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MEDHA CITY

The city of Medha, the pearl of the mid-sea and gateway to the lands of SAND. Medha is the largest coastal city of what used to be North Africa, a key trading port for the mid-sea and provides a vital ingredient for the production of Omnimorph.

The ancient walls of Medha stand as both barrier and promise on the edge of the endless Sand, their sand-scoured surfaces bearing witness to a city where every drop of water carries more value than gold. Within these formidable defenses, narrow winding streets create a labyrinth of commerce and intrigue, all radiating from the towering Queen's Spire at the city's heart. Medha follows a unique tradition—a new queen takes the throne every twelve cycles, ensuring power remains dynamic in this critical trade hub. The sprawling bazaars form the city's beating heart, where scavengers barter relics pulled from dead cities for water pure enough to drink, and nomad walker clans trade exotic goods from distant territories. Water Guild officials monitor every transaction involving their precious commodity, their blue robes moving through the crowds like sharks through schools of fish. Despite - or perhaps because of - the harsh conditions, Medha's culture pulses with vibrant energy, its people celebrating life with raucous festivals and elaborate storytelling traditions that preserve the collective memory of a world before the Sand claimed everything.

MEDHA MINES

The open cast mines of Medha run all day, every day. Massive terraced pits are carved deep into the desert where thousands of workers toil under the merciless sun, their bodies coated in distinctive orange dust. Death is as constant as the work itself, with sand mites erupting from beneath the surface without warning to shred workers into bloody pulp before consuming them, while massive sand worms create sudden sinkholes that swallow entire work crews in seconds. The guards deliberately delay their response to these attacks, intervening only after the predators have claimed several victims - a calculated strategy to satisfy the creatures' hunger temporarily while maintaining production quotas. Massive haulers lumber up huge access roads, their beds filled with the precious orange earth that forms a critical component in Omnimorph production. Each day, endless land-trains depart for Prime's cloning facility, their cargo holds full of material that will eventually become new clone workers - many destined to replace those lost in the very mines that produced their raw materials. The locals whisper that the earth's distinctive reddish-orange hue comes not from its mineral content but from the blood of countless generations of workers absorbed into the soil - a claim dismissed by overseers as superstitious nonsense, though they offer no alternative explanation for why the richest deposits always seem to be found beneath the sites of past massacres.

MEDHA PORT

The port of Medha pulsates with frenetic energy where the endless Sand meets the shrunken Mid-Sea, its ancient stone quays worn smooth by decades of commerce and salt spray. Massive cargo haulers from the mud lands dock alongside nimble trading vessels from distant Kush and Shima, their weathered hulls bearing the scars of sea kraken attacks and pirate raids survived during their perilous journeys. Dock workers swarm across the piers like industrious ants, their bodies glistening with sweat as they unload precious cargo - refined metals from Kiruna, manufactured goods from Praga, food from the Yunnan rice fields and the agridomes of the mud lands - while loading ships with fresh fish, caught at great peril by the fishers of Medha in the Mid-Sea and the the fruits and spices grown in the orchards of Medha. The air hangs heavy with a cacophony of languages and the competing scents of exotic spices, machine oil, and the ever-present fish markets where catches from the Mid-Sea's mutated ecosystem are hawked by weathered vendors. Soldiers of the City Militia in their green cloaks maintain a vigilant watch over the port, themselves being watched from elevated platforms by the Queen’s Palace Guard in their golden armour.  Water Guild officials inspect every liquid container entering or leaving the port, collecting substantial taxes on each barrel of water that passes through. Beyond the practical commerce, the port serves as Medha's information hub where rumors and intelligence from across the Desolation change hands in shadowy dockside taverns, making this bustling maritime gateway as crucial for the flow of knowledge as it is for physical goods in the post-Collapse world. 

MERCENARIES

The post-Collapse world has birthed a thriving mercenary culture, with skilled fighters selling expertise to the highest bidder across every territory. From the mud lands to the jungles of Hell, these guns-for-hire operate beyond factional allegiances, offering protection, assault capabilities, and specialized knowledge for those with sufficient Sukh. Many are former clone soldiers who survived their service terms, putting hard-earned combat skills to profitable use. Others come from scavenger tribes, bringing invaluable wasteland survival techniques to their contracts. The frost-bitten city of Ograd stands as the most notorious mercenary hub, where veterans gather between expeditions into the Land of Glass, planning missions over Moonwater liquor in crowded safe houses. Meanwhile, in the Jade Domain's port cities, mercenary captains advertise their services outside administrative complexes, specializing in jungle navigation and Neo-Cong tracking. Each region's mercenaries develop distinct methods and codes, but all share a fundamental principle: the contract is sacred, and reputation means everything in a business built on reliability and discretion.

