The Dungeon Oligarch

Hidden Figures

For most power players, the only places to be are the great cities, with Terrasquestone being the ultimate place to stake their claim to power, wealth, and glory. The other great cities, Stormfort, Krakenport, etc, are stepping stones. The Dungeon Oligarch is nowhere near any of those places, instead making their demesne the region of Maighdean Siamsa, deep in the rolling forests and flowering hills of Tir Lauchmar, the Precious Land. The easily overlooked region is three weeks of regular travel from Terrasquestone, four days by air, and two months by ship. The region has no strategic value, no great mineral wealth, and no apparent wellspring of magical power that would warrant invasion or conflict. There are no great cities, no castles, and there is barely a road to the place. Most traffic coming and going from the Maighdean Siamsa is through the narrow port of Camliel. The port is situated in a narrow bay barely large enough to handle more than two or three ships at a time, and only one if it is a large ship. There is a single road heading inland from Camliel, and this is where commerce flows out of the region.

Camliel is known for its jovial hospitality, and how the wealth of the Maighdean can be had here for cheap.

It is less known for the number of people who visit the port and simply vanish. It is a distant place full of luxury, why wouldn't a man give up a spot on an oceanic ship for a warm bed and generous woman there?

The Wealth of the Maighdean

1. Wine

2. Olea

3. Ambergris

4. Siamsan textiles

5. Gemstones

6. Precious metals

7. Spell Components

The region provides what amounts to a trickle of these goods down to Cemliel, where ships trade gold, platinum, and other currencies to take on what loads of goods they can. A merchantman who can make Camliel and see the golden aspen trees swaying above the port and return home can make themselves wealthy for life. In the great cities, casks of Maighdean wine can bring what a common man makes in a year, while a particularly special or fine vintage can be worth more than a man's life. Haute cuisine in the great city lives on the back of Olea. The use of butter is considered low cuisine, while the best cooking starts with oil extracted from Olea trees. (Tir Lauchmar is mostly butter country, but the nobility are olive oil connoisseurs. Ambergris is valued for its use in making perfumes, which are always in demand in the great cities. A great dame or lady would not want their personal aroma to be anything like the reek of the low streets. The various spas and bathhouses have a steady demand for the material for their masseuses and bathers to use. Siamsan textiles are functionally silk, with the according popularity and demand. Gemstones and precious metals are a little different as Camliel is seemingly the only source of a small and specific type of gem and unique precious metals. Maighdean moonstones, lapiz la'mah, Maighdean opal, and Maighdean moon steel are all highly sought after. Spell components are just that, beast humours, organs, etc.

The Oligarch, Camliel, and Thannerion Massiv

The Oligarch is the master of all of Maighdean Saimsa, and likely one of the most powerful individuals outside of Terrasquestone. Within the region she is known as The Oligarch and lives a secret sequestered life. Most of the people who live in the region don't even know where the Oligarch lives. There is no great palace, no fortress, no mansion, nothing. There are dozens of great estates, surrounded by farms where agriculture and natural horticulture live side by side. Most of the land is not given to organized agriculture, but the cultivation of existing nature, supporting the growth of wildlands and harvesting their bounty, rather than breaking soil into rows of farmland. The various great estates of the region are all the beneficiaries of the Oligarch, and her representatives regularly visit them, and many of the children of these houses are sent into service with the Oligarch, becoming the new representatives. These men and women lay out the expected levels of production from each of the great estates, organizing the collection of goods and the payment of tithes to the Oligarch for keeping them comfortable and safe.

The Oligarch actually lives in Camliel.

No one there actually knows that Madam Momovoth 'Momo' Tringali is the Oligarch. To the denizens of Camliel, she is the Mistress of the Trade Council, the body of mostly men who decide what trade deals are accepted and which are denied. Most of the time Momo is either at the Camliel Bathhouse or the main Inn. Audience with Momo usually requires petitioners to attend her in the bathhouse where she likes to hold her court. Most merchants find this distressing and difficult because the decorum of the bathhouse requires guests to be stripped completely naked, and Momo herself is a corpulent woman. While negotiations are carried out she will typically have two or three personal valets rubbing her down with fragrant oils while she lounges in the sauna. Merchants, stripped naked, standing in a stifling hot room, watching a fat naked woman get rubbed down by nubile teenagers, find their wits shredded and their silver tongues turned to wood.

