Nortenos (Auks) (proposed)
Principality of Isla Norte Intercity
Isla Norte is a large island in the central north of Severnya. The island is made of ruddy heaths and moors, ancient woodlands topping it’s hills and tall new forests lining it’s valleys. The thatched houses are low and cruciform built with sandstone daubed with red boulder clay.
The Principality was ruled by the emissary to the Prince of Thorns, the Prince being an unseen figure viewed by many as a deity, though one equal to and in opposition to the Hundred Pantheons.
There were seven floating cities that formed the intercity: Aukdah, Dander, Judah, Quantah, Rotoruda, Toronta, Wieldier. Each city featured a dominating castle with three ornately carved white towers set picturesquely over the city’s reservoir.
The Norteno have a strong love for poetry, story, and song. Several scholars have noted that the fishing towns on the river Hai were the greatest source for recording folk law of the Nechi dynasty despite the islands geographical distance to the Nenharman Empire in that period.
Military
Norteno soldiers wore a round metal helmet crafted with thorn laurel decorations and a beard like face guard.
The most notable of the small Isla Norte Thaumaturge guilds were boating enthusiasts that spent most of their time tinkering with sky boats and competing against each other in different kinds of races. Stolford and Ironbridge guilds innovations meant that the Prince’s fleet surpassed that of any surrounding nation for many centuries and the intercity dominated politics through it’s trade and accumulating wealth.
History
A powerful nation of military might and economic wealth, Isla Norte Intercity had dominated the destinies of its neighbouring nations, including many as vassal states. Extracting oppressive tribute and inflicting grievous slavery. To protect themselves these other nations entered into alliances with other nations. The ensuing conflicts shrunk the Intercity’s borders back to the Isla Norte which shrunk it’s wealth leading to many to forsake the Prince’s promise to sustain and protect His people.
The national life was tenuous. Spiritual life was waning and safety was constantly imperilled by pillaging hordes of harvester golaugs* from the remaining Northern Nenharman Tetrarchy.
With the passing of the Emissary Whitaker, an issue of succession fractured the nation into a brief civil war, the intercity split into three factions each favouring a different seer. At this time the Northern Nenharman settled a treaty that similarly divided the intercity’s territory and floating cities. The Nenharman annexed and began clearing the lands, gathering the people up in pens and shipping them off for food. Many fled. Those that weren’t eaten were scattered across Sevenya.
The majority of surviving Nortenos came from the city of Aukdah and Quantah which had allied under Aukdah’s Seer during the Intercity’s Civil War, this has lead to Nortenos also being known as Auks whether they come from these cities or not.
Vaggeryd
The Vaggeryd Ki Rush drew many to the tropical southeast Severnian country of Vaggeryd where they were enslaved by the Vaggeridian feudal lords. For the Vaggeridians had set up supply contracts with many Thaumaturgical laboratories.
Nicknamed the Land of Drizzle, the thickly forested landscape consists of the rugged mountains from the Henrique River that forms the eastern border to the mountains of the Kinta Schist Range that form most of the western border. The climate is tropical and influenced by a monsoon pattern with extensive rainy seasons.
Ancient Vaggers utilized terrace farming to grow crops in the steep mountainous regions of central Vaggeryd.
Ki Rush
The Vaggeryd Ki Rush drew people from all across Lore and saw a boom of Thaumaturge migrating to Vaggeryd, as several floating cities drifted nearer, convoys arrived via water portals to buy up the minerals and set up contracts for supplying their own guilds. Spurred on local authorities promptly enslaved the ki miners and put them into forced dredging drudgery in the ki pits, it wasn’t long before the authorities themselves were little more than puppets and overseers. The entire landscape changed as they cut through hill and mountain searching for every piece of ore and mineral for their Thaumaturge overlords.
This was the fate of many who fled from the floating cities of Isla Norte when their principality was annexed and divided between the northern tetrarchies of the Nenharman Empire. Though they had been scattered they gravitated on the Ki Rush. Those that weren’t enslaved to mine Ki were eaten. This however stopped their unique culture from simply dwindling out, this significant massing of Auks created a brutalized community that shared their own stories and as well as the ancient tales. The revival spread as their stories did and Auk communities flourished in ghettos across Severnya and brought many new stories to tell.
