Eternal Father
OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION
- Intent: Flesh out the capital city of TSE
- Image Credit: Click - Olga Orlova
- Canon: Ravelin
- Permissions: N/A
- Links: N/A
- City Name: Ravelin, the Great Imperial Ruling City
- Classification: Eperopolis (Continent-Spanning City)
- Location: Bastion
- Affiliation: The Sith Empire
- Population: Heavy - Estimated 3 Billion Inhabitants
- Demographics: The population of Ravelin is highly diverse thanks to its position as the political capital of the Sith Empire, with large groups of colonists arriving from across the Empire to take up residence in the massive city. Despite this, the total population still favors Human and Near-Human species in the overall percentage.
- Wealth: High
- The Sith Empire has expanded many resources into improving and expanding Ravelin into the great capital it is seen as today. To facilitate trade and economic stimulation, the Sith enticed many aristocrats and business magnates to settle in the capital and bring their substantial wealth and influence to Ravelin. As a result, Ravelin has been transformed into a hub of commerce and innovation, sky-rocketing its prosperity to never before seen heights.
- Stability: High
- Though in the past Ravelin was ruled by chaos and discord, the Sith have largely brought the most unruly elements of the city to heel as they claimed Bastion as their capital. Strict and uncompromising law enforcement has clamped down on any lingering criminal activities in the city while the Imperial Mission manipulates the Imperial citizenry into complacent loyalists.
- Freedom & Oppression:
- The Empire is all-invasive in its capital, hundreds of government officials employed as analysts, ciphers, and intelligence agents peering inward to monitor the Imperial population.
- Citizens in the capital, like everywhere in the Empire, are issued state-approved identification credentials that are electronically recorded per hour every hour. Those not in possession of identification or in possession of invalid identification can be imprisoned without due process, the minimum sentence being several weeks at one of the Empire's Enlightenment Cultivation Centers.
- Aerial drones, known as Public Security Probes, routinely patrol the lower airspace of the city. Armed with rotary laser cannons, these drones have the ability to scan individuals at a distance to detect their identification and are equipped with long-range communication sensors to alert authorities to any breaches of Imperial Conduct. They are likewise programmed to react with lethal force if attacked or tampered with.
- Checkpoints near major government facilities herd citizens into documentation centers where they are checked for their state-issued identification credentials and have their DNA tested against the Empire's vast Genetic Databank; which had been accumulated by taking samples from every registered citizen through mandatory physicals.
- All holonet transceivers are put through the same access points, allowing the Empire to tightly monitor what their citizens access through the Holonet. This also serves as the Empire's method to routinely pump constant propaganda to its citizens via the Sith-Imperial News Network.
- Description: When the Sith claimed Bastion as their new capital, they found a city on the brink of ruin and anarchy. The Sith Emperor, Darth Carnifex, outstretched his hand across Ravelin and commanded that the city was to be remade in his image. Ravelin was to be the masterpiece of the Empire's vision, a city to eclipse all others in the Tingel Arm.
Much of the old city remains as it was when the Sith found it, with notable improvements to the existing cityscape and an inclination to the brutalist architectural style of past Empires. The Emperor's massive three-kilometer tall Palace dominates the exact center of the city, serving as its beating heart and nerve center for the Empire's entire bureaucratic apparatus.
Demanding magnificence in everything, the Emperor commanded that the city was to be expanded far beyond its original borders into the nearby countryside. Working around the clock, World Despoilers tore up natural obstacles and smoothed out the land kilometer by kilometer as Urban Renewal Droids laid down prefabricated city blocks to rapidly expand the limits of Ravelin in all directions.
As the Empire's presence on Bastion ticked over into its fifth year, Ravelin had expanded to encompass the majority of the continent it had sat on for centuries. Every smaller city had been absorbed into the vast expanse, with a massive resettlement program filling up the spaces between the once disconnected cities as it was built.
Ravelin swiftly became the most prosperous city in the Empire, a shining beacon of progress that empathized the best aspects of the regime.
