Bloodsalt

In the wake of the Great Green Fire and the Wizard Guild’s recruitment of nonhuman workers for its Reclamation Project, Freeport underwent a massive jump in population—and some of the newcomers were too aggressive to get along with their civilized neighbors. Faced with cramped conditions and the threats of riots in Scurvytown and Drac’s End, the Captains’ Council decided to expand the city and create a new district, a region where the half-orcs and hobgoblins working on the project could live in relative peace.

After a few months, the unnamed district took form on the edge of the city, a curve of shanties, crude housing, and tents outside the walls of the Eastern District. At the center of the district, the Wizards’ Guild built a compound to house the Reclamation Project’s alchemical workshops and facilities, which were proving too dangerous to keep within the Old City. Savage workers would line up each day at the compound to collect tools, equipment, and barrels of chemicals and then trudge into the wasted lands north of Freeport to work the soil. The fears of the Wizards’ Guild soon proved well-founded, as various alchemical compounds soaked into the ground of the district, leaving it desiccated and dull red in color; soon the name “Bloodsalt” was coined by the inhabitants, and it stuck as the name of the district.

Bloodsalt rapidly became the most violent and dangerous place in Freeport; orcs and hobgoblins clashed every night over old tribal grudges and new animosities. Meanwhile, the nonhumans left in Scurvytown came under pressure from the human citizens to join their own kind in Bloodsalt, whether they were workers, pirates, or working families. Bloodsalt became a war zone, and the Watch proved unable (and unwilling) to police the district, putting the Reclamation Project at risk. Into this chaos came Draegar Redblade, a local hobgoblin gang leader who took over the policing of Bloodsalt and the protection of the Project compound in return for official recognition for his followers. Redblade has become the district’s unofficial warlord and governor, and the Captains’ Council seems content to let him run Bloodsalt as his personal kingdom.

Bloodsalt is a ragged excuse for a district, a dangerous place for both locals and visitors. The Redblade Militia enforces its will on the weak, while engaging in regular brawls with the orc pirates of the district’s south. Workers toil under the hot sun every day for a handful of coins, while poor orc and hobgoblin families live in fear of gangs and random violence. Even walking down the street is a hazard in Bloodsalt; your next step could punch through a thin shell of earth into a pocket of acid or flaming chemicals, a terrible side effect of the alchemical pollutants leaking from the Reclamation compound. A few of Bloodsalt’s inhabitants fight to better themselves and protect their friends and neighbors, but for most in the new district, life is every monster for himself, and the weak are nothing but victims cowering in the dark, waiting for the axe to fall.

Bloodsalt Locations:
1) The Reclamation Project Compound
2) Redblade Barracks
3) Krom's Throat
4) Irontooth Enclave
5) Gitch's Tower

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