Seagate
Seagate is the ancestral home of the southern elves, the bastion of trade and the outpost of Dawnfire's military, the Crusade. No city in the world that still stands today has seen as much pain and suffering as Seagate. However, no matter the turmoil, a single fact holds true: in its 1,000 years of existence, kings, lords, empires, pirates, devils, and dragons, the one thing that has never fallen is Seagate itself, Vryaskall. Seagate is a proud city with resolute people, and it stands ready to test its keeps and walls against anything the world can challenge it with.
Battlemaps set in this location
Sifwind Citadel
High above the sea, built atop the bones of one of the many ancient ruined marble castles around Seagate, stands Sifwind Citadel, a monument to the Sifwind family, the first mortal rulers of Seagate and uniters of the Five Crowns to stand against the disastrous waking of the ocean tyrant Dagon in the Fifth God’s Birth over 1,000 years ago.
The Citadel first served as a place of worship to the divine being Hazradorf, lord of the hunt and patron of the fey. However, during the fall of the elves, that history tarnished and faded along with them. Today, it has become the operational keep of the Brazen Lancers and Seagate's main location for gatherings and important dedications, announcements, and ceremonies to communicate with its people in the Grand Highport Plaza outside its gate.
Vyraskall, the Seagate
The famous Vyraskall seagate is a world wonder, never touched by a hammer or chisel, it was summoned fully formed by the arch-angel of war Vyraska who ruled the city in its earliest ages. A holy avenger of righteousness and fury who came down from celestial realms to battle demonic invaders in person and lead armies in a tidal charge against the unjust of the world.
She commanded ten angels and each established a castle in the city of Seagate. Only hers remains, the giant marble wall separating the inner and outer bays that give the city its name. The ruins of her sisters' castles litter the city with their magnificent white marble bricks, few knowing the important secrets they once protected.
Highport
Docking in Seagate is easier said than done. Ignoring the many draconian laws and restrictions on what can and cannot come to Dawnfire from the Triton, there is at least two days' worth of signing documentation and vessel inspections that must be performed. Because of this, Highport came to be. Sailors unwilling to deal with brazen bureaucrats have simply taken to docking along the cliffside near the city instead of in it.
Merchants there are always willing to buy goods, but usually, the crew will take a hefty pay cut. Additionally, the practice isn’t considered completely legal, so Highport has earned a reputation for skullduggery and piracy. Seeing as these merchants don’t much care where the goods came from, with the discount they’re getting, pirates from Keelhaul Falls will at times be willing to slip past the Crusade's ships to offload in Highport.
The port itself rightfully earned its name. It is built at sea level against a sheer 1,200-foot cliff face. The top of the cliff features a skydock and only two cargo winches, which crews can rent to get their goods into the city themselves, but the price is often impossibly high. Even with its unsavory reputation, Highport is actually quite a pleasant place. The people there are often more interested in selling and offloading goods than getting a knife in the back, and pirates who risk the visit to crusader waters tend to do so with few options and prices on their heads so everyone prefers business be fast and quiet.
Conclave Guildhall
The Conclave is a guild of treasure seekers who do not desire monetary value or artifacts of gold and platinum, but instead seek what they consider the most valuable thing, historical merit. The Conclave works to corroborate the legends of Crudilex's history and sort fact from fantasy, to better understand the past and build upon that for a more fruitful future.
The guild's main goals are to locate historical artifacts, but it also actively participates in the prevention of their destruction through piracy, dungeon ruination, and regional gentrification. This is why the guild has located itself here in Seagate, near to the hotspot where all three of those issues are most prevalent, Triton, the Lastsea. The enemies of the guild face harsh justice for their erasure of Crudilex's history, and the Conclave is more than willing to deliver such justice if no alternative can be reached. Their dedication to the protection of truth is absolute.
The Well
Black, deep, and presumed endless, this hole in the world is miles across and unknowable abyssal. Constructed by an enigmatic stranger for lord Marcio Sifwind to imprison the god of hunger Dagon, who ravaged Dawnfire from the deep seas off its coast. Sinking ships and destroying towns for decades. The Well’s depths are largely ignored by the people of Seagate as anything but a grim reminder from the dark days surrounding the founding of Dawnfire.
Lok'Breath Reach
Hev Clan Tent City
The coastal reaches of seagate are marked by red hills and slopes of cooled lava spilled by the most powerful dragon to exist, the primordial of fire- who brought the element into being and established the Ignan layline, Lok'Razareem, when he unleashed his fury on the Exalt Chase Urner for his part in the disaster following the Day of Dawn. The dragon's wings darkened the sky, and from its mouth, an endless deluge of hot lava spilled, burying the elven Midwinter Palace and with it the queen of Dawnfire. The devastation was among the greatest in all of Crudilex's history, and many Seagaters live in fear of the second awakening of the primordial dragon of that fiery doom, horrified that it may someday return and bury all of the city in its burning rock.
The kobolds of Hev Clan once lived secretly below the city, however, the day the great primordial dragon Lok'Razareem rained lava over the elven palace, they emerged to worship him. They have since refused to return to their lairs and instead have taken the ruins of the old palace, buried under a small mountain of dried magma, as their new home. They have begun tunneling it out, and their activities were deemed by the Malignantists as unharmful. They now occupy the ruins completely and keep everyone out, which is just fine with the city, as the area was deemed too dangerous to enter anyway. They have lived there without incident since.
