Caravans
Caravans in Olivantia consist of one or more house sized wagons pulled by gargabeasts. They are slow moving, often only covering ten to fifteen miles in a day. This has greatly affected trade since the purge, as caravans can only carry a limited number of passengers and goods.
Since everyone and everything must be locked down by sunset it means stopping at least an hour early each day, and it takes time in the mornings to break down the enclosures built to protect the gargabeasts from the consumed during the night. Average travel time would be 9 hours at about four miles an hour, so figure 36 miles during the summer. Winter hours would be shorter, and could cut travel to about 20 miles a day.
Caravan masters would have become a massive commodity. Once the surviving citizens were locked into individual cities / towns they’d need to rely completely on caravans for everything from supplies to news. The arrival of a caravan would be a big deal for most towns, as that will be the only strangers towns will see.
Life for the average citizen
Townsfolk can only travel a half day in any direction, as they need time to return home before the consumed emerge at night. Horses are very popular because they can greatly extend the range people can travel, but travellers are still careful to return back to town before dark.
Some of the more ambitious farmers have constructed fortress like farms. Most are small and crude, but provide enough shelter to keep the consumed out at night. The consumed are persistent though, and many of these farms are found abandoned by neighbors or nearby towsfolk. Everyone knows what happens to those taken from such places.
The only towns to survive the waves of consumed were those that could learn to be self sufficient. That meant finding their own sources of food, medical services, building their own shelters, etc. Many towns were able to build a wall, but later abandoned the town because they lacked too many critical things. They’d often flee to larger towns, though only about one in three survived the trek unless they were fortunate enough to have a caravan.
The end result is that rather than growing like the population should its been shrinking since the purge. The war claimed many of the citizens, and the ravages of the consumed have claimed many more. Most of Olivantia has become wild again as nature gradually reclaims abandoned towns and villages.
Scavengers / Hyena / Scrounger / Rat / Vultures
The number of abandoned towns has skyrocketed in the last fifteen years. People left behind anything that would slow them down when travelling, which meant leaving a fortune in everything from furniture to jewelry. Most of these towns are still actively overrun by consumed, but some are willing to brave the risk in order to recover the lost loot.
Scavengers are those who pick clean the bones of old settlements. Most are also caravan runners who own at least one wagon and gargabeast. This allows them to park their caravans in deserted towns so they can fill their wagons with valuable loot. Once they’ve gorged themselves on the possessions of the ghost town they bring them back to be sold at larger cities.
Scavengers are frowned on by the knighthood, but they provide a valuable influx of goods that the people of Olivantia wouldn’t ordinarily have access to. Healing potions, curealls, magic items and other treasures are frequently recovered. Usually, however, scavenger lords find that the villages have long since been picked clean. They often settle for less useful or valuable belongings. Carting away something is better than nothing after all.
Common Lore for Consumed
Prior to the purge most citizens had only seen the consumed at a distance. The vampyr considered them powerful servants, but understood how dangerous and unpredictable they could be. The consumed were kept away from the populace, and used primarily as troops in the nearly endless war against the vampyr.
People feared them, but the vampyr always served a buffer. The average citizen had no idea how brutal and mindless the consumed are, or how many people a pack could slay in a single night. Only those who lived adjacent to the fell wood knew how terrible the consuemd were, since they lived near the source of the True Blood.
The purge changed everything. Bands of consumed ranging between a half dozen and a hundred consumed ranged across the countryside. The populace had very little understanding of how to kill them, and even those who understood about Laurelwood didn’t have a ready supply available. They had no real defense against the horde, and the consumed devoured every living person they came across.
The knightood did its best to respond, but they were too few to make a real difference. They hunted and destroyed hundreds of bands, but for every one they brought down another seemed to take its place. Through it all the people died in droves. A town of 5,000 could be wiped out in a few days if attacked by a larger band, and their only choice was flee or die.
The only cities strongly held by the knights are Reverian and perhaps two or three others. The rest mostly look after themselves, although many have a temple to Dalanthar. Some of those that do have not lost their faith in the Steward of justice, but most citizens resent the knighthood. They were tricked into the purge, and instead of the life they were promised they have nothing but death and misery.
