Port Atlas

Port Atlas is the empire’s busiest halfway harbor, the place where sailors shake the Jeweled Bay’s glitter from their boots before crossing the shallower waters of Lake Gaia toward Agon. Ships drift in at all hours: merchant skiffs with patched sails, sleek privateer vessels, and occasionally a warship gliding in like a shark, reminding the city to behave.

Fort All-Dead looms to the west, a gutted relic of the Orc Wars, though anyone who’s been here longer than a season knows it rarely stays abandoned. Orc and gnoll raiders sweep up from the south, claiming it as a temporary den whenever the patrols grow complacent. Their presence is both a threat and a grim reminder—Port Atlas has always survived on a knife’s edge.

Within the walls, the true storm is political. Three great houses gnaw at each other for control, each carving the city into domains of influence. Their banners hang over streets like silent warnings; their agents slip through the alleys like tides you never hear coming.

House Greymane

House Greymane

The western quarter of Port Atlas lives under the steady, weathered gaze of Lord Kareem Greymane, the half-orc who traded a mercenary’s wandering life for a soldier’s duty—and later, a politician’s impossible dream. His stone manor crowns the lone hill overlooking the district, a squat, defiant fortress carved from the same stubborn stone as its master.

Kareem earned his fortune during the Orc Wars fighting for Midgard, though he speaks of those years the way some men speak of old wounds: directly, sparingly, and with the dull ache of regret beneath the words. The war cost him a leg and an eye, but the man still moves with startling speed when he chooses—like an old wolf refusing to admit winter has come for him. Rumor claims he hides weapons behind every painting, beneath every floorboard, even inside the bread oven. This rumor is, regrettably for intruders, entirely true.

These days, Kareem’s campaign is quieter but no less brutal. He means to shatter the chokehold the rival houses have on the city militia—tear out the bribes, the back-alley favors, the whispered threats. Purify the rot that’s turned Port Atlas’s defenders into its most embarrassing weakness. It’s not a glamorous crusade, but it’s honest, iron-boned work—the sort that makes common folk nod with respect and his enemies grind their teeth.

What few realize is that beneath the armor and growl, the man loves to bake. He rises before dawn to knead dough like he’s wrestling an old foe into submission, humming marching tunes while the bread rises. He pretends it’s merely a habit. It’s therapy, plain and simple.

Only one soul dares scold him for it: Gertrude Hildagard, the elderly battlefield nurse who’s patched him up more times than the gods bothered to. Gertrude runs the manor with quiet, unshakeable authority; not even Kareem’s old warlord instincts override her word. She cooks, she tidies, she stares down armed intruders with the same flat expression she once used on dying soldiers—efficient, merciless, emotionally bulletproof.

Kareem tries endlessly to pay her wages. She ignores every attempt. All she asks for is a warm bed, decent company, and the freedom to critique his baking without being outvoted. Their bickering is legendary in the west quarter—part mother and son, part commander and soldier, always fiercely loyal.

House Greymane stands for discipline, integrity, and the kind of hard-lived honesty that smells faintly of bandages and fresh bread. They may not be the richest or most magically gifted of the city’s ruling families, but they are the only ones people trust without checking their coin purse first.

Their sigil is a dark gray wolf’s head crowned with a lion’s mane and bristling with boar tusks on a pale gray field—bestowed upon Kareem during the war. The wolf for cunning, the lion for pride, and the boar for the endurance that refused to let him die.

Lord Kareem Greymane

Gertrude Hildagard

House Mulberry

In the northern quarter of Port Atlas stands the sprawling manor-tower of House Mulberry—a hybrid structure as eccentric and ambitious as the family it shelters. The manor itself is wide, pale-blue stone draped in creeping purple ivy, with warm lanternlight spilling from arched windows. Attached to its rear like an arcane afterthought rises the tower: three thick, gleaming levels culminating in a domed observatory that watches the city like a patient, all-seeing eye.

House Mulberry trades magic like currency and information like blood. They court passing dignitaries with charm and subtle enchantments. They collect relics with equal parts reverence and greed. And rumor whispers—loudly—that for the right coin, a forged mage license can be arranged for those who work outside the Empire’s law.

Their sigil is a sprig of purple berries on a field of light blue, symbolizing abundance, growth, and immortality. Sweet. Innocent. A clever disguise for a house that will happily plant a seed in you… and harvest whatever grows.

