Nandaahr

Nandaahr, land of abundance, danger, home to many races and place of many tales and thousands of years of peace, conflict, disease, drama and prosperity.

Geography

Nandaahr is situated in the northern hemisphere of Aar, it actually is the most northern continent. Its northern shores are faced by the Frozen Sea, in the west the smoking sea gnaws away the land, in the south the red sea, also called "sea of blood" or "bloody sea", is seperating Nandaahr from Andaahr, Aars central continent.

The East

The eastern half of the continent once (a very very long time ago) was a seperate landmass, nearly as big as Nandaahr. But sometime eons ago both collided. This is still visible in the two trenches right east of the isthmus that connect both parts. The central part of this eastern half of the continent is almost completly flat and covered by a steppe landscape that seems to reach far behind the horizont. The eastern coast on the other hand is jagged, fissured and much rockier than the mainland. Also the steppe fades when reaching the coast and is replaced by deep, dark and cold boreal rainforests that cover the lower altitudes of the coastal mountains.
When reaching further south, steppe and forests are being replaced by an endless sea of golden sanddunes, scorching by day, freezing by night, that start behind the big lakes in the south east.
This part of the continent is the home of the Orcs, who live here as semi-resident nomands.
The big gulf that seperates the eastern half of Nandaahr from the main landmass, apart from the small isthmus in the north that hosts the two cities Olim and Svedero, is called the gulf of battles for a reason. But we will later catch up with politics.

The Center

The center of Nandaahr is cut into 3 pieces by mountain ridges. The southern part is more arid and consists mainly of deserts, savannah and steppe in the deep south, further up north toward the Dragonfang mountains you will find some very very old forests that, as I dare to say, never have been fully explored by a human before. Thanks to the river Tarnur in the western half of the south it is a little greener here than in the eastern half and supports a few forests along the riverbed. The Dragonfang mountains form a tight natural border that effectivly cuts of the entire south from the rest of the continent, apart from a small swampy area in the east that allows passage around the mountains.
The mainland or heartland is filled to a big part by the giant Thaspis sea, which contrary to its name, is actually a gigantic lake. For centuries people believed it to be a part of the Frozen Sea, only after adventurer Tarkus Eba  wandered all around the lake in an expedition that lasted nearly 2 years, that proved its limnic character. In the northern part of the heartland where some rivers leave the lake towards the actual ocean the land consists of bogs that stretch for weeks and make it pretty much impossible to quickly cross this part of the country.

That lead to the foundation of Mossharbor at the central eastern shore and Nodden on the western shore. Originally founded as ferry harbors for expeditions (King Dolman II. was as adventurous as he was rich), the two have grown into blooming fishery towns over the years. The eastern shore is as flat as can be until it reaches the mountains of the istmus. With one exeption, the Achim´s Watch, a solitary steep and quite tall mountain (about 2 kilometers if I remember correctly) that rises from the ground without warning. The old fort halfway to the top has been claimed by the "Votaries of light", a - excuse my wording here - shady, vile Cult that gathered more and more power and influence over the past two decades.
A bit south of Achims watch you will find the cadaver swamps. Their portentious name goes back to the three big battles that have been fought here over the millenia and that have filled the misty bogs to the top first with dead demons and elves, than men and dwarfs and then men and men. Overall this can be considered a tremendously ugly, diseaseinfested and evil place. Rumor has it, that the bogs are home to a cult of necromancers and witches who want to enslave the dead to built their own kingdom with an army of zombies.
Unfortunatly there are not necessarily witches and necromancers needed to wake the dead from their endless slumber. Nobody knows what in fact is causing this, but numerous stories go around that claim that suddently, when people were forced to leave the road and get near to the bogs suddently everything went quit, mist arose and with the mist, so did the dead and attacked the wanderers, dragging them into the waters - from which none of them returned. Further down between the cadaver bogs and the the coast you will find the hilly area that seperates the heartland from the sea.