A lot of things aren't adding up, or you've already guessed it. Momo has a dungeon and access to it for trade goods.

Thannerion Massiv is a phallic-looking spire that rises near the center of Maighdean Saimsa, and it is indeed a dungeon. It is a relatively young dungeon, only a few centuries old, and only cultivated and really active in the last half-century or so. It is a mostly surface-level dungeon, with most of its domain being arboreal, with only the core area being inside the Massiv.

A Bit of History

Momo was a barbarian of the Ivory Behemoth clan of Saerith. Her ship was wrecked near Camliel, and the barbarians made a primitive settlement there and started raiding and exploring outside of the initial landing. Over the next several years, most of the barbarians perished. Most suffered from starvation, and the rest threw themselves at the nascent dungeon they found. If they could beat it, they could make it a new home and survive off of its bounty. They did succeed, and Momo was among the last of the surviving barbarians. Rather than destroy the core, she made a deal with it, she would offer it better protection in exchange for food and a place to live.

Thannerion Massiv was a masculine aspected dungeon and found the offer of the powerfully built barbarian highly agreeable. There was a different reason, being masculine in aspect, Thannerion had a type. The dungeon found that it liked big women. This is little different from the Gygaxian Gyre under Terrasquestone being thrilled by collecting strong and powerful women into its area of influence. The dungeon gave Momo what she wanted, and in time, Momo grew larger and larger. Camliel started growing too, with new settlers showing up via broken ships washing into the bay. After nearly twenty years, Camliel had become a small but highly sought-after port.

Momo had become a huge woman, and her court had grown as well.

Thannerion was beyond pleased, especially when his Ivory Behemoth would come visit it.

The goods that flow out of Maighdean Saimsa are all sourced from the dungeon, one way or another.

1. Saimsan Wine is made from a peculiar ghost white grape that came from the dungeon and was cultivated until it could grow on the surface and away from the influence of the dungeon. The dungeon cultivated these grapes for the single purpose of pleasing Momo, and they are candy sweet, sharp, and crisp, as is the wine that comes from them. The main purpose of the estates that have grown across the region is for the cultivation of these grapes and making them into wine. The dungeon itself can also produce the wine on its own, and these barrels are considered the most special of reserves and command the highest prices on the market.

2. Olea is made from pressing olives, which is a labor-intensive process. Like with the wine, Momo, and the dungeon cultivated an Olean dryad that could live outside the dungeon and flourish. The use is threefold. The dryads produce the olea fruits, and they participate in the harvesting and processing of said olea oil, but they themselves are also used as a resource. Olea wood is an important export for bows, furniture, and musical instruments. Within Maighdean, olea wood is used for common furniture. The best vintages of Olea are either made by the dungeon itself or are made by crushing an entire olean dryad, killing it for its contained sap.

3. Ambergris is technically the vomit of the sperm whale, and there are no whales of any variety in Maighdean, well, other than the pale fleshy two-legged type the dungeon quivers over. The source of the ambergris is somewhat less palatable. Momo spent a great deal of time with the Core and from their interactions, the Core attempted to create ivory behemoths for its paramour, the result being the horrific Dire Armorer Dungeon Hippopotumus becoming a species that thrives in Maighdean Sainsa. The beasts have a rich diet of dungeon flora, aggressively protect their ponds, lakes, and rivers across the region, and periodically vomit large nuggets of a waxy ambergris-like substance. Since the introduction of the beasts, the region has become more secure, as attempts to navigate any of the waterways in the region without the blessing of the dungeon usually ends with a broken boat and the crew gored, maimed, or killed by the river behemoths. Ivory behemoth leather, meat, and ivory are lower-tier commodities in the region.

4. Sainsan Textiles come from a specific species of great moth that originated from the dungeon. The caterpillar form of this insect can grow to the size of a man's leg and largely feed on the exotic flora of the dungeon. They do not thrive well away from the dungeon, and can only survive in high magic areas. Their infestations are easy to find and most people who find Sainsan worms in their trees will burn them out as soon as they are found. Within Maighdean, they are cultivated for their silk secretion that are used to make silk cloth. When the worms show signs of going into their cocoon, most farms will kill the worms and then eat them. A few are allowed to pupate and emerge as giant three-foot-wide moths notable for their silvery white color. This is a source of a number of spell components. The worms are typically blanched in boiling water, then peeled and cleaned like large fruit. Their rubbery flesh is then ground and mixed with a variety of local spices to create the unique green Maighdean dried sausages, which are a locally acquired taste. There is a gland located inside the worm that is considered an aphrodisiac.

