Thriving
The tower-city of Thriving is Anicoja's jewel and most prominent Wonder of Anicoja, set only a couple miles northeast of the Heliotrope Cliffs in the center of the Jungle of Queens, where the ruins were built to their highest, most grandiose, and most likely to have been previously inhabited in any large number... which is the same structure that, unbeknownst to all but the scholars of the ancients at the time of its founding, is the very monument dedicated to the Siren that brought everyone to Inom. They don't know how it did that and they don't know how to make it stop doing that.
Thriving has, of course, been heavily personalized by its inhabitants. Slums, markets, and farms spill from Thriving's base like a woman bleeding from the feet to support its ever-booming population. The rectangular wooden shacks of merfolk clash with the octagonal riverstone roosts of the zaobascai and the hexagonal rubywax silo-hives of the xon.
Within the base of the tower itself are the finer stores, the workshops, the warehouses that guards actually protect, and the administrators. Thriving keeps its roads to the base wide enough for any itinerant trader to know exactly where to go and bypass the growth.
The middle of the tower is where less savory elements have set up. Being that Thriving's rulers are mostly white-collar criminals who were unlikable and uninfluential enough to actually get sent to prison for what they did, these elements are not illegal at all. Need slaves? Need someone dead? Need to know someone's secrets? Need a new drug to replace the stuff you can't get anymore? Come to Thriving's Waist.
Said white-collar criminals live up at the top of Thriving, near the Siren, where the digs are spacious and the view incredible. New vacancies always being made; check often! Just don't try and usurp Idony, Empress of Thriving, or you will be making one of said vacancies. Here the view is loveliest, overlooking both Sirenside Gorge and the Lake Heliotrope it feeds.
Demographics
Mostly merfolk, with large populations of other Anicojan survivor species as well. Class runs the gamut from beggars and urchins to self-styled noblewomen, as one would expect from the largest city on the continent.
Government
Idony is the Empress, but she doesn't do much ruling without an opportunity to put her name and face on anything (see: the thirteenth month on the calendar, Idonea; or the currency of Thriving, the Idon) or to assert her royalty.
The feuding nobles tend to drive the rest of the "legal sytem". An aversion to both law and labor leads to the spiritual equivalent of laws being the orders given to the enforcers of their private interests. Taxes range from unenforced out in the slums to steeply-written to antagonize other nobles. Defense of assets and investigations into offenses are handled entirely privately. Industries disregard regulations carelessly, right until someone gets sick of losing fingers and decides to take over and run things differently. It's a hellscape to navigate.
Defences
It's tall, made of stone, and the people who have anything to defend live (and the means to do so) at the highest point. That's pretty much all they need.
Industry & Trade
Thriving operates on no single industry. It's the most technologically-advanced, most populous, and most species-diverse place on Anicoja; of course it has a little of everything. And if it doesn't dominate any market for consumer goods, luxuries, military protection, or slaves, sheerly by virtue of possessing those industries, you'll still probably find what you need in some shop or connection's collection.
Thriving's largest trade partner is Hojaos on the Codacote, as either city offers commodities the other can't due to their native biomes. Cargo goes over Bowl Ridge either through the Northeastern Chip or by cargo hauler stopping at Mammit.
Infrastructure
Thriving mostly stacks everything it has on top of whatever the ancients erected in the tower. The plumbing and ventilation are surprisingly advanced for a society which, near as the archaeologists can tell, never developed firearms. Thriving was already designed for easy access to the top through stairs and some still-functioning elevators, though more powerful persons have had their offices and homes equipped with their own new elevators.
Warehouses, shops, and factories are crammed into any rooms whose original purpose is unclear or irrelevant. Thrivers are known for being able to fit a windmill in a cardboard box, as the saying goes.
Assets
The ancients left a lot of Gleam-made stuff in the tower. If there's need of untarnishing jewelry, there's plenty of it here. Of course, they're also the richest city in Anicoja.
Guilds and Factions
Just about every faction has some stake in Thriving's politics. Of note are:
The Redspawn/Beet-Red's Mercenary Company: A family/tribe/mercenary organization who will accept any contract that doesn't put Redspawn against Redspawn.
The Pit Mistresses & The Herdswomen: The two biggest slaving companies around; one unprincipled and the other the opposite.
History
Thriving had been "settled" for ages. There were recluses, hermits, and asylum-seekers clustered around and inside its Feet, subsisting off of forage and small gardens. But when the merfolk arrived and saw the giant tower like their own ancient skyscrapers, Thriving was doomed to become a metropolis. It expanded rapidly--rather, it expands rapidly to this day--its population booming and its luxuries attracting migrants from all throughout Anicoja. It was Idony Blaine's rather peaceful march on Thriving in 7 APB that began this period of growth.
Idony Blaine formally declared herself Empress of Thriving on the first of the month she named after herself, Idonea, in 10 APB, back when its population could be counted in the hundreds, but nearing thousands.
One of the more notable later migrations was back in the year 15 APB, when Beet-Red decided to relocated her entire tribe to Thriving, where she could operate from a central position and receive contracts from all manner of cutthroats.
Architecture
It's the husk of a beautiful, intricate, ancient stone tower, decked and draped in jungle wood and silk to suit the needs of its new owners. The new additions take all manner of forms, for all the different occupant species, though the ancients' style tends to be most popular in the upper reaches of Thriving.
Geography
Thriving sits not far from the western Heliotrope Cliffs, and not far north of Scion's Fall. Sirenside Gorge limits expansion south.
Natural Resources
All that's left to take is the soil the slummers garden upon.
Alternative Name(s)
Siren City/City of Sirens (mostly poetic/literary)
Type
Large city
Population
Several million people live in Thriving, mostly in its slums. The tower proper contains just under a million.
Inhabitant Demonym
Thriver
Location under
Included Locations
Owner/Ruler
Owning Organization
Related Tradition (Primary)
Characters in Location
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