The manor is the public face of the family. On the ground floor, the Shrine of Magnificus welcomes petitioners, students, traveling mages, and anyone seeking spellcraft’s blessing. Incense burns in swirling blue patterns, and soft spell-threads hum through the rafters. A wing off the shrine houses the Mulberry Library and Curiositorium, where lesser magic items, scrolls, and beginner spellbooks can be purchased or—if one has enough references—borrowed.

But the tower? That is the sanctum of the family proper. Each level is a private study, sealed, warded, and uniquely flavored by its occupant:

Arthur Mulberry, Patriarch — Divination

The topmost chamber belongs to Arthur, the bald, silver-bearded patriarch whose calm gaze gives the unsettling impression that he has already foreseen the end of every conversation. His chamber is a celestial riot of mirrors, horoscopes, star-charts, and scrying pools that ripple with possible futures. Since the death of his elven wife Luna, Arthur has thrown himself into his work with a quiet, relentless devotion that borders on self-punishment.

Luna Mulberry, Matriarch (Deceased)

Luna Mulberry was an Aelinthir seer devoted to Elune, the Moon Goddess whose followers read destiny in silver light and sacred stillness. Soft-spoken and unerringly perceptive, Luna had a gift for quiet visions—subtle, accurate, and often unsettlingly precise. Even Arthur admits her intuition outmatched his own hard-won divinations.

She died shortly after the birth of her youngest son, leaving a silence in the manor that no spell has ever filled. Luna rests in the Mulberry crypt beneath the estate, laid to rest under moonstone and silver lilies. Her tomb is perfectly preserved and strictly off-limits to Isabella’s necromancy, by Arthur’s decree and by the family’s unspoken reverence.

A persistent rumor whispers through the northern quarter: on moonlit nights, Arthur descends alone into the crypt—not to mourn, but to speak with her spirit. Whether he seeks her counsel, her forgiveness, or merely her presence, no one knows. And no one dares to ask.

Zeddicus Mulberry, Eldest Son — Evocation

Below his father’s chamber resides Zeddicus, a man who views fire the way a sculptor views marble. His study is a forge-laboratory of volatile experiments, ever-crackling arcane conduits, and scorch marks no one bothers to clean. He respects power in its rawest form and sees political influence as merely another kind of explosion waiting to happen.

Atticus Mulberry, Middle Son — Abjuration

Atticus’s chambers are quiet, mathematically precise, and lined with layers of shifting, translucent wards. He treats magic like geometry—cold, elegant, perfect. Of all the siblings, he’s the one most suited to politics: calm in the face of chaos, courteous, and far too observant for anyone’s comfort.

Thaddicus Mulberry, Youngest Son — No Magical Talent Whatsoever

Then there is poor Thaddicus, whose only magical trait is the uncanny ability to disappoint everyone. Born without a spark, he skulks through the manor in a constant rotation of guilt, boredom, and get-rich-quick schemes. He routinely sneaks into the vault, stealing minor artifacts to pawn off—or tries to sell non-magical items by claiming they’re “mystically dormant relics.” The family pretends not to notice. They all notice.

Enoch Prime, Arcane Enigma

And then there is Enoch Prime, the robed, masked, possibly goblinoid creature who appeared at the manor decades ago and never left. Enoch speaks only in riddles, practices both Illusion and Conjuration with surgical precision, and slips into a personal pocket-dimension hidden inside his oversized hat whenever he wishes. He populates the manor with eerily lifelike Simulacrum servants—librarians who never tire, cleaners who never question, sparring partners who never die. No one knows what he looks like. No one asks twice.

Isabella Mulberry, Arthur’s Niece — Necromancy

Isabella has claimed the basement as her domain—a cold, candlelit labyrinth of skeletal assistants, embalming supplies, and academic detachment. She is polite, brilliant, and deeply unnerving. The dead obey her like beloved pets.

Noah Mulberry, Arthur’s Nephew — Transmutation & Enchantment

Isabella’s brother Noah lurks deeper still. Called “The Chimera” by those who fear him, he has mastered a potent, long-lasting form of Alter Self by consuming bits of beasts and absorbing their traits. Scales, claws, ears, stripes—he is a patchwork of what he’s eaten… and what has eaten at him. Noah avoids strangers like they carry plague, and only two beings draw him out willingly: his uncle Arthur and the bright-eyed girl the patriarch took in.

Edna Finch, the Adopted Ward

Edna Finch—half-elf child of heretic mages slain by Templars—serves as Arthur’s secretary, archivist, errand-runner, and occasionally moral compass. Edna is one of the only people Noah trusts, and their quiet friendship is legendary in the manor. Some joke she’s the family’s conscience. Others quietly fear that she may grow into its most powerful member.

