Chilmu-Qa (Chill-mu-kah)

Would you believe this place started as a cruise ship?

— Kalas Pascal

City of the Hoarfrost Sea. The City From the Stars. Chilmu-Qa. This settlement on the northernmost shores of the Great Swamp has many names, but those that live there just call it ‘home’.

This city, the largest of the Eltaa settlements, is nestled in the back of Kasro Cove, where the settlement’s foundations came to rest at the end of the Final War. Kasro is just one of the many small inlets along Great Swamp’s northern shoreline; it is also the deepest. The city’s foundations? That is a different story.

A Chaotic Beginning

Chilmu-Qa is unique among the Eltaa settlements because they built it out of the Coalition cruise ship, Intrepid Spirit. The Spirit was one of countless ships that fell to ground during the chaos at the end of the Final War.

This ship, like all vessels of her era, was built to withstand the dimensional portal magics of tesseract gates. It was that robust construction, along with careful navigation and luck, that enabled her to survive crashing into Kasro Cove and the Great Swamp.

Few records survived the years following the Final War. But the Eltaa oral traditions recount the crash. The impact of the Intrepid Spirit was felt kilometers away and cut a deep furrow in Kasro Cove itself. Waves of earth and wetland rolled across that part of the swamp like a tidal wave. Eltaa from nearby smaller towns raced to the crash site. They were able to rescue most of the 4,000 passengers and crew.

Hope From the Ruins

That firestorm of wild magic tore through all dimensional portals at once. Literally at the same time. But somehow, people survived…

— Kalas Pascal

But the damage from the Dark Horde had been done. The passengers and crew were marooned with no way home. Some attempted the long journey overland, but most remained with the Eltaa.

This mix of cultures from across the Worldspace is felt in the blend of Eltaa traditions and beliefs, especially in Chilmu-Qa. It is part of the backbone for the culture of the city, that’s even reflected in its name. Chilmu-Qa, in the ancient Eltaa language, roughly translates to ‘Hearth Home For All’.

Today, the ship’s architecture is the centerpiece of Chilmu-Qa. The cruise ship’s mid to upper decks rise over the city itself to form the remarkable skyline. Lower decks, which were driven below ground on impact with the marshy soil, became the basis of the city’s power grid. Even after 500 years of repairs, the ancient cruise ship’s decks and engines are still in use today.

The city has grown since the initial crash. In the 500 years since, the structure of the Intrepid Spirit has become the city center. The locals have converted decks into housing, city council offices, and even market squares.

Outside Chilmu-Qa

Kasro Cove

This long stretch of inlet is the waterway that connects Chilmu-Qa to the shipping lanes from other Eltaa settlements. In the years that followed the Final War, the early settlers of Chilmu-Qa understood they needed a means to trade with nearby communities. The Great Swamp is perilous to travel at the best of times, which left travel by water.

Most visitors and trade come by water, but since the rediscovery of an ancient, working, Tesseract drive, the rare skyship has appeared over the cove. Chilmu-Qa is still best equipped to deal with water-born vessels, but they have built a new landing platform to handle the few skyships when they arrive.

Chilmu-Qa and the cove by CB Ash using MidJourney AI

One unusual aspect of the cove is the water temperature. Warmed by the geothermal vents from under the Great Swamp, the cove’s water stays warm year round. But in winter, it isn’t unheard of for the mouth of the cove to collect some ice that has washed south from the polar regions of the Hoarfrost Sea.

They’re pretty sensitive to those mini-icebergs when they wander south. Chilmu-Qa send people out, often with a spellworker, to break it up or melt it.

— Kalas Pascal

Founding Date

10 PC

Alternative Name(s)

City of the Hoarfrost Sea, The City From the Stars

Type

City

Population

~ 22,000

Location under

Great Northern Swamp

Demographics by Culture

Eltaa (80%)

Markovians (10%)

Kindarii (5%)

Other (5%)

Common Trade Exports

Crownberries

Kelp wheat

Stonefish

Scalevine

Splatterwort Water Rice

Washiron Ore

Industry, Trade, & Guilds

Emberhammer Mining Cooperative

Sciarlas Fisheries

Humbolt Merchant Company

Aloseth Medical Guild

Marshal’s Guild

Moffett Shipping and Export

Aesgard Spellworker College

Law Enforcement

The Eltaa are a unified people, but have not formed a single, official government or kingdom. To outsiders, the Eltaa settlements are closer to city-states with a shared culture than parts of a collective country.

To ensure locals and visitors follow the laws and regulations of each city, like Chilmu-Qa, the Eltaa use the services of the Marshal’s Guild. Even though the Eltaa are not members of the Markovia Alliance, they have special arrangement with the Guild to act as their lawkeepers.

There is always a yearly debate among Eltaa council meetings about whether to form their own lawkeeper guild, with members drawn from the Eltaa, instead of relying on outsiders like the Marshal’s Guild. The Marshal’s Guild routinely offers their services to train any local lawkeepers, should the Eltaa choose to establish their own law enforcement.

Moss Island Prairie

Just to the southwest, outside of Chilmu-Qa, lies a wide stretch of open terrain and low shrubs subdivided by dozens of narrow, winding waterways. Between the small streams is a wide prairie of water grass that is broken only by the occasional cluster of three to five fog trees.

This entire location may look like a prairie, but it is nothing of the kind. The ‘prairie’ is actually a wide, freshwater lake that has become home to hundreds of moss islands. Some of these soft islands reach hundreds of kilometers across and may even be decades old.

These enormous moss islands act as immense lily-pads and platforms. Locals often use the moss islands as natural rafts to move about the lake when fishing. There are some locals from Chilmu-Qa who charge a fee to ferry travelers from one side of the Moss Island Prairie to the other using long poles and one of the older, more sturdy moss islands.

Mirror Loch

Due south of Chilmu-Qa lies the long, narrow lake known as Mirror Loch. The name comes from the unusually calm water present in the lake that is highly reflective.

At most times of the year, unless it is during a hurricane or similar storm, the surface of the water is completely smooth. This, with the dark hue of the water, gives the lake a glassy or mirror-like quality. Despite the calm nature of the surface, the lake is teeming with life. Below the water, there are seven different varieties of fish, freshwater eels, and a healthy population of kelp otter.

If you listen to the ferry-folk, there’s a lot more than just fish in that lake. Just after the seasonal storms, some folks say they see something large moving through the lake. Big too. Long neck, ship-sized body, almond-shaped head with more teeth than a necromancer at a graveyard…
Not something I want to meet on a dark night.

— Kalas Pascal