Map: Locations of the Various Nations In and Around the Western Outlands.
The following is a summary obtained from the Ursian Federal Foreign Policy Office, 18 October 2482.
| Ankh | Caravel | Dag | Eriba | |
| Gadz | Garaz | Goblin Moors | Gutak | |
| Kent | Kiali | Laconia | Lakh | |
| Long Hills | Mokul | Morden | Rank | |
| Varay | Vaz |
Please note that this is a draft report. We have not yet organized its various sections. Much of the current information comes from our field agents, several of whom are reporting actively. We will update the report and re-issue it every few months. We assume you have studied the text of the Reconciliation Treaty.
The over-count fines for Clarus have fluctuated over the centuries, but they currently stand at $1000 per year per extra person. If the plot has three blocks, the permanent population is three thousand, and there is a transient population of one thousand present for three months out of the year, the over-count is two hundred and fifty, and the god who owns the plot owes $250,000 per year for the next ten years until the next census. Blocks themselves sell for about ten million, which is of the same order as the profit that may be extracted from a well-managed population of one thousand over one hundred years, and is also equal to the fine that would be charged over ten years for an excess population of one thousand.
There are is only one conjunction in the Clarus Outlands, and it is the Clarus-Comitor conjunction CRCS1, 7-monthly, open 1 week, in heart of Kratanak Mountains, which connects the Outlands of the Kratanak Mountains with the tropical nation Kateshka on Comitor. The god of Kateshka, called Bolejnyet in Kateshka, but known as Radix on Olympia, owns the eleven plots of Kateshka and lives there ruling his people, as is permitted by the Olympian laws governing Comitor. Kateshka trades profitably with the orcs on Clarus. The conjunction is on a large plateau and it is thanks to trade through this conjunction that the working orcs of the central mountains can prosper. Dwarves mine the sides of the range, and own several passes, but the central outlands lie between the Ottoman Tunnel and the Broad Pass, and area about 80 km × 30 km, which is home to some 50,000 orcs and 100 black orcs. The central outlands are connected to the wilder Southern Kratanak Outlands by some enormous underground passages that go beneath the Broad Pass. These passages are known to the dwarves, but defended by the orcs. It is not clear if they constitute an invasion of the Homeland territory of the pass.
There are, however, no conjunctions from the Western Outlands to any other free world. If there were, there would not be the scarcity of trade that cripples the Western Outland economy.
Over the last two years, Endromis has enforced both huge tariffs upon imports from Ursian traders, and surcharges to any goods passing through Endan control to Ursia. Iron from the Star Mountains, which is the cheapest source of iron on Clarus, cannot get through to Ursia without passing through Anon, where it receives a duty of $40/kg before it is exported. Ursia is paying a total of $150/kg for its iron. The cost of iron in the Star Mountains is only $100/kg. Given that Ursia consumes of the order ten million kilograms of iron a year, a road across the Western Outlands from Kiali to Varay might be able to make as much as $10/kg transporting ten million kilograms, or one hundred million dollars a year.
The sapien nations around the Western Outlands speak a variety of languages. In Laconia, they speak a dialect of Greek that is easy enough to get used to if you speak Classical Greek. Their alphabet, however, is the Roman Alphabet of Endor. In Caravel they speak a curious language that evolved from a mixture of Endan and Orcish among the sapien slaves of the orcs during the Dark Ages. Caravel is a nation of freed slaves. We might expect such a language to be ugly, but most agree that Caravelli is a beatiful language to listen to, and sounds hardly at all like either Endan or Orcish. Their alphabet is the Roman Alphabet.
The people of Kiali are the descendents of Celtic tribes who hid in the Star Mountains during the Dark Ages. These people had, in centuries past, been conquered by the Weilandic Empire, but their language remained their own. It is related to the languages of other Celtic people in various parts of the world, and therefore similar to the languagess of Lakh and Morden. Only one in a hundred people in Kiali can read and write, and these do so in Latin. Very few travelers to Kiali learn to speak their Celtic Dialect, so all traders and inkeepers in Kiali can be relied upon to speak enough Latin. Lakh and Morden were founded after the Dark Ages by Celtic immigrants from the central plains of Idonius. Their languages are distinct but related to one another and to that of Kiali. Barely anyone in either country can read or write, but their clerics do so in Latin.
