The Boiling Isthmus

This region enjoys a mild climate with a substantial period of rain from the early winter through to the end of spring. Snows are occasional and limited to the higher altitudes that form the spine of the isthmus from east to west. The snowpack feeds three impressive rivers, two of which flow into the northern sea, with the westmost feeding a vast lake. The region has some notoriety for its hot springs.

There are two cultures here—Red and Silver.

Red are a commercial people who occupied both of the eastern river systems until a recent volcanic explosion. In the generation since, the decline of the religious capital has created political space for a loose federation of descendant trading towns to rise to prominence in the land between the central river and the coast. With the support of their navy, the three burgs have sent expeditions to secure luxuries from the south and possibly establish a resort, as few now dare to cross the mountains into the now bandit-ridden ruins they once remembered so fondly.

The Silver people concentrate themselves in a large and well-appointed city on the southern slope of the lake valley to the west. They live comfortably on the spoils of their one-time sister city, which has sparkled picturesquely where the westmost river meets the lake with a certain grand majesty, ever since the resolution of the Silver civil war. Rather than looking exclusively inward to the lake as their forbearers once did, Silver now sustains itself on ocean fisheries as well. The inhospitable outer ring of their home valley, with its deserts and crags, has also made the new Silver capital—with its commanding position at the one easy passage between the lake and the sea—an ideal base for piracy.