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[[file:Revachol Vista.png|right|thumb|300px|View of Revachol from the bay.]]
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'''Revachol''' ''(Re-va-shol)'' is a city on the [[Insulinde]].[[file:Revachol Vista.png|right|thumb|450px|View of Revachol from the bay.]]
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<br />
'''Revachol''' (''RE-va-shol'') is the disgraced former capital of the world, divided into zones of control under foreign occupation -- half a century after a failed world revolution.<ref name=":0">[[Disco Elysium]] - [[Encyclopedia]]</ref> Revachol is located on the island of Le Caillou in [[Insulindian isola]]. The name is used both to refer to the city of Revachol and its various forms of government, in a manner not dissimilar to Rome.
 
   
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==Background==
When middle class people talk about foreign places, they like to talk about “contrasts”. Travel magazines, financial journals, regional reports on the news... it's all about those contrasts. And what they mean by “contrasts” is that most people are pornographically poor while a few are obscenely wealthy. That's what they mean by contrasts. East of the river, monetary organizations promote regional stability, west of the river cops collect tare for cash and junkies shake so hard their bones come loose from their sockets.
 
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Revachol, pronounced ''RE-va-shol,'' is the disgraced former capital of the world.<ref name=":1">ENCYCLOPEDIA - Revachol is the disgraced former capital of the world, divided into zones of control under foreign occupation -- half a century after a failed world revolution. She is central to our moment in time.</ref> Currently, it is a Zone of Control under the jurisdiction of the [[Coalition of Nations|Coalition]]<ref name=":17">LENA, THE CRYPTOZOOLOGIST'S WIFE - "Nope. Sadly not. Revachol is what's called a Zone of Control. Under an alliance of foreign powers called the Coalition. We have no government of our own and what democracy we have is..." She thinks. "Market driven."<br />RHETORIC - Meaning: buying is voting.</ref> and is the primary setting for the events of ''Disco Elysium''.
 
There is no city in the world with more contrasts than Revachol. The broken, magnificent, disgraced former capital of the world. A great sky on fire, reflecting off broken glass. Revachol the Suzerain, Revachol the Commune, Revachol the Administrative Region where all forms of government have failed. Revachol the Resolver, the answer to the great burning questions of history. How should we live? Will the horror ever end?
 
   
 
==History==
 
==History==
[[file:DE Revachol Flag.png|right|300px|thumb|Flag of the Suzerain of Revachol.]]
 
Revachol was originally founded in the Dolorian century, 380 years ago, during the early colonization of the Insulindian archipelago by the Kingdom of Suresne (modern day [[Sur-La-Clef]]). Originally settled by sheepherders coming in from Suresne, the strategic location of Revachol Bay led to its quick development and eventually independence from Suresne. The former colony became a kingdom and a global superpower.
 
   
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===Founding===
Revachol's economy relied on a diverse range of territories producing commodities for export. These included apricots from the Empire of [[Safre]], marble and archeological treasures from Ile Marat (the ancestral name of Iilmaraa), sugar from the Semenine Islands and cocaine from Supramundi and Saramiriza, tinged a characteristic magenta color. In fact, the oversupply of cocaine forced the suzerain to look for new markets in the middle of the last centuryfor all the cocaine it was producing, and it settled on Safre. Introduced under exclusive contract, the suzerain created an extremely valuable captive market for an extremely addictive product.<ref>[[Board game Suzerainty]]</ref> It had other holdings: Tioumoutiri was a Revacholian colony on Iilmaraa. The suzerainty's population was mostly Iilmaraan areopagites -- up to 97%. The region was known for its tobacco export. Hence the name.<ref>[[Encyclopedia]]</ref>
 