North of Achim´s Watch some villages are scattered over the plains, and constant civil war over the predominance of ruling power over the region keeps the people poor and the land torn up and bloody.
The western part of the heartland streches as far as to the gates of Bregen at the bottom of the Black Rock pinnacles, the mountain ridge that keeps the heartland and the far north seperated. The west has some plains in the south near Nodden, but the most part up until Bregen is covered under dense forests with ocasional camps and small villages of lumberjacks and furhunters.

The Far North

Bregen is the most southern outpost of the far north, which, when it comes to landscape and climate as well as society, religion and politics, is completly different than the heartland.
If you think the heartland only has a very thin and scattered population in some parts, then the far north must seem nearly depopulated to you.
The only settlements here you might describe as cities are Bregen in the south, Freya´s Havn up in the north and Isheim beyond the borders of the frozen wastelands. Oh, and of course you will find the Arcaneum Ultima at the end of the long fjord that stretches the whole long way from the Arcaneum to the Frozen Sea. The eastern end of the northern lands consist of the Jotunheim mountains, a mysterious place, following local lore home to trolls, fairies and other enigmatic beings.
Isheim sits right at the shore of the Frostbite Bay. This bay is covered in ice most of the year, only during the peak of summer it is icefree and the ores and metalls that are mined in the Jotunheim mountains and the Frozen finger mountains further north can be transported by ship in larger numbers. During warmer winters caravans set out to transport the valuable metalls over land, but with the evil winter spirits and other beast that lurk in the long dark - oh my, I forgot to mention that in the far north with the end off fall season the land will be covered in a never ending nightt until the start of spring. Well it was to dangerous and countless caravans got lost, so nowadays most metall gets transported during summer season in heavily guarded transportation fleets.
The southern part between the Black Rock pinnacles and Freya´s Havn show a plain harsh landscape of mosses and herbs, while the more protected areas sometimes manage to grow short crippled birchforests, mixed with ocasional pines.
North of Freya´s Havn the frozen wastelands start, as the name suggests, they are frozen and not much manages to live here. But that means that the creatures that actually manage to survive here are allways looking for a warm, fresh and twitching meal. So be careful, if you ever find yourself out there, somewhere under the snow some unknown horrors might be lurking and waiting for their chance to strike.
But even the wastelands have their beautiful aspects, the northern light that dances over the cold winterskies of the frozen sea also flickers over the freezing plains of the wastelands and paint the snow in marvelous colors.

Twilight Archipelago

When mentioned in public most of the times the mention of this archipelago makes the room go quiet, odd stares are exchanged and the one who brought it up will most likely be looked at as some sort of unholy demon offspring.
Now, why is that? Well, once this archipelago was a normal outpost of the founders of Olim and Svedero, the two booming towns occupiing the isthmus in the middle of Nandaahr. But around ten years after the foundation of the town on the largest of the 7 islands, things ... changed. There were allways people living on these islands, but they avoided the traders and fischermen whenever possible. Citizens of Olim came to fish, whale and use the town, which name is lost by now, as a basecamp for their summer activities. First it started during offseason, later even during the buissiest months that people disappeared. Sometimes whining and cries could be heard during mild nights. But nothing ever was found out. Only that seemingly only foreigners went missing. There was some hickup with the indigenous people, but they knew the caves and tunnels better so after a few years the outpost was closed and the last ship left the place.
Overall this is a dark and gruesome place, which i will tell more at a more merrier point on a different day.

The Isthmus

This forms the link between the eastern part and the heartland of Nandaahr. When colliding, the eastern landmass dived under Nandaahr and folded up the mountains that at this day go by the name "the glowing mountains", due to their orange color at dusk and dawn. Since Olim and Svedero allways have been rich cities du to their tradersguilds who rule both cities, there has been a significant amount of outlaws, bandits and robber barons accumulated in the valleys of the mountains who try to plunder the caravans that head for the cities from the east and west. It has ever been an arms race between the tradersguilds and the outlaws. In times with good earnings the guilds would hire huge armys of mercenaries who would "clean" up the mountains and drive the scum out, but soon the guilds would become lazy again and their members will start to complain about the high costs of the mercenaries, who aren´t needed anymore now, since they did their job. Which eventually leads to the mercenaries being send home and the outlaws returning shortly after. Some of the mercenaries didn´t even left the mountains and joined the outlaws to plunder the now more or less unanrmed caravans - so the cycle started again. Yet still both cities can hold their position as major centers of trade in Nandaahr. That is because of the excellent position. Olim recieves all the precious goods from the arctic - rare metalls, ivory, fur, amber, tusks, dried fish, train oil (from the walers) and wood from the lumberjacks at the eastern cost of the far north. At the same time food and luxury goods take the other way up north. Svedero has the prime position that they recieve whatever they can buy from the orcs in the east - tamed beasts, and other strange artifacts, they can sell Olims arctic treasures further south to Murkwater Harbour or even Andaahr. Travel over water is thanks to the Pirates, no safe trip, but going over Land is way more dangerous and takes much longer.

