Forest Bank
The Forest Bank is an unusual place, located amongst the open oceans of the West, north of Seven Waves and southeast of Anchorstone. It consists of a forest growing from the waters of the sea.
The Forest Bank is a body of fresh water surrounded by the salt waters of the Western Ocean. Savants and geomancers have long wondered at its origin, some work of spell or artifice, the corrupt blessing of the Celestial bureaucracy, Wyld energies, or the like, but no such unnatural influences have ever been found. The fresh water of the Forest Bank has proven a hospitable environment for the growth of Coastal Conifer trees, whose tall trunks rise straight from the sea floor up into the sky, ending in conical crowns of thin branches and needles.
The Forest Bank is inhabited, a village here made up of houses built encircling tree trunks and connected by rope bridges, access to the ground occurring by way of rope ladders and elevators. In the event of attack, the elevators and ladders are raised to the platforms above, the residents pelting invaders with arrows and javelins from a great height… the thickness of tree bark near the water’s surface and the difficulty of lumberjacking from the deck of a ship mean attackers have great difficulty reaching the village.
As there is no land below to source stone, earth, clay, or animal hides and sinews, both structures and goods in the village of Forest Bank are made almost entirely of wood, from houses and bridges to tools and decorative objects, ropes twined from bark, walls and baskets woven lattices of branches and thin wooden slats. Local cuisine is, as in much of the West, dominated by fish, though these are of a different sort than those consumed elsewhere: small numbers of Sweetfish feed on mosses and algae growing on the underwater trunks of the Bank’s trees, and these are typically gathered up using large woven nets, and eaten raw. Ocean fish shy away from the fresh waters of the Bank, save for a brief time during the Air Season, when vast schools of Salmon converge from the surrounding seas to spawn. Fish are gathered in massive quantities at this time, preserved with salt and smoke… the conifer smoke imparts a flavour that some consider acrid and unpleasant, but is favoured by the locals.
Forest Bank is a prosperous and neutral port. Deep in the West, a plentiful source of fresh water is treasured by all sailors, as is a place where wood planks and even whole masts can be secured by battered vessels. Dependent on wood for survival and necessities, the population here has become highly skilled at carpentry and ropework, skills eagerly sought in shipyards and crews across the West. Thie exodus keeps the population of the Bank from growing so large outgrows the bounty offered by the Bank, though the cutting of whole trees is carefully regulated by village elders to ensure the forest remains hale. Special floating platforms are lowered around the trunks of certain trees to serve as docks for visiting ships, or as solid ground for the cutting of trees. In exchange for their expertise, lumber, and water, Forest Bank imports a wide variety of foodstuffs, metal tools, and textiles. Salt is also imported in quantity… with no Salt God overseeing this expanse of ocean, it cannot be produced locally.
The neutrality of Forest Bank, despite its small population and high value to the pirates and powers of the West, emerges not just from its defensibility but from the risk presented should the port be closed: a ship broken by storm or desperate for water today can be sure, regardless of politics and maneuver, that Forest Bank will offer water and repair. If it becomes a prize to fight over, it would surely exchange hands, and those in desperate need of it might be denied. This attitude makes the Bank one of many neutral ports of call in the West, though the chance of clashes between foes might also be lessened by the fact the place cannot dock more than one or two vessels at a time.
Forest Bank is home to a small communal shrine which includes an alcove dedicated to a god very rarely attended amidst the oceans of the West, Caltia the Eternal, who in her position as god of coniferous forests holds the Bank within her purview.
Source: Inspired by Ten Trees by BrilliantRain on the unofficial Exalted Wiki, and quality computer gaming.