Rank and Kent were settled by Endroman soldiers and their families. They speak Endan, which is an evolved form of Latin, and they use the Roman Alphabet. Varay's language is a dialect of Weilandic, having separated from the main body of Weiland when the Weilandic Empire collapsed before the Dark Ages. The Varayan's believe their version of Weilandic is the older and more correct version, and written records suggest that this is the case, for the Varayans remained unconquored by the orcs during the Dark Ages, while Weiland itself was entirely over-run. They too use the Latin Alphabet.
The Ursians speak the language of the desert nomads. The wizards adopted this language when they occupied the site of modern Pakesh. The alphabet is unique to the desert people and Ursia, as we all know.
The orcs of the Western Outlands share a common language, Western Orcish, descended from the original Gelden Orcish spoken by the orcs who came from Hell before the Dark Ages. The various orc nations and races speak Western Orcish with a range of accents. In the case of Vaz and Ankh, the language has evolved into a separate dialect. Kratanak Orcish, which is spoken on the East side of Idonius, is related to Western Orcish, but is a distinct language. The black orcs of the Western Outlands speak Latin as do black orcs everywhere.
Ankh's population is 20,000. Its god is Beelzebub, Prince of Hell, God of Pain. Government is by champion. The champion is decided by marshal contest, one-on-one, until one party submits. No more than one challanger will be accepted per year. Other challangers must fight for the privelidge of being the annual challanger. We don't know the name or nature of its current leader, but the sapien adventurer Hekmayater Belamak claims to have been champion of Ankh from 2325 to 2331. Ankh pays tribute to Garaz in the form of soldiers. Orcs seen in the Old Hills will often have the mark of Ankh on them. The mark of Ankh is a two parallel yellow lines. Slavery is outlawed in Ankh.
Caravel is a strong, united nation now under the formidable and far-seeing Queen Lativa. The people are descendents of the sapien slaves freed from the western outlands by the advancing Endan armies. These slaves were displaced from what was once Mareo by the terms of the Reconciliation. Population 300,000. Their chief export is wool cloth, which they weave with their own wool and imported wool. They use their mountain streams to drive their mill-operated weaving factories. Slaver is outlawed in Caravel.
Dag's population is 30,000. Its god is Lucifer. Government is by election among the roughly thirty black orcs who rule the common orcs. Dag is currently allied with Mokul and Gutak. Their current leader is Queen Silverleaf. The mark of Dag is a white square. Slavery is legal in Dag.
Eriba is a settlement of Elves in the swamps of the Fen River. The swamps are the territory of the Prince Erebus. They are infested with water-dwelling monsters the size of horses who breath a poisonous gas. Eriba is surrounded by a high wall of conjured material. Its inhabitants welcome no visitors except elves and occasional wizards.
Gadz's population is 50,000, government by Council of Ten, a group of ten black-orcs. Its god is Lucifer, Prince of Hell, Chief Devil. Gadz pays $5M a year in tribute to Garaz, which it pays in the form of iron at $100/kg. Officially, this iron comes from its own hills, but it has not done so for at least a century. Some of the iron comes from Kiali via the Old Hills and the Smuggling Trail, and some comes from Varay via the Fen River where it crosses the Borderlands. The mark of Gadz is a blood-red diamond. Slavery is outlawed in Gadz.
Garaz is the greatest orc nation on the continent. Its population is 100,000, government is by black-orc monarch. Its god is Thor, Prince of Hell, God of War. Garaz prohibits trade with the Homelands, but of course the orcs must have iron, so the Garaz army buys its iron from Gadz. The current monarch is King Orbelastican, born in 2224, crowned in 2362. Orbelastican is a fighter-sorcerer. Orbelastican has a son named Scholastican and a daughter named Lacewater. The mark of Garaz is a green, curving cross, as shown below. Slavery is legal in Garaz.
The Goblin Moors are home to a dozen loosely-knit tribes of hobgoblins. Hobgoblins are large, peace-loving goblins. who have found their sanctuary in the Goblin Moors, where they preserve themselves from invaders by harboring many powerful persons whom the hobgoblins play off against one another and their enemies. They profit from the drug trade with Kent. Their god is Shiva, who is an expert at keeping things hidden from Olympia. He takes donations from the hobgoblins, but he does not deal with them for the money, but for pleasure. Slavery is neither legal nor illegal in the Goblin Moors, for there is no over-arching system of law for the region. Within the small nations, slavery is usually legal and a lucrative form of commerce between Kent and places like Luxoden.
