The Three Cities of Anija

Chancellor of Hera

* Taarja Kuuhäma

Chancellor of Hestija

* Li Min-Taonaka

**The Republic of the Three Cities of Anija** (**The Republic of Anija** or just **Anija** or **The Cities**.) are a collection of city-states in the Anijan Basin all centered around three immense, walled, multi-layered megacities named *Rhea*, *Hera*, and *Hestija*.

Anija is exclusively home to generations of engineers, scientists, and others of the sort. One could say that Anija is simply a group of partially-militant university complexes.

## Description and History

Anija is the most technologically advanced nation in all the known world of Anetha. Comparatively, Anija is from a completely different era of technology, looking like they've stepped right out of the European 1910's while the rest of the world is stuck in the late middle-ages. Anija has access to electricity, running water, rail-based locomotives, and repeating (if dangerously unreliable or hilariously expensive) firearms.

The reason for Anija's tech superiority is their habit of hoarding away of their own discoveries and individuals of apparently high intelligence that they deem good additions to the cities. Another factor being their rather specific policy of pseudo-isolationism; they will interact with outsiders but will, under severe penalties, never expose any secrets related to their technology. Attempts at smuggling out these secrets are brutally apprehended by the Seeker Corps.

### Origins (May be rewritten.)

Strangely enough, the history of these cities are shrouded in legend and secrecy. The exact date the Republic was formed is a bit of a mystery, some people believe it has existed since before the fall of the Anethenian Imperium while some records point to around a few centuries ago. As far as most native citizens know, these three massive cities were founded at first as one great city by a regional petty king, his court wizard, and his single most trusted advisor who declared themselves equals and their kingdom a republic. At great cost, these three rulers had loaned to them the immense magical power of Madosakai and the impressive architectural ability of Menijata to construct The Grand Ringed City of Rhea: a city to rival even the stature of the once-massive megacity of the Anethenian Imperial Capital of Arx Anetha.

Heavily advertised, this great city attracted truly countless amounts of immigrants, too much for the city to provide for. The "three scribes", as they were then called, then only wanted to focus on the improvement of their city and the sciences, so entry was granted to only those who showed great aptitude in magic, science, and statecraft and a special military group was formed to root out interlopers: The Seekers. Generations of scholars were born, encouraging a slow, but ultimately exponential improvement to Anija's technological advancement.

The cities have since mastered how Madosakai and Menijata have put together their capital, building two additional cities with which to study any field they deem valuable to the Republic.

## Demographics

Anija is currently the only country that accurately keeps track of its own census records all the way down to individuals. All citizens are issued an ID card upon naturalization or when a native citizen reaches age 15.

### Population

488,859 Citizens in all

* 155,684 Humans of all ethnicity
* 126,493 Rutamani
* 92,473 Bremin of all ethnicity
* 87,572 Matossa and their exiles
* 19,121 Volani
* 5,205 Dorzhaila
* 2,311 Nphyr

### Languages

Anija has a wide variety of immigrants who retain their original language. However, the knowledge of Anethenian Commontongue or Metropolitan Anijan languages are heavily recommended to make working and navigating within the cities more convenient.

### Religion

Immigrant citizens are allowed to practice any faith as long as it doesn't interfere with theirs or anyone else's work or studies within the cities. Certain religions are heavily discouraged, such as the worship of the 7 gods of Sjüriga. Anija usually doesn't concern itself with spiritual matters, preferring the populace to focus more on the material.

## Infrastructure and Architecture

### Anatomy of the Cities

The cities that make up Anija are a bit of an anomaly in Anetha. Using Rhea as an example, these structures are absolutely massive fortresses surrounded by large concrete ring with steel rebar and an outer shell of a specially made Lyrite-infused steel alloy that make the outer ring of the city almost indestructible to any weapons outsiders could throw at it. This alloy makes the cities appear bronze-like in color. The diameter of this ring as about 804 meters (2637.8 feet) across with the total height being about 217 meters. (711.94 feet.)

Inside Rhea's ring, there exist 3 wide, vertically-stacked main floors which are supported by large metal columns. These floors are called "platforms" and are where standard city buildings would be built. The topmost platform on the roof houses a section of the residential district where workers of the agriculture department live, with the rest of the surface area dedicated to an artificially maintained grassy field that is used only for agriculture.

The second layer is solely devoted to residential buildings, cordoned off in districts shaped like pie-slices with a circular region in the direct center. These residential districts are all made up of apartment-like buildings arranged around a commons area in the center of each district that usually houses a small park, fountain, or other such decorations. At the center district of both the 2nd and 3rd platforms lies the University which houses libraries, research facilities, schools, and statesman offices.

The third platform is on ground level and houses manufacturing centers, the bottom-half of the university, the immense Lyrite power plant, and the Trans-Anijan Tram System platform. The surface platform also has a sub-level full of extremely large, open rooms where resources are stored and maintained.

### The Trans-Anijan Tram System

The Trans-Anijan Tram System is a trifecta of railways for Lyrite-powered locomotives that run across the surface of the Anijan Basin. As this railway travels outside the cities themselves, this opens the trams themselves up to attacks from bandit primitives or bold Outer Anijan feudal lords. To protect against this, the rails are supported about 100 feet in the air by metal supports that are armored with the same alloy that the covers the outer rings of the cities. The trains themselves consist of 5 individually linked cars that are also built using steel and armor-plated with that same alloy. Further protection is guaranteed by Seeker Enforcers who are stationed in the rear barracks-like car and armed with Lyrite battery-powered rifles. Attacks are rare, and hardly ever worth the trouble of the Seekers dealing with them.

### Architecture

The architecture of the buildings in Anija are rather bland and same-y, with everything except residential buildings looking like simple metal and stone boxes with windows. The residential apartments themselves resemble large, wide, Outer Anijan (Western Slavic) homes with some slight deviations. The appearance of the interior of the buildings are up to the tastes of the individuals that live in each unit.

### "Little Rhea"

Outside of Rhea, there exists a small town huddled around the tiny gate that serves as Rhea's only on-foot entrance and exit. As it technically falls within the Republic's borders, and they kept coming back when driven away, this town was declared a de-facto part of Anija and its residents were granted limited citizenship. As such, The Seeker Enforcers will protect this town to some extent and a limited amount of resources are shared with them.

Citizens of Little Rhea enjoy luxuries that the other Anijan feudalists lack and heavily envy, such as: electricity in the form of lights and heated homes, running water, proper medicine, and unrivaled civil protection. The outer wall of Rhea has existed for almost a century and still has yet to be breached a single time.

This town contains relatively few Republic-made constructions. Most of the houses are fully hand-made with traditional carpentry methods, while brick and mortar is seen closer to Rhea's gate. Around this small town is a relatively simple 10 meter high concrete and rebar wall that stretches all around Rhea, about 60 meters out from the ring of the city.

## Government

It's a republic, but also technocratic. Y'know. (WIP)

## Economy

Ripoff of Jacque Fresco's resource-based economy system. (WIP)