Deeprift

Deeprift
Nation:	Bryconia
Population:	561,000 (est)
Predominant language:	Common Tongue, Bryconian
Main roads:
Major districts:
Current mayor:	Elliott Sylvain
Map versions:

Deeprift, or District 03, is a district and "capital city" of the underground settlement-nation of Bryconia. Deeprift, which was originally the administrative district of the settlement, has seen various changes and improvements to its design that contribute to its industrialisation and the overall survivability of the settlement independent of foreign aid. The city was the third expansion to the original rig that descended from the cavern ceiling, and was colloquially referred to as "Deeprift" instead District 03 because of its relative depth and proximity to the Loveless Lake above which the city lies. Deeprift is one of two districts situated above the magma lake, the other being District 04 ("Silverhold").

Geography

Understanding Deeprift's peculiar architecture and structure is near impossible without understanding the odd and very specific geography that the city is situated in, particularly the extreme heat and somewhat unstable nature of the cavern that the city calls home. Deeprift was the last district to be founded directly by the original six-man administrative team that controled the settlement in its early days, and thus has the largest number of environmental phenomena named after them. The most prominent of these natural monuments is Oliver's Plunge, also called the Falls, which is a massive magma waterfall on the northwestern side of the Loveless Lake that descends to a magma river (called the Coreflow) that flows into an even more massive magma pool, that is thought to be the center of a huge underground volcano (called Elder's Respite). Oliver's Plunge, in addition to being the place where treasurer and traitor Oliver Kristensen was thrown to his death, is incredibly important to the design and construction of the city; above the pit exists a hole in the city structure that forms the center of the Generator that powers almost all of the city, which is in turn powered by the gusts of scalding air vented through the Plunge and scorching the nearby metal scaffolding to the point where forty percent of all repairs made by the entire nation in one week are performed above Oliver's Plunge.

Holly's Ballroom is the second of the three natural wonders named after the original explorers, and it is also very important to the formation and economy of Deeprift, as well as Bryconia as a whole. Holly's Ballroom, named after the infamously glamorous and self-absorbed Holly Miller, whose skeleton which is absorbed into one of the rapidly growing crystal formations of the Ballroom serves as a warning for those too interested in naught but their own reflection, is a major source of astracite crystals for both Bryconia and also all of the confederacy, with the Ballroom being thought to be a geode on the interior of an ancient comet (which is often referred to as the Lifestone). The Ballroom is both essential to the continued settlement and expansion of Bryconia and also incredibly dangerous to the people who live in the expansive city; the astracite contained in the Ballroom is the basis for most of the nation's sizable repository of verakium that the nation uses for hover technology necessary to keep the structure of the settlement from plummeting to the cave floor, but the astracite in the Ballroom is anomalous in that it contains a trace mineral that causes it to grow uncontrollably and very quickly (which is how it ended up killing Holly Miller, who, despite common sense dictating otherwise, insisted at the time that she only needed another three minutes to check her reflection). Crystals mined from the cavern are treated with high temperatures that causes the breakdown of the aberrant minerals, but the Ballroom must be regularly cleared in order to prevent it from growing into the structure of Deeprift.

Richard's Forest is the third and final of the natural wonders promulgated by the shifting and roiling geological nature of the cavern inhabited by Deeprift, and is also the one the people of the city are least fond of, partially due to its terrifying implications for the people of the city and also because it is named after the reviled Richard Townsend, who nearly caused the destruction of the underground colony with his idiotic method of "cleansing" broken tools, by tossing them into the magma. Richard's corpse forever entombed in one of the tall spires that make up the Forest after he was caught in one of their formations when he was finally exiled from the settlement. His disembodied hand holding the flag of Bryconia aloft on the peak of one of the tallest spires marks the area as his territory, and thus a place to be avoided at all costs. The Forest consists of many spires of flash-cooled obsidian that poke out of the magma lake and expand out to where the lake apparently once was, but has only left a basalt beach behind. The spires form when a geyser of magma shoots out of the lake, which is uncommon in and of itself, and is then cooled by a blast of cold air from vents in the caver ceiling that open occasionally, hardening into an obisidan tower. The area is infested with a species of bacterium that lives in the Loveless Lake, thriving upon the heat which it converts into energy through biological methods, and turning the extra energy gathered into ramshackle DNA that the bacterium throws off in an aggressive manner, which can cause mutations in creatures in which the bacterium lives. These bacteria are very prevalent in the Forest, and have infected a number of magma crabs and other unfortunate creatures in the area, including a few tortured humans, who mutate uncontrollably and have gained the colloquial name of "Red Screamers". Any creatures from the Forest that venture anywhere near the settlement and creatures from the settlement who are infected with the bacterium or go near the Forest are summarily executed by an emergency biohazard containment team and tossed into the magma to be rid of them.