At the east end of the mountains th tradersguilds have builded "the Gates". strangely nobody ever bothered to gave the two fortresses a name, but until now they are only known as the gates and the person who is installed by the tradersguilds to watch the gates is called "lord of the gates". Originally build as a fortification against the orcs, who are more or less neutral most of the time, but can become violent real quick, the fortresses now serve more of representory function, but are impressive buildings nontheless.

History

Now my fellow listener, since i tortured you with geography to its fullest you will now get a dose of history of this diverse continent. Don´t worry, I´ll try to wrap everything up a bit and drill the details into you on a later date...
So, as you might or not know, we now live in the fourth era.

The first Era

Nandaahr was first discovered by Elves and Demons in the first era. And as it has allways bin their habit, as soon as they met at what are now the cadaver bogs, they started to bash each others head in. This scattered and decimated both parties and ended the first era.

The second Era

The second one was born out of this war. A few minor battles later the demons settled in at the far north and the eastern part of the south, the elves took the heartlands and got a shock when they crossed the Isthmus and were faced by the Orcs, who according to their more vital or shall I say aggressive nature drove the elves straight back to where they came from.
But there wasn´t really time to breath. Nandaahr wasn´t as empty as elves and demons had thought. While the demons were approaching the Dragonfang mountains from the south, so were the elves from the north - and both got a bloody nose from the armor-clad fists of the Dwarfs who were everything but amused to see two armys of strange creatures entering their territory. This led to another few decades with another few battles but since neiter eleves nor demons, with neither their light nor their dark magic could throw back the lords of the mountains, they eventually gave up and left the mountains to the dwarfs who were more than happy to have succesfully beaten the intruders and have their peace back.
At this poingt one could think "and now? where were the humans? And what on earth now? Elves and demons seperated and forced to live at peace?".

Easy, ofcourse this maybe could have had a fairytale ending, but like most thigs in live it turned the worse... The humans you ask? Now the arrival of this well known species marked the beginning of the end of the second era.

The third Era

Until this day nobody knows where eactly the 13 ships came from, that washed the Humans up on Nandaahrs shores, but as myth tells the ancestors of the humans soon came into contact with elves and demons - both races saw them as playthings they could use as weapons since due to humans more shortened lifespan, their population growed as fast as a wildfire during a summer draught. But Nandaahr was wide and after all the elves and demons too were tired of beeing constantly at war with each other. So, for a peaceful 1000 years life in Nandaahr growed and prospered.
But yet again, this time the humans tried to set up settlements in the Dragonfang mountains which led to another right hook from the hands - or rather fists - of the angered dwarfs. If they would have considered asking their demon- or elven allies they would have learned that it would be pointless to fight dwarfs in the mountains - if you ever tried to drown a fish you know what I´m trying to say here - and no lungfish don´t count! Back to the "battle at the bogs" that ironically took place at the same spot as the devestating battle between demons and elves. The dwarfs had set a trap on the road to drive their human enemies in the bogs, somehow they felt safe enough outside the mountains, but relativly close to one of their major underground cities. And just as expected the human armies showed up and walked right in the trap. A slaughter beyond believe and any words ensued in which most of the fighters died a horrible death - some from each other, some where dragged away by the undead elves and demons which caused extra chaos with their supernatural mist.
At nightfall the rest of the dwarvish army retreatet to the mountains and the few human soldiers that were left behind started fleeing everywhere but away from mountains and bogs. Yet again a peace was formulated and everything seemed to go back to normal. Humanities thirst for expansion was more than satisfied and another era, the third to be precise, of woundlicking, rebuilding and peace started.