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Following the [[Insulinde]]'s discovery by one of Irene La Navigateur's expeditions,<ref name=":3">YOU - Okay, what else? Was she smart?<br />ENCYCLOPEDIA - Terribly. Women of the court were expected to play both contract bridge and chess sufficiently well to prove and interesting challenge to a man -- a similar grasp in matters of philosophy, theology, and science was encouraged. She was, by all means, a kept woman...<br />ENCYCLOPEDIA - She made the most of her position in the Antedolorian court -- a court visited by the most prominent thinkers and artists of the day. In secret, she was becoming the era's pre-eminent philosopher of the state. A scalpel, a piercing gaze...<br />ENCYCLOPEDIA - She was an almost preternaturally magnetic and intelligent individual. To her contemporaries she appeared out of time, a messenger from the future of the species. We *all* fell in love with her, head over heels. Even before she was declared an innocence her influence was tremendous.<br />YOU - How come? It was on her advice that Irene La Navigateur sponsored a number of voyages into the pale. A costly, often tragic endeavour, ultimately vindicated by the discovery of the *New New World*, the piece of reality you're standing on...<br />ENCYCLOPEDIA - She was crowned two years after the first expedition returned, setting in motion what is widely considered the greatest era in history -- the Dolorian Era.</ref> Revachol was founded in the Dolorian century, 380 years ago,<ref>YOU - "*When* was Revachol built?"<br />JOYCE MESSIER - "In the Dolorian century, 380 years ago."</ref> as a colony of the Kingdom of Suresne (modern day [[Sur-la-Clef]]).<ref>ENCYCLOPEDIA - In the very, very early days of colonizing this archipelago, the Kingdom of Suresne, a precursor of modern Sur-La-Clef, used to own the city of Revachol. An obscure detail in the bigger picture, but still -- worth dropping.</ref> It was built by settlers from the Occident, migrant workers from [[Semenine]] and Iilmaraa,<ref>YOU - "Okay. *Who* built this city?"<br />JOYCE MESSIER - "The nations of the Occident. Or migrant workers from Seminine and Iilmaraa, depending on your creed."</ref> and herdsmen of [[Ubi Sunt?]].<ref>YOU - "Is there such a thing as *Ubi Dolorianism* or did I just make that up?"<br />NOID - "Good catch, Art Cop." He crosses his arms. "The herdsmen of the Ubi Sunt? islands came here on the first boats. Their flowery version of Dolorianism could be what we're standing in."</ref>
   
=== Decline ===
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===Revacholian Suzerainty===
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[[file:DE Revachol Flag.png|right|300px|thumb|Mockup of the flag of the Suzerainty of Revachol.]]
The groundwork for Revachol's collapse was laid by the Filippian dynasty in the Penultimate Century, starting with Filippe II, the Opulent. At the moment of his ascension to the throne, the Suzerain of Revachol was one of the world's greatest superpowers. Filippe II the Opulent was born congenitally deformed and while he did expand Revachol's fortifications, including the establishment of a [[Sea Fortress]] to guard entrance to the bay, he sired a son who would prove to be Revachol's undoing.<ref>[[René Arnoux]]</ref>
 
   
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====Golden Age====
The son proved to be a disaster and turned decline into a freefall, earning the nickname Squanderer from supporters and "vicious syphilitic murderer" from detractors. Styling himself the greatest of the Filippian kings, he expended the whole national treasury on frivolous pursuits, and his maladministration foreshadowed the fall of the Suzerain to the [[Antecentennial Revolution]], the end of the Filippian line of kings, and an end to the monarchy. As an example of his excesses, he had his bedroom converted into a treasure chamber, the Sol Aurum, where an unfathomable amount of krugerrands, bars of gold, ornate weaponry, armor and various chalices covered the floor and even the walls. There were whispers the king slept on a huge pile of gold like an obese dragon, instead of a bed like a normal person would. He was also a perpetual philanderer, which culminated in syphilis. He passed it as a sort of twisted legacy on to his son, and Filippe IV was born with congenital syphilis. Furthermore, he established the traditional Filippan use of cocaine - Regnum Cocainum - ostensibly for clarity of vision, to aid in their work. This thinly-veiled excuse for cocaine dependency poorly obscured the vast amounts of wealth he wasted on the drug, consuming it at an alarming rate. In fact, his successor was even brought into this world with the help of cocaine -- the court medic administered a dose to his mother when she was in labour.<ref>Filippe III's statue in Martinaise.</ref>
 
