Beograd

Beograd - The White City
Foundation: Pre-Republican Era
Population: Approximately 85,000 souls
Status: Theocratic City-State, Seat of the Faith of the Seven
Geographic Designation: The Malatorian Islands (colloquially: The Holy Isles)
Notable Epithet: "The White City"
Leader: Grand Inquisitor Keltyn Marbrand, Voice of the Seven, Keeper of the White Tower
Prime Deities: The Seven - Bahamut, Ioun, Corellon, Melora, Kord, Pelor, and Dwindal
  History
  Beograd stands as the third-oldest continuously inhabited settlement in the known world, after the ancient cities of Aramathia and Winterward, predating even mighty Rozan by nearly two centuries. For over a millennium, it served as the inland capital of the Kingdom of Harran, positioned atop the limestone prominence now known as Holy Head, from which Harranian monarchs governed their prosperous realm. The city's original name, lost to the cataclysm, translates in the old Harranian tongue to "Fortress of White Stone," a reference to the distinctive pale limestone quarried from surrounding hills that gave the city its characteristic appearance.   The city's fate changed forever in 23 TA, when the War of Mer Succession reached its catastrophic conclusion at the Battle of the Golden Dales. King Denfor of the Dominion and Suzerain Qzaar of the Alliance brought their combined forces against the Rozani Legion upon the Golden Dales of Elén. The three-day engagement involved an estimated 250,000 combatants, with dust clouds kicked up from the battle so thick that soldiers at the center were more likely to choke to death than meet their end upon an enemy blade. The Rozani seemed to have the better of the fighting, until disaster struck.   What occurred next is unclear, as each side's history books document and blame the other side to varying degrees. All accounts agree, however, that a most terrible creature was summoned and began to attack all sides, said to stand fifty feet tall and carry the breadth of a forest on its shoulders. Little could stand against it, save for Archmage Sekarin of the Harranian Kingdom, Grand Magister of the Singrad Matica and holder of the Crimson Chair of Harranian Sorcery. The Archmage, who earned the epithet "The Nightfang" for reasons now lost to history, confronted the entity atop the hill of Holy Head in single combat. Wielding the legendary blade Sundrinker, which had been forged by the master-smiths of Old Harran and imbued with enchantments designed to sever the connection between extraplanar entities and the material world, Sekarin succeeded in destroying the creature but lost his own life in the process. The blade was cast into the abyss that formed beneath Holy Head and has never been recovered, though several unauthorized expeditions have attempted its retrieval, invariably ending in disaster.   The death of such a powerful creature, the stress of such magical discharge as mage battles raged around them, and the pressure such terrible carnage exerted on the landscape caused the Golden Dales beneath their feet to crumble, crack, and disappear. The Kingdom of Harran was swallowed in a single afternoon of horror entire cities vanished, fertile plains drowned beneath what is now the Mythveil Sea, and only four islands survived where once a prosperous kingdom had stood. Eyewitness accounts, compiled by Inquisitorial scholars from the few survivors, describe the sea itself rising in walls hundreds of feet high before crashing down upon coastal settlements with apocalyptic force. The ground beneath Beograd buckled and fractured, with entire districts sliding into newly-formed chasms or disappearing beneath suddenly-flooding caverns.   Though both sides bayed for blood, after such a crushing blow to each of their armies and a staggering loss of life on a scale not seen since the Tenebris Diebrus, a hasty and shaky peace was made between the Rozani and the Secessionist Powers. However, the Battle of the Golden Dales, while marking the effective end of Rozani aggression the Republic having lost over 100,000 soldiers in a single day and lacking the will to continue offensive operations did not immediately end the war itself. The conflict ground on for another twenty-eight years of sporadic fighting, border skirmishes, and political maneuvering before the final peace was formalized in 51 TA. During these decades, the shattered remnants of the Kingdom of Harran struggled to survive as an island nation, its mainland territories drowned, its population decimated, its economic foundations destroyed.   For three years following what became known as "The Flood," Beograd and the surviving islands endured rogue waves, massive landslides, and incursions by creatures from the abyssal depths, making habitation a daily struggle for survival. Many who survived the initial catastrophe perished during these Years of Rising, and it is said that fully half of those who lived through the Collapse itself did not survive to see its end.   The Long Decline and the Rise of the Inquisition