5. Thannerion Massiv produces lustrous white and iridescent dungeon gemstones. These resonate strongly with being used in magic items related to the moon, stars, healing, fertility, and that bag of tricks. It doesn't produce crystalline stones but rather favors agates, opals, and other more organically structured materials, including lunar/lustrous/white versions of more colorful materials like moon lapiz, moon serpentine, etc.

6. As with the gemstones, all dungeons produce their own specific materials and Thannerion Massiv produces moonsteel, a lustrous white steel. It is not considered a top-tier material like Tarasceen steel or purple Zinaideen steel. Being hard and brittle, it can certainly hold an edge, but it can snap under stress and make for poor armor and even worse bladed weapons. The material is better suited for jewelry, decorative metalwork, and accessories. It is popular for making cups, plates, and other culinary tools and flatware, as well as for women's things like brushes, combs, buttons, hand mirrors, etc.

7. Any dungeon worth the name can churn out spell components with little effort.

But Why?

Dungeons don't care about gold, it is literally part of their excretory system. Barbarians like gold, but they aren't merchants and traders, so what gives?

It wasn't supposed to turn out like this.

Momo had spent her entire life on the cusp of starvation and death, such is the life of a barbarian tribe. The Sainsa Dungeon likewise was a wastrel thing. How else could a band of barbarians defeat it? They worked together, creating a codependent relationship that fetishized the dungeon's interests and turned a desperate barbarian woman into a disinterested dungeon champion. Momo worked hard and brought the dungeon the things it needed to flourish, new things it could copy, new weapons and tools, and new monsters to be fed into. This way, Momo made the Dungeon more powerful, coached it, and protected it as it needed. In exchange, it focused on her and its attentions and interests grew more and more towards making Momo larger and larger.

The technical term is Feederism. The Dungeon thrived as Momo fed it more and more things, increasing what it was capable of. Like a good submissive, the dungeon took it and did what she told it. It became much more powerful and ranked up several times and the creation of the great beasts was a boon. Momo and the remaining members of the Ivory Behemoth tribe, with the aid of the dungeon, smashed all opposition in the region and made themselves wealthy beyond imagination, secure, and safe. Once its power was established and Thannerion Massiv dominated the region, it returned the favor.

Momo was glutted with the spoils of victory. Thannerion was uxorious in its adoration of the barbarian woman turned dungeon champion and the new chieftain of the dislocated Ivory Behemoth tribe. After a long period of privation and insecurity, Momo and the handful of survivors were all too glad to accept this treatment. Momo grew larger and larger, her powerful frame increasing in mass from the rich diet and the lack of exercise. Desperation and survival are demanding physical trainers, and luxury is the worst.

This is not the life of a barbarian, sitting on a throne while slender youths massage tired flesh, pouring wine and pushing food between parted lips. 

The Schism

Momo has left Thannerion Massiv and no longer dwells inside the dungeon's domain. Situated in Camliel she has escaped the direct control of the dungeon and has started regaining her old spirit. Old is a keyword, she should long be dead, as she is well over a century old and appears no older than the day she conquered the dungeon. At that moment, she became tied to the core and could not go too far away from it without its permission. It won't give that to her. She stays in Camliel now, running the trade that comes through the city.

There is a good reason for this, she is eventually hoping to either amass enough wealth and allies that she can mount another raid against Thannerion Massiv and destroy the core like she should have done the first time. She has made a good deal of money and amassed a large amount of local power, but the region is beholden to the dungeon, the monsters of the region resonate with its power. Momo has nowhere near enough power to defeat the dungeon.

Thannerion Massiv is aware of it's wayward lover's betrayal, and it shudders with ecstasy. It has its own plan, and Momo will not attempt to defeat the core a second time, but that she will bend her thick legs and kneel before it, becoming its great general and herald, expanding outward to crush other regions and other dungeons, yoking them to the control of the great spire.