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At some point, Revachol gained independence from the [[Sur-la-Clef|Kingdom of Suresne]] and became the "capital of the world."<ref name=":1" /> It was a constitutional monarchy.<ref>JOYCE MESSIER - "Some were rich enough to stay with the Constitution; with monarchy -- *big mistake*. Others bet on the Revolution, they were called the Ultras, or ultraliberals. They fared well."</ref> Around 97% of the population were Iilmaraan Aeropagites.<ref name=":2">ENCYCLOPEDIA - Tioumoutiri was a Revacholian colony on Iilmaraa. The suzerainty's population was mostly Iilmaraan Areopagites -- up to 97%. The region was known for its tobacco export. Hence the name.</ref>
   
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The flag of the Suzerainty of Revachol displays the Sevenfold Sun Miracle, an optical atmospheric anomaly that the first settlers of the Insulinde saw. Six suns orbit a larger one in the center.<ref>ENCYCLOPEDIA - This is the flag of Revachol the Suzertainty.
The following line of kings could not reverse the trend after the disaster. Over the next 150 years, Revachol turned from a superpower into a backwater. Filippe IV the Insane suffered from congenital syphilis. Filippe V could not save the monarchy. The penultimate king, Guillaume the Lion, capped off the monarchy with a series of military campaigns aimed at restoring Revachol to its former glory. In the last decades of the Last Century, the monarchy carried out the Ikeira Operation, a seven-year campaign during which Suzerain Guillaume's army forcefully united the people collectively known as the Ikeira tribes in the south-eastern part of Le Petit Continent, under the Revacholian banner. However, it could not reverse over a century of accumulated abuse and mismanagement. Guillaume saw the writing on the wall and abdicated in favor of his nephew, Frissel. While his uncle moved abroad to Graad, living out a long and productive life as a venture capitalist, Frissel the First found himself alone before the unstoppable march of history.<ref name="joyce" />
 
   
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YOU - What's with the sun?
===Revolution===
 
