghearas, Eternal City (Je-a-rass)
Founded some 2000 years ago, Ghearas has risen and declined through the ages; expanded and receded, conquered and been conquered. Some parts of the city are so old their creation are not recorded by books now known to civilisation.
With that said, it is a truly varied Metropolis. Huge fields with adjoining rivers surrounding it's outside to provide food for the city, narrow streets surrounded by high buildings with roads leading to nowhere, and the upper platforms holding the immeasurably wealthy elite of the city.
Beyond this, it is also a city fueled by magic. Even the lowliest jobs, working with power generation for the lamps of the city, can be based within magic- tis simply a fact of life.
Demographics
About a fourth of the population do not even live within the city proper, but are rather peasants out on the countryside. The term "Peasant" can be quite misleading as this class of citizen includes everything from lowly sharecroppers, to well-off landowning peasants, to wealthy plantation owners. These people work, or oversee, the fields which are the primary source of food for the city. Due to their use of magic, both arcane and divine, they only end up needing about a fourth of their population to work with agriculture.
Coming up to the major part of their population is the half of their population working within the industrial sector, mostly poor wage workers working with keeping the city running. Low-level mages providing fire to heat great steam engines, miners working deep beneath the city in it's ever-expanding caverns, lumberjacks tending to the city's groves, and artisans mass-producing the goods fueling the city's population. While somewhat ranging in their wealth and affluence, working with your hands is somewhat... Disdained, in a "cultured" city like Ghearan.
The last fourth of the city's population is, on the other hand, quite "cultured". Starting with the upper middle class and upwards you find artists, politicians, scholars, and artisans capable of "creating beauty". These are also the people living on the great raised platform surrounding the central citadel.
Government
The government of the city consists of the Eleven Stewards, and not much else. These are all of them taken one each from the great guilds of the city, and two being the heads of Sreaganlore University and The Ghearan Church. These guilds are the Guild of Iron, the Guild of Lumber, the Guild of Grains, the Guild of Textiles, the Guild of Forges, the Guild of Swords, the Guild of Bronze, the Guild of Spirits, and the Guild of Heat. During an emergency, though such a thing hasn't happened for some 80 years, one among them will be elected to take decisive action.
All events of some import will be discussed and voted on, while others will be delegated to a group decided on by the Stewards as to save time. I.e, Something like a riot among the workers of the Guild of Heat will affect the whole city immediately, and as such will be handled by the Stewards as a whole, while something like a bad case of tree-rot will be delegated, probably to some combination of Sreaganlore professors and members of the Guild of Lumber.
Defences
While it has been about a hundred and fifty years since the city was last under attack, it is far from undefended. The guild of swords has some 6000 troops under constant employ, their main purpose being to serve as guards and to deter and fight down riots and demonstrations. It also organises officer and combat schools to make sure that these guards are reinforced by professionally trained leadership and more elite troops.
Other than mannpower, there are several great walls protecting the town. First of all, there's a wall some twenty meters high surrounding what might now be called the "island" of Ghearas. This outer wall is matcher by another slightly taller wall around the city proper, which is itself a bit shorter than the inner walls, finally trumped by the citadel walls which houses the Guild of Swords, and potentially if need be the government. The walls heights are respectively about 20, 22, 28, and 35 meters tall from sea level, though they're all about 20 meters tall counting from the ground they're standing on. This wall is lined by towers and stations for war mages and ballistae to fire upon any encroaching enemy.
Industry & Trade
While trade beyond one's own borders has completely ceased, there is still extensive industry exclusively for the upkeep of the city. Tools, weapons, food, heat, and water all require hard work within all possible kinds of areas, and that's excluding luxuries like Luth, a caffeinated drink made from the roasted leaves of the luth plant. and ever-present tobacco.
Infrastructure
Most of the city, excluding the upper layers, provide some sort of service of infrastructure. Some examples of this includes:
Plumbing - Most of the city has access to advanced plumbing due to the harnessing of water elementals in the lower layers of the city. These also make sure to bring water to the...
Steam Engines - Water is heated up using magic, work usually done by low-level mages, and is then either sent to different engines powered by it or to the central heating system running through the upper levels. One of the machines using this steam is...
The Mills - While these used to be powered by the river, the lack of a strong current left by years isolated from Rapture has driven them to be replaced by steam powered mills, something required for a fourth of the population to single-handedly feed the rest.
While these are only examples of the advanced infrastructure available to the city, they show how isolation and need have created complex systems in support of the city.
History
Ghearas, or a city standing where Ghearas now lies, has truly existed since time immemorial. Due to not too far off inactive volcanoes, the ground is fertile. There are hills that almost seem purposefully layered to offer great defense, with rivers carrying mineral-rich water coming down it's slopes. It sits in the center of a circular mountain formation, giving easily defensible borders for any sort of expanded empire. It is in all ways a natural place for a great city to emerge.
Ghearas as a mercantile oligarchy was specifically formed about 473 Before Rapture upon breaking free from the greater Kratorian empire within which it was a province, something signalling the start of a greater revolt of city states in the greater geographical area surrounding them. This is what would eventually be called the Iontach, the Golden Cities.
From that point to the Rapture, Ghearas would be a major player in the area. Through that time they exemplified themselves by advanced research and application of magic; Sreaganlore University has even been seen as the finest place of magic education known to any of these wealthy city-states almost since it's inception.
The last twenty years Before Rapture, on the other hand, were characterised by strife. The armies of Voyshka approaching from the West shattered the unity of the Ionacht, which had remained undisturbed for decades, and became an unprecedented threat due to the sudden emergence of an enormous nomadic civilisation which seemed to employ every single one of it's citizens for war. Even the most warlike of the Ionacht were unused to war, using their armies as a shield rather than spear, and while disunited were conquered one by one. They would surely have taken even Ghearas if Rapture hadn't befallen the world upon their approach to the city.
The past 80 or so years, Ghearas has been adapting to their isolation. Their management of resources, their infrastructure, their industry, and their culture all being adapted over the past few generations to the thought of civilisation being them, and only them. During this time they still experienced tumult; social injustice and increasing authoritarianism by the oligarchy in charge leading to mass demonstrations, the rise of something like anarchist politics, and brutal repression became the hallmark of these conflicts.
Architecture
The outer parts of the city is characterised by low, stucco buildings with brick roofs and, for the lucky, garden plots. As one moves further in, these buildings gain bases of concrete to allow greater heigth, and by the time that you reach the inner walls most buildings are some 15 meters tall. Within the inner walls, on the other hand, wood becomes the primary construction material due to it's status as a construction material for the wealthy. Great timber halls with bases of mortared stone and open spaces characterise the inner city where the rich middle class and upwards are found. Finally, there's the Citadel. The Citadel is almost completely made of great, solid stone blocks and concrete, wood only being used as palisades and spikes around the central structure.
Geography
The city is built upon something like a layered hill, with water running out from something like an eternal well (connected to the plane of water) being located within The Citadel.
Natural Resources
The ground around the city is rich in minerals and well-kept due to crop rotation and inherently volcanic soil, and mineral deposits run beneath the city in such abundance that it's exploitation has single-handedly supported the city for some 80 years of isolation.
Founding Date
3000? Before Rupture
Alternative Name(s)
The Returned
Type
Metropolis
Population
About 1 Million
Inhabitant Demonym
Ghearanites
Location under
Included Locations
Owning Organization
Characters in Location
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