The Church of Aesir (need better name, something symbolic)
As more and more citizens lost faith in Dalanthar they sought another source of spiritual comfort. Unfortunately none of the other Stewards had a sizable following. Celeste’s dedicated could have helped, but the people outlawed magic and Celeste forsook their country in anger. Amarigen could have helped, but many of his worshippers were killed in the years following the purge. Since they lived in the wild places many were set upon by the consumed.
Enter a prophet by the name of Azuriah, who began life as a simple farmer but also fought in the purge. He claimed that the Stewards were not the answer, that they’d forsaken the people of Olivantia. Instead they should focus their energy inward, relying on the strength of the people. If they came together surely they could conquer any outside force, even the consumed.
Azuriah was highly critical of the knighthood, blaming them for the current state of the nation. He argued that their short sightedness had resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of good people, who might still be alive if not for their meddling. Azuriah preached non-violent protest, but with a dangerous message. He theorized that the nation was better off under the vampyr than the knighthood.
Would all those people have died had the vampyr been left alone? It may not have been an ideal situation, but no matter how you look at it the knighthood made a mistake in removing the vampyr. They are inadqueate to protect the people, and the people need stronger guardians.
Azuriah began preaching in Reverian six years ago after a particularly brutal winter ended dozens of towns across Olivantia. He used the event to stir up fear in the people. Would their town be one of the ones to disappear during the next winter? Thick snows didn’t concern the consumed, but they isolated communities and made it easier for them to be picked off.
When Gavin first heard about the church he dismissed Azuriah as a crackpot. After all the sacrifices the knighthood had made to free and protect the people he couldn’t believe anyone would follow such nonsense. Gavin made a critical error, one which could spell the end of the knighthood. He ignored Azuriah.
Azuriah’s sermons were repeated all over Reverian, and within weeks he had several hundred downtrodden followers. The priest told them to seek their own salvation by learning to protect themselves, and by helping their fellow men. He encouraged them not to rely on the knighthood, but rather to be strong and free together.
After an entire year of sermons Gavin was finally forced to act. Azuriah’s followers numbered in the thousands, and began a riot that damage the Great Temple and saw several dozen protestors killed. The knights dispersed the mob, but it built far more resentment and galvanized the people under Azuriah. Publicly Azuriah chastised the mob saying that non-violent protest was best, but he lambasted the knighthood for cracking down on innocent civilians.
Gavin had finally had enough, and decided to remove Azuriah from power. Yet even as knights moved in to seize the prophet he was whisked away by his followers. Azuriah left Reverian one step ahead of a the headsman’s axe, and Gavin assumed things would get back to normal. They were anything but.
Azuriah took a caravan on a tour of the major cities and towns across Olivantia. He spread his doctrine of self-sufficiency and non-violent opposition to the knighthood that had caused so many problems. Everywhere he went people joined him in throngs, and his year long journey cemented the Church of Aesir in the hearts and minds of the people.
By the time he arrived back in Reverian the church was too strong to stop. Gavin knew there was no way he could safely remove Azuriah from power, because if he did his own citizens would rise up against the knighthood. He had no choice but to let the church continue, and with each passing year they gain in strength while the knighthood strinks.
One thing the church agreed with the knighthood on is chanters, publicly at least. The church says that the power offered by the Fae is powerful and unpredictable. It recommends that no one deal with chanters, and councels that they are not to be trusted. That’s it’s public face.
In private the church gathers chanters and smuggles them to safety. This practice has been widely whispered, but the church has decried it loudly and longly. This only makes Gavin more certain they are working with chanters.
In reality the church takes all chanters it rescues, and gives them True Blood. The survivors become new binders to rebuild their army. The rest join the throng of consumed already plaguing the countryside. Either way it increases the vampyr strength, while depriving the knighthood of the one resource that might allow them to stand against the vampyr.
The church’s stance was very carefully chosen. Both the knighthood and the church decry the chanters, which means they can’t find safe haven in Olivantia. This means they have to run, and running generally puts them in contact with the church. It isn’t 100% effective, but the majority of chanters have fallen into vampyr hands for the last six years.
This means they’ve built a cadre of chanters spanning the circle of eight, which gives them everything from healers to illusionists to binders to call upon. This diverse magical backing has been focused in Reverian with the express purpose of causing a revolt against the knights.
