Pronunciation: zar-TELL
Founding Date: 721 DA
Dissolution Date: -
Demonym: Z'Arva/Z'Arva
Capital: Qumadoto
Racial Distribution: dragonborn (46%), human (22%), halfling (20%), other (12%)
Official Language: Tivellan
Z'Artel is governed by a council of mages, each representing one of Z'Artel's seven provinces, and each replaced with a new face after seven years, with one province's seat being up for election per year. They cooperate to ensure matter of national significance are handled well, negotiate on behalf of their citizens for the trading of various goods and services, and collaborate in the sharing of magical and technological advancements. They take the emergence of new magic and technology very seriously, and their stringent patent system is built to ensure that inventor of a given device or technique benefits from their work while also allowing the populace access quickly and efficiently.
Z'Artel's main trades are lumber and fruit, both of which grow in abundance in the warm climate. They produce a wide variety of plant fiber based textiles, used for clothing, accessories, and rope. Small and simple magic items can be readily found for sale, and more complex or valuable magic items may be commissioned in the large cities. Z'Arva woodworking products, from furniture and tools to paper and carved jewelry, are the highest quality products of their kind in Altandor. Z'Artel also produces a wide variety of dyes, which are often used to add brilliant color and intricate patterns to cloth made here.
Z'Artel's territory spans the Lerovul Forest and the Danthyl mountains, forming a triangular wedge between the Helion and Iothian Seas and the mountains to the north. The Lerovul Forest is lush, damp, and tropical, seeing frequent rain during the spring, summer, and fall, and experiencing a drier and slightly cooler season during the winter. The forest boasts a variety of unique flora and fauna found nowhere else on the continent, unique to this jungle environment. Numerous rivers and stream wind down from springs in the mountains, with the Niarin River being the largest of them, and the Ipo River the most famous due to its path through the Alabaster Springs, a stairway-like series of hot spring pools trailing down the side of its mountain of origin.
For dragonborn, the majority race in Z'Artel, the warm and wet climate and lush forests and pools are nearly akin to paradise. Other races may find the area hot, muggy, and positively infested with biting insects, which don't bother the dragonborn on account of the difficulty of biting through scales.
Qumadoto: perched high on the cliffs overlooking the Helion Sea and the Southern Islands, Qumadoto is the capital of both the province of Ixentu and the nation as a whole. The city is built on top of the ruins of a more ancient settlement, and though most of the buildings from that era have long since collapsed, a fairly extensive magical defense system remains in place. Nested spherical shields can be activated at a moment's notice to defend the city from attackers, and access to freshwater from a spring deep underground ensures that lengthy sieges can be endured with ease.
Z'Artel is a place that strives for knowledge, understanding, and advancement, and as such it is a center for research both technical and magical. The natural affinity that dragonborn have for magic has led it to become prominent in Z'Arva life - roughly 30% of the populace can proficiently cast a cantrip or two, and those with more talent can hone their schools at some of the finest arcane towers in all of Altandor. Artificers may be found in nearly every town, crafting minor magical items that can help in tricky situations or simply make one's life more convenient. Each of Z'Artel's province capitals is built in rings around a teleportation circle, a remnant left from a bygone civilization, and these circles are run by a staff of wizards to allow daily travel access between the cities.
Z'Artel is the most open to odd experiments of all the nations, and no organization makes that more obvious than the existence of Z'Artel's necromancy guild. One of the few known instance of necromancy considered by the surrounding populace to be ethical, the necromancy guild acquires the corpses they need by essentially hiring them from the families they once belonged to - the families receive regular payments as long as the body is in use, paid out of various research funds and sometimes earned from labor performed. It's not uncommon to see a retinue of zombies, carefully preserved and sealed inside special suits so as not to carry the scent of rot everywhere, working on various construction projects or ferrying goods in and out of storerooms. It's quite common for poor families to leverage hire out deceased members to ensure the survival of the living ones, ending the agreement and reclaiming the remains once they're no longer in dire need of funds.
Crafting skills, whether mundane or magical, are the most highly prized traits in Z'Arva society. It's common for Z'Arva to declare their intent to court someone by giving that someone a product of their own labor, whether it be intricately dyed cloth, a delicate and beautiful carving, or the finest orange produced by their orchard this year. If this proposal is accepted, the recipient may later propose marriage by offering a craft of their own.
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