Lore and Legends of the Dezzyverse

Sea Cities of the Marakhor; Part 1

Vohrkohz was founded on at a hill inside a sharp bend on the Tyrqohz river almost 500 years ago. The settlement was fortunate in it’s position between the mouth where the Tyrqohz emptied into the Marakhor Sea and the rich ore-fields on the face of Mount Ghaul. The flood plain on the low bank of the river bend offered exceptionally rich soil for crops, the river herself was bountiful and her lower branch was wide and easily navigable to the sea. Vohrkohz was well suited to grow and support her people.

For most of it’s history Vohrkohz grew from a town on the riverbank to a modest city-state renowned for it’s artisans. They crafted beautiful and precious objects using the aurixom ore mined from the face of Mount Ghaul. When Vohrkohz joined the early Xjinn Empire, the fortunes of the city grew exceptionally fast. The markets of the expanding empire for luxury made Vohrkohz very wealthy. After the Old Xjinn Empire declined and Vohrkohz claimed its independence as a city-state and joined the Sea Cities league, their reputation and markets had been long established, and their wealth continued to grow. This was Vohrkohz’ golden age.

However, every golden age comes to an end. Vohrkohz began her decline as the Aruixom mines began to demand more and more destructive techniques to yeild enough ore to satisfy demand. The fisheries pulled more fish from the sea and the Tyrqohz became polluted with the industrial mining and forging industries.

Then, the Old Xjinn Empire, under the guidance of the Nea’Archi Doctrine religion, began to reclaim all it’s former lands. Vohrkhoz was reabsorbed into the Empire twelve years ago. The returned Empire was different than the one that Vohrkohz was first a part of. This Empire was martial, expansive, authoritarian. The Nea’Archi Doctrine was a strict and agressive religion, spreading the worship of Lords of the Higher Worlds, a pantheon of deities aligned with Cosmic Law. While in the dozen years of imperial rule have not purged the variety of faiths practiced in the city. Still, the Nea’Archi Doctrine did grow among the ranks of Vohrkohz’ aristocracy.

The Old Xjinn Empire has rejected sorcery and adopted the rational disciplines of industry and science. This influence had affected Vohrkohz with the discovered industrial properties of aurixom. The forges of Vohrkohz had long known of how aurixom, when alloyed with steel created a metal of exceptional strength and durability. the Old Xjinn Empire has rebuilt and expanded Vohrkohz’s forging district to produce industrial quantities of refined aurixom and alloyed aurixom steel. The artisan districts were also turned into factories that used the refined metals to create tools, weapons, and machined parts for clockwork engines. These processes were both labor and resource intensive. The furnaces for forges and factories burned tons of coal day and night, filled the skies above Vohrkohz with clouds of brown-black smoke and filled the air with harsh fumes that could be smelled and tasted from anywhere in the city. When close to or inside the buildings the foul air even burned the eyes and skin after two or three hours.

The Tyrqohz River was extremely polluted due to the industrialization by the Old Xjinn Empire. It had been growing more polluted due to aurixom mining operations for decades prior to industrialization. Afterwards, both the industrialized mining processes polluted the upper river, and the refining and forging districts heavily polluted the lower river. This destroyed the fishing on the Tyrqohz and affects the mouth emptying into the Marakhor Sea at Port Tir. The fishing fleets from Port Tir needed to sail further out from Tirgohro Bay into the Marakhor Sea to find fishing waters that were not corrupt.

The banks of the Tyrqohz that served as floodplains and supported the agriculture of Vohrkohz have been polluted and corrupted into a toxic, unfertile scar. The region, called the Befoulment became a deadly, poisonous wasteland choked with mutated flora and fauna hostile to the natural environment. Within the Befoulment can be found the ruins of grand, once palatial estates, and ghost towns where the populations were driven out by the encroaching poison.

All of these factors combined to make Vohrkohz an industrial Hell. The aristocracy embraced the Nea’Archi Doctrine had made the city opressively authoritarian. The traditional religoins that had been practiced among the artisans and farmers and fisherfolk were slowly but methotically driven out of the public. The merchant class was split, driven either into the aristocracy or out of business all together. The laborer classes were pushed into indentured servitude in the factories, forges, and workhouses of the city. All under the authority and dominance of the Old Xjinn Empire.