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ENCYCLOPEDIA - This isn't just one sun, but there are little suns dancing around the big sun. This is the Sevenfold Sun Miracle.
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YOU - What's the Sevenfold Sun Miracle?
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ENCYCLOPEDIA - It's an optical atmospheric anomaly the first settlers saw. Happens in cold weather: six small suns around the big one. This complex halo-phenomena is how old Revachol got its flag.</ref>
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Revachol's economy of this era relied on a diverse range of territories producing commodities for export. These included apricots from the Empire of Safre, marble and archeological treasures from Ile Marat (modern-day Iilmaraa), sugar from the [[Semenine]], and unprocessed magenta cocaine from [[Supramundi]] and [[Saramiriza]].<ref>SUZERAINTY: THE BOARD GAME - In addition to the worker and building tokens used by each player, there are also several piles of colourful resource tokens, each representing one of the game's four principal resources...<br />SUZERAINTY: THE BOARD GAME - From the Empire of Safre: orange apricot tokens. From Ile Marat (the ancestral name of Iilmaraa): gray marble block tokens. From the Semenine Islands: white sacks of sugar tokens. And from Supramundi and Saramiriza: magenta tokens for unprocessed cocaine leaves.</ref>
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Siigay, derogatorily known as the "Apricot Suzerainty,"<ref>RHETORIC - *Apricot Suzerainty* calls to mind an era when the Siigay archipelago was colonized by Revachol. It's a bit of a slur, in other words.</ref> was a Revacholian colony on [[Samara]].<ref>ENCYCLOPEDIA - This man probably comes from Siigay, sometimes known as the 'Apricot Suzerainty,' an archipelago in the Samaran isola.</ref> To this day, it supplies apricots for Revachol.<ref>ENCYCLOPEDIA - By the way, the raw materials were most likely exported from Siigay (the Apricot Suzerainty) and processed in Sur-La-Clef into the apricot-flavoured chewing gum loved by kids of today -- and yesterday. Hmm. Something about it *is* familiar... And not only to your fingers.</ref> Tioumoutiri was a Revacholian colony on Iilmaraa and supplied tobacco.<ref name=":2" />
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The oversupply of cocaine led to the suzerain introducing it to Safre under exclusive contract. Therefore, they created an extremely valuable captive market for an extremely addictive product.<ref>ENCYCLOPEDIA - Well, the suzerain was looking for new markets for all the cocaine it was producing, and it settled on Safre...<br />ENCYCLOPEDIA - By introducing cocaine into Safre under exclusive contract, the suzerain created an extremely valuable captive market for an extremely *addictive* product.</ref> It is implied that Filippe I, or Grand Old Filippe,<ref name=":4">YOU - What's in the west?<br />SHIVERS - More winding coastline lined with abandoned buildings. Crumbling piers salt water lapping at their dark piles. Grey and red, forgotten city blocks. What remains of the pre-revolutionary effort to gentrify the coast.<br />YOU - And beyond that?<br />SHIVERS - The waters turn black. Coal City in the shadow of Saint-Martin, a boom town, back when coal extracted from countless shafts near the city was need to power Revachol.<br />SHIVERS - No more. The coal was supplanted by petroleum from the ocean floor and hydropower from the Esperance. Everything crumbled. These days, only the weakest remain in Coal City. Their hopes of getting rich linger in the defunct shafts under their feet.<br />YOU - What is there?<br />SHIVERS - Below the old mines -- L'Ossuaire Municipal, Revachol's underground cemetery. *Les petits rats* brave the underground passageways, trying to get to Le Royaume...<br />YOU - Le Royaume...<br />SHIVERS - ...where the Filippian kings were interred, with their doctors and their admirals. Mausoleums, burial chambers, leaf gold still remains on the Double Door of the Morning.<br />YOU - Les *petits rats*...<br />SHIVERS - Children under 14. They go underground, looking for artefacts to sell to foreign museums -- and for fabled relics. Their parents let them. They go deeper...<br />YOU - Deeper...<br />SHIVERS - ...after rubies, melchiorite, lapis lazuli plundered from Safre and Seol during the time of the Suzerain. In the burial chambers of the kings: Grand Old Filippe, Guillaume II, and even in the mausoleum of Filippe the Opulent.<br />SHIVERS - Two kilometres underground, in a winding shaft along whose walls mirrors have been placed so that daylight may eternally fall upon the richest of all the kings.<br />SHIVERS - The mausoleum contains untold quantities of gold -- and that special, purest-of-the-pure magenta cocaine favoured by Revacholian royalty.</ref> is the one who initiated the contract.<ref name=":5">ENCYCLOPEDIA - You see, Old Filippe wasn't just good at squandering the national treasury on gold and ceremonial weaponry. He was also a prodigious snorter of nose candy.<br />ELECTROCHEMISTRY - Not just *any* nose candy, though. We're talking royal *Filippian* blow, allegedly twice as potent as the stuff you find nowadays. And purple, Filippian cocaine was purple.</ref> This era of mass cocaine production is called "Regnum Cocainum."<ref name=":6">RENÉ ARNOUX - "That's why the Filippian kings used cocaine -- for clarity of vision, to aid in their work... Regnum Cocainum -- Revachol's finest years." He seems to grow taller, brimming with pride about the past.<br />KIM KITSURAGI - "Of course," the lieutenant marks dryly. "Clarity of vision. *Awareness*."<br />RENÉ ARNOUX - "Filippe III was even brought into this world with the help of cocaine -- the court medic administered a dose to his mother when she was in labour. And it is well known that with the help of cocaine -- only the purest, of course -- he was able to connect with higher realms..."</ref>
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There was a king named Guillaume II<ref name=":4" /> though it is unclear if he is related to Guillaume "Le Lion."<ref name=":7">RENÉ ARNOUX - He catches your glance and nods. "This is the uniform of the Royal Carabineers in service of Frissel the First, Guillaume *Le Lion*, and the valiant King filippe the Fifth before him.</ref>
