Akaku

Akaku is an island pretty much out in the middle of nowhere, far off to the east of most of the islands. It has a sort of Pacific island feeling, complete with abandoned and anachronistically high-tech military bases left by imperial civilizations in days past. The natives are divided into several villages, each sort of associated with a different element or terrain.

Geography
Akaku is located on the eastern side of the map, isolated from most other islands. As a result of its isolation (and thus the lack of attention it gets from peacekeeping orders), its surrounding skies are known to have more than the usual number of pirates.

Characters

 * Aka of Gilbertstown is a naturalized citizen of Akaku, raised to be a member of the Smiths' Guild in Gilbertstown. Serahi also would have been raised there, had she not been separated from her family during a "layover" on Agarin as their family was traveling to Akaku.
 * Many years ago, a Warforged known as the Ice King emerged from the wilds of Akaku, uniting the island and starting a golden age for the locals. About sixty-four years ago, after an eighty-year reign, he disappeared along with a fully-crewed airship during a voyage to a neighboring island, ending Akaku's golden age but leaving the island with plenty of legends to tell.

Inter-Island Relations

 * The Archeologists' Guild does not yet have a strong presence on Akaku, but is working to encourage greater exploration of its older and more dangerous areas.
 * Due to the island's remote location, the Order of Unyielding Light is unable to devote many resources to "policing" its region of the sky, and, as a result, pirate activity flourishes in the vicinity.
 * Gilbertstown is by far the largest and most advanced city on the island and its gateway to the rest of the world. Most airships land there (aside from the freighters that stop at the mines on the underside of the island) and the population is relatively diverse.

Original Concept Information
The following information is strictly from the original draft submitted to the Dungeon Master over the summer, although some corrections have been made in terms of grammar and name-matching from one part of the draft to another, and names from other parts of the world that were unavailable at the time of first writing have been added in brackets where appropriate.

Geography
Max Length:  37 miles

Max Width:  33 miles

Height:  3.8 miles

History
Akaku is located near the fringes of the [Ezentari] empire's extent and was never heavily settled, although a military base was established in a period of civil war. During and before the early empire days, an ancient culture built a number of large, stone monuments of surpassing quality. It has avoided most major events thanks to its isolation, and its people have focused on surviving life's usual hardships as well as incursions by strange beasts from the area around the military base.

One hundred forty-four years before the start of the campaign, a Warforged in white armor and a mask came out of the wilderness and began to work as a protector of the inhabitants. During its eighty-year reign, the guardian became hero-king of the island, establishing a secure perimeter against the beasts, facing pirates and invaders in battle and establishing good ties with the nearest island. However, since the leader's disappearance in the Cloud Sea, the island has largely returned to its earlier state.

People
The inhabitants of Akaku are human, but short in stature with an average height of five feet. Black is the usual hair color. Most residents are direct descendants of the original natives, although there are rare individuals who can trace their lineage back to other islands. Akaku has its own language and script, although the majority of the population speaks accented Common. Within the island as a whole, there are five distinct tribes and communities that are friendly with each other but fiercely independent.

Miru Lake
Miru Lake is the island's primary source of fresh water. It is fifty miles long and its rivers flow all across the northeastern half of the island. One of the five tribes makes its home on an artificial island near the northern shore of the lake. This town is made mostly of wood, but is still fairly well-fortified. The residents are known as excellent sailors, fishers and boat-makers, as well as fierce fighters.

Ihu Peak
Akaku's highest point is located on the southern side of the mountain. On the (somewhat) less-steep northeast face, the mountain is covered in snow and ice. It is here that the Ice-King's now-ruined court, made mostly of solid ice, can be found. The opposite side overlooks the Cloud Sea and the wasteland around the imperial ruins.

Kakama Plain
The flat peninsula on the westward side of the island is a dry place, cut off from most of the rain by Ihu Peak. By necessity, the tribe that makes its home there is made of semi-nomadic herders, who drive their livestock from place to place across the plain on horseback. Due to its close proximity to the imperial base and its monsters, the herders have become adept at fighting monsters from horseback, and maintain a fortress atop the long hill that touches the center of their land.

Huna Step
In several places along the northern face of the island, an outcrop of flat land known as the Matatu Step protrudes beneath the upper rim of the island. This land is uninhabited, save for some farmers from the Rau Spire tribe who have little access to arable land elsewhere.

Rau Spire
On the underside of the island is an inverted mountain known as the Rau Spire, which, many centuries ago, was somehow colonized by particularly-daring cliff-dwellers. By this time, the resident tribe has created cable cars to connect them to the Matatu step, and have delved deep into the spire to seek out the deepest-forming metals and minerals Akaku has to offer. While these people would starve without trade with the rest of the world, their underhanging society and central town carved of living stone is the island's center for advanced craftsmanship and metal production.

Mahiki Forest
A dense forest stretches from the Miru Lake to the northernmost reaches of the island. This is Mahiki, and it is, of course, the center for lumber and other necessities like tar and charcoal. Its people are the most retiring of the islanders, and are known to be stealthy and agile. In addition, they have unique dialects of both Common and Akaku that puzzles neighbors and outsiders alike.

Gilbertstown
Gilbertstown is the most cosmopolitan place on the island, meaning the place most reminiscent of the other islands. It is a city of two thousand protected by a stone wall and filled with half-timber buildings. Many visitors to the island - except for those seeking the resources of the underdwellers of Rau Spire - land here. In addition to handling foreign affairs, the Gilbertstowners control farmland across the easter side of the island, and also mount armed resistance to monster incursions from Ngingio, the old imperial base, in the south.

Ngingio
"Ngingio" means "blight" in the local language, and that is what the military base left over from a long-forgotten civil war in the old empire is to the islanders. The complex itself is a series of bunkers and tunnels that stretches along the southern and southeastern flanks of Ihu. In the thousand years since it was abandoned, a narrow, twisted jungle has grown over it. Both the base and the jungle are inherently dangerous and difficult to traverse, but some sort of ancient technology or magic causes the local beasts to become monstrous creatures that seek to attack the rest of the island. For this reason, islanders believe that the heart of the network of fortifications is home to an evil spirit known as Atarangi, the Shadow.

Atarangi
Atarangi is a hypothetical evil spirit that lurks in an ancient fortress on the south of the island. He is said to have a corrupting influence on anyone or anything that comes near, plants, beasts and people alike, and is blamed for the mad and mutant beasts that plague the island. This evil god is associated with shadow and madness, and is believed to want intelligent life cleared from the island so that he may rule it for himself. Since no one has interacted with Atarangi directly for a long time (or returned sane to talk about it), this information is merely folklore.

Akaku
Up to and long before the fall of the empire, the natives of Akaku made many stone carvings:  some simple designs depicting an abstract, smiling face, to statues that appear to be of some of the empire's local warriors of note, both organic and warforged. A few of these are taken to be representations of Akaku, Akaku's patron spirit.

Akaku is widely held to be benevolent and powerful, but somehow restrained. Whereas Atarangi attacks, Akaku guides others to protect the island. It is believed that Akaku sent the Ice King, and there are legends of others receiving Akaku's blessing and gaining access to great powers. To seek out Akaku's favor, islanders seek out remote places of importance:  imperial ruins rife with technology and untouched by Atarangi's influence, natural wonders believed to be formed by Akaku's grace, and native ruins whose meanings have been lost to time.