Gutak's population is 50,000. Its god is Lucifer. Government is by monarch and council. There are roughly fifty black orcs living in Gutak, and they form the council. By unanimous vote, they can replace the monarch or veto any of his decrees. Gutak is Garaz's long-standing adversary, and is now allied with Mokul and Dag against Garaz. The current monarch is King Earthscorcher. The chief of the army is General Rackhammer. The mark of Gutak is a plain, blue circle. Slavery is outlawed in Gutak.
Kent is a frontier nation from the Reconciliation, population 400,000. It was founded by Endan soldiers, who brought their families from Endromis to live in the newly liberated territory. To its north-east are the Plains of Grototh. To its south-east are the Goblin Moors, part of the Western Outlands. It is bordered on the north by the Whispering sea, on the coast of which is its capital city Belladoni. The western edge of Kent runs along the foothills of the Star Mountains. To the south-west is Morden. Slavery is outlawed in Kent.
The Kentish call the people of Morden and Grototh 'barbarians'. The hobgoblins of the Moors are 'hellspawn'. In the last century, there were some invasions from Grototh, but the Kentish army has quadrupled from 5,000 to 20,000 men over the last fifty years. The cost of such an army, one soldier for every twenty inhabitants, is high, but it protects the nation from the perceived threat of the barbarians and hellspawn. The soldiers are everywhere in the cities and doing exercises in the countryside.
The Kentish government is a republic, fashioned after that of Endromis, but lacking the King, who in Endromis serves as Commander in Chief of the army. The Kentish army is directed by the elected Master of the Senate. The god they worship in Kent is called Bedalia. She is an independent operator, not as sharp as she once was, and likes her people to be devout and good. She is in the Peace and Prosperity camp. Kent is a firm ally of Endromis, with whom they trade via the Whispering Sea and the Goon River.
Trade began with the outlands fifty years ago in drugs such as heroin, marijuana, and cocaine. The government banned the importation of these substances with heavy penalties. The prices of drugs went up, and the black market spread crime through the cities. The government introduced penalties for possession and sale. Now they are fighting a war on drugs, with the hobgoblins as their chief enemy and supplier. In the past ten years they have started sending armed forces to raid drug-ring headquarters hundreds of miles into the outlands. The government asks the people to tolerate the cost of the army, because a strong army is 'the only way to stop the destruction of Kentish society by the poisons of Hell'.
Kiali, on the other hand, is a libertarian nation open to trade in all directions, and hospitable to anyone who wants to make business. The capital city of Kiali, Lutetia, is 1 km from the borderlands. Kiali is only 200 km EW and 50 km NS. Its people are the descendents of Gallic Celts who survived the Dark Ages. Their god is Drevel, whose creed is devoutly libertarian. By their prowess at arms, and their good business sense, they have survived in these dense forests for centuries. Most of its population of 100,000 lives on small farms cut from the forest, out of sigh and hearing of their neighbors. Kiali makes good money as a trading nation, a free port where trade among its neighbors can occur unhindered by taxes and regulations. Kiali is a close ally of Caraval. Caravel sells cloth to Kent and the Outlands through Kiali. Kiali is ruled by a chief and a complex social hierarchy. Ten thousand people live in Lutetia. There is no slavery in Kiali.
Laconia is populated by descendents of the people of Mareo who fled from the orcs before the Dark Ages, and returned as soldiers in the armies of Endromis. They are a nation of warriors. Their men work as mercenaries all over the world. Most of them learn their trade fighting the Garaz orcs, and the creatures of the Badlands. Their god models the culture of Laconia on that of ancient Sparta. His name in Laconia is Spartus. Population 200,000. Its standing army of 4,000 is reputed to be the best in the world. They claim that their soldiers can take on orcs one-on-one. Endans laugh at the claim, saying they can take on two each, but they don't fight many orcs, so they don't know what they are talking about, and the Laconians do. Laconians are abstemious people. They prize fitness and skill at arms above all other abilities. Among their favorite aphorisms are, "No pain, no gain," and, "A good man is hard to find, but a hard man is good to find," and "Come back with your shield or on it." Slavery is legal in Laconia. Their capital city, Kepoi, is at the extreme west of their country, on the shore of the Celib river, at the terminus of the Endan Highway, which runs east to Scartoni.