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====Decline====
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The groundwork for the Suzerainty's collapse was laid by the Filippian dynasty in the "penultimate century." [[Iosef Lilianovich Dros]] claims that Filippe II, the Opulent, was congenitally deformed,<ref name=":12">YOU - "What is this place? This island..."<br />THE DESERTER - "It's not an island, droite." He looks around. "It's a defensive fortification of the Commune of Revachol and I am its last surviving defender."<br />YOU - "What was it used for?"<br />THE DESERTER - "The congenitally deformed King Filippe II built it to restrict access to the Bay of Revachol. We captured it in '02, retrofitted the fort with an AA gun to defend against an airborne landing -- against the whole world."</ref> and the entire Filippe bloodline had a poor history of mental health.<ref name=":9">HORSEBACK MONUMENT - A silver plaque on the statue's pedestal reads: 'I am Filippe III, the Squanderer, the Greatest of the Filippian Kings of Revachol; Son of Filippe II, the Opulent; Father of Filippe IV, the Insane.'<br />VOLITION - Not a good track record of mental health in that family.</ref> His son, Filippe III, the Squanderer, is credited as the most instrumental in the fall of the monarchy.<ref name=":10">ENCYCLOPEDIA - Even by the standard of the Filippian kings, Old Sumptuous Filippe was known for his profligacy.<br />YOU - In what way?<br />ENCYCLOPEDIA - Well, he blew through the whole national treasury, starting the decline of one of the penultimate century's greatest superpowers: the Suzerain of Revachol...<br />ENCYCLOPEDIA - His own maladministration foreshadowed the fall of the monarchy during the Antecentennial Revolution, an end to his family line and the monarchy on the Insulindian isola.</ref>
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King Filippe III, who was king 150 years ago,<ref name=":13">YOU - So he was addicted to nose candy. A bloated druggie?<br />ENCYCLOPEDIA - That's what the revolutionaries said -- 150 years later. Right before they emptied out the royal mausoleum and dumped His Majesty's mortal remains in the Insulindian Bay.</ref> was known for his profligacy.<ref name=":10" /> Most notably, he converted his bedroom into the Sol Aurum: a treasure chamber allegedly full of krugerrands, bars of gold, ornate weaponry, armor, chalices, and a bed of gold-dipped feathers.<ref>ENCYCLOPEDIA - Stories have it that he had his bedroom converted into a treasure chamber where he stored unfathomable wealth: *krugerrands*, bars of gold, ornate weaponry, armour, and various chalices.<br />ENCYCLOPEDIA - He called it the *Sol Aurum*. It was obscene. There were whispers he slept on a huge pile of gold-dipped feathers like some obese dragon, instead of a bed like a normal person.</ref> Moreover, Filippe III spent a lot of money on his cocaine addiction, specifically of purple Filippian cocaine.<ref name=":5" /> In fact, his mother, during childbirth, had received a dose of it.<ref name=":6" /> Such expenditures over his 25 year rule<ref name=":11">THE DESERTER - "The bacteria entered his brain and made him squander trillions on sparkling wine, *cocainum*, and monuments of himself. His son Filippe IV the Insane contracted syphilis in the womb..." he breathes in with a wheeze of hatred.<br />ENCYCLOPEDIA - That is technically possible, although Filippe III was not actually syphilitic, he was just mad.<br />THE DESERTER - "And he *still* went on the govern Revachol for twenty five years! We lost 2 million lives toppling that mode of government -- and those grotesque statues too, hundreds of them."</ref> led to the depletion of the national treasury, and therefore the fall of the Suzerainty.
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Royalists claim that the Filippian kings used cocaine for "clarity of vision," though it is a thin excuse for their cocaine addiction.<ref name=":6" /> There are also untrue rumors that Filippe III had syphilis; he was simply mad.<ref name=":11" />
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Filippe IV, the Insane, is only mentioned by name.<ref name=":9" /> He presumably failed to reverse the effects of his father due to his madness.
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By the [[Antecentennial Revolution]], Guillaume "Le Lion"<ref name=":72">RENÉ ARNOUX - He catches your glance and nods. "This is the uniform of the Royal Carabineers in service of Frissel the First, Guillaume *Le Lion*, and the valiant King filippe the Fifth before him.</ref> was suzerain. He briefly attempted to bring Revachol back to it's former glory; his Ikeira Operation forcefully united the people in the southeastern part of Le Petit Continent, collectively known as the Ikeira tribes, under the Revacholian banner.<ref>ENCYCLOPEDIA - 'The Ikeira Operation' was a seven-year campaign during which Suzerain Guillaume's army forcefully united the people in the southeastern part of Le Petit Continent, collectively known as the Ikeira tribes, under the Revacholian banner.</ref>
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However, Guillaume fled the Insulinde before the fighting got too bad, becoming a successful venture capitalist in [[Graad]]. His nephew, Frissel the First, took his place as king.<ref name=":8">YOU - "Anyone else get shot in the head -- on the opposing side?"<br />JOYCE MESSIER - "Oh, lots of people. Even the king got shot in the head, or thrown beneath a horse. Or drowned. Accounts differ. It was unceremonious." She shakes her head. "Just as well -- he wasn't actually the king. Just the king's nephew."<br />JOYCE MESSIER - "The real king abdicated and lived out a long and productive life as a venture capitalist in Graad." YOU - "Smart king."<br />JOYCE MESSIER - "Yes, King Guillaume had a nose for bad PR. He ran before it -- what is the expression -- *went down*? Anyway, Gil got out alive and his nephew Frissel got shot in his place..."</ref><ref name=":72" /> Frissel was eventually killed by the communists,<ref name=":8" /><ref name=":14">THE DESERTER - "Calm down? I'm not angry..." His hand still trembles. "I *adore* him. He reminds me of everything we fought for. At least we killed that Frissel and his kingsmen..." He's overtaken by a coughing fit.</ref> formally ending the monarchy.
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===Commune of Revachol===
 