  For nearly two hundred years following the Collapse, Harran persisted as a shadow of its former glory a collection of fishing communities and religious sanctuaries clinging to four surviving islands. These were the White Rock bearing Beograd itself, the fortress-isle of Sudenmark with its White Tower intact, the trading port of Veleska similarly preserved by its ancient tower, and the ruins of Harkon. Once the kingdom's greatest maritime fortress, Harkon now stood as a shattered skeleton inhabited only by pirates, the desperate, and the inhuman denizens of the deep who claimed the flooded lower levels. Each surviving isle, save cursed Harkon, possessed one of the ancient White Towers, structures predating even the Kingdom of Harran and whose origins remain lost to history.   A succession of increasingly ineffectual monarchs ruled during this period, governing more in name than in fact. The true power lay with religious orders that had organized disaster relief, maintained what remained of social order, and preserved knowledge through the chaos. Chief among these was an organization that even then preferred to operate without official recognition, its authority exercised through intermediaries and proxies. The nature of this organization is not spoken of openly, for there are truths in Beograd that, once voiced, cannot be unspoken.   By approximately 223 TA, the last Harranian monarch had died without clear succession, and what had been informal religious governance became formalized in the establishment of the Beogradian Inquisition and the office of Grand Inquisitor. The transition occurred with minimal violence the old order had been dead in all but name for decades, and most citizens welcomed the stability that organized religious authority provided. The Inquisition's founding document, preserved in the White Tower's archives, makes no mention of certain predecessor organizations whose membership, methods, and archives were seamlessly absorbed into the new structure.   Following the several wars that enveloped Medolania in 264 TA, including the Rozani Empire's "defensive war" to annex territories from the Infernal Alliance and Helvenic Dominion, many turned to their faith to persevere through trying times. Due to the brilliance of Firbolgs in spiritual understanding, clerical leaders of the Dwarven faith, and the adjudicating abilities of the Vedalken, a loose compact was established between all realms in Medolania, including the dogmatic Dragonborn and religiously intolerant Dwarves.   To that end, wherever one travels in Medolania, there are seven legally recognized deities: Bahamut (the Platinum Dragon, chief of the Draconic pantheon), Ioun (Goddess of Knowledge, worshipped heavily by Elves and Vedalken), Corellon (God of Craftsmen, worshipped universally but especially revered by Men and Dwarves), Melora (Goddess of the Wild, her worship almost exclusively confined to Firbolgs, Halflings, and Gnomish peoples, though it has seen resurgence in Rozani cities), Kord (God of the Storm and Tempest, worshipped mostly on the western coast), Pelor (Goddess of Agriculture, worshipped universally by rural folk), and Dwindal (Arbiter of Peace and Prosecutor of War, predominantly worshipped by the races of the Rozani). Worship of deities outside this pantheon are allowed, within reason, as long as they are recognized as legitimate avatars or lesser deities of the Seven.   To enforce these laws equally, or with the appearance of equality and impartiality, the city of Beograd home to the Church of the Seven negotiated itself a minor army in the form of the Beogradian Inquisition. Arming inquisitors was the responsibility of all nations, in order to maintain spiritual peace and their own interests. The Inquisition negotiated specific remits to carry out religious investigations with a service of clerics and paladins to serve as both investigators and enforcers of this religious law. In order to do this and preserve the appearance of being unbiased, inquisitors are not permitted to show their faces during the course of their duties, they speak only in Common and, where possible, disguise their voices in order to show no obvious signs of racial features. Illusion magic is also approved to assist in this endeavor. Their power varies from region to region, and they are headquartered on the collection of islands in the Mythveil Sea known as the Holy Isles, though their geographic name is actually the Malatorian Islands.   The Walls of the Saints
  Beograd's defensive architecture reflects both its pre-Collapse grandeur and its post-catastrophe adaptation, embodied in its three concentric walls two functional, one commemorative. The outermost fortification, the Wall of Saint Theodric the Steadfast, extends around the city's lowest tier in a rough oval, encompassing the Harbour District and outer settlements that cling to Beograd's slopes. Constructed from the same white limestone that characterizes the city's architecture, Theodric's Wall stands thirty feet high with watchtowers every hundred yards, its seaward faces reinforced with massive stone buttresses added after the Collapse to resist the enhanced tidal forces that now afflict the coastline. Saint Theodric, a Firbolg cleric of Melora who perished during the first Year of Rising while organizing evacuation of coastal settlements, lends his name to this barrier, and his shrine occupies the wall's most prominent bastion overlooking the Harbour approach.   The middle fortification, the Wall of Saint Veritas the Illuminated, encircles Beograd's ecclesiastical district and middle city, rising forty feet and featuring more sophisticated defensive works including machicolations, reinforced gates bearing the symbols of the Seven, and integrated shrines at each major bastion. Saint Veritas, a Vedalken scholar-priest of Ioun who documented the immediate aftermath of the Collapse with unflinching accuracy despite the trauma afflicting survivors, represents the city's commitment to preserving truth even in the face of horror. Her wall remains in excellent repair, maintained by donations from the faithful and serving as the primary defensive barrier should hostile forces breach the Harbour District.   