Lakh is populated by Germanic Celt immigrants from north of the Whispering Sea. Unlike Morden, Lakh is on good terms with Kiali. They are a matriarchal society, with men and women living in separate quarters. The men bear arms, plough fields, and do other heavy work. The women organize things. They have a queen and headwomen. They do not believe in keeping animals constrained, so they have no horses to ride or plough with. They hunt for meat. There are two rivers in their territory that yield gold. These they keep secret, and once fought over with the dwarves until the dwarves gave it up so they could trade for Lakh grain. You are not allowed to ride through Lakh, nor to carry any arms larger than a knife. But they are warm people, and wise. Population 200,000. Slavery is legal in Lakh.
The Long Hills are Shiva's territory, occupied by Giants. The Giants are peaceful farmers and shepherds for the most part, with the exception of their king and their aristocracy, who are aggressive enough to collect taxes and defend the farmers from the orcs. The king of the north is called Vasaleshen, and he is currently (2483) being challenged by his nephew Garandelsmashum. The king of the south is called Pak. According to the Olympian Cencus, there are thirty thousand giants living in the North Kingdom, and another thirty thousand in the South. Each kingdoms has area roughly thirty thousand square kilometers, or three million hectares. Half the land is adequate for grazing, and all of the available grazing land is used by the giants to raise sheep. The giants eat the sheep, but also shear off their wool and weave it into cloth. This cloth they wear themselves, but also trade for goods, some such goods even coming from sapien nations. Most villages are home to two or three hundred giants, and there are roughly four hundred villages in the Long Hills. The combined flocks of the shepherds amount to three million sheep. Each sheep needs a hectare to graze, so we see that half of the area of the Long Hills is used for grazing. The other half is steeply-sloping forest or exposed rock.
Mokul's population is 20,000, government by black-orc monarch. Its god is Lucifer. The current monarch is King Trackandslay, a sorcerer, born 2322, crowned 2435 when he siezed power from Queen Blessedcloud, now in exile. The mark of Mokul is a red cross, as shown below.
In 2453, Trackandslay hosted the signing of a three-way alliance between Dag, Gutak, and Mokul, which has held since then, leading to war with Garaz every summer. Slavery is legal in Mokul.
Morden is populated by sapien immigrants from the coast of the Whispering Sea, population 150,000. They are Germanic Celts. They are warlike and crude. They have little to steal, so it would be pointless invading. They provide grain to the dwarves in the mountains. They don't have sex until they are twenty, because it is supposed to sap their strength. They look down upon and often quarrel with the Gallic Celts of Kiali. There is, however, a road through south Morden to Kent, from which the Morden chiefs derive profit. The Mordi have plenty of iron to trade. They get it from the dwarves in exchange for food. They would have no qualms about trading with the Outlands, but they cannot provide the legal and operational conveniences offered by Lutetia. In the Morden borderlands, there is a tavern, the Green Horn. Slavery exists in Morden in many degrees, from indentured servitude to total captivity.
The Green Horn is a tavern run by a retired Mordi adventurer, Falmut Grossman. He has four wives, who run the place with him, six daughters and three young sons. His elder sons are away on their adventures, but return occasionally. He rules a small village, populated by one hundred orcs, fifty sapiens, six renegade black-orcs, and many other reprobates, all of whom are in awe of Falmut and his astonishing strength and prowess. For Falmut, it is one big brawling party. The tables are bolted to the floor along with the benches. The rooms are stone-walled with tile floors. He hoses them down to clean them. It is fight-proof, filth-proof, and welcoming to everyone. He sells his beer and accommodation for cheap, cheap enough for the orcs to afford it, but that is not where he makes his money. He makes his money by acting as a trading post for luxury goods between the Homelands and the black orcs of the Outlands.
Rank is a nation of two hundred thousand people governed by a democratically-elected parliament. Their chief product is wool. They raise sheep, and they use their swift-running mountain streams to power weaving machines and fuller's mills. Their standing army of five thousand troops is large in proportion to their population, but it is paid for by Endor, in the interests of keeping Rank allied with Endor, supporting its democratic government, and providing a barrier between Caravel and the Endan border. The Rank society is one of few rules. Slavery is illegal because no such ownership of another person is recognised by the law. There is mining in the mountains just outside the territory claimed by the dwarves of the Star Mountains, and frequent disagreements with these dwarves. There is sheep=theft in the foothills, avenged by the farmers themselves. There are polluted rivers downstream of the fuller's mills, and little that the residents of the downstream villages can do about it. There is corruption in government resulting from the steady flow of money from the Endans. In an effort to curb some of the excesses in such corruption, the Endans began recently to attach conditions to their support of the army, and among these was the requirement that every soldier in the Rank army be a Rank citizen, instead of the Gothic mercenaries the government was hiring.
