Vori… is OLD 😲, Vori is GEOLOGICALLY, COMICALLY TOO OLD!!!
The settlement of Vori (in my world) has been around for so long that when it was founded, all humans were still a homogeneous, single group under one single political entity.
So old that it would witness a strange alien settlement of sheeple a few hundred blocks to their west rise from just strange, novel creatures to an empire so large it occupies more land area than all other sovereign states in-world combined.
Vori is 119 years older than its own Kingdom, Booh, who gained independence a mere sixty eight years ago from today, in the year 245 😱.
Vori is the remnant of a strange ancient world. It was settled by humans exactly once and it never had other inhabitants, just that same continuous line of humans from Tulidar, the province's first Governor, to Cepacina.
They still build their houses with wood even as much younger cities like Navutumce just to their north across the sea build their walls with cold stone.
It isn't the oldest city in the world by a long shot, Unsur is so old that most people in the world still identify, ethnically, as being Unsur and just old enough to have gone from the center of the universe to a backwater province, but Vori's physical borders haven't shifted an inch since the early 60s C.E. the world around her is 100% different from what it was when she was founded.
The Vori people all speak Byh, they all identify as Unsuric, and they all practice the Uwiwo religion, and all Vorii are Homo Sapiens. This makes Vori extremely homogeneous, yes, but it also makes them old in a specific way: the world was never as united, whole, peaceful, and small as it was during the first days of Unsur as a settlement.
Vori is too isolated, poor, and strategically costly to conquer and rule from some distant capital in the same way as the humans settled the area in the first mid first century as a way to get themselves closer to the eastern continents.
It is literally the farthest you can get Unsuria in the Southwest before being in Bahan in the east. Vori is also the southernmost point on the Planet.
The Vorii are also seem to be quite isolationist as a people seeing as though they barely ever send trading vessels anywhere farther than Bahan and Unsuria. They don't seem to have a direct trade relationship with Ruum, the central continent (whose largest city is naturally called Meditia 😅, which would translate to something like Central Place in Latin if that word actually existed, which is ridiculously lucky that its basically in the center of the world).
Vori is, overall, not a very impressive settlement. It's struggling and kinda sad to look at. Their economy was annihilated by wars between Kashusia and Bah, which basically ceased trade to the south from the north.
The Baakins essentially run the global economy. When they are struggling, every other state, especially small states, will suffer too. The settlement doesn't have resources at all, it doesn't have a farm, and it doesn't have a mine. When she was founded, Vori would be under Kashusian control for well over a century. In this time, support from the west ensured they could have a trading vessel. This at least means they have a stake in the economy, but they offer very little 🥹.
Most of them are homeless, too many are starving, and I'm gonna turn on Genetic mirror, which will show us all a very good look at what an isolated, chronically small population looks like.
So, with that all being the case, I opted to write about how old Vori was and what is actually good about them: a stable, unique population who live in an ancient, unique city. That's not much, but it's something.
Unsur is not the same land it was when it was founded. The wars and brutal conquest gutted the site into an entire new settlement with new housing, and new demographics, and new cultural dynamics.
We can suppose that, around 170 C.E., there was a Bah culture minority in the city of Vori, that's where they get their language and clan, of course. This small minority lasted well long enough to declare independence from Kashusia in 177 C.E. before quickly dying out, being reabsorbed back into the Unsuric ethnic fold.
This alone shows that Vori isn't a perfect nation state that hasn't been under foreign rule, their clan is literally named after the Bah Empire and their Kingdom is named for a nearby city founded by the empire. But where Vori sticks out for being uniquely itself is the Unbroken line of civilization that has been there since the site was founded.
Unsur is dead because the chaos and violence transformed it irrevocably into something else. Bah changed from a random sheep village to the seat of a global military power over many long years of war and force—an Unsurite Queen sat on their throne—but Vori will still have Vorii kings that are born of the land, nursed by a Vorii mother, who was also born of the same country.
For whatever that's worth, Vori will always be a cool city in my book.
