In 1003 YK, Sharn is a city of contrasts. In the heights of the upper towers, fine and fancy folk enjoy sweet air, sunshine, huge parks full of natural beauty, an active nightlife, the finest opera house and museums, etc. In the midst of the towers, the bulk of the population works the day away, making, trading, going to school, getting by, dreaming of a better life for their children. And in the depths, the forgotten, the outcast, those with nowhere else to go, eke out what existence they can.

In the lower districts, police patrol in dense urban hubs, along major thoroughfares, and nearby train stations. The rest they leave to the gangs, with whom they have an uneasy truce, and an understanding: if they keep order, the police will look the other way. And so does the undercity economy thrive: making and selling all the things the fancy folk desire, but can't be had legally. It certainly helps that the undercity has direct access to the harbor, and the innumerable nooks and crannies among the towers make for plenty of off-the-books trade hubs for ships to offload contraband before mooring at the legitimate docks.

One particular district, formally known as Ashblack, but known to literally everyone as The Cogs, is a particular case of urban blight. Generations ago, it was undesirable real estate, even among the undercity, with the least natural light of any lower district, unfavorable access to water for shipping (as only small vessels could reach it underneath the lower bridges between outer towers), and a constant funky smell from underground Fernian lava flows venting noxious fumes. Seeing an opportunity, House Cannith bought up swathes of territory there, clearing out the remnants of old development and muscling out its few inhabitants, and building huge factories for wartime production. Sharn's unemployed were quickly depleted, and as news of the massive hiring spree reached all corners of Khorvaire, immigration surged. With so many foreign nationals unable to enter the country due to their war status, immigrants from Droaam and Darguun had a huge advantage, and the undesirability of their racial makeup was overlooked by the factories. Anyone with a working pair of hands was welcome to apply.

For a generation, the factories and their workers thrived. Cannith didn't pay well, and demanded long hours with poor safety control, but it was still a marked upgrade for many of the immigrants. They scrimped and saved, and built enough wealth to buy company housing, furnishings, the makings of a home. They made friends, fell in love, and started families. The Cogs become a thriving community. Instead of sunlight, the streets were lit day and night by the running factories, and a rapidly-developed infrastructure. Instead of chill at all hours, the air was warmed by the belching smokestacks. It still wasn't where the city's well-to-do wanted to live, but it was home to a population that could alone comprise a major city elsewhere in Khorvaire.

And then came the Mourning. An uncertain truce settled in, and the factories slowed their output. When peace was declared, they abruptly shut down, and the employees were left with no livelihood, no pension, no prospects.

Things escalated quickly. Crime became rampant, and with it, gangs rose and fell. The immigrants weren't welcome in the rest of Breland--or even the rest of Sharn for that matter--and clashed with the city's guard forces and private security whenever they strayed from their ghetto.

When the Chronicle began to illustrate the truth of the situation, telling the story from the immigrants' side, public opinion shifted. The government of Sharn, dominated by moneyed interests and privileged nobles, adopted a "let them eat cake" attitude, which only fanned the flames. The city was pushed to the brink of civil war. Crowds gathered outside the city council hall, threatening to turn violent.

The King himself arrived to mediate the dispute, demanded the council open the floor and hear arguments. When all was said and done, a new compact was signed by the plebiscite, reforming the government, and creating social programs to ease the economic stress of the undercity.

And so everything was fine and everyone was happy forever.

Yeah. Sure.

The State of the Undercity, 1003 YK

Scholars debate the true definition of "The Undercity". It's one of those nebulous terms for geography that everyone has their own personal definition of; the only agreement is that, statistically, everyone includes The Cogs in that definition, and most of the adjacent districts, but few extend it to the entirety of the Lower Districts. Similarly, the underwater district is rarely included, but the underground districts usually are (even though they have additional, more local names, such as the famous Gutter Forges and the delightful "Bull's Balls").

But the Cogs are unquestionably the heart of the Undercity, with their characteristic poor natural light, and the relatively new addition of massive, abandoned factories, as filled with vagabonds and criminal syndicates as they are with lethal guardian constructs and Cannith experiments gone wrong. Cannith built great city blocks for huge factories, with broad streets between them to move materials easily. Society today clings to the roads, both in the original street-facing mixed-use midrises and tenements, and in a variety of semi-permanent structures sprawling into the streets. The factory grounds between these developments are a no-man's land, at least for ordinary citizens.

