Matsu Xiangu
The Haruspex
"The best view of heaven, is from hell!"
OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION
Intent | To provide more concrete information as to the feel and purpose of the city for players looking to roleplay in and around it.
Image Credit | HERE | HERE | HERE
Canon | No
Links | Will be provided if necessary.
SETTING INFORMATION
City Name | New City
Classification | Megacity
Location | Maena
Affiliation |
- Matsu
- ‘Self-Governed’ - largely lawless
Demographics | Hugely varied, the New City is host to approximately 300 million humans, near-humans,
Wealth | Varies - extremely low to extremely high. Wealth largely depends on which level you find yourself. The richest live within the very top of the City. If you don’t own at least a moon, you probably can’t buy apartments here. But at the very bottom of the city, money means nothing because it can’t be found. Currency is food, medicine, shiny baubles, or religion.
Stability | Variable. The New City is a chaotic environment thriving off its own mania. Gang wars, terrorism, fiery accidents, rampant crime, fires consuming entire levels - all of it is commonplace, and therefore none of it causes major issues. To those who live here it’s, ‘just the New City.’ While Matsu and her trusted associates guide the City to the tune of their own interests, it would be foolish to assume this great beast does anything but what it wants. It could not be oppressed even if someone wished it.
Description | Glittering from within the maw of a breathtakingly massive inactive volcano, the New City is a marvel of engineering packed and built over hundreds of years to the beast it is today. Breathing with the frenetic life of hundreds of millions of inhabitants, this is a place that truly never stops. Bathed in neon lights and loud advertisements, this is a place that caters to all kinds. The atmosphere and wealth changes depending on where you are (see Points of Interest) but it is always chaotic. The higher levels closest to the mouth of the dead volcano are narrow in diameter but built higher, while those closer to the bottom became wider as the volcano bows out, leading to shorter height but more space to roam in either direction.
POINTS OF INTEREST
The New City is filled with far too much to list, so please find a breakdown of individual levels and their general tone and atmosphere. Transportation by tram, airbus, airtaxi, elevator, and air-walkway are easily accessible on Levels 1 - 50. Please see city maps when proceeding below Level 50 - transportation can be found at designated sites. Public Transportation below Level 200 is not guaranteed.
- Levels 1 - 5: Home to high-end and strictly legal retailers, clubs and bars with excessively strict dress codes, satellite or permanent offices for legitimate businesses, and residences of the wealthiest in the galaxy. Relatively safer than lower levels, however the Maenan Security Board would like to remind you to remain vigilant at all times.
- Levels 5 - 50: HUGE tourist section for those looking for excitement and potential danger, but not willing to truly risk themselves. Mostly commercial and white-collar businesses. Entertainment is the name of the game here, from the relatively tame made more fun by the potential for danger, to the things one might hesitate to tell even their friends they did when they get home.
- Levels 50 - 100: The ‘Lower 50’, a region of blue-collar workers who keep the lights on - literally - in the New City. Most of those who live here keep the electricity, water, and all other amenities running in this massive megacity. Looked down upon by the Upper 50, and scorned by anyone who lives below Level 100, these people go about their daily lives and stick mostly to themselves and the decent and steady pay that keeps them out of the mine life. Tourist attractions still abound here as well, but the general atmosphere leans more towards the working joe.
- Levels 100 - 200: While still largely levels that attract tourists, this is a more dangerous playground. While nothing overt, more unique pleasures are catered to here. The bars are louder, the clubs more dangerous. Gangs and criminal activity begin to be more obvious here. The atmosphere is, overall, far more grim than the party above. The sun and sky are non-existent past Level 100, and neons are the only thing lighting the streets. Illegal trade begins to thrive here, black market vending a lucrative business. Air traffic is still loud and busy.
- Levels 200 - 300: Here, criminal activity and the gangs associated take hold openly. The entertainment takes a turn for the truly obscene. Bars are filled with hardened criminals of every kind - professionals known in the seediest shadow-ports of the Galaxy. Those illegal trades found in upper levels become even more open and carefree. One can find anything their heart desires here, if they are willing to pay the price. The Maena Security Council would like to remind all visitors that past this point, it is not advisable to proceed any lower. Your personal safety cannot be guaranteed.