Varay is protected by mountains on the west, and hills to the north and south. It was the last part of Mareo to fall to the Weilandic Empire. When the orcs invaded, it re-asserted its independence, and with the help of the dwarves of the Iron Mountains, remained a free sapien nation throughout the Dark Ages. They are a proud and independent people. They speak a language that is a mixture of Mareo and Weilandic. They live in harmony with their dwarf neighbors, and are on excellent terms with Ursia. The nation is home to 2,000,000 people, and in time of war can field 200,000 soldiers with no difficulty. Given the size of its conscripted army, Varay is a valuable ally to Ursia. Their government is elected by its citizens. The citizens are residents of the country who attend military training. The training takes two days a month and one continuous month a year. You must be seventeen or over to take part. Two centuries ago, women were granted the right to enter the training, and one century ago, all the regiments became mixed, including the dormitories and the baths. One third of the population are citizens. Of these one in three are in the prime of life, and it is these who will be conscripted first in a war.
The Varayan Air Force consists of twenty hippogriffs. These griffs patrol Varayan air space, but they do not patrol over the Outlands, where they are vulnerable to attack by black orcs on wyverns. The VAF does not use wyverns. The VAF cooperates with the Ursian Air Force on patrols of the caravan route to Sax. Each year the VAF takes part in exercises with the UAF. The VAF is equipped with thunder-eggs and other magical devices to enhance their fighting ability, but their primary role in the Varayan military is to survey enemy forces and transport valuable personnel.
The Varayan Army includes a company called the Night Fighters. This company is made up of orcs born to sapien parents inside Varay. Each year, an average of two orc children are born in Varay. Under Varayan law, an orc is always treated as a child. An orc must always have a responsible guardian. Almost all the orcs born to Varayan families end up going to military school and form the Night Fighters. They are well-respected in the Varayan military, and their abilities from the basis of the Varayan estimates of Outland military power. These orcs speak several languages, can operate as spies in the Outlands, and operate without sapien supervision. They are one of Varay's most formidable assets in small confrontations and covert operations. Anyone operating for Ursia in Varayan territory or the Outlands should be wary of engaging an orc party without first ascertaining their origins. Although the Night Fighters are well-known to the Ursian Army, and widely believed to exist by the Varayan population, they are a secret company, and do not parade openly with other army companies in public. The reason the Night Fighters are held out of the public eye is, according to the Varayan War Office, because the government does not want to encourage the idolization and acceptance of orcs as potential citizens of Varay. Another reason to keep them secret is to avoid the Princes of Hell being fined for their existence in Varay, which would amount to $50,000 per year for the fifty of them. This fine might motivate the Princes to kidnap the Night Fighters and return them to the Outlands.
Varay is a nation of roughly four million hectares. Half the area is too rocky or steep for farming. There are roughly a hundred and fifty thousand farms in Varay, occupying a total area of one and a half million hectares. One quarter of the population are farmers. Varay occupies four temple plots, the boundaries of these plots having been most recently re-drawn at the time of the Reconcilliation. The southern extremes of the temple plots overlap upon the northern edge of Ursia. These four temple plots are among the hundred most profitable temple plots in the free worlds. They are owned and managed by the Goddess Athena. The people do not worship her, but they attend her churches on Sundays because these gatherings in church are social events the people enjoy. There is singing, a short sermon, recognition of major events in the parish, and rememberance of the deceased. Everyone pays for health care themselves, although for women the prices of health care are much higher if they refuse long-term contraception. Prices are the same for everyone but there are large charities in Varay that provide funds to buy health care for the poor.
The government is funded by taxes levied on the residents as income tax, on land-owners as property taxes, and businesses as corporate taxes. Donations to charities such as the welfare of the poor charities are supported by the government by tax benefits. Such corporations have public records, but donations can be made anonymously. Slavery is outlawed in Varay.
Vaz's population 20,000. It's god is Beelzebub. Government by High-Priestess of Pain, a black-orc woman chosen by Beelzebub. Vaz is an ally of Ankh, and pays tribute to Garaz in the form of soldiers who end up working in the Old Hills. The mark of Vaz is an inverted green T. Slavery is legal in Vaz.
According to our agents on Olympia, the Princes of Hell don't make any money out of the Outlands. They might make $100/yr per orc if they tried, but that would mean only $40M per year for the entire Western Outlands, and would require that the orcs be forced into an organized taxation system. Thus oppressed, they might rebel, and break the Reconciliation, bringing upon the Princes penalties far greater than their potential gains.
