Isger

Location overview

Isger is a temperate land of plains and rolling hills, hemmed in on all sides by mountains — the Aspodells and River Keld to the south, the Menadors to the north, and the Five Kings to the east — and sharing borders with Cheliax, Andoran, Druma, and Molthune. Its lifeblood is the Conerica River, a great trade artery that winds through the heart of the country to Elidir. The land takes its name from the Kellid Isgeri tribes who once roamed it freely, but it has known little besides conquest since: claimed by Taldor's Seventh Army of Exploration in 2133 AR, then seized by a young Cheliax as the empire's very first vassal state after the Even-Tongued Conquest. For centuries it has been governed by a steward appointed from Cheliax — at present the self-serving Hedvend VI — and bled for its lumber, minerals, and river trade while its own people see precious little of that wealth.
Asmodeus is its official patron deity, though Abadar, Erastil, and the rebel-beloved Milani are quietly honored too. Most Isgerians are humans of mingled Taldan and Kellid blood, alongside a large goblin population in the Chitterwood, scattered gnome communities like Umok, and many halflings whose families fled Chelaxian bondage for Isger's comparatively lighter yoke. The defining wound of Isger is neglect. Its elites cluster around the riches of the Conerica and pay no mind to anything beyond the capital, leaving countless towns and villages to govern and defend themselves — so when famine, plague, or war reaches the hinterlands, the common folk face it alone. The Goblinblood Wars are the bitter proof of this: when hobgoblin warlords forged the Chitterwood's Goblins into an army and razed the countryside, the government pulled its soldiers back to guard Elidir and left rural Isger to burn, and the nation has yet to fully heal. In the war's aftermath, Cheliax tightened its grip through gentler means, its Asmodean orders winning gratitude and quiet loyalty among a battered people — though resentment of the patron nation still runs hottest in the long-forgotten countryside.