Lands of Lásdan

[Cuthalion]

Hey,

I'm almost finished with the novel I'm writing now, so I decided to start thinking about other subjects to write about, this is what I came up with:

Synopsis

The lands of Lásdan ("Forgotten" in the language of the native elves) are inhabited by Humans, Elves and Dwarves. Thirty years ago (possibly more) a strange disease swept the lands, killing the weak (old and very young) and leaving the survivors with a broken memory. No one remembers anything about what happened before the disease, everyone was infected. As a result of this, many have died and even more have been killed in the fighting after.

Imagine waking up, knowing not what your name is and seeing a member of another race, your first (instinctual) response is hatred/violence (this is instinctual response is present in humans now too, one of the reasons black & white people don't always mingle very well) and this is what happened.

Races

The Dwarves are little heard of, they barricaded themselves in their mines and don't often come out. The ones left in the cities were killed, most often by humans.

The Elves posses one of the three greater cities of Lásdan, and since they don't know the real name of the city they called it 'Eloszar' ('The First' in the language of the native humans). Eloszar is the only civilized city left in Lásdan.

The Humans posses two of the three greater cities of Lásdan because they are great in numbers (though the Elves are better at 1on1 combat). They are ruled by two Warlords, of which only one can be descriped as remotely civilized.

Story

My novel would be about one Elf trying to make a living for himself by doing jobs for an Assasin-master who sells his services to the smaller warlords. The main character would stumble upon the only university left in Lásdan, where Dwarves, Elves and Humans are working together to get back their history by researching it. Though most of the effort of the University goes to finding back how to do magic.

Offcourse, the story would be full of references to what the disease was and how the culture of Lásdan was, before it become the land of the forgetfull.

Lands

The countryside of Lásdan is mostly small grasses and burned farms. Because the survivors of the disease in the first few years had to survive without any kind of balance between what comes off of the land and what goes in the mouths of the people, many farms were robbed, burned and then left for dead (often the former owners had died before that).

There are a few mountains, and within a few mines (populated by Dwarves), the food the Dwarves eat are mostly mushrooms and the like that grows in dark and damp environments.

There are a few farms that are still in operation, especially around the cities. These farms are protected by the Warlord of the nearby city. Other working farms include the farms that handle the foodsupply for small communities which have sprung up the last five years.

Cities

The population of Lásdan was about 350.000 before the disease, about 90.000 died directly because of the disease and about 130.000 in the troubles that arose after the disease (hunger killed about 50.000, violence about 60.000, other causes about 20.000).

Because of this, the cities are sparsely populated. The Warlords decided to move into the center of the cities and build a wall around that, to create a more defensible spot. So the cities are all surrounded by burned homes (often deconstructed to use the stone for the wall of the inner ring) and a broken-down wall.

Whatdayya think?

Thanx,
Cuthalion

[Mormacil]

Very nice Like the idea let me think on it for a bit before I cna really say anything.