The Vanished Wilderness
Far across the Northern Sea, beyond the Isle of Light and off in the darkness lies a land. For ages and ages it has lain undisturbed, unsettled, hearing neither song nor voice nor tramp of boot ever since the long times of creation. But now man walks upon it, explorers eager to find new vistas, settlers searching for something they couldn't find in the Old World. Opportunity beckons in the untrammeled acres, the savage vistas, the waters untasted and wind unbreathed in all the many lives of men. Many types of folk have come to this new land, and you are one of them, come to write your history upon these blank lands.
The Wild Lands, as scholars call them in the capital, are largely unexplored. Speculation is rife as to what exactly lies in the black portions of the map that the ancients marked with cryptic warnings, but every year more soldiers and prospectors and pioneers make the dangerous journey to the north, looking for what they only hope they will find there. Fame, fortune, renown, glory- each desperate soul has their own reasons for making the crossing. Some regions of this mad land are mapped, however, and knowing what you may find is of vital importance.
IC Thread
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Known Regions
The Mouths of the Eras River: One of the first regions ever mapped by explorers from the Continent, the rivermouth is a fertile region, lightly forested with tall whispering trees unclassified by science and rich in fish and life. Though her rich black silt has proven to be excellent for farming the few crops brought by curious naturalists, severe floods occasionally strike in the spring, making any long term habitation of this region dubious in the opinion of the Royal College. However, categorization of the strata in this area suggests rich fire-clay deposits, and several large stands of indigo reeds which could be quite valuable if harvested or maintained with appropriate agrarian expertise. Bordered to the east by the Watchful Hills, to the west by the Aherrad Plains, to the north by the Lower Vale, and to the south by the Bay of Storms, it is about two days ride from the delta to Farholme, half that by boat.
Lower Eras Vale: Just up the river, the wide stagnant water of the rivermouth is replaced by the strongly flowing main body of the Eras. Though in places bordered by bluffs cut by the action of the water, most of the Eras is marked by smooth sloping banks that promise excellent opportunities for irrigation or pastoralists. Rich earth in this river valley is sustained by gentle yearly floods, leaving an ocean of tall grass as far as the eye can see broken by only the occasional hillocks bearing rare trees. Prospectors from the Company believe this region may hold copper deposits based on intermittent outcroppings of the bones of the earth, but their geological musings are as of yet unproven. A wide desolate land, it occasionally sees travelers in the form of supply ships for the settlement at Farholme, but is otherwise an empty country. Excellent room for livestock if enterprising souls were to import them, some small mule-deer make their homes in this tall grass hunted by the what are presumed to be the odd unclassified alpha predators. Bordered to the south by the Rivermouth, one can reach Farholme in only a day's ride from most parts of the Vale, as long as yearly floods haven't turned the paths and tracks to muck.
The Three Rivers: The last point of exploration for most folk from the Continent, the Three Rivers are where the White, Blue, and Gray Rivers combine on Lake Nemis into the large course that is the Eras. A cold clear blue lake, despite the amount of sediment that enters it, Lake Nemis is known for excellent fishing and heavily wooded eastern shores that have supplied the small settlement of Farholme. Farholme, a possession of the Company, is a small mining and trading outpost maintained by the Wardens over one of the few known silver ore deposits in the Wild Lands. Most travelers arrive here by ship from the Empire, and as such the lands about it are well mapped and occasionally patrolled by the small garrison. Though the land here is not nearly as fertile as the land farther down the Vale, the junction of the Three Rivers promises to be a flourishing region for trade and commerce as the lands about it are tamed. Game and wild fowl are abundant in the eastern woods, but on the desolate western bank towards the Sandhills not much grows save endless expanses of ghost-grass. The Three Rivers region is bordered to the north by the wastelands before the Jagged Peaks, to the east by the Endless Woods, and to the west by the Sandhills.
Farholme: The only settlement in the Wild Lands, Farholme is a humble military outpost established near the outlet of Lake Nemis on the eastern shores. Surrounded by a wooden palisade and guarded by five Wardens, it represents the only real human habitation this side of the Northern Sea. The most prominent features of the village are the barracks and the silver mine in the center of the town, which was the reason the Empire established the outpost where they did. Four houses aside from the barracks stand inside the walls inhabited by various miners and in some cases their families, and a small stockade protects the adjoining storeroom where silver bars are stored for transshipment to the Continent. A smelter and sawmill also operate here, though very intermittently. Entrepreneurs or new colonists could rent room in the houses here or purchase supplies, but given the lack of any primary industry supplies are likely to be expensive, as they have been shipped all the way from the Continent.
