1
Dispatch → Account → Other
by 
The Realm of Terra da Cinza.
.
6 reads.
Rio Sangrento
Corporação de Rio Sangrento
Rio Sangrento Corporation
A view of the Neiva district on a summer day.
Pure blood flow
Rio Sangrento, officially referred to as the Rio Sangrento Corporation after the legal entity that governs it, is the largest urban agglomeration in the Ashlands and the principal economic center of the Realm of Terra da Cinza. Possessing over 18 million inhabitants within its administrative limits amounting to an area of approximately 1700 km², it features very high population density within many of its districts. A fundamental restructuring and consolidation of the municipal governments under the RSC in the 1970's following a fiscal crisis that nearly bankrupted the entirety of the metropolitan area has resulted in monumental changes, beyond administrative changes perhaps most notably in the radical architectural change that is has experienced since the enactment of the 1981 combined zoning and building regulation code which together with an exceptionally strict aesthetic mandate and aggressive taxation scheme heavily favoring buildings with very high floor-area ratios. Consequently, Rio Sangrento holds the records for the city with most skyscrapers and the tallest average building height.
Lying at the mouth of the Crimson River which flows through the city and discharges into Crimson Bay, Rio Sangrento is located on the southern coast of the Cinzan State of the Realm, south of the geographical center of the Ashlandic mainland and between all other major population centers. Rio Sangrento is the core logistical and transport center of the Ashlands, possessing the largest commercial airport and seaport within the Realm. The city is notable for being one of the very few Ashlander cities to prominently feature rapid mass transit systems in the form of three private subway systems serving Rio Sangrento.
Settled in 1549 two years after first being discovered by Dom Carlos da Rosa Branco, the small town would come to grow substantially and receive first political and economical prominence in 1639 following the signing of the Treaty of Hakugyokurou formalizing the Fujiwara and Uesugi administrative dominance of the Ashlands and enacting the exchange of blood and faith, in which Rio Sangrento would play a memorable part. The Fujiwara would consolidate their administrative presence and the importation/exportation of goods between the Ashlands and the Japanese home islands in the city, fostering a strong mercantile presence which eventually surpassed the commercial significance of Novo Guimarães, the capital of the Suebi Domain. This development would continue for centuries, decades beyond the formal end of Fujiwara subjugation and the establishment of the Realm in 1878, until it began to lose its economic dominance relative to other Ashlander cities in the 1930's, a trend which lasted for nearly four decades until the late 1970's when drastic structural changes were undertaken to the administrative arrangement, revitalizing yet irreversibly changing Rio Sangrento in the process.
Etymology and Symbology
'Rio Sangrento', signifying 'Bloodlike River' or 'Bloody River' in Portuguese derives from the Rio Carmim, 'Crimson River' which flows through the city. The name is literal in quality : The waters flowing through the stream possess a vivid carmine coloration. The origin of this unusual hue lies at the boundary of the Cinder Fields, where ash and cinder come in contact with the resurging subterranean river inhabited by an endemic colony of micro-organisms which break down the combusted material, producing a vivid crimson carotenoid pigment in the process which dyes the water. This pigment is harmless to humans, and the water dyed by said pigment potable.
The flag and seal of the Rio Sangrento Corporation prominently features the river, yet incorporates a notable and related event within itself. The exchange of blood and faith and specifically the ceremony which took place in the city in the early 17th century are represented in the form of the Torii gate symbolizing the Lunar variations of Shinto, victoriously standing above the crimson flow washing a torn bible away towards the sea, the 'Alpha' and 'Omega' engulfed in the carmine tide and representing the triumph of Portuguese blood over the Christian faith. The white, red and black elements conforming to the traditionally Japanese aesthetic ideal of 'triple-layering' on the escutcheon which rests on the traditionally Portuguese monochrome gyronny is noted to form one of the archetypal examples of Luso-Japanese aesthetic fusion in the Ashlands.
The Capital Misconception
The Realm of Terra da Cinza does not have a capital, as the Ashen Constitution is entirely silent on the matter, not specifying any location as the seat of of the Realm. Regardless, the misconception of Rio Sangrento possessing this role persists, primarily because of the fact that several of the Realm's institutions are headquartered there, notably the Realm Constitutional Court and the Marine Bank, as well as most of the Realm's auxiliary services. Rio Sangrento is furthermore the primary host of foreign diplomatic missions to the Realm, and the base of operations for most foreign individuals and legal entities operating within the Ashlands.
