There was something so distinctly different about the way the sky looked, and the way the light entered the city than in the Ober Calemberg region. There was an orange haze in the morning, smoke and sulfuric fumes from Crookback and the Merchant Districts would obscure the sun. The distant roaring of the Grand Crucible, the largest forge in the Dwarven District, produced a flame so bright on the city skyline, that it was near indistinguishable from the sun behind the clouds. There was the double golden hour in the early morning, where Regalia would thus have two suns on the horizon, one obscured by, and the other created with, the fires of industrial progress. Christopher von Henselbrücke wandered the streets of the Waldmark district, many of the thrifty Wirtem and Waldemarker people had long gone to work, as for many, piety was an unfortunate obstacle to making a living wage, especially in these gentrified districts were poor people were hard to find. He stopped at the Temple of repentant forgiveness, one of the "smaller" Temples of Ness in the Regalian capital, yet a tall spire with gothic embellishments nonetheless. What was once an edifice of bright yellow sandstone, had since decayed to a blackened stone, a combination of wear and tear from the centuries of charcoal and wood stoked furnaces in the district, accelerated rapidly in the latter few years by the manufacturing fumes from the adjacent districts. There was a poetic semblance between the decay of the stonework, how the pollution had eaten away at all the fine intricate details and crenelations of the building, and the work-first-faith-later attitude of the people who lived in the district. A deep inhale, perhaps in defiance of that attitude followed, but it was far more likely a brave-chested expression of ego, for Calemberg had not sunken to the low level of "this city". Nay, Calemberg's Temples stood strong, brighter and more clean than Hadrian's Mountains beyond, both in spiritual and the literal sense, the one brought about by purity, the other by the taint of Magic. Christopher ventured in regardless, exhaling slowly, because faith was faith, and because a rotting house of the Goddess was still holy ground, regardless of how few would shed a penny to restore her face. Some time later, Christopher ventured into Kronmeier Park, one of the few idyllic scenes of Calemberger garden work near the Lion's Court, one of the few places left in the city not absorbed by the ever encroaching stone masonry of pavements, and the tall high rise of Prestige Plaza. There were ladies and lords present, promenading in the park as one does with the newest conquest of the season, though all with moderate and modest distance to one another. A gentle arm in arm here, a walking cane and umbrella there, it was so distinct to observe how contrasting the many districts of the city were. While Calemberg observed a wholly encompassing cultural scene, with everyone behaving more or less the same, Regalia was like a microcosm of the world compressed into a small worldscape, albeit in the same of a colossal city. Here there was modesty, dignity, class and refinement. And two districts over an Eronidas was holding some deranged debauching feast, committing adultery and violence on both onlookers and his household staff. Another district over an Asha was trying to swindle an Elf out of their hard earned money, and yet a district over Haqet was feeding on some hapless citizen, while planning their next adventure at the expense of the faithful. And yet, with its elegant rounded shapes and tightly manicured grass fields, this park invited any of its visitors to forget that reality. To be surrounded by the tranquility of the Besichtigungsfelder, a quintessentially Calemberger tradition of putting yourself, or your guest on display for others to see. The pathways and trees were aligned in such a way that anyone could see everyone else in the park, except those obscured by the fountains in the lake. Any would be envious lady could spy across the lawns from behind her fan, and any would be debonair mischief could put itself wildly on display on a nearby tree, to the feigned outrage of onlookers who were all too eager to take sight to speech in their visit to the Waldmark Coffee Houses. Indeed, this was also where Christopher was headed, though perhaps with a bit of a detour, and with entirely different intentions. On passing the Kreuzstreet, he walked across the river bridges, past the lower south side of the city, and into old town, to gaze upon the demolition of the Velheim district, a fitting albeit silent end to the last district in the city that still had thatch roofs. A city ordinance declared some years back that thatch roofs were no longer permitted within the city to reduce fire risks. This was a particular problem, as the Velheim District was close to Crookback, where errant embers from the manufacturing plants could easily be carried by the wind, and act like a fire starter. But, as one would expect, the Velheim people used all manners of delaying tactics, neighborhood associations, cultural festivals, protests, to extend the date of execution of demolition. And yet, much like anything in this city, it fell victim to the final decider of all: a new group of people who simply had more money, and bought their way out of the problem, the Isldar who would build their new district on top of the rubble of the Velheim. Poetic also for Ellador, as a form of Elladorian justice. Christopher's favorite luncheon could always be spent at Zillertal Weinstadl, a Waldmark coffee house and banquet bakery belonging to a family who had immigrated from the Waldmark valleys close to the Genevaud Alps. The building looked distinctly Waldmark, with its dark lacquered window frames, its intensely decorated sandstone carvings on the walls, and the high detail painting murals of various Waldmark symbolisms like knights and dragons. The windows were filled with all manner of advertisements, between the Kaiserbread, Osteiermark Coffee, and the various pretzels that this place was famous for. Christopher had met here frequently with a relatively new acquaintance, a man (or at least, he assumed he was a man due to the tone of his voice) by the name of Charonn, a Bronn, as some might be surprised. Many of the Bralona in the city had gone different ways since the disintegration of High Command, and many of them simply tried to fit in. The religously persecutive narrative was quickly