MUD

Central, Eastern, and Northern Europe have been transformed into a vast expanse of treacherous mud flats, simply called "the mud" by its inhabitants, forever altered by chemical warfare and unnatural weather patterns. The sky here is an eternal twilight, choked with ash and acidic rain that falls in relentless sheets. Endless fields of grey-brown sludge stretch to the horizon, broken only by the twisted remnants of civilization. Half-sunken skyscrapers jut from the mire like rotting teeth, their surfaces slick with algae and rust. The mud itself is alive with danger - pools of quickmire that can swallow a person whole, pockets of toxic gas that bubble to the surface, and predatory creatures that have evolved to thrive in this hellscape. The constant heat and moisture rots everything it touches, and the acrid stench of decay hangs heavy in the air. The sound of bubbling mud and the distant, eerie cries of mutant creatures and their dying prey create a constant, unsettling backdrop. Scavenger tribes eke out a meager existence here, building rickety settlements on stilts above the sucking mud. Others navigate the treacherous terrain in patchwork vehicles with massive tires, always on the lookout for valuable salvage or the next meal. The tribes and clans that exist here are constantly recruiting new warriors by either conquering other clans, "liberating" workers from the countless agrifarms or ambushing deliveries of new clones to one of the bigger cities like Praga. The constant churn of the mud often unearths forgotten caches of pre-Collapse technology, leading to fierce battles over these priceless artifacts.

MUD KRAKEN

These massive tentacled horrors lurk in the toxic ponds and mud pits scattered throughout the wasteland, their presence betrayed only by subtle ripples on the murky surface moments before they strike. Where there is mud, there will be kraken - no biome in the Desolation is truly safe, especially those humid enough to support these apex predators. Their hunting strategy is terrifyingly efficient: remaining perfectly still beneath the surface until a hapless victim approaches within striking range of their sensory-loaded tentacles. Each appendage, thicker than a human torso and lined with barbed suckers that prevent escape, can detect minute vibrations and body heat through meters of sludge. When a mud kraken attacks, survival is virtually impossible - victims are ensnared and dragged beneath the surface in seconds, their screams abruptly silenced as they're pulled into the creature's central maw where rows of rotating teeth shred flesh from bone. Even heavily armed scavenger parties avoid bodies of standing water, as mud kraken have been known to lay dormant for weeks, patiently waiting for prey. The most terrifying specimens inhabit the vast mud flats of former Europe, where specimens large enough to crush small vehicles and drag down land trains have been documented by the few witnesses who managed to escape. Experienced travelers learn to recognize subtle warning signs - unusual stillness in normally active areas, the absence of smaller predators, or the distinctive smell of digestive enzymes that lingers near a kraken's hunting grounds.

MUTANTS

Most human males transformed by the Reaper Agent lose their higher cognitive functions in the process, becoming the savage mutants that now roam the wastelands in packs, their bodies twisted by the same enhancement protocol that created the superhuman warriors of the Great Collapse. While mostly feral and aggressive, many mutants maintain enough cognition to form primitive tribal societies, their mutations similar to those of the Reborn - powerful limbs, enhanced senses, and thickened hide that can deflect small arms fire - but without the blessing of retained intelligence that separates the Reborn from their more mindless kin. They communicate through a simplified language of grunts and gestures, engaging in basic trade with desperate communities though their volatile nature makes such interactions perilous, as a simple misunderstanding can trigger explosive violence from creatures whose strength can crush steel and whose claws can tear through armor plating. Since the end of the Purge, the surviving mutant populations have continued to evolve at an alarming rate, developing new strains and abilities that keep even seasoned wasteland survivors on edge—some have adapted to specific environments like the acid-resistant marsh mutants or the heat-immune desert variants, while others display disturbing signs of returning intelligence, suggesting that humanity's twisted children may be reclaiming their birthright in ways their creators never intended - and that the separation between Mutant and Reborn is really on a spectrum rather than clear-cut, based on social acceptance more than anything else These evolved mutants represent an ongoing threat to the fragile settlements scattered across the Desolation, their pack hunting strategies and territorial behavior making them apex predators in regions where even heavily armed scavenger bands fear to tread.