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[Lore] Saarvagerg


SteelEagle

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SAARVAGERG - THE CITY OF BLOWS

 

Saarvagerg, known as the Saar to most, is a city of ancient tradition and values. Far away from Heil and the progressive minded High King, the Saar operates on the very edge of civilized space and its inhabitants are quite pleased to be considered on the very edge of the civilized creatures themselves. It is the ancestral home of many of the major clans and a great many of the Caribou Epic Poems start in the Saar, even if it looks anything other than epic in its current state. Saarvergerg was the home to many clans who decided to strike out from the Whitescar in opposition of the High King, leaving it a bit underpopulated. Nonetheless, it still remains a major city and one of the most dangerous in all the world, though only in a way that only a caribou city could be.

 

Unlike Heil which officially outlawed arenas and the coastal metropolis of Barn which restricts such combats to only one large arena, the Saar is home to a great many clan owned arenas and a few large public ones. The Saar is a city that by its very nature abhors weakness and cowardice and values battle-hardened bravery and bloody-hooved strength. A great many caribou seek fame and glory in brutal combat and at all times one can find at least one arena open and featuring combat. It can take the form of an honorable fight between friends and professionals to bloody feuds seeking finality. Criminals earn redemption by fighting other criminals until those who remain are considered worthy enough to stand on the Wall, cowards fight wild animals for entertainment, and several of the larger arenas can play host to small scale skirmishes where dozens of combatants fight tenaciously to the hooting and hollering of the crowd. While Caribou make up the larger percentage of combatants, other races are represented.

 

Pirates from Hippostion utilize the knife fighting skills that come in hoofy during a back alley brawl or during a seizure of a vessel. They run up against disgraced Aquillan Marines who fight for glory and gold instead of Griffon and Country. They are dismantled by Unyasan mystics with an edge who are more than willing to earn their respect in battle, who in turn find themselves outmatched by peerless Arabian duelists and Acronian Hoplites. The arenas are always hungry for more fighting and the city is famous, or infamous, the world over for them. The spectacle draws not only fighters but spectators and more than a few nobles from across the world can be spotted. The coffers of the city run on this spectacle as well as the payments it receives from the clans to maintain defenses on the Wall. Indeed, it is those two things which help define this city's economy as little else exists to support it. Resources are few and the land is dead. It doesn't need financial encouragement to guard the Wall, however.

 

Even more than the Arenas, the Wall has come to symbolize the tenacity and fanatical combat of the Saar. One hundred feet high and fifty feet wide, the Wall is an ice construction that stretches from one end of the southern isthmus to the other. This large structure helps guard against the Southern Wilds, home to such an array of evils and ferocious beasts that only the existence of the Wall prevents the Saar from being overrun by them. Small combats outside of the Wall and inside some of the chambers are quite common, on the scale of several a week, with large assaults both organized and wild a monthly occurrence. The bravery of the Wall's garrison is legendary, but they are always in need of more warm bodies. Criminals can help earn their redemption here and most clans send small contingents, allowing the Wall to be held at a high cost. A few small hidden exits are used to allow Caribou out to take the Will Test but otherwise the caribou rarely venture too far away from it. This is by consistent clan and national decree rather than the will of the locals however, who constantly plead to be allowed past so they could crack undead monster skulls with large weapons. Not only could a lot of Caribou die, but they like the species to be tested. Nothing could define the Saar better than that simple desire to run around the most dangerous place in the world smacking everything with large axes until everything stopped moving.

- A Journal Between Lovers: My Travels and Travails, by Flowing Stars

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