Friday 11 February 2011

The city of Oblast

As the Globan production of Holmgard decreased, hundreds of miners which were initially attracted by the relatively safety and high wage, left the colony in search of a new way to earn a living. The best of them were employed in the modern mining colonies such as Magnar Impresso but hundreds of others weren’t so lucky.

But soon after the closure of Holmgard’s largest mining facility, a new Globan deposit was discovered by the lonely roamer, Rabunch. He discovered the Globan, in an area known as the Great Wastelands, an extremely dangerous area known to be the habitat of the most horrifying creatures that roam the Red Planet’s surface. These exaggerated reports sparked a small Globan rush among the residents of Holmgard. Spending all their money in an attempt to reach the borders of the Great Wastelands, the colonists founded the colony of Oblast. After some months the small Globan vein was exploited and the miners faced another period of poverty. Luckily, weeks before the total exploitation of the Globan, the miners traded some mirrors and blankets with a local Tulain tribe. During this trade the miners heard of large metal ore veins under the Tulain village. However this metal ore wasn’t worth as much money as the precious Globan, the quantity of ore under the Tulain village stunned the inhabitants of Oblast.

The colonist soon agreed to try and convince the Tulain to move their village further into the Great Wastelands. The Tulain chieftain offended by this impossible idea, immediately stopped the trade of Tulip and other rare desert herbs. Also offended by those savage natives, the colonist hired a small force of heavily armed mercenaries to chase away the Tulain. However the Tulain warriors were numerous and brave, they lacked adequate leadership and modern weapons. The mercenaries massacred most of the warriors and the rest of them dispersed into the Great Wastelands to be never seen again.

Some of the citizens of Oblast, managed to enslaved hundreds of Tulain and forced them to mine in the most dangerous areas of the immense mining complexes. Many of these slaves, lived their entire lives under the Red Planet’s surface never witnessing the sun or their families again. Now in control of cheap manpower and huge quantities of metal ore, the citizens of Oblast became one of the wealthier inhabitants of the Red Planet. Oblast became the place were dreams come true, miners became directors and housewives became the owners of large taverns and motels. Attracted by the glamor of this new colony, hundreds of new colonists arrived by all sorts of transport from the slow moving Tulip convoys to the modern Imperial Public Transport System or IPTS (only for authorized Imperial citizens and at a cost!)

The population of Oblast boomed as the industry flourished and the city’s economy prospered. The city of Oblast counted an population of at least 7450 citizens. Aware of the danger of the all growing Imperial influence on the Red Planet, the city banned all Imperial citizens only permitting them day passes in limited numbers. The Oblastians also formed alliances with several free cities such as T’Otal and Novo Ivelis. These three cities formed their own armies which merged into one large army when one of the free cities was invaded by large regular forces such as the Empire. This army, the second largest human army on the Red Planet counted approximately 1200 Oblastians which are drafted by lottery, 750 irregular militiamen which are hired and equipped by the notorious Fuel Boarz and the industrial city of Novo Ivelis provided the army with modern armoured vehicles and 2000 battle droids of the Novo II class, armed with VX-07 long range precision blasters.

The Emperor dislikes the idea of the free cities and especially the alliance of Oblast with the Fuel Boarz! War is imminent, …

1 comment:

  1. Love this blog post! A really interesting read! Followed!

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