Ostensibly, everyone therein is a citizen of Sharn, who can vote in elections, and is both subject to and protected by the laws of Sharn, enforced by its unified municipal police force. In reality, the political map is a chaotic quilt of ever-shifting gang territory, that most police just steer clear of...just like the bad old days. The social programs of the last 7 years are helping to stave off starvation and homelessness (a little), but they aren't creating new jobs. To this day, the only booming job sectors are gambling, prostitution, intoxicants, and of course, crime.

The Big Three

For a while, it was just a Big Two, but no one can deny the meteoric rise of House Tarkanan any longer. The territory of the Undercity is roughly equally split between the Boromar Clan, Daask, and House Tarkanan, each of which has their specialty.

Boromar Clan

The Boromar's are often thought of as "the respectable ones". They wear pinstripe suits and nice fedoras. They drive fancy new cars (with armored doors and shielded windows). They can go up topside and mingle with the fancy men.

Their specialty: political intrigue. Anyone who's anyone gets invited to special parties, where they're invited to indulge in their wildest fantasies, where nothing is off-limits. Whether a willing, enthusiastic participant, or charmed by some sorceress in disguise, or just straight drugged or framed into it, these industrialist, nobles, and councilmen commit illegal acts (or at least ones that won't play well to the Chronicle's audience), and the Boromars keep all the evidence. From then on, they own them.

Most members of the Boromars are from the "pretty" races, the ones the topsiders aren't afraid of: humans, elves, halflings, etc. The actual Boromar family at the center of the gang are themselves halflings, but don't be fooled: Conall Boromar may be half the height of a man, but he's got the strength of ten of them.

In combat, they rely on traditional gangster strength: numbers, weapons (including, of course, tommy guns, and the element of surprise.

Daask

A homegrown gang, Daask represents the fusion of many smaller, tribalist gangs of demihumans, unified by the guiding hand of none other than Sora Katra, though not in so obvious a guise. She helped them overcome their differences and realize that together, they represented the real population of the undercity--the immigrants, the unwelcome, the "ugly"--and they should be foremost in their home district.

Their specialty: magic. Artificers and House Cannith sell every manner of convenience to the topsiders in nice, clean, convenient storefronts, but magic is harder to come by, hoarded by wizarding guilds and reclusive practitioners. There's no artifice knicknack to make someone fall in love with you, or to lose those stubborn 20 pounds, or polymorph into someone else's body to impersonate them. But magic can do all of those things. And the best part: there isn't a stable market with well-known prices. A potion that costs 3 copper to brew might sell for a bag of gold to the right noble.

Lately, they've added a potent new arrow to their quiver: Dragon's Blood. A tiny vial of this red potion can literally give you superpowers. Always wished you could fly? Shoot fire out of your hands? Skip the commute traffic and just teleport to work? Now you can! One power today, another tomorrow. The best part: it's temporary, so customers have to keep on coming back for their fix.

House Tarkanan

The newcomer nobody saw coming. "House" Tarkanan is a deliberate mockery of a dragonmarked house, where everyone (at least the "made" members) bears an aberrant dragonmark. Such dragonmarks are not hereditary, so they aren't actually a biological family, but they are united in their shared experience of distruct, shame, and scapegoating for their marks. Thora Tavin, the foudner, took the name Tarkanan after Halas "The Earthshaker" Tarkanan, a mythic figure from the War of the Mark 1500 years ago.

Their stated goal--if they can be said to have one--is to bring low the Dragonmarked Houses, force them to face justice for their exploitation and greed, for their warmongering that cost millions of lives. Nobody, in their eyes, bears this guilt more than House Cannith. To that end, they position themselves as avengers of the injustice suffered by the people of the Cogs, natural allies against the corrupt and unethical house that turned their burdgeoning community into a miserable slum. Even so, the locals are hesitant to trust them, especially with Daask better representing them.

Their advantage, naturally, is their dragonmarks. Each is unique, but all are powerful. Some members are expert spies and assassins, others are persuasive conmen, others might phase through bank vaults to rob at will. They have no specific focus in their criminal activities; rather, they gather wealth and power to support their overall goal, while focusing on their most important resource: people with aberrant dragonmarks. They employ "seekers" who find candidates all over the world and convince them--one way or the other--to join their ranks.

If anything, their niche in crime these last few years has been taking the jobs the other syndicates don't want. They have a reputation for having no moral lines, and will happily cross the other syndicates to make a buck. Both Boromar and Daask hate the Tarkanans, but until recently, neither thought they were a serious threat.