[[File:DE Communist Flag.png|right|thumb|300px|The star-and-antlers, symbol of the Revolution.]]
 
[[File:DE Communist Flag.png|right|thumb|300px|The star-and-antlers, symbol of the Revolution.]]
[[file:Figurine set revolutionary.png|right|thumb|300px|A figurine of a Revolutionary, showing the usual garb of the ICM.]]
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[[file:Figurine set revolutionary.png|right|thumb|300px|A figurine of a Revolutionary]]
The [[Antecentennial Revolution]] happened right at the start of this century, in Graad in '02 and then spread like wildfire. The Revolution bloomed thanks to dissatisfaction with the Suzerain's rule: Numerous underground pamphlet-printing operations sprung up in the years leading up to and during the Revolution, helping ferment dissent and rally people against the King. The forces of the [[communists]] and the anarchists, known as the blacks and the whites respectively, organized under the collective banner of Insulindian Citizens Militia at the outset. Frissel attempted to quell it in one brilliant military move. Unfortunately, Frissel sent the least suitable person to lead the crackdown, his cousin, Drysant. He marched his men in a neat column right up to the communards' position, promptly leading to a massacre at the hands of the well-prepared and well-armed revolutionaries. Drysant himself lost his jaw, but survived the battle thanks to one of the [[René Arnoux|royal carabiners]].<ref>[[René Arnoux]]</ref>
 
   
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====Founding ====
However, the loyalists, or browns, as they were called, fought valiantly, too loyal to be considered sane. The bloody fighting continued until '06, leading to the establishment of the Commune of Revachol. The communists of the Parti Communiste d'Insulinde set about remaking society in the wake of a brutal war that consumed two million lives and deposed the wretched Suzerain. Monuments to the old order were dynamited and bones of Filippe III were thrown into the Insulindian Bay by the revolutionaries, who immediately set out to right the wrongs. Some changes took the form of repressions, other of reforms. Revachol communists started 'Ask Revachol', a radio show used to address civil issues. However, the Commune would be short-lived: The [[Coalition]] formed soon after, interested in ending the commune and the revolutionary experiment. Probing attacks launched on Revachol were supported by loyalists, who fed intel to the Coalition, provided diversions as Coalition aerostatics entered Revacholian airspace, and launched guerilla attacks during the bombings.<ref name="RAGM" />
 
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The [[Antecentennial Revolution]]—also known as the Civil War within Revachol<ref name=":02">YOU - "Who pinned them? Which side?"
   