Silver Mine: A silver deposit of average richness located in the Three Rivers, an hour's walk from Farholme to the north east by east along the banks of the White River. The mine has barely begun to be worked, and is located at the apex of a small river that feeds the White.
Silver Mine: A silver deposit of average richness located in the Three Rivers, an hour's walk from Farholme to the north east by east along the banks of the White River. The mine has barely begun to be worked, and is located at the apex of a small river that feeds the White.
The Jagged Peaks: As far north as men have gone, the Jagged Peaks are the edge of the lands civilized folk have traveled to, and are a forbidding and harsh region. From their obsidian valleys and shadowy caves the waters that feed the Gray River issue forth, and it is a harsh land, full of blasted fields of stone and ice with little that grows here save hardy scrub-grass and the occasional bent and gnarled stand of wizened trees. Little soil coats this region, and scratching a living off of produce would be all but impossible according to the Explorers' Society, though the wolves and northern ibex that teem in this land seem to be able to get by. The exact mineral composition of this region is unknown, but prospectors tales range from only broken shale to cliffs made of gold and pebbled rivers strewn in precious gems. At the very least this area teems with workable stone and many small spring-fed lakes, which makes it a hard place, but survivable. It is unknown what lies to the north of the Peaks, for no man from the Continent has yet scaled them, and they as yet bar passage to the north for any man. It is, however, a mere day's ride back to Farholme from this wild place, and that journey could be cut in half with travel aboard a barge or boat.
The Endless Wood: Past the lightly wooded marches on the shores of Lake Nemis, the forest gradually grows more and more dense, ancient firs and pines eventually blotting out all light and the sound of footfalls growing inaudible under the gloomy canopy. Almost nothing grows beneath these dark trees, the forest floor covered in a hundred years of dead needles; the odd meadows and clearings are spots of brightness and light that are all too few unfortunately, and the occasional wild deer and other creatures can be found at times under the trackless eaves. How far the forest extends is unknown, though some explorers have entered its vast reaches and never returned in attempts to find its limit. Timber, obviously, is ever-present here, and an enterprising lumberjack could work in the outer forest for an eternity. Many men have become lost and disorientated under the ceaseless trees and only survived by luckily stumbling upon the line of the White River where it babbles westerwards towards Lake Nemis. To the south the forest gradually bends away eastwards as it approaches the coast, where one might emerge with luck from the glowering branches onto the windswept moors and craggy features of the Watchful Hills, while to the north the land slopes upwards and the black trees overrun the slopes of the perilous Jagged Peaks.
The Aherrad Plains: West of the fens and silted delta of the Eras River stretch the Aherrad Plains, gently wooded dry grasslands riddled with little hills and dells where one might find a babbling brook or yawning cave mouth at any moment. A country of soft loamy soil, the trees here do not grow tall, but their golden and silver leaves are a delight for the eyes, and the soft embrace of the salt-sea breeze keeps the air cool and moist, a fit rejoinder to the blasted heat of the Sandhills which blows from the north during the summer. Few creatures make their homes here, but natural foliage unknown across the sea has proven to be easily edible, and despite the distance from any inhabited regions the Royal College predicts the Plains may be one of the easiest marches for men to inhabit in the long run. Some of the deeper caverns that riddle this area are known to have the red-oxide of ferrous deposits, a resource most useful to the cause of colonization if it can be feasible extracted. To the west and north of this region, however, like the vestiges of the Sandhills, and beyond the Gasping Dust, neither of which are places that are friends to living things.
The Watchful Hills: These desolate moors face the southern sea, and are cold year round. In some of the deep dells between leering crags there are depths of snow that never melt, and shadows that never disappear. Though well explored, few men have any desire to travel in this region- most who have walked the silent hills describe a feeling of being observed gnawing at their minds, the echoing footfalls of their passage amplified and distorted until one always feels as if another presence is following, unseen, but just behind. Barren and swept of most life by the prevailing winds from the ocean, only a few stunted trees cling to life in the valleys of the Hills, though some of the dells farthest north are warm and full of thick soil complemented by outliers of the Endless Wood. Of the few trees that grow here, the Sanguinary Trees are the most famed, for their cores when felled are as strong as iron and twice as durable. Recently discovered, heartwood is one of the few resources men value in this wasteland. Ten thousand rivulets and streams make their winding way to the fens and marshes of the Rivermouth from these jagged outcroppings, but food is scarce in this land, for even the animals and beasts of the field seem loathe to break the silence that covers these cracked bluffs like a cloak. Three days ride from Farholme, few men walk here, though it is known that rich veins of many metals are to be found in the turbulent geology of the region. To the east the Endless Wood crawls over the hills greedily, swallowing them up in its expanse, and to the north one rapidly encounters the dark eaves of that same forest. The cliffs of the southern coast are broken only a few places by treacherous rocky coves where a ship might be able to put in, but the only real access to this region is from the west, from the more hospitable region of the River Vale.