- Administrative Sector
- Imperial Palace of Bastion - Fortress Carnifex: One of the largest structures in all of Ravelin, the Emperor's Palace is the central hub for the Empire's bureaucracy and governance. Rising three-kilometers above the cityscape the pyramidal structure is an edifice to the Empire's magnificence and vanity and is regarded as the most well-defended location on Ravelin.
- Imperial Capital Compound: Once the headquarters of the Imperial Remnant, and later the Fel Empire, the Imperial Capital Compound stands parallel to the Emperor's palace, the two structures separated by a massive plaza adorned with a statue venerating the ruling Sith Emperor; Darth Carnifex. It was a towering black monolith, with a crystalline starburst at the pinnacle. This starburst could be used as a docking bay for important visitors, and also contained an arboretum dedicated to the ancient military strategist and fleet admiral, Gilad Pellaeon.
- Pellaeon Gardens: Once the personal arboretum of Gilad Pellaeon, the garden has since been transformed into a national monument to the eternal glory of the Empire. The Imperial Crest design on the floor had been dug up and replaced with the crest of the Sith Empire, denoting its new ownership. Many Sith Lords and Imperial officials use the garden to meditate and contemplate new strategies.
- Ascendant Circle Hall: Built during the reign of the Empire's precursor government, the Sith Ascendancy, the Circle Hall is a ceremonial structure where Knights on the cusp of mastery would meet with the Sith Emperor or one of his proxies and be officially recognized as a Sith Lord or Lady. The interior of the structure was restricted to non-Sith, with guards posted at every entry to keep curious minds away from the holy site.
- Great Sith-Imperial Library: The greatest library in Imperial Space, that of The Great Imperial Library stands as a testament to both the power of The Sith Empire, but its tireless efforts to recollect the lost archives of Sith millennia before. Structured in the center of Ravelin, the facility imposes a sense of wonder in the casual imperial citizen, inspiring the next generation to look towards the government and its strength for more than just security, but growth and knowledge. An entire facility given to the masses as a sign of respect, enticing each of them to explore the annals of history and trades, while serving as an integral part of restoring the lost history of the Sith.
- Royal Academy of Bastion: The most premier school in the Sith Empire, the Bastion Royal Academy is reserved for Force Sensitives who have performed exceptionally in the Empire's entrance exams. The future leaders of the Empire are trained and tutored behind the Academy's walls, their progress and potential constantly monitored by the Emperor's servants to select possible apprentices and personal attendants for his majesty's power base.
- Sith-Imperial News Network Hub: Despite SINN primarily operating from the station high above Bastion, a headquarters was built within the Administrative Sector. While built in the same structural style as everything around it, the Network Hub manages to still stand out amongst them. The building complex provides a combined mixture of production, recruitment, and management. Physical media, such as propaganda, is produced on-site to later be distributed across Bastion. Prospective talent is brought there to be interviewed and tested. And should any pass, they’ll find themselves spending a few semesters learning in the Royal Academy. Lastly, the complex provides a means to host meetings for those without the authority to be on the space station.
- Commercial Sector
- Immemorial Hall - Bastion Opera House & Theater: Located on the edge between the Commerical Sector and the Administrative Sector, Immemorial Hall is the largest and most extravagant opera house in the entire Empire. With routine nightly showings of the greatest plays of the age, thousands of Imperial citizens flock to its hallowed halls to witness greatness night after night.
- Imperial Colosseum: The Imperial Colosseum is a massive arena, larger than any other in the Empire. Designed to fit hundreds of thousands of spectators at any given time, the sheer enormity of the Colosseum is staggering beyond compare. Games of extraordinary complexity are held within the Colosseum, such as sporting events, gladiatorial combat, war games, tournaments, executions, and anything else deemed appropriate by the Imperial Government.
- Imperial Starport/Freight Complex: The largest structure in Ravelin, the Imperial Starport/Freight Complex rises one hundred and sixty-eight kilometers into the planet's atmosphere and possesses a width of three kilometers in diameter. Tethered to orbital satellites and stabilized by repulsorlift technology, the Complex was designed to accommodate massive military build-up by the Sith Empire as well as serve as a central hub for all starship traffic in and around the capital city.
