The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Artbook

chapter ii
The Free City
of Novigrad
Where the Pontar meets the sea, there lies Novigrad, the metropolis of the North. Enriched by
the water-bound trade passing through its harbors and straddling a key military juncture, the city
wields tremendous economic and political influence, making it a force the Northern Realms and the
Nilfgaardian Empire alike must reckon with. Whoever controls the Free City, with access to its full
treasury, many workshops, and mighty fleet, holds in his hands the key to the North. Spies, religious
fanatics, powerful criminal organizations, and trade guilds alike thus all wage brutal wars for power
and influence within its walls, calling on every form of conspiracy, intrigue, assassination, blackmail,
and bribery imaginable.
Novigrad has recently become even more turbulent than usual. The Church of the Eternal Fire, a sect
based in the city, has turned fanatic and incited a wave of witch hunts that have made burning pyres
an all-too-frequent sight on the city’s streets.