House Sangria

Sangria Manor broods over the eastern quarter like a gothic confession. Iron fencing coils around the estate, its guard dogs patrolling with military precision. The Sangrias themselves are just as elusive—velvet shadows who rarely trouble the sunlight. Invitations into their home are rare; returns are a statistical anomaly.

Mistress Diana Sangria, the eternally composed matriarch, is rumored to have inherited a fortune from her family’s winemaking empire. Locals know better than to test the truth of it—they keep clear of the manor after dark, instinctively wary of things that smile too softly.

Her silver-haired adopted daughters—Victoria, Lucinda, and Celeste—walk the night like a trio of hungry moonbeams. Beautiful, predatory, patient. Men who follow them rarely make it home, and the city pretends not to notice.

The Sangrias’ circle of midnight guests includes Lord Barticus “Barty” Von Ricten and the pallid Lazarus Drake, proprietors of Port Elias’ notorious Red Room. And then there’s Felix—Sangria’s man on the docks, charming enough to talk a bored guard into forgetting what he saw, and savvy enough to vanish before the honest ones get too close. He buys, sells, and “relocates” goods better left off the books, moving contraband with the same casual grace others use to pass bread across a table. A first-rate fence. A second-to-none thief.

The city knows Sangria gold sleeps in many pockets—merchants, captains, even the militia. But no one knows how deep the family’s roots go. Some stones simply aren’t meant to be overturned.

Mistress Diana Sangria:

Family Matriarch

Lord Barticus “Barty” Von Ricten:

Co-owner of The Red Room in Port Elias

Lazarus Drake:

Co-owner of The Red Room in Port Elias

The Sangria Sisters:

Victoria, Lucinda, and Celeste

Felix the Fence

Cassius the Shadow:

Alchemist

Silas Emmett:

Houndmaster

Tatiana:

Servant

Other Locations

Durgen Sandbarak

The Sandstone Museum

The Sandstone Museum—once a proud beacon of scholarship founded by the celebrated dwarven archaeologist Durgen Sandbarak—now stands silent behind barred doors and shuttered windows. For decades, Durgen’s expeditions carried him from the steaming jungles of Esmerach to the ashen cliffs of Helthas. Yet none scarred him the way his most recent descent into the lost tomb of Gul’athar, last emperor of the ancient Zal’khuul Dynasty, did.

The tomb had always been a myth—a half-believed campfire tale traded by desert guides with too much sun in their blood. Gul’athar: the emperor who defied death, who marched atop necromantic legions, who bound a colossal serpent sired by Lilith’s own breath. Bal’gulath, the Serpent Who Ends Light. The shadow fated to swallow the sun and drown the world in her mother’s eternal night.

Most scholars laughed the legend off. Durgen did not. He found the tomb buried beneath the dune-choked heart of Grash’Sharim, its entrance strangled by sand and the stink of forgotten magic. When he finally staggered back into civilization months later, he was sunburned, hollow-eyed, and muttering about “the coil that dreams.” In his trembling hands, he clutched a jet-black artifact—an obsidian staff carved into the spiraling form of a serpent, its eyes twin flecks of dying fire.

This was no relic. It was the emperor’s scepter—the instrument Gul’athar used to raise the dead and summon Bal’gulath from the abyss. A conduit of Lilith’s darkness. A key meant to remain buried until the end of days. Durgen spoke to it. And worse—he listened when it spoke back.

Without apology, without explanation, he shuttered the museum and sealed his life’s work behind iron bolts. Since that day, the grand halls of the Sandstone Museum have remained dark. The once-bustling plaza is now a place where people cross at a near jog, collars pulled high, as faint lights flicker in the upstairs windows at impossible hours. Citizens whisper that Durgen still prowls the galleries at night, chanting in a tongue that scrapes the eardrums raw—like bones being dragged across stone.

And the basement—always the basement. Passersby swear they hear groaning echoes rising through the floorboards, sounds twisting somewhere between bestial and human. Some claim the foundations tremble with each pulse of the staff’s faint, hellish glow. Officials dismiss it as “pipes settling,” but no one believes them. Not when shadows move behind the glass. Not when the bold who knock after sunset swear something knocks back—from deep, dark below.

Once, the Sandstone Museum was a sanctuary for scholars. Now it is a tomb nested inside a tomb, a shrine to a relic that should never have tasted daylight. Those who pass by hurry their steps—yet always listen, just in case the serpent beneath the floorboards begins to coil, and breathe, and remember the sun it was born to devour.

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