- Imperial Grand Harbor: Spanning a large section of the continent's coastline, the Grand Harbor is the focal point for all sea-bound transport, trade, and military activity on Bastion. As the military defense of the planet was relegated more and more to orbital fixtures and starships, the Harbor became a hub for the wealthiest citizens of the city to moor their massive luxury yachts and pleasure barges.
- Residential Sector
- The Sith Heights: A series of highrises and apartment complexes, the Sith Heights is the government-funded housing for members of the Brotherhood of the Sith with the prestigious rank of Sith Knight. Every structure was designed in an identical manner and came with all the necessities an up and coming Sith Knight would require, including a private shrine for the worship of the Dark Side of the Force.
- Panatha Minor: When the Sith Emperor abdicated his position as King of Panatha, he rallied many of his most loyal generals and advisors to follow him in his quest to restore the Sith Empire. The families of those followers settled in the expanding city of Ravelin, forming their own community that greatly resembled the world they left behind. Distinct Panathan architecture separated Panatha Minor from the rest of Ravelin.
- The Baths of Tai Fa: Dedicated to Tai Fa, the Thirriken Lord Inquisitor of the Saaraishash, is the massive complex of baths, saunas, and swimming pools utilized by the vast majority of the capital city. Regulated by a small army of attendants and administrators, the Baths have become one of the most highly sought after locales for individuals visiting Ravelin.
- Science Sector
- Center for Progress: The hub for all military research in the Empire, the Center for Progress was where the Sith developed and tested all of their latest technologies before they were either put into production or scrapped as failures. The Center itself was divided into three sections:
Armament Division: This was where technologies regarding martial might were developed and tested, ranging from new vehicles, weapons, armor, starships, and anything that might be of use to the Empire's Legion or Armada. - Biological Division: Home to a diverse range of biological experiments, this was where the Empire attempted to extract the natural components of plant and animal life to suit the needs of the Empire. Some of the most terrible biological weapons have been developed here.
- Mysticism Division: The most secretive division inside the Center for Progress, the men and women who work here have been charged with ascertaining the properties of the more mystical elements of science. They experiment with ancient relics, particularly those of Sith and Jedi origin, in an effort to produce powerful esoteric weaponry for the Sith Emperor.
- Center for Progress: The hub for all military research in the Empire, the Center for Progress was where the Sith developed and tested all of their latest technologies before they were either put into production or scrapped as failures. The Center itself was divided into three sections:
- Industrial Sector
- Factory Complexes: Dozens of city-wide factory complexes comprise the Industrial Heartland of Ravelin, churning out incalculable tons of military hardware on a daily basis to fuel the ever-expanding war machine of the Empire.
- Resource Warehouses: Gargantuan warehouses the size of small cities and townships hold massive amounts of resources excavated from asteroids belts and ore-rich planetoids along the Braxant Run. Though primarily a stockpile, when the Emperor has a necessity for a certain type of resource, that resource is often taken from the mighty storehouses in Ravelin.
- Battleship Assembly Yard: Though Bastion possesses its own orbital shipyards, the demand for more and more warships has led the Empire to construct portions of warships, or even entire warships themselves, on the surface of Bastion. Assembled in deep canyon-like crevasses by slave-rigged construction automatons, it is not an uncommon sight to see entire Star Destroyers take off from the industrial sector and into the atmosphere.
- Military Sector
- Blackblade Castle: The Blackblade's headquarters on Bastion was a towering monolith of black metal and red illumination strips, a symbol of their power and prestige as the Emperor's personal army. Beneath the main tower was an underground fortress filled with training grounds, barracks, armories, launch bays, storehouses, everything the Castle would need to hold out a siege indefinitely.
- Fortress Ultima: Situated across from Blackblade Castle was Fortress Ultima, the Imperial Legion's base within the Imperial Capital. Though secondary to their headquarters on Gravlex Med, it was nonetheless an extremely important location for the Empire.
