The Cursed City of Khern
This was a small experimental writing I did, something foreshadowing for future stuff (I swear it has to do with furries as well, all in due time).
With this essay I want to bring to light a few dark realities, ones that have been hidden for too long.
They deserve to know.
They have to be ready.
Khern was one of the extended cities of the Rya expansion, in eons past it was a fervent trade hub for the Frontier, being right on the middle of R-05. Naturally, many other expansions and empires would come to endeavour in the local economy, trading, selling and buying all of the wonders such a convenient portuary planet would bring.
Quickly it grew, being favored by Ancient entrepreneurs and scholars as an easy form of acquiring rare commodities and study instruments and information, as you're bound to find something of the first war if you have so many sentient races coming to trade their goods findings and informations.
The recently freed Hakaiir did not like the Ancient meddling of the city, but the Rya did not give ear to their complaints, as the Ancients brought quite a lot of coin to grow the city even further. And so, they kept expanding into the wilderness, but never was it so that they affected the fauna or flora too much; for the Rya, you see, information and preservation are above all else values. Those values were not shared by the Ancients, however. The meddling guests were fervent in their long boasts and spiels as they tried to convince the Rya to overreach their grasp on the planet, swallowing the nature whole with concrete and metals; heeds not heard and that lend the Ancients unwillingness from their hosts which hurt their reputation even further among the trader hub.
Pleads unheard, only a few centuries past, the Ancients decided to seize Khern, through a violent war they took the city from the original Rya overlords and representatives; they kept the buzzing trade unaffected, below the steel behemoths and skyscrapers, raising the taxes only slightly so that they could more easily have access to the information and objects they desire. It was then that all went wrong; vain faith and pleasure houses were spread wildly in the city, corrupting the core of those less aware of the heinous nature of their acts.
It was not only the souls that the Ancients corrupted, but the planet itself soon was bent to their crooked will; they didn't stop until the earth was but an amalgamation of cement, steel and gold, all painted on the lighter white and blue hues of the Ancient expanse. The glamorous look of the now planet city was only a mask for the decadency that lied underneath the pristine look of the city. Soon, criminal gangs dominated the underworld, and started to overflow to the top, tainting the thin veil of decency that the stainless metals brought.
The taking of the city was only one of the reasons for the Rya Revolt only an eon after, grudges piling on and adding to the enmity between the Ancients and their Rya descendants. The fate of the olden race of former gods is widely known, their grip on the corrupt city of Khern dissipating as the Ancients themselves disappeared over a single century. The Rya, however, did not concern themselves in retaking the city, even if it was one of the reasons they went to war against their ancestors; it was too much corrupt, too destroyed to rebuild it to be a coherent and stable society, it had been way too long since the tipping point for that.
Criminal gangs now rule the countless cities under the still buzzing metropolis, a more formal government only being a mask - not unlike the one previously hiding the city's true nature with light hues and precious shines - to the gang bosses who truly ruled, and who played the territorial free-for-all, deciding the fate of billions in games of cards, gambling and gang violence. But now it was much less of a secret, the previous gold and clear hues giving way to dark cement and neon lights. The vain faith dissipated, but the pleasure houses only multiplied over time, and with the vain illusion of fulfillment gone, the denizens of the cursed city had to turn to more drastic measure to fill the holes left by the existential dread. Drug usage is almost as usual as eating, not to mention other forms of corruption that fill the daily lives of the deeply forsaken ones of the city.
When Demaysu came to fame, not even him, with his orderly motives and overreaching grasp even tried to remold the city, he knew any of those who endeavoured on the city's customs would be eternally corrupted by it; yet, he was quite eager to send agents of the Community to the city, as some sort of test of their will and dedication to the cause.
It is said that in a dirty corner of a dimly lit street, beneath the petrified rests of servante Dhaarkran's shadow, lies a special pub, one that to the untrained eye would be just your usual amalgamation of scoundrels and ruffians, but for those with a bit more finesse and know-how, could easily find themselves at the presence of the grand leader Demaysu himself. But there are too many pubs under Dhaarkran's shadow, and most that tell of this tale are just as stupid as those who couldn't find out which pub would that be, even if they sat on one of its benches and asked for a drink. After all, it is not in Dhaarkran's shadow where this pub lies, but rather it is beneath the steel sky of Landren's Veil; which doesn't make the task any easier, as there are even more pubs and dubious establishments on that ward than beneath a whole servante's feet.
Many scholars, even of the Rya variety, decide to not even mention the cursed city itself, at best a footnote on the ever expanding Codex Universalis. It's said that whoever writes of the city and endeavours on the research of its long but troubled history will be struck with sadness and despair; many falling to deep depression, even if those are of races and cultures not even related to the ones of its former glory. And those who are not devastated by their own findings become, instead, tantalized by the vain wonders and pleasures the metropolis can provide.
With the Ordarum right on R-05's door, it is widely speculated if the brass legion will do anything to try and revert the damage done by eons of corruption, or if they will ignore it just like an annoying wart that stubbornly sticks around an uncomfortable place. It is possible that they eradicate it, just as they did with the hellish landscapes of Kuros, but, as cursed and depressingly low as the city may be, it still is not so unfathomably heretical as Kuros was, despite no sadness following the wake of those who studied the place, at least, in quite the same way as it is with Khern.
It may be some kind of edict laid by the Ancients themselves before their fall, or simply something specific about the history that makes historians so ill of mind and heart, but it's hard to tell.
Dalregos,
Attached to this mail will be the full essay I received from an anonymous source; I know it may end abruptly much unlike any essay of its kind, it lacks conclusion and details, but I think it the best that we are prived of sch gruesome tales. It is a first that anyone would write about the story of Khern, or at least, just as my anonymous author did. Even if I interviewed many mad writers who would tell similar tales as this one did; I did not know the source of their madness was the information itself. I had gathered that something was amiss in this whole story, nonetheless; I've been debating whether to publish this story or not, and so I'll let that decision to fall on you. I have no interest in entertaining our reader's curiosity with this one, I don't want to lead them to search for this city and getting as mad as the rest of the populace, or the many oddballs I've encountered who had tales of the grand city Khern, or the Acursed City Khern; sometimes some would even interchange those terms in the same phrase.
Attached to the letter with the above essay was a small note, with a weird symbol on it, those are the other attachments. I'd like to know if you saw that symbol anywhere else. The note itself only had written some gibberish in, what I assume, is some obscure Unbound script; either Kaalyn in nature or some hybrid's earthbound squiggles, thinking themselves unique. I don't know what is written there, but again, neither do I know what the heck the symbol is about. If you find anything, please mail me back.
Your's truly, Jaalok.