But you are completly right - where are the demons now? And the high elves? Now that is a good question. While the demons were happy with spending their days in their sin infested towns, breaking all cultural taboos they could get hold of, some starting with necromancy again (that was kind of set under taboo at the start of the second era) and gaslighting some war and piracy here and there, the highelves had an especially arrogant and rassist leader. His name later has been erased from every archive by the remaining highelves and humans after the cataclysm that was about to happen. But we don´t want to start at the end now.
This now unnamed leader had the strong belief that he and the highelves as decendants of the aetherials were born and meant to be the absolute rulers over the continent and that the other races should winch in the dirt below his boots and beg for his rightful guidance.
Sadly he was as charismatic and smart as he was evil and mad. And so he slowly started to twist the human kindoms, cities, tribes and settlements around his fingers with empty promisses and dripping his whispers like venom in their ears. It took around 2 centuries for him to fully hatch and act out his plan, but in the end he messed it up by trying his luck wih the dwarfs. To him the dwarfs were merely more than bipedal moles he could easily charm with gifts and promisses.
But his arrogance were the slippery stone that started his fall and the cataclysm of the third era. the dwarfs were offended and then enraged when they uncovered his plan to take over controle over Nandaahr.
The dwarfs saw themselves as the generous owners of Nandaahr who let the other races use the part of their land they have no use for (That means everything but the mountains). When they found out that this "sly greedy alien-fuck" as a dwarvish lord put it wanted to basicly enslave them, they hatched a plan on their own, warned the demons and their human allies, formed an alliance and started an ambush on the Highelves army when they wanted to leave the mountains at what now is Crows Rock. They wanted to flee the dwarfes to the plains in front of the mountains, only to be welcomed by an army that consisted of men, demons and all kind of nasty things the demons brought from their homeland (another story) or conjured from some wicked realm. The biggest battle Nandaahr has seen until this day enfolded, songs about it are still sung and let me tell you my fellow friend, I can say they aren´t over exaggerated a single tiny bit. Until this day the plains south of Crows Rock are called the bonefields because you still find weapons, bones and parts of armors. (There is some kind of blackmarket going on that trades these pieces to wealthy collectors) After the battle the demons, humans and dwarfs officially formed the "Alliance of the southern Flames", while the Highelves and their human allies formed the "Votaries of light" - you remember the name? - which had the annihaltion of demons and dwarfs as their most urgent goal.
War raged again for decades and due to the highelves having hatched and polished their plans longer they finally succeded. The last demons who escaped execution left Nandaahr for their former homeland and the dwarfs retreated to their rocky strongholds.
This could have been the end of it, but once again the leaders arogance let to his final downfall and ended the cataclysm. After promising for years to rule Nandaahr hand in hand with his human allies, he showed his true colors and tried to subjugate his former allies. Too bad for him that some felt it coming and united with the scattered rests of the southern flames and planned an ambush - how ironic - at the cadaver bogs. The higheleves and their left allies wanted to get to the south as fast as possible and to avoid conflicts with the dwarvish rebels they had to use the notorious route around the cadaver bogs. The third era was taking its final breath. Just as expected when the battle between the humans from the north and the newly reinforced armies of the southern flames (now only consisting of humans) met, the mist arose, which rendered the few higheleven mages that acompanied them useless since they didn´t saw what was going on. The soldiers of the southern flames retreated pretty fast after killing a significant amount of their enemies and left the rest of the enemies to the undead who gladly did the dirty work. Some say that you can still see some groups of soldiers wandering the bogs at dusk, but nobody is stupid enough to go to the bogs at nightfall. After their army was wiped out the remaining rebels saw their chance, headed for Achim´s watch, the Headquarter of the Higheleves, besieged the place for 20 months, then gruesomly butchered the leader and drove his remaing clan and all the higheleves they could get hold of out of Nandaahr, just as they have done with the demons.
This ended the third era and started the fourth era wih the day the last Ship of the highelves left Nandaahr.

