Neveah

Neveah, officially the Republic of Neveah (pop. ~12.5 million) is an independent city state and a location within the Cityverse, and, as the city for which it is named, the primary setting. Neveah is described as existing "nestled in the space between Earth and the Otherworld", and as a "melting pot" for people of varied ethnicity, language, and species.

## Geography

Neveah is an island in the northern half of the Pacific Ocean, somewhere between the Aleutian Islands and Hawaii, although it has proven notoriously difficult to plot accurately on maps, as it has actually been shown to move small distances, likely due to it's somewhat precarious position in the insubstantial borderlands between realms. Despite this, Neveah is a relatively easy to access place, as much like many things involving magic, the most important thing to do is to set off in roughly the right direction with the *intent* to go there.

Neveah has a mostly temperate climate, with warm summers and cold winters, and is somewhat hilly, though too small for genuine mountains. The parts of Neveah that are not urbanised are rich in woodland and beaches.

## History

Conventional wisdom dictates that Neveah was discovered in 1524, when a ragtag group of Euro-American colonists got distracted during a routine trade journey and ended up, purely by accident and quite in spite of a cultural zeitgeist that was trying to move away from Medieval superstitions, proving conclusively that the supernatural is, in fact, actually just rather natural.

Conventional wisdom is, of course, wrong, as the average sailor of the time couldn’t “discover” his way out of a particularly complex cardboard box, and at any rate, the local indigenous peoples, those from other nearby islands such as Sibija and so on, had in fact already known of the "vanishing isle" for a good few centuries at least; they merely avoided going out of their way to build permanent settlements there for reasons which translate roughly to modern English as “fuck that noise”.

For you see, those who grow up in close proximity to the unknown and unknowable tend to develop a healthy sense of caution about all of that magic nonsense, whereas the Europeans, high off of their overdeveloped senses of both romantic adventure and profit, saw merely another unclaimed landmass ripe for the picking, a particularly exotic corner of a world that was theirs for the taking.

Who was right, in the end? It’s hard to say. On the European side of the argument, the establishment of Neveah as a human city-state lead to the subsequent eventual establishment of magic as a legitimate field of study and proved beyond doubt the existence of other sentient beings that were merely smart enough to avoid human detection, two facts that make up arguably one of the most important developments in human history, and which it’s inhabitants tend to be a little smug about to this day.

On the other hand, there is a strong argument to be made that we didn't discover Neveah, so much as it discovered us, and put us back on the radar of the other.

## Culture

Loud, eclectic, artistic, and multicultural, with a mixture of North American, Asian (especially Japanese), European, and other influences. Neveah is a world leader in Magical Theory and research, and Neveans in general place great value on knowledge, with a large, world-class state run university spread across multiple campuses, and an unusually high number of museums per capita, whether for local history, art, magic, or more obscure subjects, including the history of coffee, cats, and the colour pink.

Neveah is commonly known as a place where you can find anything if you look hard enough, for both good and bad. It is simultaneously a modern megapolis comparable to London, Tokyo, or New York City, and a place more deeply entwined with the Otherworld than potentially anywhere else on Earth. Outsiders tend to either love or hate Neveah; its diversity, intensity, casual attitude towards the magical, and sheer scale can often be seen as overwhelming.

Neveah is a presidential republic, and tends to lean towards socialist and liberal policies, with free healthcare and education, as well as decriminalisation of sex work and recreational drug use. Neveans as a people tend to value education, creativity, community, and fairness.

## Demographics

Neveah has a relatively young population, particularly as many from other countries go there in order to pursue careers in magic or to advance their education. Neveah is a high income country, with a strong social safety net and high standard of living, but nonetheless still some fairly significant issues with wealth inequality, though nowhere near to the level of many other countries. As a city state, Neveah's population is predominantly urban, but there are pockets of rural, semi-rural, suburban, or industrial land, too.

Neveah has no official language, although English is the *de facto* most used, and an ethnically diverse population. Most Neveans are of either east Asian (predominantly Japanese and Chinese) (20%), North Pacific (5%), European (35%), multiracial (10%) or Black/African (20%) (the latter two through early settler cultures/North America), with smaller populations of Polynesian, Arab, South Asian, and Indigenous people. Neveah has less racial tension than comparable "new world" countries such as Canada or the United States, due to several of its founding members being non-white (in particular, indigenous North Pacific peoples having magical knowledge that European explorers did not), the lack of an indigenous population to exploit, and no one group having an overall majority.

Neveah is a secular state, and the most commonly practised religions are Christianity (largely protestant), Islam, Buddhism, Judaism, Hinduism, and various pagan faiths.

## Supernatural

Neveah has a higher than usual amount of supernatural activity, and even laypeople tend to have picked up on a little magic to help them get by. The close proximity to Faerie means that most people are aware of and on the lookout for faerie activity. It is common practice in Neveah for people to place charms of luck, protection, or prosperity on their homes and businesses.

## Known Places Within Neveah

Red Light District

Central Park