Rudena Clocks

Rudena Clocks, invented by elven arcanist and engineer Kimita ie Rudena, are colossal seven handed tower clocks synced across the Esiteshi Empire. In addition to telling time, Rudena Clocks are capable of conveying information about its location, currently used to communicate military situation, the weather, and national events from city to city.

Reading the Clock

The Rudena Clock has no number directly at the top or bottom, left or right. Instead the 2, 5, 8, 11 positions point at perfect 45 degree angles.

Time

Season Hand: Tipped with a sun ornament reaching outside all of the other hands, it shows the passage of the year, the top right quadrant the spring, going clockwise around. Short Hand: 12 Hour division of 1 day. 1 hour = 2 conventional hours. The equinox sunrise in the capital is set to the 1 position. Each following hand also changes the greater hand at this position.
Long Hand: 24 Minutes per Hour. 1 minute = 5 coventional minutes
Spider's Hand: 300 seconds per minute. 1 second = 1 second. The hand has an extra joint in it, which revolves 1/5 per second, the rest of the hand advancing 1/60 after each revolution of the extra joint.

Weather

Relative to the expected weather of the season, the clock will detect the temperature and humidity. A hand tipped with an ornament shaped like the outline of a leaf goes up for hot, down for cold, left for dry, and right for wet. When rain or snow falls, the leaf turns opaque.

Military

Manually set by a guard posted in the tower, this hand shaped like an ornate sword almost always points down. This hand moves anti-clockwise in almost all situations. To a perceptive person, even in the background the reverse ticking of the clock should alert something is wrong. When the hand reaches its position, the guard will blow a great horn, magically amplified by the clock.

Low: No Crisis
Low-Mid: Forces Spotted
Mid (Right): Enemies Identified/Approaching
Mid-High: Battle Unavoidable
High: Battling Enemies
Left: City Taken, Evacuating

National Events

Though almost always locked in place facing to the sky, a small central hand in the shape of the crown can show the death or passing of an emperor. This is yet to come into play as the Emperor has not died nor passed the throne to another soul.

Inter-City Communication

Using Entangled Glyphs and Inscriptors, the time of the clocks are matched to the capital each day at midnight. This is transmitted through a chain of cities all linking back to the capital Ritunesia. Using this same network, the weather and military status of each city adjacent in its respective chain is communicated. This means in a chain Ritunesia - A - B - C - D, C would receive the time through A and then B. C would be able to see the weather and military situation of both B and D. Any crisis in D at the border would be transmitted all the way back to the capital in reverse order. In implementation, the interior of a city's clocktower contains small replicas of the clocks in its adjecent cities.

This system means that the capital has fairly spread out data on the weather across the empire, and can moniter the border through the implementation of these clocks. Because of its great advantages, they have become standard as one of the first things built in a newly conquered city under the empire.

Hijacking the glyph system of one of these clocks, individuals can and have been able to transmit simple messages to one another using a pre-devised code. This has been put to great use by the Hobbit Independence movement.