Laransk

Laransk is a Dacian Sich town characterized by a pit similar to the one in Algenburg. The town was built around the pit to force the Pagan natives to submit to Dacian authority and act as their allies in return for being allowed to continue disposing of their dead in the pit, as is their custom.
Laransk is a very important town. By enlisting the natives as defenders and allies, and with the threat of psychic anguish should they fail to act as such, the town has become a cattleherder's dream come true. Absolutely colossal numbers of steppe-cattle are bred around Laransk at a low cost. They provide much of Dace's meat supply, and the town's success was essentially used to justify continuing to pump money into the Sich.
The Laranski themselves, however, are not a happy people. These Dacians are faced with constant tension with the Burakhs, the tribe whom they have strongarmed into defending them. They also work in very unclean environments, with many cattle passing through their town daily, and totally inadequate water supplies from the singal well in the town. Many are perpetually sick, and they have a characteristic look to them, thin and hollow-cheeked, despite having a diet consisting of quite a bit of meat, compared to other Dacians. Dacian Surgeons are very interested in why this might be, but as of yet have had no excuse to barge in and make demands of the fiercely independent Sich folk.
There are also reports of a great upsurge in the appearance of strange creatures, locally called Samojeds. These are beings born without mouths that emerge from the ground, and then slowly starve to death over anywhere between a month and a year, going gradually insane as they do. The Burakhs knew of them before, but once upon a time one might emerge in a century--these days it's dozens and dozens a year, and their decaying bodies poison the ground around them, bringing grave sickness to any who draw near.