The Sandhills: Misnamed by some of the first explorers ever to reach the region, the Sandhills are not, despite their moniker, actually made of sand. True, the soil of this region is loose and occasionally mixed with powder and grit coming off of the Gasping Dust, but in reality the soil is fertile enough, a mix of dry dirt and a large quantity of volcanic ash. Apparently at some point in the past one of the Burning Heights lived up to their sobriquet, spewing magmatic doom over most of this region. In the heart of the desert sand has covered over these layers of incinerated history, but in the dunes and scattered oases of the Sandhills the memory of that pyroclastic fury lives on. Almost no trees live in this region, aside from the rare shade-palms that make their homes around scattered sinkholes and the line of the Blue River. Not by any means, though, are the Sandhills a dead land. Vast fields of the appropriately named pale-white ghost-grass are emblematic of the area, and though the grains this cereal bears are not especially nutritious to travelers, in a pinch they can sustain the hungry. They certainly are enough to feed the large herds of ungulates and grazers that shoal over the Sandhills like fish in the ocean, and the castoff of all this life means the rivers too are teeming with creatures. A fine area to travel through, though taking a compass is wise- the featureless seas of grass can have a man as lost as the high ocean, if he is not prepared. However, the Sandhills lack in any material for building save sod, and even that sod is fragile stuff; bedrock is many yards down in many cases, or even farther where the gravelly underrock predominates. Still, it is far more hospitable than the Gasping Dust to the west. Most of the Sandhills is within a day or two's ride of Farholme, and Lake Nemis can be reached by following the line of the Blue River if one is in need of civilization. To the north the Sandhills are bounded by the Jagged Peaks, and to the south by the ocean and the Ahmerrad Plains, depending on the region.
The Gasping Dust: If there is a hell on this world, the Gasping Dust is that hell. If you're too far south, you're baked by winds that can strip the moisture from a man in mere hours, hurricane force storms that lash the enormous peaks of the Burning Heights with enough power to throw men screaming from their cliffs despite any efforts to survive. If you're too far north, at night most men will freeze in their sleep, never to wake again, and the cold sand offers no respite even as the forbidding towering Jagged Peaks offer no solace. Very few men have ever even penetrated far into this region, but they speak of burning lakes, choking smoke, pillars of devouring sand that strip men to the bone, and despite it all still more try to survive here- all for a single reason. Opal. The jewels beyond price are known to be found in this blasted land of death, and the few retrieved by the ambitious are enough to be worth the ransom of kings. But to survive in this land one must have many supplies, and even then almost no miners looking to strike their fortune ever return.
The Burning Heights: You thought the Gasping Dust was bad enough? The ashen landscape of this defunct volcano off the southern coast looks even worse. Few have gotten close enough to survey the land for anything of value, but the smog is thick enough to choke on even hundreds of lengths off its shore. Best stay away from here for the time being.
More lands are speculated to exist beyond the current natural barriers- after all, it isn't as if the world suddenly ends where men have not explored it. But with the dangers that currently exist for further exploration, and the seaborne currents and winds making coastal transit all but impossible, it is unlikely that any knowledge of the Wild Lands will expand rapidly.
The Material World
Since the first king and the first peasant, man has been defined not only by his role in society, his skills and flaws, but also by his tools and how he uses them. Ever since the northern frontier was opened, all manner of folk and citizens have made their way to the pristine continent, and tried to cut their own livings from soil and stone. Farmers, loggers, miners, soldiers, thieves, tailors, tinkers, smiths... they all have their role in this vast wilderness. As such, His Imperial Majesty has ordered that the following list of useful gear and equipment be tabulated; the Artisan's Society has also supplied a list of rudimentary buildings and their construction methods for the perusal of those who are considering taking passage for the Wild Continent. Be warned that many goods are only only capable of being produced by skilled professionals, and even the creation of enough food to avoid starvation may escape less prepared individuals due to the known savage nature of the new world.
you deserve attribution for a couple of those skills, after all.
