Bladegarden

Bladegarden is home to many of the Empire's military forces and businesses. Due to its history, many of the inhabitants have orcish lineage from the original tribes that lived in this region. The population is made up of 32% half-orcs, 21% orcs, 25% humans, and 22% other races.

While Bladegarden is technically a military settlement under the watch of General Kruth Doorav, the Crown also assigned a starosta, Leman TuFinn, to oversee the day-to-day minutiae of imperial governance. They are often at odds, but work together to manage Bladegarden.

The city, which houses a large number of Crownsguard, is perpetually host to a large legion of Righteous Brand soldiers and soldiers-in-training. Many of the high walls and defensive weaponry make Bladegarden more of an extended fortress than an ordinary city.

There are many modest inns and taverns. Armaments and basic supplies are readily available in large numbers, but more luxurious services and goods are extremely difficult to find. Businesses related to items of wealth or recreation have a hard time finding customers amidst the thousands of military individuals. However, those looking to sell high quality weapons, armors, enchantments, etc. have many willing consumers amongst the higher ranking military officials and mercenary groups that have come to participate.

Bladegarden was the site of one of the bloodiest battles of the Calamity; its name referred to the volume of weaponry scavenged by orcs from the war-ravaged earth.   When the Julous Dominion was defeated, the expanding empire saw the nomadic Odakar orc clan, formerly under Julous rule, as an opportunity to secure their hold on the eastern border. The empire reached out to the more approachable members of the orc settlement of Bladegarden, offering them wages, resources, and access to imperial goods and services. A number of them became the cornerstone of the eastern branch of the Righteous Brand and emboldened the empire's military techniques with the prowess of the border-hardened orcs. Other orc clans who rejected these ideals were forced eastward into the Brokenveil Marsh and forgotten. From this accord, the new Righteous Brand training facility in the central Marrow Valley was established.    Bladegarden is both a training complex and the core of orcish society in Western Wynandir. Contests of skill and might are commonplace among the recruits and their trainers. Even the merchants come from sturdier stock and often partake. A sense of honor and pride fills the ranks here, stoked by the rivalry between Bladegarden and Grimgolir.

Aside from the impressive halls of the sprawling Righteous Brand barracks that loom over the eastern edge of the city, Bladegarden is considered by many a remarkably drab place. The oval settlement is threaded by wandering dirt roads that seemingly stop and start without reason, and there is little color in the streets. Beyond the western walls, there are a number of farmsteads where local produce is gathered to aid in feeding the populace, but the majority of food is brought via cart from other sources across the Marrow Valley.