Coastal Cities

~Mostly Mollusk~

Part 1 - Part 2 Here - Part 3

Settlements.

Coastal Cities

-Taranoake 

“Bay-City”

A bustling town of bugs and sea bugs, basking in the warmth of the sun.

--Architecture

There are eight main areas of Taranoake to consider: The Gates, Jellyfish Bay, The Outpost, The Colosseum of Ven, The Cast Shell Pit, The Agora, Fort Taranoake, and Training Grounds.

---The Gates

Sandswept driftwood gates with rope tied end to end, dunes collecting around the poles. While nowadays most travellers enter from the Wayward Path, this used to be the main entrance to the city.

Near this area lie shimmering, indigo clam-shell mosaics bearing written welcomes to any who venture into Taranoake.

---Jellyfish Bay

Resting in the center of Taranoake lies Jellyfish Bay, a large pool of water where most of the city's vegetation is grown, for the few among us off put by the idea of eating their fallen friends--or for anyone else in need of a seaweed salad.

---The Outpost

A sight for sore eyes, the travellers off the eastern Path come here to rest after long journeys, beckoned forth by the golden shell beacon perched at its peak. It's an inn of sorts, though without any true owner and rarely caretaker--the denizens here are expected to clean up themselves after they leave, unless of course they die prior.

North of this area rests the skeletal husk of a long-dead beast draped with overgrown seaweed and surrounded by serrated shell, named by locals The Thorns.

---The Colosseum of Ven

Witness grand fights to the death... and maybe even receive a free snack afterwards! Here at the Colosseum, gladiator-fools engage in perilous combat for the glory of battle and the favor of their God of life and death. While victors and any other survivors simply live to see another day, the fallen are consumed by their brethren as it is most honorable to benefit your society even after death.

South of the building the barracks can be found. Connected by a few short tunnels, the room is where fighters rest between battles. Like the main area this place is not short of green blood--many are too stubborn to anticipate combat for long, rather wishing to get back into the fight before a chance to heal up.

---The Cast Shell Pit

After their carapace is judged as unsafe and the previous...owner ill, a corpse may be tossed into the hole with not much thought. It is a mourned soul who is infected in such a way that they can no longer benefit their society. Resting over the mass grave a long shrub has recently planted itself, growing through the sand and gaining worship as an omen of the green god Ven: The Guardian of The Dead, Pando, was formed after the town collectively decided that the tree was in some way sacred.

The pit was meant to contain The Thorns, until it was realized the body was too big to move, relieving the hole of its actual purpose.

---The Agora

Need food? Water? Weapon and shell? Dead bodies? We’ll look no further than The Agora. Overlooking Jellyfish Bay, the city's glorious marketplace has everything you might need after a long day of travel! Visit one of the many vendors for a wide variety of goods and perhaps a conversation, while you're at it.

---Fort Taranoake

Despite its militaristic and intimidating exterior, Fort Taranoake is where the citizens of this lovely town reside. Many call it home nestled within these walls, surrounded by banners and children attempting to scale the walls to reach The Acorn that washed ashore so many seasons ago, the symbol that few but the oldest clam remember.

---The Training Grounds

Some looking to compete in the colosseum, some wanting to travel the world, none having any idea how to fight, many outsiders and citizens alike come to train here. Despite the obvious, combat is not the only class. Students are taught how to forage food, how to learn from their surroundings, how to prepare a meal or subsist off of shells, how to survive the land inside and out of the supposed safety of the city. Regardless of ability, spending some time here could benefit even a champion gladiator or seasoned explorer.

-Citadell 

“Basins-City, Quiet Citadell”

A quiet city along the shore, hidden from aerial view and predators among the tides. 

--Architecture

The city consists of nine bays fading into deep holes, being primarily underground. Rooms are chiseled through the sides of the craters, and platforms are set outside connecting each entry, used as catwalks on low tide and decks at high. In the former case, tarps and stalls can be seen set up on the basins, packing up when the water reaches the third bay and the other areas are soon to follow.

---Six Basins

The holes in which most of the city’s traffic takes place, and rooms are placed around. They can be likened to plazas, and while The Archives has the general layout of a Basin it is considered a room instead.

Notable rooms include:

Woodworker’s Association, Second Basin

Noctiluca Cafe, Second Basin

Kritto’s Stall, Fourth Basin

The Archives, Fifth Basin

H.C. Labs, Sixth Basin

Interconnecting each basin lie series of alleyways where, at the lowest levels, the bioluminescent and edible mosses and algaes are grown, and where the sea-dwelling citizens make their homes. The bugs who cannot live in water are restricted to anywhere else, as the tunnels are drenched no matter the tides, carefully irrigated in a way so as not to flood the plazas.

---The Archives

A massive library carved into the sand, connected through pathway to the fifth basin. Unlike the rest of the caves, the roof is solid, arching over the area and carefully protecting the shell tablets inside from the sun. It is by far the largest room dedicated to one purpose.

---Bellows

A giant, translucent green object with salmon shells placed inside, settled on the sands above the cliffs. When the winds blow strongest, the interior howls and the sounds of the shells rattle through the city, marking the shift in tides.

-Renin

A small, long-hidden ghost town, with merely a sole original occupant. This “town” is composed of dozens of burrowed tunnels and sand statues crudely shaped to resemble frogs.

--Architecture

A labyrinth of tunnels and caves, most filled with fake furniture lining areas that give the whole place an uneasy feel. The whole town is full of cobwebs--and sand lumped together in a vague impression of frogs.

---The Ponds

Three slowly eroding caves towards the bottom of Renin, full of salt water and uninhabitable for frogs.

---Housing

Plenty of sand and rocks shaped into the makings of homes are scattered all around this place, most looking like they haven’t been used in years.

Marine Structures and Settlements

-Kelsik

A town of sea slugs, residing much closer to the water's surface than most other settlements inhabited by the purely-aquatic creatures. Homes are fashioned out of the large shells of other mollusks, and foliage is carefully tended to in the form of rows of seaweed. It's small in that all the villagers know each other well, and travellers are warmly welcomed.

While the population mostly consists of marine gastropods, crustaceans have a history with the town, where a few choose to make their home.

-Cranton's Abode

A driftwood hut pulled together neatly by twine, circled around one side by rocks placed in the formation of a sort of patio, where the work of the lone-though-not-lonely shrimp Cranton unfolds. He's something of a traveller--and scavenger--himself, so despite fire not being an option underseas, his food still manages to be the best of any you'd find this side of the Cities.

-Anemone Reefs

A cluster of inert cnidarians far from the surface, corals scattered through despite its namesake.

In the center of the well-protected forest lies a clearing, where two nudibranch siblings have chosen to make their home.

-The Ruins

A collocation of objects that appear to be more of the strange white internal chitin of dead creatures, those of which terrestrial scientists lament not having more information on. About five full sets of them, just sitting at the bottom of the ocean, all relatively and inexplicably in the same area. No one has any explanation and nothing is known of them except that they must have died some time after the rest of the vertebrates, given their condition. Archeologists may not have time to learn more about these before they are completely worn away by the tide.

-Anchor

A city atop a buoy, inhabited mostly by aerial bugs, and those who can climb up from the seaweed-and-chain “stairways” drifting from surface to seafloor. Though the hard minerals did prove difficult to tunnel through, the sheer size and the natural platforms have made it worth the effort to improve.