Fis-Raza Memorial Shrine
The Fis-raza memorial is a shrine upon which young brazen tieflings of Seagate come and begin their infernal untethering, a ritual by which a demon-blooded child refutes their evil ancestor and journeys across Dawnfire alone to reach Shan-La, where the Ninoten spirits of Dawnfire help them learn to control the voice in their mind left behind by their demonic ancestor.
Malignantist Parliament
Home to the Malignantist Court when their services are needed in Seagate, the Parliament buildings otherwise handle the day-to-day bureaucracy of running one of the world’s most powerful trade centers. Staffed by long lived fallen elves who once lived in the city when it was ruled by its first queen, Vyraska, Conclave scholars dedicated to preserving history not only of Seagate but the many artifacts that get bought and sold in its markets, and the especially bureaucratically minded Pith who work for the Malignatists to maintain a strict order under law giving the Parliament a reputation for truly drowning those who require their services in red tape.
Little Ravenfall
Like a city within a city, complete with its own wholly surrounding wall, Little Ravenfall is a dwarven neighborhood famous for its tinkerers housed within Seagate. The dwarves here are very different from those in the place it takes its name from; while the residents of Ravenfall might be unwelcoming to outsiders, the people of Little Ravenfall are very hospitable. The craftsmanship here may not be on par with a ten-generation master of Eastface Castle, but it is more experimental, creative, and incorporates ideas from all over the world that pass through the coastal city of Seagate.
The craftsmen in Little Ravenfall are always pushing the envelope, trying new things, and more often than not, failing in their experiments in spectacular fashion. However, there is a saying in the neighborhood, “Each momentary failure is a step toward a lifetime of success.”
The Urner Estate
Before the founding of Aberdeen in the Fifth Godsbirth the Urner Estate was built upon the ruins of the humble childhood home of the mother of the brazen Grand Light, Exalt of Joremy, Chase Urner. Honoring the humble beginnings of his line after he came into incredible power as the voice of the divine goddess worshiped all through Dawnfire. It now houses his extended Urner family, mainly the Baker family, The Exalt’s sister. The home is at the back of a large walled garden and is adorned with a tall tower at its center with six portals inside that connect to rift gates all across the world of crudilex.
Aldermeen Tenements
Built by an ex-crusader turned privateer, Aldermeen, the tenements are tall apartment-like buildings where Seagate's poorer citizens and crusader veterans can live for free in exchange for lending any aid they can provide to the tenement's upkeep. Aldermeen himself was once on track to become a judge before his battalion was destroyed by the Thinny, a sea monster, due to bad information provided by his unscrupulous conscriptionists, Gella and Makan, whom he hates with unwavering fury. The Tenements has been his attempts to turn his fury and anguish into something more positive, as an aging veteran he thinks his time in the world nears its end. And he hopes to bring some kind of kindness into the world before he faces the Goddess's judgement.
The Pire
The closest thing to a graveyard of Seagate, where the bodies and prayers are burned in ritual funerals so that they might be sent to Joremy's afterlife. The ashes are divided, partially given to the family and partially placed in a ritual urn stored in the church, where they can be prayed over by brazen priests.
Bormel University
At the front of the city the first thing those arriving on foot see is the Borneo University and its three large towers connected their brilliant arched sky bridges, built in a brazen recreation of the Jilder architectural style, Bormel University is one of only two schools in all of Crudilex that specializes in non-magical studies such as math, geography, and history. It offers simple magical programs, but the scholars there are more interested in understanding magic and the secrets of the universe than performing them. Those who wish to study a more practical application of spellcraft in Dawnfire typically join the consecrationists in Abermore.
The Beastmaster's Market
The Beastmaster's Market is a series of six nested roads right up against the busiest area of Seagates Inner Bay. The buying and trading of creatures here is how the market earned its name. Run by Miss Mora, the master beast-wrangler, the market is the best place in the world to sell off creatures both rare and mundane or to acquire something to fight alongside you in battle. Every day brings something new, so the Beastmaster's Market is never short on marvels to Witness.
Miss Mora's Stables, Mounts, and Domestics
Miss Mora is Dawnfire's leading beastmaster and a regional social figure in Seagate who has an impressive reach and local political power. One wouldn't suspect it upon meeting her, she’s an ill-mannered, short-tempered halfling amputee. However, her stables occupy a massive swath of the southern portion of the city and have been in her family for a dozen generations. She has a complete monopoly on travel, mounts, gaja hatchlings, and paluna within the reach of the Brazen nation.
Doumlalk, Light’s Gate
Built directly opposite the Vraskall the Seagate, protecting the inner bay which gives the city its name, Light’s Gate is an ornate white and orange sandstone wall with a huge steel gate opened twice daily for merchants and travelers to come and go. The Brazen Lancers patrol both sides at all times, never leaving weaknesses or gaps. Unlike the divine nature of the Seagate, Light’s Gate was built by mortal hands and as such lacks much of the impossible dimension and unachievable intricate motif designs. It is constructed to mirror its noble opposite as closely as is humanly possible, for reaching for the divine is a prayer in and of itself to the brazen people. But the disparity between the two is obvious, as they might say, it is between man and angel.
Seagate has suffered much throughout its troubled history, but its twin gates have never been successfully breached by an enemy army, not even when Dawnfire was made up of city-states warring between themselves. The Doumlalk represent the preservation of the human spirit, watched over by the unimpeachable power of the godly, and neither shakes when Seagate’s enemies come knocking.