This was also the year the Arcaneum Ultima was founded, but that doesn´t belong here.

Intelligent Species and Societies

Nandaahr is as you might have realised so far, a very diverse and heterogenic place. And eventhough demons and highelves are missing since the beginning of this era, there are still a lot of elvish tribes, the orcs, dwarfs and the humans left.

Orcs and their clans

For an orc, there is no more important thing than their family and those connected to him by blood. In case of a threat towards a member of the clan, all other members drop whatever they have been doing and back their "brother" (not necessarily the real brother) or sister up. This lead to multiple skirmishs and feuds, which in turn gave the orcs the reputation of beeing short fused and bloodthirsty. That is, don´t get me wrong the case to a certain degree, but like most clishees this is a little over exaggerated.
Living in the vast steppe of Nandaahrs east they are organised in clans, 90% of the time without a ruler. And as long as nobody enters their territory without consent, orcs live pretty peacefully. Men and women are more or less equal, the life here isn´t easy and everybody can do most jobs if needed. Normally the clans roam their land with their herds of horses, thunderbirds, sheeps and (only in the south) monitor lizards that can grow up to 5 meters in lenght. For winter season each clan has a settlement which is abandoned during summer but will be used to face the harsh winters in the plains.

But this is for peaceful times, when a crises arises, then all clans send an ambassador and a candidate for the title of the high Khan to the Arcaneum of the first light, the orcs arcaneum, situated on a small island in one of the eastern fjords. There will be a big assembly where the ambassador and canditate will advocate their strategy towards the problem - after everybody got one hour, every team has one vote (they obviously can´t vote for themselves) and the canditate with the most votes will be nominated High Khan for the duration of the crisis. That means he has the absolute power over all orcs. His word is the law and who disobeys gets executed. But his mandate will end automaticly after whatever crises may have caused his (or her) election is dissolved. There have been some struggles throughout history with Khans not willing to give up power, but the eldest from the arcaneum, well handled it everytime, which meant something bad happened to the High Khan.

The orcs haven´t allways lived as scattered clans. I can tell you, there once was a big, believe me, massive empire that streched all over the east. This was the peak of orcish power back then. This "empire of the sky" as myths call it was founded before the first era and lasted up into the second era, when a change of climate and a draught of a hundred years defeated the mighty empire. This empire has, beside the Arcaneum of the first light the only documented permanent settlements and cities in orcish history. The ruins can still be found in the plains near the big lakes. Nowadays the orcs don´t like to go there since it reminds them of their lost glory and they mostly stick to singing strange sounding chants about the way their endless armies used to dominate the lands.

Dwarfs, rulers of the mountains, provosts of the subterran halls

Just like the orcs have been living in the east since the dawn of time, the dwarfs have allways underminded the Dragonfang mountains. Orcs tend to roam the plains today, but the dwarfs are one of the few examples of an empire, that under changing rulers and some slightly altered laws existed since forever. Over the millenia the dwarfs carved huge cities with thousands of inhabitants out of the subterran caverns of the mountains - to this day there are six major cities with an absolute ruler who obeys the "emporer of the depths" who resides in the biggest city kilometers unter the surface. The smaller settlements around the bigger town each have a mayor that reports to the ruler of the nearest bigger city. Dwarvish society it pretty much run top down.

But a rigid empire with firm rules doesn´t affect their sense of art and curiosity much. Together with their more earthbound magic the dwarfs are by far the most skilled craftsmen, blacksmiths and engineers of all races. That bummed the highelves alot since they allways saw themselves as the prime species. The dwarfs have created multiple awe aspiring things over time - their biggest inventions were multiple new metalls they crafted from the ores of the Dragonfang mountains, and the abillty to magically alter metall in a way that you can replace limps with it - I´m talking fully funtioning steel hands and legs here. I admit that is an incredibly technology but what all other races are after are their swords, bows, axes and other weapons. The dwarfs hardly ever tell anyone the secrets of how to forge these special metalls, which drives the price for a sword as hard as diamonds, allways sharp enough to shave yourself and as light as a feather through the roofs of their rocky halls.

