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The Tale of an Industrious Rogue (updated 3-12-2014)
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<blockquote data-quote="Cristian Andreu" data-source="post: 6252727" data-attributes="member: 23822"><p><strong><u><span style="font-size: 15px">Part XVI: To Rule a City</span></u></strong></p><p></p><p>Chasing dreams and all that was very nice, but eventually the party realised they had been putting more down-to-earth stuff on the backburner for a while. Specifically, there was a bunch of administrative and managerial shenanigans regarding the burgeoning town Saltspit was turning into to take care of:</p><p></p><p><strong>The Salt Operation</strong></p><p>Whipmaster Konkaf (a Cyclops they bought in Katapesh to take care of in-situ slave labour administration. Very big, very bad at depth perception, and great at workforce motivation) complained that the slaves at the mines were too weak. As it turned out, Khandassar had been shipping sick slaves, and there was now the risk of an epidemic. Konkaf had been breaking some spines to instill morale and see if it cured something, but surprisingly the illness was not reacting to other's people sudden promotion into a paraplegic status. On the bright side, further experimentation had managed to restitute the original portal conduct, and salt was pouring out once more -a second portal had to be built into the Deep Ethereal in order to allow easy access for the Hags-, which meant the operation could go back into full operation (and rogue quasielementals were chasing down people like in the good old days). A deal was struck with the Festerfang gnoll tribe, which was able to secure some extra slaves from the deserts of Osirion to the north, and in general the plague thing was played down so much even the sick guys were starting to forget about it (not really, but that was the official version announced by the recently created Saltspit Barber-Surgeon General office).</p><p></p><p><strong>The Brass Legion</strong></p><p>Hranuf, the ulfen in charge of handling the 60-some mercenaries that made up the Brass Legion -the guys in charge of "security"-, demanded better living conditions for his men. Among other things, he wanted an increase of 6 copper pieces per day of work for each man, private latrines (the <em>“Salspit Shithouses”</em>, the vast hive of rotting public latrines set up in the early days of the city, were infamous for being so foul that some people literally died while using them due to the noxious gases and extremely unsafe scaffolding. The thing was enormous, big enough that it was unofficially considered to be a quarter of the city all by itself, also serving as a part-time cemetery and exotic zoo), and the right to one harlot each week for every man, which would be chosen from any of the city’s wenching houses.</p><p></p><p>The final agreement included a raise of 2 silver pieces a week, plus another 5 for the 10 best-performing mercenaries; this was Jack’s idea: The performance would be determined by a system where all the mercenaries would be divided between the four districts of Saltspit in which they operated (Northern Saltspit -the... well, northern part of town-, the Bazaar –the area where most of the commercial activity took place-, the Ledge –the side of the town that was next to the mine and existed in a perpetual state of crumbling down- and the Pit of Prostitutes –the area of Saltspit where gambling and drinking, but mostly wenching, happened, and the turf of Mahmud Al'Sherengen -). Then, the local population would vote for those members of the Legion they considered had done a good job . As it can be expected, this soon spiralled into an epidemic of leg-breaking, house-burning, and fist-assisted suicides, all in the name of sound, healthy democracy, of course.</p><p></p><p>The rest of the agreement went on about the private latrines (eight would be build, two in each district. The Brass Legion would be in charge of upkeep, though, which essentially meant they would bully the locals for it or drown them in crap) and the wenches. This last part caused some friction, since Vorgok –who as previously mentioned had the right to <em>Prima Nocte</em> for every new lady of ill-repute in Saltspit- had become very attached to the harlot community, and in fact was quite well received by them, and he refused to diminish them so much. In the end, though, Hranuf was inflexible about his men’s necessities, and it was settled that 3 wenches would be sent each night to the Legion’s headquarters in the Bazaar –generously provided by Al’Sherengen’s <em>Pavillion of Pleasure</em>-, but the men would have to share.</p><p></p><p><strong>Urban Planning</strong></p><p>Saltspit had grown beyond all expectations. Indeed, nearly 6,000 people lived there and more kept coming, making it the third largest settlement in the region, after Katapesh (around 200,000) and Okeno (around 13,000). It had also developed into a full-fledged trading nexus, with all the wealth produced directly or indirectly by the STC spilling over to hundreds of other business activities (did I mention the excellent state of the wenching industry?), with caravans going in and out non-stop, carrying all sorts of goods, from katheeran silk to thuvian wine, nexian glowstones and black powder from Alkenstar, slaves from Katapesh and even the occasional load of tobacco from the unknown reaches of southern Garund, of which Vorgok quickly became a well-known connoisseur, holding weekly <em>"Let's Smoke This Thing and Chat"</em> sessions in the House of Smelly Fountains that eventually gathered dozens of cigar enthusiasts. All this prosperity, however, was starting to cause a few problems beyond the sands: Magistrate Kemal Al’Kaffesh had recently been dispatched from Katapesh to sort out the urban status of Saltspit: Was it a city? Did it recognize the primacy of the Pactmasters and Pactbrookers? Did it abide to the –highly flexible- katapeshi legal system? Was trade being protected? Who handled crime? Where were the criminals being sent? And a long et cetera that required urgent looking-into.