Shirai

Shirai is the most populous city on the island of Kenta Kara and the second most populous city in the Lightpoint Lands. Shirai is a major port city and trading hub, situated neatly between the Tribal Lands and their coastal trading routes to the east, and the massive city of Leskavod on the Southwestern edge of the Lightpoint Lands.

Council of the High Sea Ronin

Shirai is ruled by an elected council among the various members of the mixture naval and pirate fleet called the Sea Ronin. These Ronin, each a captain of their ship and the master of all laws and rules while aboard their ship, elect among them seven High Ronin to serve on land for a period of time. This task is considered far more of a duty than an honor, as most Sea Ronin prefer the currents and swells of the ocean to the stink and circumstance of the city proper.
High Ronin serve alternating terms of fourteen years, with a new High Ronin appointed every two years. High Ronin may serve an unlimited number of terms, though most only desire the one term, given its longevity. It is considered bad form and dishonorable to elect a High Ronin who does not wish to serve a second term to the same, and the few times in the history it has happened, it was done as a punishment.
High Ronin Councillors are appointed to one of seven different fields of control: The Executor of Justice, tasked with administering and maintaining order on the island of Kenta Kara; the Shell of the Island, tasked with ensuring the Island of Kenta Kara always has a robust military response should any enemy ever make landfall; the Master of the Mounts, tasked with keeping the cavalries of the justice and defense stocked with well-bred horses and other mounts; the Steward of the City, tasked with organizing civic projects and festivals within the city of Shirai and the towns down the Peasant Road, as well as administering the elections of new High Ronin; the Administrator of the Scales, tasked with ensuring fair trade and administering taxes and regulations within the city; the Keeper of the Swans, tasked with ensuring a symmetry between nature and civilization on the island, ensuring that the woods are always replanted, species of fish are not threatened, and mines are not too quickly stripped; and finally, the Architect of the Roads, a quasi-religious and somewhat mercurial position officially tasked with maintaining the Royal Road for pilgrimages to the Cave of the Four Pillars.

Rise of the Sea Ronin

In an age past, the city of Shirai was simply a town of peaceful Tortles, who traded caught fish and chopped wood with the nearby Half-Orcs of the mountains in exchange for iron forged tools for tilling the fields and building fishing ships. This peace and prosperity lasted for centuries, until the coming of an evil empire from the South. Though the true name of this empire has been lost to time, most refer to them as the Empire of the Snakes.
When the Empire of the Snakes arrived from the south, they came with fire and steel, robbing the villagers of their wealth and slaughtering all but the elderly and young, though of the former, they took many back with them as slaves. Hundreds of terrible stories of their deeds are told to children in their beds in the city of Shirai. Some say the Empire would ritualistically blind their captured slaves with a terrible bright light, before taking them back south for unholy rituals. Others say they would seal all of the parents in a single building, usually the town hall in the center of Shirai, and burn them all alive, chanting and giving thanks as the poor villagers burned.
So this went for centuries, until finally, the Tortles tired of rebuilding, and the Half-orcs tired of losing their closest allies and friends. Together, they formed the Sea Ronin, an naval order unrivaled in all of Wonder. Carefully crafted ships, built from the finest wood and armored in the toughest iron, were made, and this new fleet made war over the Twin Seas of Many Islands and Illusions.
It wasn't until the Prophets of the Four Pillars emerged from the cave, with their secret truths about the Sea of Illusions, that the tides turned in the Sea Ronin's favor. Armed with these new secrets, the Sea Ronin we're able to ambush and destroy the fleets of the invading Empire. Eventually, the Empire of Snakes faded from history, but the Sea Ronin and the city of Shirai lived on, dedicated to naval piracy and protection of the island of Kenta Kara for all time.
This is the history as written and taught in Shirai and the greater island. Because of this shared cultural history, the city of Shirai maintains a fierce independence from mainland Volkyr, kept in place by the veneration of their Sea Ronin.

Growth into a Port City

It has been a few millennia since that time of war. In that time, Shirai has grown from a primarily Tortle fishing town to a prosperous, multicultural city, with architecture reflective of its Tortle roots. Beautifully carved aqueducts carry fresh water to every district of the city, and in some districts, the roads are replaced with waterways, carrying travelers in flat bottomed pole boats.
The city's waterfront district is the most raucous, rambunctious, and wealthy in all of the world, or so the denizens of the city would have you believe. Along the coastline, hundreds of yards docks are not enough for the plethora of boat traffic moving in and out of the city. For this reason, a single water, large enough to fit two galleys, cuts the city in half, itself lined with stone docks built directly into the city. Still, ships seeking to dock or leaving with wares or in search of plunder number in the hundreds outside the city at all times, a sight that stretches to the horizon when viewed from the docks.
Inside the city, rounded stone buildings ranging from two to five stories are roofed with oval shells varying greatly in composition, color, and texture. Some roofs are jagged, misshaped pyramids of bright green streaked in yellow, whereas others are smooth and pale red. The streets themselves are painted turquoise along the roads that run the coastlines, and are often decorated in salacious graffiti, a tradition among the Sea Ronin and their crewmen when at port in the city.

Shops & Activities

Along the coastlines of the city, on the turquoise roads, all things can be found if given enough time. The roads themselves are pakced with carts, peddlers performer, leaving prospective buyers walking shoulder to shoulder among the shouts and sales. Stone storefronts send their salespeople into the crowd, attempting to, "steer the current," as they call it, to bring those walking the road into their shop. In the evening, the many brothels and alehouses make merry until just before the dawn of the next day, pausing only to sleep for a few hours before resuming when the rooster lets out its cry.
In districts deeper in the city, more scholarly and magical pursuits are available to the prospective learner. The Century Stone is a four storied round building painted in broad bands of green, yellow, and red, within which is housed one of the World of Wonder's greatest library. In the bowels of this building, wizards scribe scrolls and scholars ink tomes of the histories of the World of Wonder, fed by tales told from Sea Ronin who have taken their ships to the Edges of Wonder.

The Royal Road & the Peasant Road

The two major roads leading from the city are known as the Royal Road and the Peasant Road, respectively, though no monarch has ever ruled Shirai in their written histories. These names instead apply to the purpose of the road; those elected to an office of High Ronin must walk the Royal Road as part of their appointment ceremony, and the peasant road leads to the various towns and villages that make up eastern Kenta Kara.
The Royal Road is thin, only wide enough for a single cart, for trade is forbidden along the Royal Road. Miner's from the town of Aragon to the northeast use dirt paths that run parallel to the road to bring ores from the mountains down to Shirai and its neighboring towns. The road itself is reserved exclusively for Sea Ronin pilgrims walking from Shirai to the Cave of the Four Pillars. The road itself is made of perfectly cut brick, squared and dyed bright red.
The Peasant's Road, by contrast, is four times as wide as the Royal Road and made of cobblestones dyed a vast array of different colors. The quiet of a walk along the Royal Road stands in stark contrast to the constant hustle and bustle of the Peasant's road, where wagons carry goods to and from the villages and towns on the east of Kenta Kara.

Type

City