The innermost barrier, the Wall of Saint Miklas the Martyr, exists more as monument than fortification. Encircling the summit of Holy Head and the complex of religious administrative buildings clustered around the White Tower, this ancient Pre-Collapse fortification suffered catastrophic damage during the great cataclysm. Massive sections collapsed entirely, leaving gaps that were never rebuilt; other stretches lean at precarious angles, held upright more by divine providence and careful engineering than structural integrity. The Beogradian authorities deliberately maintain the Wall of Saint Miklas in its damaged state as a permanent reminder of the Collapse's devastation and the folly of the wars that precipitated it. Saint Miklas, a Dragonborn paladin of Bahamut who commanded Harran's royal guard and died defending civilians during the initial catastrophic waves, is commemorated at each surviving gate and breach, his sacrifice invoked as a reminder of duty even in the face of apocalypse.   The Spire of Sacrifice - Monument to the Nightfang
  Dominating Holy Head's summit alongside the White Tower stands the Spire of Sacrifice, erected to honor the Nightfang Sekarin. Unlike the elaborate commemorative architecture favored elsewhere in Medolania, the Spire consists of a single column of pristine white marble rising one hundred feet into the sky, its surface entirely unadorned save for a circular depression at its apex. Beogradian tradition holds that this depression marks the precise location where Sekarin's final incantation scorched the stone, his life force expended in a conflagration that consumed both himself and the infernal entity he opposed.   The monument deliberately eschews representation of Sekarin's physical form no statue crowns the Spire, no relief carvings depict his features. This omission reflects both theological consideration and historical reality: the Nightfang's sacrifice was so complete that no remains were ever recovered, and the magical forces involved were sufficiently intense that witnesses reported being temporarily blinded. Monthly vigils are held at the Spire's base, attended by members of all Seven faiths, during which the assembled faithful recite the Litany of Ultimate Sacrifice, a prayer-poem that celebrates Sekarin's deed while studiously avoiding any mention of demonic involvement or specific magical details. The official narrative promulgated by the Inquisition describes the entity Sekarin faced merely as "a great evil summoned by the recklessness of war."   In practice, older residents of Beograd and scholars with access to pre-Collapse documentation understand that Sekarin confronted a Pit Fiend of extraordinary power, likely summoned inadvertently during the magical chaos of the battle, but such knowledge remains unspoken. The Inquisition maintains that specific identification of the entity serves no theological purpose and risks inspiring dangerous curiosity about daemonology.   Governance - The Light Hand and the Hidden Fist
  The Grand Inquisitor, currently the elderly but formidable Keltyn Marbrand, occupies a residence of deliberate austerity adjacent to the White Tower, eschewing palace complexes in favor of quarters that differ little from common priests save for proximity to power. Elected for life by the Council of the Seven though tradition strongly suggests the hand of unseen influences in such selections the Grand Inquisitor serves as final arbiter in matters of doctrine, coordinator of inter-faith cooperation, and public face of Beogradian authority. In practice, Grand Inquisitors exercise authority through persuasion, allocation of charitable resources, and the implicit threat of inquisitorial investigation rather than through direct command.   The Council of the Seven comprises the senior-most representative of each approved faith, occupying separate but equivalent administrative complexes arrayed around the summit of Holy Head. The House of the Platinum Scale (Bahamut) occupies the eastern approach, its fortress-like architecture reflecting Draconic martial traditions. The Archive of Endless Questions (Ioun) commands the northern position, its soaring library-towers visible from throughout the city. The Forge of the Covenant (Corellon) holds the western approach, perpetual smoke rising from its sacred smithies. The Gardens of the Untamed (Melora) sprawl across the southwestern slopes in deliberate contrast to the city's ordered districts. The Hall of Thunder (Kord) dominates the southern promontory, its storm-lashed towers a testament to tempestuous devotion. The Fields of Golden Grain (Pelor) blanket the southeastern approaches with agricultural terraces that feed much of the city. Finally, the Circle of Binding Peace (Dwindal) occupies the northeastern quarter, its austere meditation halls embodying the god's dual nature as arbiter and warrior.   This architectural arrangement serves multiple purposes beyond simple geography. The physical separation prevents any single faith from dominating through proximity to the White Tower, while routing pilgrims through multiple faith-controlled districts ensures exposure to all approved worship. More significantly, the arrangement facilitates the Inquisition's strategy of managed competition each faith maintains its own charitable operations, dispute resolution services, and community support structures, creating overlapping networks that the Inquisition manipulates to maintain balance and prevent any single faction from accumulating excessive influence.   