Ag Dwan Palace

Home of the High Council

This place has been built, rebuilt, and renovated so many times... we're not even sure what's inside it anymore.

— Palace Maintenance Staff

In the pollution riddled capital of Hansun known as Sansu-Sesu, on the city's southern mountain range containing the only bit of land to rise above the smog, is the royal home of the High Council -- Ag Dwan Palace. The tall, complex, and multilayered structure is one of the oldest buildings within the city, originally constructed thousands of years ago, though it has long since resembled anything near the original design; in fact, it's been destroyed, rebuilt, or modified so many times that there exists no complete set of plans or documents of the building anymore.
The Palace is home to all 12 members of the High Council, as well as any and all servants each member might need. Within the building's complex layout of rebuilt rooms, boarded up halls, and secret passages are all the spaces required for them to live, meet, and decide the fate of Hansun.

Palace Exterior

Ag Dwan Palace has been destroyed by fire three times -- twice by lightning, and once by invading forces from a country to the south. Each time the structure has fallen, it's been rebuilt with as many of the original materials in as close an approximation to the original as possible; when not, the closest facsimile to the originals are used. When the palace experiences renovations, of which it has fully undergone a total of 4 times, these similar materials are again used to build upon, improve, or simply fix that which already exists within the building.
The result is a palace that is mostly cohesive in aesthetic -- yet with obvious seams, tears, and grafted segments upon it. For the most part it's built out of wood and stone; with a selection of vibrant paints applied to much of the exterior to bring the entire structure to life.

Massive lengths of timber are used for structural members such as columns and beams, usually painted in some form of bright red or green; it's these pieces of wood that hold the entire structure up. Spanning between these are smaller pieces of wood forming the joists, trusses, and other smaller pieces of structure that form the armature of the palace -- giving more strength to the build, and also providing enough material for the wooden panelling used as cladding for the building to be mounted onto.
All of this brightly painted and complexly assembled wood sits atop of, and sometimes surrounded by, a pristine white stone that's been carved into large block chunks. The stone forms the foundation, most of which is still original, as well as a series of low walls that more of the palace is built on top of.

by Daniel Bernard

Creation

377 AW

Size

10,307 sq. m.

Destruction

405 & 1392 & 2427 AW

Capital City

Sansu-Sesu is one of the few large cities in Cathedris that is able to claim its founding date to be right around, or right after, the world nearly ended during The Seven Day War. It formed from a small enclosed community built for protection against the Rendlings, and it's been the capital of Hansun for thousands of years.

High Council

Hansun, and therefor Sansu-Sesu as well, is ruled over by the High Council -- a group of 12 elites that form the executive and legislative branches of Hansun's government. Unknown to most, this council was secretly taken over by the Legion in order to further the organization's own interests.

by note thanun

The Original Construction

How in Miyu's good grace did they haul everything up here back then?

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— Erin, age 14, on a school tour

When Ag Dwan Palace was first built, it was decided at the time that the city needed a grand structure at the highest point within city limits to both symbolize the strength of the people from Sansu-Sesu, as well as create a perch from which all may be watched, so as to be better prepared for attacks and invasions. However, this location had no trees large enough to harvest for good quality structural lumber, and none of the stone atop the mountains was in good condition for building firm foundations. Thus, every beam, every column, every massive block of pristine white stone, each piece had to be hauled all the way up from the plains below.
After the first few months of painstakingly slow progress, construction was halted in favour of a new temporary project: an early version of a gondola system was created, allowing for much easier transportation of goods up the mountainside. It wasn't much more than a few heavy timber columns with rope strung between them and a system of pulleys to operate, but it did manage to substantially increase the rate of construction. The gondola system wasn't anywhere near safe enough for workers to use to ascend (though that didn't stop some from trying and dying) so most people still made the trek up the mountain while their materials got pulled up by those workers who were already at the top.

The Original Plans

From the very beginning, Ag Dwan Palace was intended to be a place for governance and observation, somewhere that those who ruled could learn, decree, and watch over that which they dictate. Sleeping quarters for all 12 of the council members, as well as space for their servants and families, were some of the first rooms to be designed for the palace.
Multiple meeting, eating, and bathing rooms were initially planned for as well in order to support the number of residents that'd be staying in the palace. These were all tied together with a series of hallways that wove their way throughout the structure, organizing themselves radially around 3 inner courtyards, one of which, the largest, featured an extensive vegetable garden. Finally, as if it was meant to fill in the gaps left by that which came before, a winding and complex library comprised of a series of small rooms and passages filled the remainder of the space.

by note thanun

"As Builts"

