Finally

Gladiatorial City

  Dradinu, know as the Gladiatorial City, is a small city builded in the Continent at north of the Sorowfull River by human iis (involuntary immigrants) who came to Sharitarn before the time when Earth became the planet affected by the vortex. Even before the forest people’s home planet be the one touched by the intercosmic phenomenon.

    The original citizens of Dradinu used the last remains of a old wall builded by a long lost empire to place their city in high and solid ground. By the time when Draninu was founded it was in the border of a Xar scar, beyond the reach of magic. A few centuries after that the land healed and magic became once more available, but when that happened the Gladiatorial City was already well organized and well armed enough to survive the inevitable changes.

      The Dradi’s original planet, Naar, is a place were all mammals and most other animals are  hermafrodites. Each person up there is both male and female, and their descendants naturally keep that characteristic. In general they are tall and strong, with small breasts and no beard, have blond hair and brown skin.  

    Only a few Dradi are born with one sex, either male or female; in their peoples’s home planet they would be considered carriers of a genetic disease and sterilized as newborns. Both male and female people were treated with pity and condescension by their societies. In Sharitarn the male Dradi are normally sent to friendly nations as diplomats, or enter merchant caravans, since they have little chance to find a place in their home land. Female Dradis have a hard time in their city as well, but leave in obviously more complicated for them.

    Naar has no magic, like the people of Sharitarn understand it. They may have a little more ostensive magic than Earth or  the forest people’s home planet, but their tales about that can easly be just fantasy.

  As for tecnology the last people who came from the vortex from up there described developments about as advanced as the ones know by the humanity on Earth in 2095. Clean energy beyond the possibilities of use for it, a global net of public transport fast and confortable. Is impossible to know what has hapenned on Naar since that time; the subject is a classic theme for literature and other arts on Dradinu, some paint extremelly positive scenarios, others terrible nightmares.

   Despite their advanced medicine and their even more advanced farming sciences the people on Naar don’t know the populational catastrophic situation endured by humanity on Earth. They have the popularity of violent sports to thank for their confortable populational stability.

  The same deadly entertainment, practiced more or less of then by every normal person on Naar, gave them a chance to gain freedom and conquer a land to build their city. Luck and good choices made that chance flourish.

   Unlike the natives of Earth the people on Naar had little to no unemployment. On most planet they adopted a caste system not very diferent to the one they found (and we still see) on civilized places of Sharitarn. By that system individuals unable to find a activity useful for society never survived more than a year.

   One important diference between Naar and Sharitarn is that in Dradi’s home planet by the time the vortex still touched it there was no slavery. That’s one thing the founders of Dradinu adapted to in order to build a viable home in their new planet. Even today they have fewer circunstances were a citizen can be slaved than any other human city in the Continent, on the other hand is almost impossible to anyone from other nation became a permanent resident on Dradinu (let’s not even mention earrn citzenship).

    On Dradinu there is no Magical University,  just a few Sigrax Houses. The sigraxes in the city are generalists, not by option but because they have no one to teach them a magical Way. That lack of tradition is a problem they could not yet solve, and to make it harder most high caste citizens still feel that less as a problem they should solve and more as a national pride to brag about.

    The warriors of Dradinu contrast with their sigraxes in reputation, their excellence is legendary. Since the art of war is very similar  to the favorite national sport, practiced by all Dradi, the Warrior Caste in the city must work harder than normal to earn his place: it does that, and a bit more. Their grey archers, who amput one breast, are the most respected amoung the enemy warriors; some call then “almost magic” as a way to say that their arrows are the more deadly weapon in the hands of humans, magic excluded. The infantary fights with black shields and black sword, their iron will and discipline is almost as admired as the grey archer’s aim.

    Dradi captured and slaved almost earn their freedom back in exchange for military service, or die in sand circles playing their national sport surrounded by a ring of avid fans.

    As masters the Dradi are not as well reputed as they are as Warriors and fighter slaves. “The chains are light on Dradinu” is a popular saying in both sides of the Sorrowfull, used even by people unable to point the Gladiatorial City on a map. Supposedly the Dradi are lenient with their slaves, both male and female, but that’s a overgeneralization.   

   The citizens of Dradinu are also reputed as hedonists who live the moment and extract every single drop of sensual pleasure they can squeeze from their short and violent lifes. That generalization is somewhat more precise than the one about their lenience with slaves.