More Setting ideas

It is the 327^th Year of the Marbordo-Longa Imperio, and its rule stretches the two hundred miles between the shore and the mountains along two thousand miles encompassing some fifty cities more or less, and something approaching a quarter million people. Fishing boats and merchant-ships flock the sea between the shores and the reefs, guarded by war galleys. Walled cities dot the river mouths and bays of the coast, and march into the foothills of the mountains. Coaches and long-wagons ply the fine roads between the cities while wheel-carts reach out from the roadways to plantations and redoubt farms. 

The Imperio is protected by the Legions in war and the Lampioneers in peace. In the Far Away, west and east, the Legions fight barbarians and sometimes foster new colonial cities. The only real rival in power to the Imperio is the Empire of the Horse Clans over the Grand Southern Pass.  In the Far East lies the Empire of the Desert Kings, a land of exotic goods and strange customs. In the Far West above the Great Escaprment is the Aplaki Verge, a region of forests and lakes nestled amidst many narrow valleys, peopled by rough yeomen in lonely steadings, clever but stern and wary of strangers. But patches of Mallumo, the Murk, still lie throughout the land and monsters, of myriad form, are spawned and roam unguarded lands and bandits and sorcerers consort with them and prey on travelers and isolated settlements. These dangers are dealt with by the Legions if they, as they occasionally do, mass into large bands or hordes. But more usually these dangers are dealt with singly or in small groups by Lampioneers or adventurous heroes, those of the so-called “Martial World.” In the cities criminal gangs and the Beggars Guild are contained by the Constables of the Tribunals, examined by Judges, and condemned for punishment or executed if they go too far.  

The people of the Imperio have several religions, the state and bureaucracy support the Civic Sage’s Way, an ethical philosophy of community and knowledge that focuses on correct behavior rather than the afterlife, though it acknowledges spirits beyond the civic community and the possibility of an afterlife. The Sovereign Way follows a messianic spiritual king who offers salvation after death, but whose ethics complement or parallel those of the Civic Sage. The Mystic Way reveres spirits and inspirational immortals and warns of demons and hells, its ethics more variable and pragmatic than the other Ways. The Followers of the Sovereign and the Seekers of the Mystic Lights both have temples and monasteries. The Civic Sage instead has Academies and ritual temples, but not monasteries. Every city also has three other temples sanctioned by the state, one to the Civic Spirit that represents the community and watches over it, one to the Warrior Spirit for soldiers and constables and adventurers of the Martial World, and the temple of the Ancestors where funerals are held and offerings made to the ancestors, that inspire and guide people. Each city also has an Opera Hall that serves both as a place of public entertainment and a place for ritual and ceremony on display to the community. Each city is led by a Council of Seventeen but more properly rules by a Judge in his Tribunal and aided by constables and bureaucrats. The council is generally composed of retired officers and bureaucrats, leaders of important merchant or craft guilds, and otherwise prominent citizens – but each city has different traditions and circumstances. On the coast a sea captain of long experience may sit on the city council, while inland his counterpart might be a mining engineer or master architect. Several cities are grouped into a Province and ruled by a Prefect, who also serves as a judge to appeals against a city Tribunal. Above the Prefects is the Emperor and the State Ministries: The Ministry of War commanding the Legions, the Ministry of Justice and Safety organizing the Judges and Prefects as well as the Lampioneers, the Ministry of Taxation and Expenditure which handles finances, the Ministry of Rites and Ceremony that encompasses religious matters involving the state as well as diplomacy with external states or powers and also the Offices of Censors and Inquisitors that audit and inspects the other ministries and act as something like an intelligence service and secret police, and the Ministry of Archives and Knowledge that oversees record keeping and education in general and in particular of bureaucrats and legionaries, and the Ministry of Works and Posts that builds roads and bridges, ports, forts, and other states infrastructure staffed by Engineers and Mechanicians that direct ordinary Legionaries or hired citizens that do ordinary labor according to their designs. These Six Ministries are the coordinated strength of the Imperio. The Emperor guides all and is the final arbiter of conflict and dispute, chosen from the Twenty Three Great Families by Imperial Electors (the six Ministers, heads of the Ministries, leaders of the three religious Ways, and a representative from each city selected by their council). This then is the world of the Marbordo Longa Imperio.