Derevnya is @activatingaggro and Iâs industrialized northern and Russian-inspired city with a serious killer pelican problem! On the surface, at least - under the city, thereâs a complex system of sewers and heating that has some more deep-rooted issues.
The city overall has a community bonding culture based around the popularization of bathhouses. People often go to these saunas as a casual outing the same way you might go to the movies with a friend. There are many small artisan-run bathhouses dotted around the city, and everybody has their favorite - some trolls love X on the corner of Y and Z for its specialty steam infusions, while others prefer H for its entertainment selection of music and radio shows. The two most popular ones, however, are large, public bathhouses that each span across two city blocks at opposed halves of the city. They're each cheaper than most of the smaller artisan hothouses and offer both dry and steam heated rooms for patrons.
These bathhouses are all heated and fueled by the same volcanic hot springs that run the heated canals snaking through the city, and have resulted in the setup of an interconnected tunnel system beneath the city. Many of the tunnels are non-traversable or used for sewage, but many are maintained to a high standard of cleanliness and used to run heat and steam underneath the city. Due to the generally cold and snowy environment that the city is set up in, the seadwellers populating the heated canals find themselves living primarily underground in the colder months. The extremely high humidity and temperature of the underground tunnel system, which links all the public bathhouses and the locked basements of people's private homes, makes it an ideal environment for the tropical seadwellers that have migrated to Derevnya from the Reef, a nearby underwater colony.
It also makes the tunnels an enticing opportunity for homeless landdwellers during the winter months when living on the surface risks one's death by exposure or by predatory beast. The main inhabitants of the tunnels, the seadwellers, don't tend to take to the invasion kindly, however, and the small lowblood shantytowns are consistently subject to turf wars and extermination efforts - a living that does not end up much more forgiving than it might be on the surface. The high humidity and heat is an additional discomfort for more lowblooded inhabitants, who are prone to overheating and respiratory infections when overstaying their welcome.
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âAgain.â the old lowblood says, patient but insistent.Â
You pout, lower lip sticking out while your shoulders hunch up. Youâd so much rather be in your respiteblock, cuddling your lusus.Â
âBring your mind back, little yipbeast. You cannot control the shadows with a thinkpan clutching something else.â
Your ears flick, irritated, but with a muted sigh you do as he says, scrabbling your fingers against the floor as you close your eyes.
Shadows rise like mist around you, black vapor curling close like your coldblooded body is a source of heat, outlining your small figure in a rainbow of dark hues - black and blue and dark umber, rippling like water shot through with silt.
Dark isnât only one color. Dark isnât only one thing.
The brownblood nods, though you canât see it, and snaps his fingers. The rest of the roomâs shadows rise up in smooth sharp streams around him, mastery born of nearly all his short life of practice.
You feel him draw them, feel him trying to tug control of yours away from you.
You curl your fingers into fists as if the shadows were solid - something you canât do yet - and will them to stay put around you, to cling to you as if you were the only source of light.
Seconds later theyâre all yanked away and you yelp, falling into a heap of chubby limbs, hair in your face though your eyes snap open, absolutely furious.
âThatâs not fair! I can't hold them like you can!â
âFair? Another mage will not be fair to you in a fight, little yipbeast.â
You bare your small fangs at him.Â
âThereâs hardly any other mages! Everybody thinks youâre a joke! The other kids say Iâm crazy cause I learn with you!â
Your hands fly to your mouth. You didn't mean to...you were frustrated, but...
You bow your head with shame, shutting your eyes again, expecting him to hit you. Heâs done it before, once when he summoned shadow beasts to scare you and you screamed until he slapped you across the face and your mouth was full of blood, his strike surprisingly strong for a troll of his age and caste.
The blow doesnât come.
You crack open an eye.Â
âArenât you...â The words hang in the air, charged with fear and uncertainty and shame. âArenât you gonna...â
âNo.â
He says, and looks more tired than youâve ever seen him.
âI know what they think of me, little yipbeast. The Empire will never take our art seriously; they fear it, so they deride it, suppress it, ensure that no one wishes to learn it so the people stay reliant on psiionics and tech.â
He pauses, and then looks down at his hands.
âIf you wish to quit your lessons, I cannot force you otherwise. There are many other opportunities for a purple in this city I do not offer.â
Your face crinkles, confused. This isnât what you expected.Â
âMarron?â
âYes, little yipbeast?â
âWhy did you learn shadowmancy?âÂ
He pauses, letting his shades drop, returning all the roomâs shadows to their usual positions. He sits there, looking at you with two fingers pressed under his chin, and only answers when youâre starting to feel itchy and uncomfortable.
âI had powers once, but carelessly burned them out. It is a miracle I even lived, though it put me in a deep coma with only my moirail to care for me and hide me from the culling drones. I missed conscription. When I woke...I wanted to die, believing myself useless for my caste. My moirail would not let me. She was a follower of the Order of Light; they have many books and manuscripts that do not always follow the Imperial line. I began to teach myself from them, while the university hired me to clean. Still I toil for this narrow-minded place...and pass on what I know.â
He snaps his fingers, this time summoning a shallow pool of dripping shade in the palm of his hand. You watch it, fascinated.
âI sought a way to protect myself, little yipbeast, and a way to be someone again. What is it that you want from shadowmancy?â
You shuffle uncomfortably. You werenât really expecting Marron to tell you...or that he would tell you so much. Usually he only speaks to instruct you, or to politely ask you how your lusus is, how your schoolfeeds are going. You had no idea there was so much more to him.
âI donât...â You shrug helplessly. You started to take lessons from him because you thought it would be cool, forbidden, exciting. Instead itâs mostly a bunch of frustration and dopey exercises that feel pointless.
But where else could somebody teach you how to make the world bend to your whim, to craft with the very thing that protects trolls from the death the sun brings? Youâre purple; outside of voodoos, your caste has no powers, and the Church has always unsettled you too much to consider joining.
You want to have something special. Something that isnât just forcing a lower caste to bow to your whims.Â
This has to be worth it. Youâll be like Marron, only youâll have so much longer to enjoy it. Sweeps to perfect your magic.
You close your eyes, and will the shadows to rise again, feeling the dark cluster around you.
You open them. Theyâre still there.
You smile and reach a hand out, the shade now pooling in your small hand instead of his.