While it may be argued that this effectively makes Rio Sangrento the De Facto capital of the Realm, the Realm proper has consistently rejected this assertion, arguing that the absence of a centralized capital is a deliberate omission by the Ashen Constitution, further pointing that the Realm's Forces do not host any significant command functions within Rio Sangrento.
History of Rio Sangrento
The exact date the mouth of the Crimson River was first discovered isn't know, but it is assumed to have occurred between 1544 and 1545 during an expedition by the Company Marines Dom Carlos da Rosa Branco unwittingly marooned on the Ashlands after being pulled southwards by the ocean gyre surrounding the landform. The stranded men spent their time exploring the southwestern interior and the southern coast of the Ashlands, eventually discovering what they described as a 'blood-crimson river discharging into the sea'. Noting and annotating the presence of a shielded, deep natural harbor at Crimson Bay, the drinkability of the stained water and vast fertile flatland expending northwards, the location would be settled in 1549, two years after Branco's return and the establishment of the Ashlands colonial company.
First records of a settlement called 'Rio Sangrento' date back to 1551. The first pioneers and majority of subsequent settlers came from the then-Portuguese province of Entre Douro e Minho, reflecting the general character of Ashlander migration, although the settlement did receive a substantial influx of Flemish migrants as did many other settlements in what is now the southern coast of the Cinzan State of the Realm, many fleeing the counter-reformation occurring in the Low Countries at the behest of Philip II, with a lesser amount of Frisians, Hollanders and Zeelanders also settling in the time preceding the subjugation of Portugal under the Iberian Union in 1580. While the legacy of those hailing from the Low Countries has largely faded into oblivion in contemporary times, meticulous recordkeeping first by the colonial company and later the Fujiwara-sponsored Shinto Shrines as well as comprehensive genetic testing reveal the considerable impact these populations had in shaping the contemporary composition of Ashlanders in the southern portion of the Cinzan State of the Realm.
Rio Sangrento, while already one of the largest settlements on the Ashlands by the beginning of the 17th century, would rise to prominence only in the aftermath of the Fujiwara and Uesugi subjugation campaigns and the 1639 treaty of Hakugyokurou. Despite being sieged by the Fujiwara on multiple occasions during the conflict and subjected to a years-long maritime blockade with occasional respite, the city was largely spared from destruction as the Company Marines successfully held their ground and relieved the siege through the Crimson River, most notably during the battles of Cruz Quebrada and Devil's Pond which are credited as having effectively saved the city from being sacked by the Fujiwara. These victories did not however decisively change the outcome of the conflict, which would not see Rio Sangrento fall to Fujiwara retainers, but rather be handed over to the the clan's administrators. Under the direction of Kujō Makihisa and the terms of the 1639 treaty, the Fujiwara elected to not physically occupy settlements in the Ashlandic mainland or interfere with the day-to-day management of the settlements ran by under the concelho system, instead choosing to establish an overarching administrative system overseeing and linking them together as well as regulating their external trade and conversion affairs under what was referred to as the Mandokoro-system derived from the private household management system prevalent during the Heian period. The first and likely most consequential act under this system would be the direction of the exchange of blood and faith together with the conselhos, apostate clergy and contracted company marines, with the planning and execution of the scheme primarily taking place in Rio Sangrento, as did the memorable opening ceremony of the process : The apostate jesuit priest João Vasconcelos held an open symposium below the first Torii gate in the Ashlands, mercilessly and systematically dissecting, rejecting and denouncing the Latin Rite, Christianity and Abrahamic monotheism, concluding his stand and displaying his rejection of Catholicism by tearing his personal bible in two and tossing the halves into the Crimson River, remarking that pure blood would wash the ephemeral impurity away.
It would be under this Mandakoro-system that the Fujiwara would eventually consolidate their administration of the Ashlands in Rio Sangrento, establishing their administrative quarter that is today known as the Gohei district. This largely segregated district would house the head Fujiwara administrators and their retinue for over centuries, in addition to acting as the central point of external trade for the now-isolated Ashlands where goods were imported and exported through the Fujiwara merchants. This monopoly would become so lucrative as to allow the Fujiwara to administer their subjugated lands without imposing taxes unrelated to tariffs, perhaps the largest factor in the longevity and relative stability of Fujiwara rule. This consolidation of wealth, trade and administrative functions further accelerated population growth, which would come to exceed that of Edo by the mid-18th century. The unusually warm period principally brought on by an anomaly in the oceanic gyre surrounding Ashlands which lasted approximately between the 14th century and the 1970's, a long period of stability in the southern coast of the mainland and innovations in agriculture and sanitation, specifically in the field of niter fertilizers, facilitated a general population explosion that saw the population of the Ashlands and by extension Rio Sangrento double several times over in the span of a few generations. This extensive growth would greatly increase the density of Rio Sangrento, which would exacerbate pre-existing problems related to fires, crime and and public health : Rio Sangrento would be ravaged by destructive fires on multiple occasions between the 17th and 19th centuries, prompting the Fujiwara to adopt several measures implemented in Edo earlier, such as widening roads and establishing open green spaces such as gardens and markets to hamper the spread of fires. Rio Sangrento would also receive the first sewer system in the Ashlands around the mid-18th century in the form of an underground drainage canal network to manage floods that was soon after adapted for general sewage disposal, resulting in a noticeable reduction in the spread of infectious diseases.
