The Hub is a unique demilitarized vassal state: a large region jointly held by all four of the old world’s major powers - the Kingdom of Clairnia, the Jaknian Conglomerate, the Lexalian Republic, and the Holy Theocracy of Olympus. The land had been home to many ancient countries before it was demilitarized and repurposed into a single, jointly managed neutral territory by the first treaty of its kind in the world’s history.
History
The Hub occupies lands with a long and turbulent past. They were once the heart of Loreshia, the nature-worshipping realm that collapsed after the great demon-flood of 731, leaving the region without a single ruler for some seven hundred years. In that long interregnum many powers rose and fell: the Kingdom of Swadia held the north for roughly three centuries until 1300, while the Sarranid Sultanate - which had bound together five of the area’s seven great tribes - held the south until it fractured in 1078 into the rival states of Vageria and Umalia, with the Bazani and Perzakati tribes holding the lands around Sinope.
One by one these realms fell to the four great powers. Jaknia absorbed Umalia by 1150; the Theocracy and Clairnia carved up Vageria between them along the mountains; and the Lexalian Republic, after years of raids, finally conquered Swadia in 1300. The borders the four powers now shared became a tinderbox of political and military friction. Voices in every nation called for peace talks and for some way to prevent “the next Ma’ar”; the idea of a jointly held demilitarized zone was floated - only to be nearly abandoned, for no nation trusted its neighbours. It was the appearance of the Girl of the Volcano and the outbreak of the War of Horrors that finally forced their hands, and the four powers signed the Verra Accords.
The Verra Accords
The Hub exists because of the Verra Accords - signed in 1519 and ratified again in 1540, and known in different circles as the Verra Treaty or the Verra Agreement, and nicknamed in political circles the Clint Accords. The treaty was the outcome of enormous effort by parties in all four countries, initiated and led by Achilius Clint.
After years of territorial disputes, a series of proxy skirmishes, and trade embargoes, the Accords created the Hub as a shared territory - providing much-needed reprieve from conflict and allowing the world to focus on the War of Horrors. The Accords laid out five key principles:
- No single nation may claim sovereignty over the Hub, neither by force nor by political or economic means.
- All cities are to be governed by Councils of Five - one representative from each nation and one elected local.
- Military presence is strictly limited and symbolic, with two notable exceptions:
- Armies may move through the Hub so long as the purpose is declared and the movement is notified in advance.
- Peacekeeping forces may be sent in only if the purpose is declared in advance, and only if all four countries agree to send equal forces in strength and number for the same purpose.
- Trade must remain open and taxed equally - the most vague of the five principles, and the one most subject to scrutiny and circumventive legislation.
- Law in the Hub upholds all four of the signed countries’ charters of law. Intended to keep any one nation from holding too much sway, this principle became the origin of the concept of international law.
Governance
Each major city in the Hub is governed by a Council of Five:
- 1 delegate from Clairnia - usually a baron with strong ties to a duke, skilled in political maneuvering and information gathering.
- 1 delegate from Jaknia - a conglomerate-backed magnate or industrious merchant, always with scholarly degrees and expertise in trade negotiation and bookkeeping.
- 1 delegate from the Lexalian Republic - often a veteran or tribal chieftain with a proven battle record and ties to existing warrior infrastructures.
- 1 delegate from the Theocracy - usually a priest or elected emissary with religious insight and ties to the ruling party.
- 1 local representative - drawn from the prominent local populace, and traditionally chosen by the outgoing local representative (a custom begun when the cities’ former mayors each named their successor’s local seat), often in a manner that lets the other delegates exert subtle or overt control over them.
Day-to-day governance covers local trade, law enforcement, and public order; mediating foreign disputes within city limits; enforcing the terms of the Verra Accords; and regulating traffic to and from the New World through the port at Teremisis.
In practice the Councils are frequently deadlocked. Decisions require a majority of three of five, and the national representatives often vote along political lines. This makes the local vote a kingmaker, and local elections are hotbeds of interference, bribery, and even sabotage.
Under the Edict of Verra (the formal legal text of the Accords), the four faiths hold equal standing: every Hub city must raise a temple to each of the four religions, and the worship of any god outside them is technically a crime - though one enforced far more loosely here than in, say, the Theocracy. Trade, too, is taxed by the four nations rather than the cities, so a good may be banned or heavily taxed in Teremisis yet perfectly legal and untaxed in Verra. Large ventures - above all the New World port - are taxed directly by the four powers rather than the local councils; yet none of them controls the ships that sail to the New World or the port itself, which is precisely why the project draws such fierce interest.
Economy
The Hub runs an entrepôt economy. It produces very little of its own; its economic function rests entirely on its status as a neutral intermediary, thriving by facilitating trade, providing services to merchants, and serving as the physical meeting point of the world’s major economic blocs.
Its unstated strategy is to remain too important for any single nation to risk destroying, and the local representative’s key role is to break deadlocks in ways that maximize prosperity for the Hub’s actual residents.
- Trade & Logistics - warehousing, shipping offices, and customs brokerage are the primary businesses. The port at Teremisis is the single most important economic asset in the region.
- Services - a vast service economy caters to travelers: inns, taverns, stables, courier services, banks, currency exchanges, legal services specializing in international contract law, and information brokers.
- Black Market - the tangled legal system and the convergence of powerful interests make the Hub a natural breeding ground for smuggling, espionage, and the trade of illicit goods and information.
The Hub’s exports are essentially re-exports - goods from other nations passing through it - together with the intangible “service of neutrality,” which it sells in the form of secure trade. Its imports are, simply, everything: goods from all four nations, and people of every kind - merchants, diplomats, spies, adventurers, and anyone looking to make a fortune or disappear at the crossroads of the world.
Present Day
By 1540 the Hub has become the quiet battleground of the whole old world. Each of the four powers, nursing its own post-war wounds, works to keep the zone unstable - whether to thwart its rivals or to stop any one of them from seizing control. Amid them all moves the Center, a society grown from the zone’s most ambitious adventurers, whose influence over local affairs runs deeper than its modest public face suggests. Caught in the middle, the Councils of Five are bribed from every direction at once.
Cities
The Hub’s governing cities include Verra, the City of Raven, and Teremisis, with the trade road running on through Haymerkate and the Senegarte Pass.
The Hub
Link to originalThe Hub
Politics
Government The Council of Five Organizations The Center The Trismagistus The Emporium Recollectors