There are five Princes of Hell, known by many names. We shall call them Beelzebub, Lucifer, Shiva, Thor, and Erebus. They share the burden of enforcing the Reconciliation on Clarus. This burden is their punishment for allowing orcs to get to Clarus in the first place. The Reconciliation confiscated all the Princes temple plots in the homelands, and gave them all the plots of the outlands.
When they deal with their orc populations, the princes most often communicate only with black orcs. The black orcs always rule their smaller and short-lived relatives.
Thor looks after Garaz. He is in favor of obeying the Reconciliation, and making the most of it. He likes things as they are. His nation, Garaz, gets its strength from the profits it makes in the Badlands and the Old Hills. He boasts of these profits to the other Princes.
Lucifer is responsible for Makul, Dag, Gutak, and Gadz. They defend themselves against Garaz, but they are live in fear of invasion. Although the Princes try not to take part in the squabbles of Olympian politics, and rule only their own four worlds, Lucifer has a long-standing interest in the Western Outlands, and he is a cultural dynamist. He is an admirer of the old Mareo culture, and he is an admirer of Aries and Bakkus. He was against the final destruction of Mareo brought about by the Reconciliation, and spoke against it in the Olympian Council. His advice went unheeded. He was out of favor at the time: Gelden was Lucifer's general. Endromis carried out Mareo's destruction. Mareo had stood in the way of Endan imperial ambition for centuries. The Reconciliation eliminated it forever. Lucifer would love to see the Reconciliation annulled, and something like Mareo restored, with orcs thrown in the mix as well, but he cannot encourage such an endeavor directly, because the fines he would suffer as a consequence would be crippling to him, and he is beholden to Olympia for his bodies, as are all the gods.
Beelzebub is responsible for Vaz and Ankh. His delight is to create orc societies that give the appearance of being ruled by dark and oppressive cruelty. His orcs live in fear of him directly, as opposed to fear of the black orcs. Beelzebub will appear himself, black and huge, in his temples. He doesn't care much about global politics, and likes to hang out with his scrappy orcs, maybe torture some criminals, or flay a few sapien prisoners.
Shiva owns the plots of the Long Hills, where she keeps giants who mine tin and copper, and the Goblin Moors, where she sells drugs to Kent. This latter enterprise is new, and provides her with much-needed revenue to defend the hobgoblins from their many enemies, both to the north and from within.
Erebus owns several temple plots in the Western Outlands, with small populations of hellspawn other than orcs. He owns the swamps of the Fen River, including the elf settlement of Eriba.
The Princes of Hell are friends who spend a lot of time in one another's company. They like to play war games. They invade one another's territory, they make secret alliances, and betray one another, but only in the game. On Clarus, the Reconciliation makes the game more exciting, because they have to compromise between risking fines on Olympia and increasing the size of their armies. In their war-games, Thor tends to prefer open contests. Lucifer is the most daring. Shiva is clever and careful. Erebus is secretive.
The Princes of Hell control the black orcs by controlling their supply of longevity drugs. Black orcs have a three-hundred year life span. Half of them use sorcery. At 100 years they start with the drugs. By 250 their skin is gray. They have no hair to turn gray, otherwise the drugs would be noticeable sooner. Black orcs are as smart as sapiens, larger, stronger, faster, and longer-lived. Their success as a species is limited by the seven-year gestation period. They are romantic people, they fall deeply in love. They are protective.
When a god travels to or returns from a Free World, he must report both his time of arrival and departure to the Olympian Council. The Council enters the dates into the Public Record. For Clarus, the public record also contains the temple plot that the god visited, its exact location on Clarus, and the population limit associated with that plot.
On planets where the Olympian laws enforce population limits, a block is the right to have one thousand people living in your territory. A Claran block currently sells for about ten million Olympian dollars. The Reconciliation prohibits the transfer of blocks into the outlands, but it allows the transfer out of the outlands. Therefore, the legal population of the outlands can only decrease, and it was the hope of the gods that this would lead eventually to the reduction of the Outland population to zero. But the Princes have sold not a single one of their Outland blocks. They have traded blocks among themselves, but they have not allowed them to pass to the homelands.
