The Sprawl
The Sprawl is OLD. Your grandparent’s grandparents were not born when the Cage was built. Layer upon layer of ancient buildings form the foundation for the Sprawl.
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The Sprawl is HAUNTED. Spirits are real and speaking their name gives them power. Druids commune with the city streets and paths. And the Great Betrayers howl at the walls.
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The Sprawl is HUGE. It sprawls in all directions, as far as the sea in the north and the Cage in the other three directions. The Iron Lords watch from their tall towers and rule the deep mines that delve beneath the streets.
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The Sprawl HAS SECRETS. Beneath the pavement, within the walls of the noblemen’s towers, deep in the mines and darkest alleys secrets are made, kept, and stolen. Smugglers, fences, businessmen and nobles use the populace as their pawns.
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The Sprawl is CROWDED. The population limits were reached long ago, yet the people are still trapped within the Cage. Entire extended families huddle in single rooms, tower-apartments overflow and even the sewers have become refuge for those with nowhere else to go.
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The Sprawl is DANGEROUS. With so many people living on top of one another, with so little to go around, tensions often escalate and blood is shed. For those who live at the feet of the towers, life can be brutal and short. For the privileged, though, life is just as dangerous. Political intrigue and treachery abound.
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The Sprawl is STRONG. Everything is constructed from iron, steel, bone or stone. Walls are thick, doors are heavy, weapons are deadly. Nothing is made of wood. Valuables are locked in iron vaults, and the guard patrols the streets to ensure the nobles are safe.
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The Sprawl is NEEDY. There are too many mouths and not enough food. Farms struggle to keep up and the fishing fleet struggles to haul a worthy catch. Sailors blame the sea-hags; farmers speak of goblyn once again infesting the fungus catacombs.
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The Sprawl is HOT. Furnaces burn night and day to warm the towers of the Iron Lords and work the raw materials that are burrowed from the earth. Firemen destroy illicit plant material in gouts of flame, and the Cage is lashed with liquid fire every day.
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The Sprawl is COLD. Chill wind blows in from the coast and roars through the narrow streets, between the towers and beneath the bridges. Winter is the longest season in the Sprawl. Those on the streets are in an ongoing struggle to find shelter.
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The Sprawl is BEAUTIFUL. Graceful bridges and gantries span the space between towers, iron fretwork decorates every building and brightly colored banners are unfurled from the tallest buildings with the rise of every morning. Each banner, emblazoned with the mark of an Iron Lord, defiantly declares to those beyond the Cage that the city has survived another night.
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The Sprawl is DARK. Even on the finest days a thick smog muffles the city, smoke belching from a thousand-thousand fires, furnaces and flame carts. The sun never reaches the deepest corners or beneath the broadest bridges, making perfect homes for vermin and worse. Lamps Men work hard to ward off the darkness, but it's a dangerous and thankless job.
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