Revenue generation occurs not through direct taxation but through a sophisticated system of "voluntary" contributions. Each district maintains its own alms-houses, staffed by faithful of the locally dominant religion, which distribute food, medical care, and economic assistance to those in need. Receipt of such assistance carries an implicit expectation of contribution once circumstances improve expectations reinforced through social pressure. Businesses operating in each district similarly find themselves expected to contribute generously to the local faith's charitable operations, with those who fail to demonstrate appropriate devotion discovering that licenses become difficult to renew and disputes are resolved less favorably.   Districts compete to demonstrate their faith's superior charitable works, generating substantial resources for the Inquisition's centralized operations while creating natural rivalries that ensure no coalition can form to challenge inquisitorial authority. Policing occurs primarily through community enforcement, with each district maintaining its own watch composed of volunteers from that area's dominant faith. These watches possess authority within their districts but lack jurisdiction outside them a limitation preventing dominance while ensuring transgression across boundaries involves multiple communities and, inevitably, inquisitorial mediation.   The system's efficiency manifests most clearly in its treatment of unauthorized religious movements. New religious expressions find themselves subjected to immediate response through theological disputation, social isolation, economic pressure, and, when necessary, nocturnal visits by armed figures whose faces remain forever hidden. The Inquisition's boast that no unauthorized cult survives longer than one month within Beograd's walls proves tragically accurate. Those who recant receive mercy and reintegration; those who persist disappear into the White Tower's lower levels.   Economic Foundations
  Despite its religious prestige and position as neutral ground for international diplomacy, Beograd operates as one of the poorest major settlements in Medolania. The Collapse destroyed the agricultural hinterland that once sustained Harran's capital, leaving the city dependent on fishing, trade, and charitable contributions from faithful across the continent contributions that flow primarily to the Inquisition rather than to the general population.   The Harbour District houses the majority of Beograd's population in conditions that charitable observers describe as "austere" and honest assessments recognize as desperately poor. Housing consists primarily of whitewashed stone structures of two or three stories, deliberately maintained in the Pre-Collapse style but overcrowded to degrees that would provoke riots in Rozani cities. Extended families often spanning three generations occupy single-room dwellings, with communal kitchens serving entire streets.   Fishing provides the primary economic activity for perhaps half of Beograd's working population. The Collapse's disruption of normal tidal patterns and the release of deep-dwelling creatures into shallower waters makes this occupation notably more hazardous than in other coastal cities, with perhaps one fisherman in ten lost annually to accidents, hostile marine life, or simply disappearing into unpredictable currents around the sunken ruins of Old Harran. Widows and orphans of lost fishermen form a substantial portion of the population dependent on charitable support.   Trade flows primarily through Beograd's position as neutral ground where representatives of the Rozani Imperium, Helvenic Dominion, and Draconic Ascendancy can meet without triggering diplomatic crises. The city maintains designated diplomatic quarters within each faith's administrative district, allowing visiting delegations to reside under the nominal protection of their preferred divine authority while conducting negotiations in spaces consecrated to promote truthfulness and peaceful resolution. These diplomatic functions generate substantial revenue through accommodation fees, provision of translators and scribes, and services of Inquisitorial mediators revenue that flows primarily to the Inquisition.   Beograd's emphasis on austerity and contempt for material excess translates into sumptuary laws that prohibit ostentatious display, restrict prices on essential goods, and mandate that businesses demonstrate charitable activity proportional to their profits. While these regulations prevent worst exploitation and ensure basic availability of necessities, they also suppress entrepreneurship and innovation. A thriving black market naturally develops, operated with the tacit knowledge of inquisitorial officials who recognize the pressure valve such controlled illicitness provides.   Architecture and the White Tower