challenged by some of them, who actively tried to learn from the locals, instead of impose on them. Charonn was one such Bronn who had largely abandoned Bralona cohesion, and opted to be open for learning new things, something that Christopher had quickly attached to. His reasons, more often than not, were always selfish, but with a pious undertone. Here presented itself a hard working, never-tiring, and unkillable goon who was most important of all impressionable. But at the same time, if this soulless creature could be converted to Unionism, then surely, any of them could? It both turned into collecting yet another assistant in some nefarious scheme Christopher was plotting, no doubt perhaps even to the detriment of a particular Sorenvik, but it was far more important than that, because it was also a test of his skill as an orator to convince others of the worth of the Everwatcher. Their evenings had been spent, debating the consciousness of faith and the providence of divinity, but more-so on the nature of divinity itself, and the difference between transhumanist beliefs of creation itself being divine, and installing a divine believe in some inconceivable and intangible entity. The Bronn had difficulty understanding that anyone would choose to believe in something they had never seen, but was amiable to the purpose of existence and the collective faith the religion proposed. He often remarked how central directive among the Bralona was missing, they were in essence the perfectly disorganized, anarchist and decentralized polity, unable to achieve higher levels of progress because of everyone just doing "whatever they wanted", and the Bronn admitted there was an elegant beauty in the idea of simply being told what to do, and everyone collectively working towards the same goal. Some progress was to be made each time, and each time they parted more on friendship terms than a transactional relation, and one of mere one-way being used. The last discussion, enjoyed with the presence of Osteiermark Coffee and a croissant with Waldmark cheese and Genevaud butter, was the concept of self-sacrifice, and the purpose of signs from a higher calling. The Bronn seemed particularly amicable to the idea that, at some point in life, the Everwatcher would present the person with a sign for their purpose in the Great Way, though started hyper-focusing on what this could be to him. Christopher realized in that moment, that if the question was even being asked, it meant that the Bronn had already been convinced that Unionism was the right calling, but could not give him a satisfactory answer, for that was only to be found in prayer and determination by the Gods and Goddesses. The two parted ways in perhaps an uncharacteristic manner for Christopher, an embrace. For as much as he upheld a sense of Calemberg superiority and haughtiness, as much as people coming to the city might try to change it, Regalia always ends up changing them more. Though the biggest tragedy of Regalia, was inevitably always the collateral of someone else's problem. Whether it was the severe Vampire prosecutions and extra judicial killings due to the war between Haqet and the Truth Minister, or the ongoing struggle between the remnants of the Brothers of Purity and the Hexenblood, the city was filled with a chaotic network of conflicts that would spill out into the street. Similarly, entirely unbeknownst to Christopher and his Bronn compatriot, the Zillertall Weinstadl had been the meeting place of remnants of the Agatheritters, some unknown fanatic organization of Waldmark knights who wanted to purge the Occult from the government. Nobody in the city had ever heard of them, because this was such a small splinter group that only select individuals had ever interacted with them, and yet, the city was always a fertile breeding ground for new mass-organizations. After all, the Brothers of Purity had only started as a small regional conflict between purists and mages, and eventually spilled over into an archipelago wide calamity that the state even had to get involved in. The city was always home to unseen battles, between unsung heroes and unnamed enemies. Whole lives were lived and ended without anyone ever hearing, and here too, lives were about to be lost over a cause that would never see the light of day. The lady stroking a cat by the window, the apothecary worker out on a delivery in the street, Franz Weinstadlmeier who was scoring his newest sour dough in the kitchen, and his wife Anna who was tending the tables. The five Agatheritters sitting in the far corner of the Weinstadl, the two mustached individuals, likely shopkeepers, who were enjoying an afternoon Coffee on the bench in front, and finally Christopher von Henselbrücke, who stood in the doorway. He had just finished waving Charonn around the corner as he was about to put his white gloves back on, a precautionary removal to prevent any stains on them. Suddenly, he felt a flash of heat behind him, and a rapidly rising pressure. The sudden changes put his neckhair on edge, though everything was experienced almost in slow motion, as in reality, it took a mere half second for all the windows to burst and flames to spew out forward, bringing with them shards of porcelain, pieces of wrought metal and remnants of people. He attempted to raise his hand to cast mender Magic, the signature white lines formed on his hands as he grasped the chords of reality, but the sad thing about the Ailor body, is that it can never outpace time, or act faster than an explosion. In a split second, the whole street went up in flames, the plume of the explosion rising higher than the nearby bailiwick and Temple of Allest's Judgement Might. The fire rose so high that it could be seen by the entire city, and yet, would be noticed by only few, as yet another small blip on the endless skyline of the city of millions. The flame, as destructive and killing as it was, became unnoticeable in the cacophony of fumes and loud bustling noises of the city, only the regional Metropolitan towers ringing emergency bells and the firefighters rolling out, while crowds of citizens massed on the squares to watch the ominous black powder clouds rising from that now decimated street. And here once more, some people were just in the wrong place at the wrong time because of someone else's problem. A singular broken Unionist prayer chain left on the pavement, charred, molten even by the heat it endured yet partially survived.