They allways saw themselves as owners of the continent and look at the other races with a (in their oppinion) healthy dose of suspicion and wariness. In the mountains nobody can take on them, but they know that in the plains, they can be defeated. But they have never showed interest in anythig but mountains, which lead to them allways standing a bit aside of the ongoing dealings of the other races.

The main foodsource of the dwarvish folk are mushrooms that they grow in underground tunnels and odd looking eyeless insects and other horrible creatures they hatch in some lighless dark places in the deeps. But they also have some farms at the surface, far up in the valleys of the mountains. But its a risky job, beeing a dwarvish farmer. The dragonfang mountains did not got their name just because of their looks, but also because of their inhabitants. The Dragons are extremly rare, but just like the Leviathan at sea, the dragons rule the mountains and skies. Until this day there is only one occasion known where a dwarf managed to kill a dragon. But the circumstances are more then just a little shady I can tell you and the hero only showed up with the pretty roughed up head of the beast and the body was never to be found... But i leave the judgement to you on this case.

Woodelves, Snowelves and other tribes

As I mentioned in the history section, the highelves left Nandaahr at the end of the third era. But that doen´t mean all elves were gone. Elves are a very adaptable species. At first, there were only the highelves, but over time, depending on where they lived they changed their ways and looks towards their surroundings. In the forests in the northern heartland around Bregen, in the depths of the woods north of Murkwater Harbour and in the scattered woodlands of the western South you might stumble upon big settlements of elves in the trees. But beware, eventhough they aren´t hostile against humans per se, when stumbling into of their settlements it haven´t ended so well for most intruders. The woodelves are smaller than the highelves and smaller than humans too - yet bigger and more slim than dwarfs. The hair of most of them features some shade of brown and their eyes can be everything from emerald green over amber and gold to brown. They live very close to nature in treehouses that are integrated so well into the trees you only spot them when you are right infront of them. But that doesn´t mean they are harmless - you will hardly find better archers than woodelves and their daggers and blowpipes are very deadly too.

Woodelves don´t have a higher ruler or anything like that, most of them live in small groups of around 50 people, those are most of the time lead by two young persons who deal with everyday life and older priests that seek guidance from the gods and spirits of the forest. In the bigger settlements you will find highpriests that keep up the peace, but apart from taking care of basic organisation and mediating serious feuds they don´t have much influence or interference with the inhabitants lives.
The snow- or frostelves are a mysterious bunch. Even I don´t know much about them - and that should say a lot. Only thing thats known, or that sounds plausible, is that they derived from a group of highelven soldiers that were fleeing the attacks of the dwarfes during some fights between them over the bases that the highelves had set up in the dragonfang mountains without seeking permission first. As I mentioned earlier, elves are very adaptable species and the myth goes that the elves, freezing and starving in a glacial cave, fearing for their lives, started praying to their gods for rescue - and they did answer. Somehow. So the group recieved a vision of a secluded valley even higher up the mountains. In their despair they mobilised their last strenght and crept up the mountains. As soon as the entered the valley, mist rose up and whisper filled the air, mixed with the screams of the elves. But when the mist faded, they woke up and looked at each other. They all looked gaunt and their eyes turned to an unnatural purple or icy grey while their hair turned as white as snow, as did their skin. The last thing they heard from their savior was a whisper "... thank me my children... now go forth, claim your kingdom and worship me..."
That was the last message they ever recieved and that is all that I know about their origin. Oh, and the rumor that there is another group of snowelves living in the frozen finger mountains in the far north.

Fairys

Now here you caught me. There is even less knowledge about the fairys then there is about the snowelves. But I will try to satisfy your curiosity. The fairys are a mysterious race. It seems like they have allways been around, yet never took part in anything. I have knowledge of a few sightings that describe them as childlike figures, some with butterflywings, some with wings like birds, they wear clothes made out of bark and other materials and their language seems to consist of whistles. Some suppose they have magically hidden settlements in remote and isolated places, impossible for other folk to find. Personally I strongly agree with this thesis, sadly nobody ever found such a settlement to back up this claim.
Nevertheless some people who got lost claimed that a fairy showed up and lead them back home, even speaking their language. They resume to be mysterious but if you dig deep enough there are pieces to resolve this puzzle a little. But that is work for another time.