Orcs in Western Outlands get iron from Homelands to the north. They have very little in their hills. Of the nations to the north, only Kiali permits open trade with the Outlands, which takes place mostly in the borderlands between Kiali and the Old Hills, just outside Garaz. There was once iron in the Old Hills, but it ran out 500 years ago. After the iron ran out, Garaz found another use for the Old Hills.
Over the last century, a shortage of iron is now affecting the western outlands and the nations to the south, in particular Varay, Isengard, and Ursia. The outlands started smuggling iron across the borderlands from the Star Mountains, despite Garaz's apparent efforts to stop the trade. Although they were once rich in iron, the Iron Mountains are now short of easily accessible ore. The dwarves are stripping many of their older ironworks to obtain fresh metal. They are importing iron by space bridge, even though the procedure is expensive and dangerous. Gutak and Gadz used to get iron from Varay. Isengard never exported directly to the Outlands. The bridge over the river in north-west Varay is the prime route to Gutak, and the southern tip borderlands are the route for Gadz.
| Location | Price of Iron ($/kg) |
|---|---|
| Any Place by Space Bridge | 150 |
| Pakesh | 150 |
| Isengard | 150 |
| Varay | 150 |
| Kiali | 100 |
| Kent | 110 |
| Gadz | 130 |
| Garaz | 130 |
| Endromis | 105 |
Over the last twenty years, the flow of iron from Varay into the Outlands has slowed to a halt and then reversed. Now the iron comes from the Star Mountains north of Kiali, through Kiali and into the Outlands, and from there around the hills to Gutak, and down through the pass to Gadz. Garaz buys its iron from Gadz, under the official assumption that Gadz mines the iron itself from the hills to the South-East of Gadz. There is some iron in these hills, but not nearly enough. Isengard, therefore, is now importing iron from the Star Mountains via Kiali, Gadz, and Varay, or Kiali, Gutak, and Varay.
The Old Hills are now inhabited by endless monsters and riddled with dungeons, a testing ground for sapien and orc adventurers, and the scene of secret trade between Kiali and the Outlands. The dungeons are taxed by Garaz, except for a small section to the east, which is independent, and through which the iron trade from Lutetia passes. The dungeons of the Old Hills have 'unbreakable doors', 'decks of many things', and many other strange and baffling features that make for exciting adventures for novice hackers, but guarantee that the adventurers take in more gold than they bring out. The maxim of the dungeon managers in the Old Hills is that if you let one hacker get away with a thousand dollars, you will get ten thousand dollars back in captured armor and weapons from those who follow in his footsteps. The Old Hills provides the Garaz government with more income than any other operation. It is the secret to their dominance of the far-western outlands. They tolerate the iron smuggling through the eastern edge of the Old Hills because it is their chief source of iron, even though it passes down to Gadz before it comes to them.
The Badlands are the borderlands between Garaz and Laconia. The two nations fight many battles there. Laconia justifies funding for its army from Endromis by these battles. Garaz sometimes gets a cut of this money. The Badlands are riddled with monsters and dungeons just like the Old Hills, but the Laconians compete with the Garaz orcs to cut their teeth in this territory. Garaz does not tax it. Instead, it takes payments from Laconia.
Hellspawn live together to some extent. We obtain the proportions of the various races from the Olympian Census of 2474.
| Number (per 1000 Orcs) | Race | Role in Society |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | black orc | Rulers, Generals |
| 40 | ogre | Porters |
| 10 | gnoll | Couriers |
| 20 | kobold | Scouts |
| 10 | bugbear | Guards |
| 20 | goblin | Miners, Technicians |
| 20 | hobgoblin | Farmers, Herbalists |
| 1 | elf | Legendary Creatures |
| 100 | sapien slaves | Laborers |
Ogres are used by orc armies as porters, in which capacity they are invaluable during the summer campains. Because ogres are so stupid, they don't do very well on their own, so orc society makes use of them all year round as porters, heavy-lifters, and as ceremonial guards. They are so big that orcs can be intimidated by them, even though they are not particularly formidable in combat. By far the largest minority race in the orc nations of the western outlands are sapien slaves. The population of slaves varies from one nation to the next. Garaz has approximately twenty thousand sapien slaves living among its one hundred thousand orcs.
Goblins are dwarf-sized humanoids that can breed with orcs, but seldom do so. They do not have the snouts that orcs have, but wide sharp-toothed mouths instead. Goblins mine for orcs in the same way that dwarves mine for sapiens. They can defend themselves against orcs in their tunnels just as dwarves can defend themselves against sapiens in their cities.
