Campaign- City of Shadows

Welcome, traveler, to the Grand City State of Pelens.

The city straddles a dirty river, with slums and neighborhoods of tenements sprawling out from the huge, imposing city walls surrounding the central districts. Above all, a huge circular tower rises above castle walls, atop a rocky rise at the city's center. The spires of a cathedral, a clock tower and a huge dark obelisk also dot the skyline, and are vaguely illuminated by a smog-choked sunset. Quiet fog hovers just above the muddy cobblestone streets. Above, the sky is a dismal grey tinged with pink, half smudged by soot and smog, the light of day slowly fading into darkness as the sun sets to the west. The air feels thick, hard to breathe at first, foul and heavy with smoke. Smelling of unwashed bodies, waste and manure with an undertone of brine and low-tide, the scent of this place can be alarming to newcomers. For residents however, it has long since become unremarkable, perhaps even comforting in a perverse way. For many of them, it's the only life they've ever known.

As night falls, Lamplighters make their rounds to illuminate the shadowed streets. A whistle blows in the distance, signalling a shift change at the factories and shipyards, also joined by the low bell of a clock-tower ringing out 8 times before going silent. Horse-drawn carts clatter past and people on foot hurry by, heading to their homes and tenements before darkness falls. Armed watchmen on horseback make the last of their daytime patrols, muskets slung across their backs and billy clubs at their sides. They seem to pay no heed to those in their way, as they laugh and joke to one another, clearly less worried about doing their job and more so eager to end their shift.

Night brings a subtle, dangerous shift to these streets. Once full of people about their daily business, vendors and working folk, they are now host to those who would rather do business under cover of darkness. A red lantern is lit in a second-floor window above a pub, as scantily clad women and men of various races loiter below. A cloaked man hawks his unsavory wares from the shadow of an alleyway. Raucous laughter and shouting erupts from a drinking establishment, as drunkards emerge onto the street and a fight breaks out inside, and one may even hear- far-off- the muffled sounds of a scream echo through the darkness as someone's luck runs out for the last time. Most watchmen, once numerous, have left these slums to patrol protect those of better means, and chaos now reigns under cover of night.

In this city, living by the law brings only broken spirits and hard luck to the working-class masses. Corrupt politicians, nobles and wealthy lawmakers do their best to keep the poor under their boot and have done for hundreds of years. Most poor folk are too downtrodden, too fearful or too honest to do anything but accept their place in society. A cog in a great machine, doomed to a short, difficult existence. But for others, this life of hardship, or the prospect of it, is cause to seek less legal ways of making a living. For some, this only amounts to picking pockets or swindling the wealthy out of a few silvers. Others turn to a darker path, their hard lives having twisted them into cruel, desperate killers and thieves. This underbelly of corruption, crime and violence lures the very worst of society to these streets. Here, after darkness falls, you'd best be on your guard-

After all, you never know what could be lurking in the shadows.