Humans of Nandaahr

The humans ancestors showed up during a terrible storm, 13 ships landed on the northern shores with the first light where today the city of Olim is to be found. More than half of the ships were damaged beyond repair, so the captains decided to scrap and recycle them to build a camp and start a new life. The original camp is long lost, my best guess is that the city Olim just growed over it and burried the remains under its growing quarters.
Not long after they arrived, just like elves and demons before them, they started to explore the continent. And just like the elves, when they tried to enter the orcs territory they got themselves a bloody nose. This was at the peak of the empire of the skies, just decades from its downfall, but the impression of the invincible cavalry stuck with the orcs, so humanity turned westwards.
This way they stumpled over the elves - which weren´t as bloodthirsty as the orcs, or the humans have become a bit more careful - I am not quite sure here. But they did meet and got along pretty well, pretty quickly. That was the start of the big expanse where humans and elves spread throughout the whole of Nandaahr - north of the Dragonfang mountains. A bit after the first ships arrived, some other ships with humans arrived from Andaahr in the region of what is now Masranur. Unlike the other humans they were of a bit darker tone and spoke in a different tongue. Just like the northern human tribes teamed up with the elves, the southern humans bonded with the demons who were delighted to have found allies against their odious elven twins.
Both groups cemented their claim on their lands and time lead eventually up the second battle of the bogs that ended the second and started the third era - on both sides od the Dragonfang mountains the two groups longed after the endless ressources of the mountains and the humans tried their benighted try to cut a chunk out of the dwarven territory.
After humans of the south and north formed a more a less stable alliance to "conquer some mines" they thought their combined powers were to much for the dwarfs... I suppose you remember how the second battle at the bogs ended, right? Once again, the dwarfs came out as winners in their rocky stronghold. But even if they can be shortfused and choleric, Humans tend to learn from their mistakes, in this case especially the southern ones, who not able to get metall from the far north, made peace with the dwarfs and started a lucrative trade for both sides. Exotic food, cloths and other things you wouldn´t find in the mountains in exchange for weapons, armor and metalls.
As a center for that trade the city of Crows Rock was founded. At this point only a lightly fortifies market known as Tazpoks Meadow, after the demon general who set up a warehouse, a brothel and some taverns after the war to make a profit of the growing trade.

Nowadays the human societies are, like the woodelves a very heterogenic mixture. You can roughly differ them by the region they are living in, but even there are some great differences between them.

The North

To start with the north, in the wasteland, outside of Isheim you will only find a few tribes of hunters surviving in the hostile lands, but in the more friendly parts south of Freyas Havn the land hosts a lot of self-goverened settlements of fischermen, traders and hunters. But don´t be fooled by the peaceful look - they are notorious for going rogue once in a while and plunder the coasts further south. In general you got a big difference between the countryside and the cities, the cities in these parts host a lot more traders, mercenaries and craftsmen than the countryside. Especially Freyas Havn is known for its "swords-for-hire" Mercenaryguild called "the sons of Freya". But don´t called them Mercenaies when they hear you, this might cost you a finger or two... Bregen is different from the rest of the north. Its a mixture of southern and northern architecture, culture and people. In Bregen the only there is, is gold. Or atleast the one with by far most influence. The city is all about trade, beside the traders of Olim who rule the seas, the "High Masters of Bregen" control the trading routes on land in this part of the Land right to the routes of the Dragonfang mountains.

The Heartland

As I just mentioned, Bregen is the link between the north and the heartland, so it belongs to both regions in some way.
The heartland gets seperated by the Thaspis sea and so are is the folk that lives here. The west

Maps

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  Nandaahr

  This is the full map of Nandaahr. It was drawn by human scholars, so don´t expect to find the hidden towns of the dwarfs, orcish territory boarders or elvish settlements. But if you dig deep enough in the archives of the arcaneum I will guarantee, you´ll find what you are looking for. Nonetheless this map will give you a good impression of what is where.

Type

Continent

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