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Cristian Andreu, post: 6252727, member: 23822"] [B][U][SIZE=4]Part XVI: To Rule a City[/SIZE][/U][/B] Chasing dreams and all that was very nice, but eventually the party realised they had been putting more down-to-earth stuff on the backburner for a while. Specifically, there was a bunch of administrative and managerial shenanigans regarding the burgeoning town Saltspit was turning into to take care of: [B]The Salt Operation[/B] Whipmaster Konkaf (a Cyclops they bought in Katapesh to take care of in-situ slave labour administration. Very big, very bad at depth perception, and great at workforce motivation) complained that the slaves at the mines were too weak. As it turned out, Khandassar had been shipping sick slaves, and there was now the risk of an epidemic. Konkaf had been breaking some spines to instill morale and see if it cured something, but surprisingly the illness was not reacting to other's people sudden promotion into a paraplegic status. On the bright side, further experimentation had managed to restitute the original portal conduct, and salt was pouring out once more -a second portal had to be built into the Deep Ethereal in order to allow easy access for the Hags-, which meant the operation could go back into full operation (and rogue quasielementals were chasing down people like in the good old days). A deal was struck with the Festerfang gnoll tribe, which was able to secure some extra slaves from the deserts of Osirion to the north, and in general the plague thing was played down so much even the sick guys were starting to forget about it (not really, but that was the official version announced by the recently created Saltspit Barber-Surgeon General office). [B]The Brass Legion[/B] Hranuf, the ulfen in charge of handling the 60-some mercenaries that made up the Brass Legion -the guys in charge of "security"-, demanded better living conditions for his men. Among other things, he wanted an increase of 6 copper pieces per day of work for each man, private latrines (the [I]“Salspit Shithouses”[/I], the vast hive of rotting public latrines set up in the early days of the city, were infamous for being so foul that some people literally died while using them due to the noxious gases and extremely unsafe scaffolding. The thing was enormous, big enough that it was unofficially considered to be a quarter of the city all by itself, also serving as a part-time cemetery and exotic zoo), and the right to one harlot each week for every man, which would be chosen from any of the city’s wenching houses. The final agreement included a raise of 2 silver pieces a week, plus another 5 for the 10 best-performing mercenaries; this was Jack’s idea: The performance would be determined by a system where all the mercenaries would be divided between the four districts of Saltspit in which they operated (Northern Saltspit -the... well, northern part of town-, the Bazaar –the area where most of the commercial activity took place-, the Ledge –the side of the town that was next to the mine and existed in a perpetual state of crumbling down- and the Pit of Prostitutes –the area of Saltspit where gambling and drinking, but mostly wenching, happened, and the turf of Mahmud Al'Sherengen -). Then, the local population would vote for those members of the Legion they considered had done a good job . As it can be expected, this soon spiralled into an epidemic of leg-breaking, house-burning, and fist-assisted suicides, all in the name of sound, healthy democracy, of course. The rest of the agreement went on about the private latrines (eight would be build, two in each district. The Brass Legion would be in charge of upkeep, though, which essentially meant they would bully the locals for it or drown them in crap) and the wenches. This last part caused some friction, since Vorgok –who as previously mentioned had the right to [I]Prima Nocte[/I] for every new lady of ill-repute in Saltspit- had become very attached to the harlot community, and in fact was quite well received by them, and he refused to diminish them so much. In the end, though, Hranuf was inflexible about his men’s necessities, and it was settled that 3 wenches would be sent each night to the Legion’s headquarters in the Bazaar –generously provided by Al’Sherengen’s [I]Pavillion of Pleasure[/I]-, but the men would have to share. [B]Urban Planning[/B] Saltspit had grown beyond all expectations. Indeed, nearly 6,000 people lived there and more kept coming, making it the third largest settlement in the region, after Katapesh (around 200,000) and Okeno (around 13,000). It had also developed into a full-fledged trading nexus, with all the wealth produced directly or indirectly by the STC spilling over to hundreds of other business activities (did I mention the excellent state of the wenching industry?), with caravans going in and out non-stop, carrying all sorts of goods, from katheeran silk to thuvian wine, nexian glowstones and black powder from Alkenstar, slaves from Katapesh and even the occasional load of tobacco from the unknown reaches of southern Garund, of which Vorgok quickly became a well-known connoisseur, holding weekly [I]"Let's Smoke This Thing and Chat"[/I] sessions in the House of Smelly Fountains that eventually gathered dozens of cigar enthusiasts. All this prosperity, however, was starting to cause a few problems beyond the sands: Magistrate Kemal Al’Kaffesh had recently been dispatched from Katapesh to sort out the urban status of Saltspit: Was it a city? Did it recognize the primacy of the Pactmasters and Pactbrookers? Did it abide to the –highly flexible- katapeshi legal system? Was trade being protected? Who handled crime? Where were the criminals being sent? And a long et cetera that required urgent looking-into. [/QUOTE]
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