Capitalism, while arguably present in an archetypal mercantilist form from the very beginning, is considered to have truly emerged in the Ashlands around the turn of the 18th century, with Rio Sangrento as its birthplace. The Ashlands may have been an private venture of the Ashlands Colonial Company, yet it would take over a century for joint-stock companies to truly become commonplace and economically significant, when certain political, social and economic conditions aligned : By 1700, the Ashlands remained in a protracted state of low-intensity civil war, with the majority of landmass under de-facto local autonomous rule under variations of the Guerrilhamento-system, and only the urbanized heartlands of the largest entities under some form of centralized administration, which contributed to an elevated rate of brigandry and poor transport infrastructure slowing travel and commerce (which was further exacerbated by the Japanese monopoly on horses following the disastrous equine plague and subsequent Fujiwara Horse Hunt), which greatly hindered intra-Ashlands commerce. Yet at the same time, the Ashlands was becoming increasingly unified under a common legal framework developed by and presided over by the private judiciary known as the Juizes de Albião who first proliferated across the northern coast protected by the Independent Marines and the Witch marches before spreading through the entirety of the Ashlandic mainland. The emergence of a common legal framework was especially important for the Pre-Realm economy as the system, which derived from English common law yet was compatible with the diverse customary legal traditions of various different locales, established comprehensive bodies of contract, tort and corporate law harmonized across the land. This significant reduction in trade barriers, which by the mid-1700's had resulted in the abolition of all internal tariffs, fostered an environment where great internal commercial opportunity was prevalent yet great risk for the individual trader persisted, resulting in individuals instead pooling their capital into a collective organization to limit individual risk and liability, while also benefitting from the inherent organizational advantages a multi-person entity held over individual merchants. Because of Rio Sangrento's geographical position and role as the center of international trade, most joint-stock companies would emerge or settle in the city, further increasing its commercial importance.
By the late 18th century, it is estimated that more than half of the total value of goods and services produced in Rio Sangrento were generated by for-profit legal entities such as joint-stock companies, perhaps the first manifestation of corporate capitalism in history. This consolidation of economic power by Ashlander entities in the heartland of their mainland administration greatly worried the Fujiwara who had grown complacent with their monopoly position, and led to the clan seeking to curtail corporate influence out of the fear of plutocratic state capture. These efforts would quickly fail however, as the emergence of new conditions which strengthened the corporate entities made the Fujiwara ultimately dependent and possibly subservient to them : The Marine Bank of the Independent Marines had established itself as the de-facto central banking authority of the Ashlands in the course of the late 18th century, overtaking the Suebi goldsmith bankers in consolidating fractional-reserve banking and beginning the issuance of different financial instruments such as Company Marine bonds, and perhaps most importantly becoming one of the very few lenders both capable and willing of financing state entities such as the Fujiwara, who following their separation from the Fujiwara Hokke-branch of the mainland lost access to financing by other clans and the merchant houses of Edo and Osaka, effectively forcing them to seek loans from the Independent Marines, one of their principal opponents in establishing dominion over the Ashlands. In an ironic twist, the same Marine Bank financing that enabled the companies to expand their enterprises would prove to be the chains that constricted and subdued the Fujiwara clan for good.