  The overwhelming use of white limestone quarried from the same formations that survived the Collapse creates a cityscape of luminous austerity, particularly striking when viewed from approaching vessels. Residential architecture adheres to Harranian tradition: rectangular structures of two or three stories, flat roofs accessible by external stairs and used for drying fish or cultivating small gardens, minimal ground floor windows, and walls painted white annually during the Festival of Remembrance. Houses front directly on narrow streets with no setback, creating canyon-like passages that provide welcome shade but contribute to overcrowding.   The White Tower itself, centerpiece of Beograd's skyline and ultimate seat of inquisitorial authority, rises from Holy Head's exact summit to a height of three hundred feet. A structure predating the Kingdom of Harran by centuries, its origins remain lost to time but its purpose is unmistakable as beacon, fortress, and symbol of enduring authority. The Tower presents a remarkably plain exterior: a cylindrical shaft of seamless white stone thirty feet in diameter, devoid of ornamentation save for narrow arrow-slits at regular intervals and the distinctive domed structure that crowns its summit. Legend attributes the Tower's construction to the first inhabitants of these islands, survivors of some even earlier catastrophe.   What is documented is the Tower's survival of the Collapse without visible damage not even cracking despite destruction that leveled lesser fortifications and hurled massive stones hundreds of yards. This miraculous preservation contributed substantially to the Tower's adoption as religious symbol and headquarters of the eventually-dominant Inquisition. The Tower's interior, accessible only to initiates of appropriate rank or those summoned before tribunals, reportedly consists of a spiral staircase ascending through multiple levels of administrative offices, libraries, and contemplation chambers before reaching the summit dome, which houses the Grand Inquisitor's personal chambers and the Council Chamber of the Seven where the most consequential decisions occur in candlelit secrecy.   Below the White Tower extend the Depths a labyrinthine complex of chambers carved into Holy Head's limestone foundations, serving as archive, treasury, prison, and repository for objects deemed too dangerous for common knowledge. Few who descend into the Depths as prisoners emerge to recount their experiences, and those who do return speak in careful vagueness about cold stone, perpetual dampness, and chambers extending below sea level into darkness absolute.   From Inland Capital to Maritime City
  The Collapse's transformation of landlocked Beograd into an island city necessitated wholesale adaptation. Pre-Collapse Beograd possessed no harbour, no fishing fleet, no maritime traditions whatsoever. Trade goods reached the city by caravan across fertile plains now drowned beneath the Mythveil Sea; fish came preserved from coastal settlements; naval affairs remained the concern of Harkon and other ports. The Collapse's reduction of the kingdom to scattered islands forced transformation or extinction.   The Harbour District occupies the city's lowest tier, constructed partially atop Pre-Collapse structures and partially on land created by landslides, subsidence, and deliberate engineering that filled collapsed areas with rubble. This hybrid origin gives the district its characteristic irregular layout, where straight Harranian streets terminate abruptly at areas of rubble-fill or curve unexpectedly around remnant structures. The harbour itself accommodates perhaps three hundred small fishing vessels, a dozen larger trading ships, and diplomatic vessels that arrive with varying frequency.   Fishing traditions were imported wholesale from surviving communities and foreign advisors invited to teach skills essential for survival. This importation created lasting cultural divisions, as "old families" who trace ancestry to Pre-Collapse aristocracy regard fishing as appropriate for lower classes, while "new families" who acquired maritime expertise possess economic security but face subtle social discrimination. The Inquisition maintains official position that all honest labour honors the gods, but in practice, clergy drawn from old families subtly perpetuate ancient prejudices.   The Unspoken Truth
  Every citizen of Beograd above the age of twelve understands with perfect clarity that the city's peace depends upon an authority that predates the Inquisition's public face, that guided the transformation of a traumatized survivor community into a theocratic power, that coordinates activities never officially acknowledged. They understand, with equal clarity, that this understanding must remain forever unvoiced. The city's streets bear no commemorative plaques to certain founders. Its archives contain no formal histories of certain organizational transformations. The White Tower's lower levels house certain prisoners whose crimes remain forever unspecified.   Those who walk the streets at night occasionally glimpse figures in black moving through shadows, their faces concealed, their destinations unknown. Those summoned before certain tribunals learn that hierarchies exist beyond those diagrammed in official documents. This is Beograd's true foundation the city endures because its people understand the covenant: speak the name of that which must not be named, and discover that the sea is deep, its currents strong, and its creatures patient.   Culture: Austere, Devout, Anti-War, Maritime, Fiercely Independent   Government Structure: Theocratic Council, Grand Inquisitor elected for life by Inquisitor Lords, true power exercised through charitable networks and community surveillance, enforcement through faith-based district watches and three military orders