02 - Iron Kingdoms W.. - Captain Spud Is Amazing

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mathematics, engineering, alchemy, metallurgy, and
arcane theory to its curriculum and to allow women
to enroll. The Crown mitigated its demands with
grants to establish the prominent Sunbright Strategic
Academy, now referred to simply as the Strategic
Academy, and the two foundations work together in
developing military projects.
Unfortunately, many of the earlier buildings
were largely destroyed during the Cygnaran Civil
War and the university was closed throughout the
latter 400s. It was rebuilt more glorious than ever and
reopened in 500 AR. Since its reopening, the University
has erected numerous statues throughout the city,
opened a massive library, created the Caspian Gallery
& Museum, established western Immoren’s leading
sanatorium, and outfitted the Sentinel Point Naval
Fortress. The current chancellor of the university is
Hanna Yarrington (female Thurian Exp7/Sor7), an
excitable woman of advanced years but in excellent
health and noted for her expertise in history and law.
She claims her university is the most attended in the
history of western Immoren and boasts between ten and
twelve thousand students enrolled annually—Strategic
Academy included. This is a reasonable claim.
Entertainment &
Recreation
If you want to know the nature of a
culture, take a long, hard look at what
they do to entertain themselves.
—Nikolai Corsar (male Umbrean Exp5/Rog2),
philosopher
Entertainment for the Rich
Now more than ever, the people of western
Immoren need some means to escape the reality of
daily life—something to help them forget, if even
just for an hour or more, the harsh truths of war
and death. Granted, for some the present dangers
have had a sobering effect. With undead roaming
the countryside, many choose to bar their doors
and windows and simply withdraw into the relative
comfort of home and family. Others have heard the
call of king and country and have left relative safety
and everything they know behind possibly to give their
lives in the defense of all they hold dear. Many simply
want to forget the terrors and attrocities that plague
the land and seek to escape from those realities at least
for a short while. What form this escape takes depends
a great deal on one’s station in life. A great many
elaborate forms of entertainment take money and
resources and therefore demand entry fees—making
them the purview of the rich and well-to-do.
Masques, for example, are all the rage among
affluent Immorese largely because of the exquisite
craftsmanship required for the costumes and the
extravagant sets these plays demand. Some of the
greatest operas and masques can only be performed
in purpose-built theaters due to their special set
requirements unlike the plays watched by common
folk which can be performed in any open area. For
example, the Cygnaran historical epic Orgothika
Nex requires a full orchestra with nearly twenty
percussionists—including two cannons—to perform
“The March of the Colossals” in the third act. The
“Land & Sea” theater in Merywyn actually has a
mechanical dracodile powered by gears and winches
that can be elevated to the stage from below when a
performance calls for a fearsome beast.
Formal theater is also surprisingly popular in Rhul
although the dwarves favor histories and legends
rather than flights of fancy or the romances. One of
the most popular theatrical forms in Rhul is the elegiac
“bone plays” originally performed as a posthumous,
semi-biographical eulogy at the funerals of dwarven
heroes and leaders. Today, bone plays are formal
performances about the lives of legendary dwarves.
Bone plays are often very symbolic, and the actors all
wear masks and carry specific props to identify their
characters. For example, Orm, the Father of Building
and Stonework, always carries a square and chisel
regardless of what he is doing in a given scene, while
Dhurg, the First Father of Battle, is never without his
axe. The masks worn by bone actors are exquisitely
crafted and designed with wide, conical mouths to
help project the actors’ voices. These grimacing faces
are considered by many collectors to be works of art
in their own right. As each actor slowly increases his
repertoire, he accumulates his own collection of
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