Thanalos
Located at the southern end of the great River Road to Tsadar, Thanalos is the southernmost great city on the Plains of Xha and as such is the leading transportation hub of the Xha’en Hegemony. So important is access to and from this city that its great walls were disassembled long ago, leaving the city to sprawl unchecked across the flatlands around it.
A striking combination of modernity and the rustic frontier, Thanalos stands at a crossroads between the urbane north and the wild south. The old city — that portion of Thanalos that lies within the old, now-demolished walls — boasts many magnificent structures that date back to before the founding of the Hegemony, carefully maintained and repaired by the city’s leaders. A near-religious respect for the past is common among Thanalos’ nobility, for many have ancestries that can be traced back thousands of years. This backward-looking attitude stands somewhat at odds with the rest of the city, which is inhabited by thousands of new arrivals, many from such distant lands as the Utterends. Here, buildings are built overnight, shops and stalls crowd the chaotic streets, trade caravans are constantly coming and going, and the population rises and falls unexpectedly. The focus is on the future, on expansion and on new ways of living, doing business, and making money. As the stodgy nobles remain in their ancient buildings dreaming of the past, the city’s new inhabitants have created a vital and chaotic society where almost anything can be bought and sold, crime runs rampant and fortunes can be made and lost in the course of a single day.
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