- The Vox Imperius: A monument of the First Soldier of the Sith Empire - Sith Emperor Kaine Zambrano alongside Sith-Imperial soldiers. Their guns are pointed in four cardinal directions out from their Emperor who raises his blade defiantly in the air. The statue is 151 feet high from base to the tip of the blade. At the base of the statue all around the soldiers, one can read the names of every Sith-Imperial Soldier to die in service to the Tenth Sith Empire. The ground is a different set of massive tile that has a different set of names. These are considered the Stones of Origin or the Foundation Stone. This stone has the names engraved of every soldier of the Sith Ascendancy, the predecessor nation that paved the way for the Sith Empire. These names are the founding soldiers who died giving their lives so that was the fractured order could unite and the dream that was the Sith Empire could be realized.
- Rating: Medium
- Though several locations within Ravelin are more heavily defended than the rest of the city, the overall defense force for the city is relegated to an adept law enforcement army that policies and enforces Imperial Law.
- The planet itself is heavily defended, but all of those military assets are reserved for planetary defense in the event of an invasion, not for routine enforcement of laws or the patrolling of the city.
The city of Ravelin was built many centuries, perhaps even many thousands of years, before the New Sith Empire declared the city to be its new capital. The earliest records discovered about the city's history described it as originally being a fortress by early Human settlers to protect themselves from the wilds of the Galactic Rim. The name Ravelin was derived from an ancient Notron Cant term that was used for a primitive triangular earthwork fortification.
Ravelin grew in notoriety as it became the capital city for the fledgling United Remnants of the First Galactic Empire after its disastrous defeat at the Battle of Endor. It served this role for one hundred and thirteen years before the Empire under Roan Fel was very briefly able to reclaim the shining jewel of the Core, Coruscant, from the Galactic Alliance during the Sith-Imperial War.
However, due to a Sith coup orchestrated by Darth Krayt, those Imperial assets loyal to Emperor Fel were forced to retreat back to Bastion. There they staged a rebellion against the Sith-dominated Galactic Empire for eight years until Krayt's rule was overthrown at the end of the Second Imperial Civil War.
With the formation of the Galactic Federation Triumvirate, Bastion and Ravelin remained the capital for Imperials for the next several centuries. But with the advent of the Four-Hundred Year Darkness, that sector of space was isolated from the rest of the galaxy and went completely silent for the duration of the plague.
As the galaxy emerged from the trauma of the Darkness, Bastion was a shadow of its former self. Its population depleted and Ravelin overrun with criminals and Dark Side zealots, it teetered on the brink of annihilation. Then came Ronin Fel, a descendant of Roan Fel, who eradicated the vices plaguing the city and used it as a base to reestablish the Fel Empire in the region. He joined the Republic and the Mandalorian Clans in destroying the Old Sith Empire, taking large swaths of territory for his new Fel Empire in return.
But his reign was not to last. In retaliation for his transgressions, the Sith Lord Kaine Zambrano infiltrated Ravelin and struck down the Fel Emperor in his private estate. Fleeing with his body, the Fel Empire was thrown into chaos and collapsed not long after.
Ravelin was again in despair as those criminals elements that had been driven away by the Fel Empire now returned to exact vengeance. In the years after Fel's death, the planet and the city itself would change hands many times. The Mandalorians used it as a distant outpost along the Tingel Arm while the Primeval eventually assumed ownership and converted it into a center of worship for their dark and profane gods.
Neither stayed in power for long and eventually, Ravelin would again regain its independence after many wars.
It was when the Sith Ascendancy gained control of Bastion that Ravelin would truly undergo a transformation, the Sith pooling a large number of resources into its restoration under the supervision of Kaine Zambrano. As the Ascendancy transformed into the New Sith Empire and Zambrano became its Emperor, more importance was heaped upon Ravelin. Emperor Zambrano decreed the expansion of the capital city to unprecedented heights, and the surrounding landscape was flattened to accompany the rapid urbanization.
By the fifth year of the Sith Empire's existence, Ravelin had grown from a single city to a massive continent-spanning sprawl. Colonists from all over the Empire and beyond had been relocated to inhabit this vast gargantuan city, the true extent of the Empire's desire to reshape the galaxy in their own image.
Ravelin, the Great Imperial Ruling City, was at last truly born.
1/13/2020
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Fixed the Formatting
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