The White Chests

The White Chests are a widespread and well-organized ring of fences, smugglers and transportation experts operating outside of the legal customs and taxation structures of the nations where they are found. They commonly recruit and employ savvy Aeldic humanoids including Orcs, Lizardmen and Tabaxi in addition to the Gazaf races (Human, Elven, Dwarven, etc). They excel at seeming perfectly normal and unremarkable, and in so doing, permit a worldwide black market trade in all illicit goods, from stolen property to slaves, gunrunning and controlled substances.
Identifiers: Rather than any physical marks that might stand out or draw attention, Chesters use various code words or otherwise unremarkable physical actions in the Thieves Cant and other mannerisms, to ensure the secrecy of their identity to anyone outside of the organization. Likewise their billing and payment structure involves dead drops and off-books banking (often with the assistance of members of the Yellow Fingers whose specialty is illicit cash, currency and accounting).

Structure

Very organized modular structure based on Imperial territories and, outside the empire, on whatever the local governmental units are. Each large region is broken down into efficient sub-units to the level of a small village or in a larger city, an area comprising a few blocks, easily managed in a single day by a given team of 2-4 shippers. The network uses transit through the underdark and the air, as well as by sea and land, and if the stories are to be believed, even transit across planes; in all cases they rely heavily on reliable, loyal, and well-paid 'invisibles', a great deal of whom are also crossovers in the Obscurati or even the Vox Hermetica, the primary keepers of and traders in secrets across the world and the planes, respectively. Much like a true underground railroad, people are just people until their specific location is involved in transit in or out; then the shippers do their shipping promptly and efficiently, handing off to the next set of shippers and returning to their daily business with no one the wiser, 99 out of 100 times.

Public Agenda

The White Chests are the hands and feet of an even more shadowy organization known as the Obscurati, who are spies and informants in all walks of life and all social classes, and who are in turn closely associated with the Steel Reciters. The role of the Chests is in the critical transportation of actual things to actual places, rather than trade in secrets, but the two are almost always inextricably linked in actual fact. Often the thing being moved is payment, occasionally stolen goods or contraband arms or liquor, and sometimes slaves, though the slave networks have their own means of moving product as well and the occasional linking of a White Chest operation to a government informant encourages slave traders to ply their dangerous but lucrative trade elsewhere.

Assets

The White Chests prefer the anonymity of public transport to the uniqueness of private, as their main goal in addition to moving a thing from point A to point B is for no one else to notice anything is moving at all. Presumably they do have their vaults of money, well-guarded no doubt, as well as funds in banks and purchased assets on their private books, but the nature of their work is such that positive identification is very difficult. The sheer size of their organization suggests that they are very well funded from unknown and likely various sources across the Orbis and possibly across the planes.

"Keep it moving."

Type

Illicit, Syndicate

Alternative Names

White Barrels, Slipdips