The end of Fujiwara ambitions to reassert hard control over their administered domains, with Rio Sangrento as the center, came in 1812 when the head magistrate of Rio Sangrento chose to intentionally default on a massive bullion loan borrowed from the Cinzan sorceress Cremilde, whom they perceived as incapable of recovering her assets by force. Besides an immediate boycott on the issuance of further credit by Ashlander financial institutions, the default would result in a punitive expedition led by Cremilde which saw a successful night-time infiltration of Rio Sangrento's Gohei district followed by the systematic massacre of Fujiwara administration, retainers and their dependents as well as the retrieval of the bullion during the exfiltration. Most notably however, Cremilde did not elect to return to the north but instead marched to the Cervos de Prata-district and captured the opulent Heian-style mansion acting as the summer residence of the clan head. Entrenched in the massive, fortified estate with the bullion in her custody, Cremilde proclaimed that she would begin offering a Ryō's worth of gold in exchange for a severed Japanese head brought before her, with this offer being in effect until the Fujiwara agreed to compensate her in a satisfactory manner. Purportedly, an immediate killing frenzy ensued across the Ashlandic mainland which saw indiscriminate mob attacks on the Japanese, before systematizing as professional military organizations such as mercenary groups, guilds and shrine associations organized began taking advantage of the offer. The sheer scale of violence forced the Fujiwara to immediately deploy the vast majority of their own retainers and professional Samurai soldiers and draft tens of thousands of peasant Ashigaru peasant infantry in order to counteract the chaos, facing fierce resistance and constant ambushes from the very moment of disembarkation at Crimson Bay. While the Fujiwara managed to take control of the majority of Rio Sangrento and the surrounding countryside in the span of a few months in the Winter of 1813, the clan repeatedly failed to retake or maintain a siege on the district of Cervos de Prata-district where Cremilde held her ground. Having suffered massive casualties and facing domestic peasant unrest in the auction islands and a possible opportunistic attack by the Suebi Domain, Uesugi and the Independent Marines, the Fujiwara relented and agreed to compensate the sorceress. The terms of restitution were heavy, mandating the Fujiwara buy every Japanese head Cremilde had accrued across the campaign back for two Ryō each, while also transferring ownership of the entirety of Cervos de Prata. Being nearly insolvent, the Fujiwara negotiated a reduction of price per head to one and a half Ryō in exchange for also transferring ownership of the ruined Gohei-district to the sorceress under the condition that Fujiwara administrators be allowed to continue operations therein. Cremilde would burn the Heian-style mansion down and build her own extravagant mansion atop the ashes, the Solar da Feiticeira, arguably the most opulent Pre-1878 residence within Rio Sangrento.
It bears mentioning that nearly all of the merchants, bankers and joint-stock companies outright refused to participate or endorse Cremilde's headhunt, while simultaneously strongly condemning the Fujiwara for their wrongdoing and demanding the clan compensate the sorceress in order to redress her legitimate grievances. Contrary to popular belief, a small minority of those who took place in the violence were inhabitants of Rio Sangrento, and even fewer were considered otherwise reputable or of good moral character; The lion's share of the violence is ultimately attributed to outsider mercenaries, particularly Suebi ones who left their unmistakable signature on the victims by the coup de grâce of a misericorde thrust through the eye socket. This is considered to be one of the reasons, alongside the precarious military situation, why the Fujiwara explicitly abstained from mounting a reprisal. Despite having ultimately been an outsider-perpetuated event that shocked the citizenry of Rio Sangrenty considerably at the time, the event is widely commemorated and celebrated through the Noite da Penhora, one of the largest festivals local to Rio Sangrento.
The consequences of the event were significant to Rio Sangrento and the Ashlands as a whole; The death of approximately 70% of the Japanese population in Rio Sangrento, long disruption of the Mandokoro-system, a debt crisis worsened by the loss of customs revenue and a lack of willing lenders, military humiliation and an extremely dangerous stigma of untrustworthiness and weakness, together with the successful continuation of normal local administrative processes under the concelho-system forced the Fujiwara clan to fundamentally reconsider its approach against the threat of losing its foothold in the Ashlands for good. The Shugo of the clan, Kishimoto Sougen demoted his eldest son from the succession and retired, passing both the political office and leadership of the clan to Kishimoto Kiri, who adopted a policy of managed decline after concluding that the end of subjugated rule, be it factual or ceremonial, would almost certainly come to an end during his tenure and would be accompanied by several existential threats to the clan, be they from the Ashlands, the Auction Islands, Japanese Home Islands or the West. Kishimoto directed the clan to honor the terms of the Treaty of Hakugyokurou to the letter and comply with Ashlander customs without hesitation, while massively downsizing the Mandakoro-apparatus in Rio Sangrento and liquifying clan property in the Ashlands, confining the remaining few hundred Japanese to the Gohei district, which lost all of its functions save for levying customs duties when Kishimoto settled most of the clan's outstanding debts by transferring these rights to the newly-established Rio Sangrento Corporation owned by the creditors, save for the Marine Bank which received the island of Menir located on Crimson Bay.
Rain falls upon Crimson Bay.
Geography
Governance
A helicopter belonging to the Realm Warrant Service in low flight.
Law Enforcement
Economy
Edited: