Asarius

Description

Asarius is surrounded by a tall, fort-like perimeter wall built of purple vermaloc wood planks sharpened into points ten feet from the ground, with watchtowers scattered along the outskirts. One spire is loosely central to the entire shape of the city's skyline. Batches of mud fields surround the eastern end of the city where crews of hobgoblins and bugbears harvest roots and tubers and other strange and hardy produce from the unexpectedly cultivable land. The western side outside the walls is dense with wheeled carts, armored orcs, gnolls, and other goblinoid soldiers checking and cleaning equipment and occasionally bickering. The southeast gates are each about ten feet wide and fifteen feet tall, higher than the surrounding wall and with a slight arch. To either side are very large and armored ogres, both holding heavy clubs with an axe blade on each side.

The Creets

The large residential district on the southwest side of the city. Within the city, the winding dirt roads are pungent with the smells of animal hair, wet earth, and dung. Droves of waste folk wander the streets, including ogres, orcs, gnolls, goblins and goblinkin. A massive dormant horizonback tortoise occupies one lot, and atop its back is a goblin neighborhood of dense shacks and dwellings, clustered, built, and strapped onto its back.

The Northroads

The northern half of the city, the more affluent region. In roughly the center of the city is the single three-story spire of gray stone called the Aurora Hold, the seat of government within the city, part stone and part dark tinted glass like a cathedral spire, with distinctly elven elements to its design and structure. It looms over the rest of the city, which doesn't have a lot of variation in its height. Most of the buildings are built close to the ground, whether it be from limitations on the people who constructed it or a cultural indifference to trying to make things with multiple floors.

The Pits

Located in the southeastern district, the name comes from its multitude of breeding pits for livestock and war beasts. The smell of wet animals and manure found throughout the city is very heavy there. Poorer citizens also live there.

• Zorth's Pits, a livery and breeding pit of moorbounders owned by Zorth.

Scowl Square

This is a marketplace of tents and stands, as well as many other businesses. Located in the Northroads, at the crossroads between two large streets and a lot of alleys, there's at the center a patch of grass with a single tree at the center.

• The Four Corners Tavern: Owned by Resk the Mad, it is a large and rowdy tavern with a fighting pit.
• Baron's Meats: A butcher shop, owned by Baron Visco.
• Timoch and Ude Make Things: A craft store.
• Madam Musk's: An alchemy shop, owned by Madam Musk.

Demographics

Asarius is very diverse: 41% of the population are goblinoids, 32% are gnolls, 10% are dark elves, and 17% are other races, including kobolds, orcs, minotaurs, and few humans. In 835 PD, the total population of the city is 48,025.

Culture

The city holds an annual two-day food festival called the Faire of Abundance that draws people from across Xhorhas. On the second day of the festival, members of Den Olios try out the ten most promising dishes and award the best cook a sizable cash prize along with a trophy called the Golden Thistle. The winner in 842 PD immediately sold his recipe for meat pies to the Four Corners Tavern, which began selling them on fight nights.

Background

Asarius is a cultural and military hub established by the Kryn Dynasty as a home for the waste folk of northern Xhorhasian. Prior to the founding of the city, the land was fought over by various factions of waste folk. The Kryn persuaded these folk to join their civilization by promising protection, resources, and religious enlightenment. While the establishment of Asarius was initially rocky, the city eventually became a symbol of unity and community for northern Xhorhasians.

War of Ash and Light

During the war, the Kryn Dynasty capitalized on Asarius's strategic location and turned the city into a major military hub. Many Asarians were enlisted into the Kryn army, and military tents littered the western outskirts of the city.

Campaign Two: The Mighty Nein

When the Mighty Nein stopped in Asarius, they discovered two abyssal rifts beneath the city. One rift was in an underground moorbounder breeding pit owned by a goblin named Zorth, and the other was in a cavern adjoining a well in the middle of the city. The source of these rifts was an Abyssal Anchor, which had been deliberately placed by agents of the Angel of Irons cult.

Campaign Three: Bells Hells

In 843 PD Scanlan Shorthalt and Dr. Dranzel's Spectacular Traveling Troupe were in Asarius as part of a tour the bard organized because of his third mid-life crisis. During his time there Scanlan found the local goblinoids so nice that it ended his life-long hatred for them.