"It should be right here!" Sherry dropped the roll of papers on the table in exasperation. She looked in frustration at the wall in front of her -- the long, expansive, unadorned wooden wall, free from any openings whatsoever.
Her colleague, leaning against the table they'd set up in the hall, quietly unfurled the roll of papers -- the "up to date as-built plans" that they had been given.
"Are you sure..." he began, tracing his finger along the faded lines and hard to decipher annotations. He was interrupted before he could finish the thought by a sudden sound, however, as Sherry began repeatedly knocking on the wall in various places. The colleague looked down at the plans quickly, before glancing back up at the wall Sherry was knocking on.
*Knock knock knock* came the sound.
"Do... you think the room is still--" started the coworker again, but Sherry shushed him.
"Quiet, Bo, I need to listen carefully here." *Knock knock knock*
Sherry continued down the hall they were in a few more steps, knocking on the wall every so often and listening to the sound it made. *Knock knock knock* came the sound, again and again.
*Knock knock knock*
*Knock knock thunk*
"Ha!" Sherry let out a triumphant laugh. "I knew it. Eric owes me a beer. I told him there's no way these plans are accurate."
Bo let out a small cheer, but cut his celebration short as a realization came to him. "Wait, but, if the room is boarded up... how are we supposed to get in there? How are we supposed to install the boiler?"
Sherry turned around, bringing her attention back to her younger coworker. Her face was aglow in a mischievous smile, one that Bo had seen a few to many times already since starting this job.
"Bo... go grab us a couple hammers. We've got carpentry to do."

~

The two stood catching their breath as the dust settled around them. The wall had been substantially harder to tear down than expected, as the wood was still incredibly strong and seemed to have some sort of plaster backing to it that added strength and created copious amounts of dust when broken.
"Okay, perfect. That should be wide enough to fit the equipment in through. This room is right below the main water line, perfect for the boiler, and it should have tons of space inside for us to set everything--" this time, Sherry cut herself off.
She peered in through the clearing dust cloud, into the supposedly empty room, and saw that it wasn't the empty abandoned room they had been told at all. Instead, the space appeared to be some kind of richly decorated library. Luxurious and comfortable looking chairs, bookshelves lining the walls filled with countless old volumes and texts, and ornate tables with candle holders filled the small space.
Everything was covered in a thick layer of dust -- it was clear no one had used this room in ages.
Sherry sighed. "Great, another thing these plans were wrong about."
Bo looked shocked at the room and it's decor; this was still his first week working on Ag Dwan Palace, and he hadn't quite yet learned what sort of surprises the building has in store for those that work within it. Sherry, on the other hand, had just celebrated her 10 year anniversary working maintenance on the building.
"Well, we're not putting the boiler in here." She said shaking her head. "Instead it looks like we've found yet another library. I think that puts this palace up to 4 separate ones now -- including the main library that seems to wind through the whole building."
Sherry looked wistfully at the heavy steel contraption they had carted up to the floor they were on, thinking about how much of a pain it was to carry it through the winding halls and tight, cramped passageways.
"We'll deal with the boiler later." She finally said, like a long frustrated breath being drawn out. "Find some other hopefully empty room to put it."
She put a hand to the rough opening they had ripped open into the wall. "If this had been any other space, I'd say we leave it like this, but..." Sherry looked in at the dust covered books. "The council and the librarians will probably want to know about this place."
She ripped off a chunk of wood that was overly sharp, poking out from the edge of the opening. "Let's go grab the rest of our tools, and some supplies. Time to turn this rough opening into a door. Then we go tell the council what we found."

The Modern Palace

Every time it has been rebuilt, the layout has shifted and changed slightly. Every single renovation made to the existing structure has added, modified, or removed things that not everyone knew about or recorded. Each change, each reconstruction, has been done without knowing the full original picture; the modern day Ag Dwan Palace is a complicated labyrinth of forgotten rooms and inaccurate drawings that are enough to drive any architect, engineer, or grounds maintenance officer utterly mad.

The Current Layout

Everything is in just slightly different enough locations from their origin placement that the original plans are now essentially useless; new versions of these exist that have tried to keep updated on what's changed over the long history of the palace, but none have been able to fully capture the extent of all the differences.
The sleeping quarters and living spaces are mostly in the same positions, but a secondary set of halls have been added connecting them all together, mostly boarded up and forgotten about, save for a few entrances that remain as secret passages. The main library has tripled in size as well, as the council continues to expand the space as they collect more and more books, and require yet more storage for the documents they produce themselves.
Old rooms have been boarded up, and many projects left incomplete, as the palace continues to be worked on forever more.

by David Ford

Outside the Palace

Far removed from the main structure itself, located all the way down at the base of the mountain and on the nearby slopes, a series of guard towers and living quarters for the clerical staff that work at the palace can be found. It also has a small plaza, parade grounds, and announcements square for sharing news and making new decrees. Jutting out from this area is a massive avenue that cuts straight through the capital city, all the way to the other end of it -- the so called Royal Avenue put in place within the last 100 years by the High Council.

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