Tanah-Chook

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"We have sewers now. Sewers! No one's building them in Venderbight."

Tanah-Chook is a tomb-colony located on an island near Venderbight. Founded by Third City tomb-colonists unhappy with the state of Venderbight, this sandstone city is centered around a vast ziggurat that serves as the seat of its leader, but the rest of it is small and really not a tourist attraction. Its only contact with London is via irregular postal exchange, so most on the mainland have not heard of it at all.

Tanah-Chook has few landmarks. Its main marketplace is surprisingly tranquil, and any attempts at theft are borne from boredom rather than greed. The local tomb-colonists preserve their physical vigor at the House of Exertion, through activities like dance and dueling - both of which are approached with the same level of competition and rivalry. When not such engaged, they can be found keeping their minds busy at the Great Library, a repository of centuries worth of literature. The Library also hosts events like public chess tournaments and concerts, and features a cafe.

The Ebullient Undertaker

As the newborn colony began to require proper management, its founders "disappeared," leaving their position to the Ebullient Undertaker. She set up democratic groundwork by allowing three main ways for tomb-colonists to let their weary souls pass on. Either they could ascend to the Surface to see the Sun one last time, move to the Grand Sanatorium in Venderbight as a hospice of sorts, or follow a practice that Tanah-Chook's founders had invented: Emergence, in which a tomb-colonist at the end of their elongated lifespan incubates a frost-moth that eventually bursts from their chest. The Undertaker also proclaimed universal voting rights, for both living and dead. This also includes the permanent dead.

All who have chosen their permanent end find themselves on the far shore, a place of (presumably) no return. But even in this state, citizens of Tanah-Chook are still expected to participate in the city's political life. This might be accomplished through such means as memorizing pages of reports to update fellow denizens, whispering to the dying at the Sanatorium, or sending a message in writing on a frost-moth's wings, as these regularly migrate between the Neath and the far shore.