Hobgoblins are half-way between goblin and sapien. They like to farm and they enjoy cooking and chemistry. They can breed with both, but not reliably. They lack aggression when compared to orcs, and lack ambition when compared to sapiens. Consequently, their societies tend to be peaceful and vulnerable. The only community of hobgoblins in the Western Outlands is the one in Taerin, on the north side of the High Road of Taerin, east of Kent. It is this community that grows and supplies the drugs that fuel the drug war waged by Kent. Their community is not protected by armies of hobgoblins, but by a distributed collection of powerful Princes (male and femal) of various races, and their personal armies, whose estates lie among the hobgoblins. Among these princes are indivicual elves, some families of elves, exiled black-orc sorcerers, sapien wizards, and perhaps even some renegade demons.
Here is a table of the population of nations on Clarus, including those in the neighborhood of the Western Outlands.
| Nation | Population | Race |
|---|---|---|
| Anon | 6,000,000 | Sapien |
| Caravel | 300,000 | Sapien |
| Endromis | 4,000,000 | Sapien |
| Equina | 3,000,000 | Sapien |
| Gastranoi | 1,000,000 | Sapien |
| Kent | 400,000 | Sapien |
| Kiali | 100,000 | Sapien |
| Laconia | 200,000 | Sapien |
| Lakh | 200,000 | Sapien |
| Morden | 150,000 | Sapien |
| Outlands, Western | 300,000 | Orc |
| Outlands, Kratanak | 200,000 | Orc |
| Outlands, Southern | 500,000 | Orc |
| Rank | 200,000 | Sapien |
| Ursia | 1,000,000 | Sapien |
| Weiland, Dukedoms | 7,000,000 | Sapien |
| Weiland, Coastal | 8,000,000 | Sapien |
| Sax | 2,000,000 | Sapien |
| Siam | 500,000 | Sapien |
| Varay | 2,000,000 | Sapien |
Note that Endromis is the name of the capital city of the nation of the same name. The island of Endor is off the coast of Idonius, and Anon is the mainland portion of Endromis that was incorporated into the nation after the Reconcilliation.
| Nation | Type | Philosophy | Population | Standing Army | Conscripted Army |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Caravel | Monarchy | Libertarian | 300k | 3k | 3k |
| Endor | Democracy | Socialist | 10M | 50k | 1M |
| Equina | Democracy | Socialist | 3M | 15k | 300k |
| Kent | Democracy | Libertarian | 300k | 20k | 20k |
| Kiali | Democracy | Socialist | 100k | 500 | 10k |
| Laconia | Democracy | Oppressive | 200k | 4k | 10k |
| Rank | Democracy | Libertarian | 200k | 5k | 5k |
| Ursia | Oligarchy | Libertarian | 1M | 10k | 30k |
| Outlands, Western | Oligarchy | Libertarian | 300k | 90k | 90k |
| Varay | Democracy | Socialist | 2M | 10k | 200k |
Here we provide estimates of the per-capita income of various outland inhabitants in Olympian dollars.
| Race | Income Per Year Per Working Adult |
|---|---|
| orc | $1000 |
| black orc | $100,000 |
| bugbear | $2000 |
| kobold | $500 |
| gnoll | $500 |
| ogre | $1000 |
Total Income of Western Outlands Inhabitants is roughly $500 M per year.
| Commodity | Income | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Salt herring | -5 | From Whispering Sea via Kiali |
| Iron | -10 | From Star Mountains via Kiali |
| Cloth | -10 | From Caravel |
| Tin | +5 | From Long Hills |
| Copper | +5 | From Sharp Hills |
| Gold | +5 | From Lake Zakh |
| Mercenaries | +5 | Summoned mercenaries |
| Intrigues | +5 | Old Hills Adventuring |
In the above estimate of the total imports and exports of the Western Outlands, we have assumed that the value of the exports is equal to the value of the imports and then done our best to present an approximate picture of the magnitude of the trade.
The Long Hills are old granite of varying quality. The Iron Mountains are igneous rock varying from gniss and schist, to granite. The dwarves have mined these igneous formations for gems and fool's gold. The latter is an iron ore, which they found in remarkable abundance within the Iron Mountains, hence the name they gave to the range after they had established their first city some two thousand years ago. There is no record of mithril being found in the Iron Mountains.
Between the Iron Mountains and the Long Hills there are large areas of clay, chalk, and limestone. The orcs have mined limestone for many years, using it to make their larger structures. Both the quarries and the structures are visible from the air.