- Level 300 - 400: If you’re here to sightsee, you must have a real need for something you can’t find anywhere else in the Galaxy. Crime is open and vicious here. Unspeakable acts of retribution between rival gangs are displayed openly on the street. Riots that look more like parties are commonplace, often stopping the flow of water, electricity, and other necessary things that are already difficult to pump this low in to the city. The Maenan Security Council does not bother to patrol or intervene here, and visitors to the planet are told in no uncertain terms that they will not be assisted should they run in to trouble.
- Level 400 - 500: The worst of the worst sort of desires are catered to here, though the potential price is high. It is wildly ill-advised to visit here unless you absolutely can’t live without the possibility of seeing something fantastically horrible or unavailable anywhere else, or...you’re the sort of person that belongs among scum. Water, electricity, and other amenities are intermittent here due to the chaos of the levels above and the nature of the place itself, where such things are often sold at a premium to those who can’t fight back. The neons flicker, the streets are always glistening with condensation, and the claustrophobia is suffocating. And at the end of some alleyways, darkness coils… but no one goes towards those… the entrances to the levels below…
- Level 500 - 600: Not even the most despicable of the inhabitants of the 400 - 500 levels go lower in to these levels Populated largely by shadowy Cult members carrying lore from Maena’s more ancient past, obsessed with their strange gods, this place is best left alone. The city was built over this place while the planet boomed. None of the neons that characterize much of the city glow here. The streets are eerie and dark, its people downtrodden and wretched. They curl up in street corners and abandoned buildings, starving and thirsty, sick with addictions. It is, essentially, a tomb built over those too weak, poor, or unwilling to get out. But most frightening of all is the Cult, tending to their mysteries in the Dark. They rarely come up in to other levels, and those that must go down to visit them do so quickly...if they ever come back at all.
A depiction of Level 15 as seen from Bardo Fashion Industries.
HISTORY
The construction of the New City as it now stands began centuries ago, some time after the ancient residents of the planet realized the volcano had died. Volcano Worshippers, those that survived after the vicious eruption that saw the behemoth expire moved to get to its core. They explored slowly, careful but hopeful for a new place to settle in the belly of the gods they worshipped. And settle they did, slowly building homes and businesses in their typical ramshackle style.
But as in all things, the outside world found their riches. New settlers, criminals, and those seeking the buzz of a new and frantic sort of life began building too and soon...those original settlers were lost, families buried under hundreds of new levels of city streets. It is rumored that those original family lines are those that constitute the shadowy cult that populates the bottom of the City, still worshipping in new and wicked ways… but it’s not as if anyone ever goes down there to check.
The centuries have seen the New City grow by leaps and bounds, fueled by the constant flow of credits and trade between factions and criminal elements. Six hundred levels of scum grew to glitter - ironic, filthy - out of the mouth of a monster.
The Gulag Plague hit this city like most anything else, though it’s position in the Unknown Regions saw it reach them later than many other planets. Though once it came, brought to Maena by terrified civilians fleeing the Core, it hit hard. Spreading like wildfire in the claustrophobic corridors of the City, the Plague decimated half the city before it was through. The 400 Years of Darkness that followed saw a slow rebuilding of what had been thriving in the City, the growth of old factions and the appearance of new. The allure of the planet’s natural riches was loud enough a siren’s song to lure even the most wary back to the neon clutch.
The City was not exempt from Netherworld’s strange powers either, the population once more halving overnight. Chaos reigned in the city as crime ran even more rampant, those gangs that were weak as their membership disappeared seeing their territory doing the same. Residential families huddled in their homes, trying to understand where their loved ones had gone while avoiding the chaos outside. And for those close enough to the bottom… they’ll tell you if you were brave enough to go near the holes in the ground that led to the bottom levels, you could hear something like chanting, something like joy from the strange inhabitants at the very darkest parts of the City…
But the New City cannot be beaten and eventually it crawled right back to frenetic power. It was around then that Matsu Xiangu found it. It reminded her of...home. And so, quickly and quietly, she eliminated those in her way and took control. Now she presides - silent, and with as much influence as anyone could have over a place like this. No one person could ever control the ‘The 600 Cities’ in full. And with that she is content. What a shame it would be to chain such a beast! Even still, around this place gathers a cast headed by Matsu and a droid called Six-O many have learned to fear, to whom many of the out-of-control fires baking the City and horrid happenings reported along the holonet are rumored to be attributed. Strange and wild and full of terrible opportunity, it can only grow from here.