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KIM KITSURAGI - "The revolutionaries: so the communards and the anarchists. White's their colour. But the custom started in the Suzerain's army so it held meaning for the kingsmen too."
The game of cat and mouse lasted until '08. To prevent the attacks, communards set fire to the oil wells so that no one could enter the isola, halting trade, poisoning the air and the water, creating oil slicks for miles and miles. However, it only delayed the inevitable. Coalition's land forces invaded Revachol in a massive amphibious operation called the Beachhead. The Coalition artillery bombarded Revachol's coastal defences for a week using [[Lafayette cannon]]s, then launched the landings at three points simultaneously: Martinaise, Delta, and Stella Maris. The Coalition aerostatics had to reroute because of the fires, but when they got there, the line simply broke. Martinaise simply collapsed. Many revolutionaries deserted. Some came over to Coalition-side, some just ran. That sealed the fate of the Revolution. The communard government surrendered, although the Communist Party did not. For their services, the loyalists were summarily disposed of and even executed 'by mistake'.<ref name="RAGM">[[René Arnoux]] and [[Gaston Martin]]</ref>
 
   
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KIM KITSURAGI - "It's about girls and boys more than *sides*. Girls sending off boys who are going to their deaths -- then also dying themselves in the ruins, from dysentery and consumption. It's a symbol of the Civil War."</ref>—was a series of interisolary conflicts primarily between the [[Communists]], known as the Communards, and the Moralintern and royalty. It began in Graad, in '02,<ref>JOYCE MESSIER - "The Revolution began in '02, on the isola of Graad, though by the end nearly the whole world had gotten involved."</ref> sparked in part by a virulent prion pandemic, called "tzaraath."<ref>JOYCE MESSIER - "It wasn't a *who*, but a *what*. A pandemic of tzaraath, a particularly virulent prion disease, which the authorities in Graad proved unable to contain. Then Mazov came along and overthrew the government."</ref>
===Under occupation===
 
The city came under Coalition occupation as a Special Administrative Region, divided into zones controlled the Coalition's member states from INSURCOM: the Insulindian mission command. INSURCOM is the theater command for the combined armies of Occident and Graad, with Mesque volunteers. The post-revolutionary decade was a disaster for the Coalition Government, as not only much of the western parts of the city remained leveled, the Coalition was busy fighting communist holdouts and carrying out mass executions, then bulldozing the bodies into mass graves. Loyalists and innocent civilians were routinely caught up in the executions. However, the approach proved successful: A combination of mass executions, brutal policing, bounties, and good old snitching eventually extirpated communists from Revachol together with much of the infrastructure.<ref>[[Iosef Lilianovich Dros]]</ref>
 
   
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On the 7th of March in '02, the new Commune of Revachol transmitted the Le Décret de Mars (The March Decree) to world governments, announcing their creation.<ref>YOU - "What did the revolutionaries do with those advanced tape computers?"
Revachol in the Twenties was hell, especially on the west side of the river: gang warfare, a botched privatisation scheme, a nuclear pile meltdown, all resulted in the he division of the city into zones de contrôle under foreign nations: the Mesque Zone, the Occident-Graad zone, and the International zone. The International encompassed Revachol districts west of the river, and was the site of a decade-long urban war that saw swathes of Revachol West leveled, offshore platforms set alight, though overall, it was considered an improvement over the hellish years of '08 - '19.<ref name="joyce" /><ref name="devdiary" />
 
   
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TRANT HEIDELSTAM - "They used them for military communications," he says, while his son looks up idly chewing on the corner of his würm-themed colouring book. "But also to write and send out press releases. The most notorious example being Le Décret de Mars."
Still, no nation wanted to claim responsibility. The [[Revachol Citizens Militia]] was founded to step in and keep the order, allowing Revacholians to maintain the peace and give them a semblance of self-governance. Indeed, the RCM restored peace where the Coalition failed (an unforgivable sin). However, it allowed the Coalition to proceed with its plans: INSURCOM made sure that free market capitalism imposed by the foreign powers persisted, and enabled the opening of the local job market to large numbers of cheap foreign workers, allowing the rich to make a killer profit. In the meantime, the poor were crushed beneath the heels of foreign occupiers and much of Revachol - especially districts like Martinaise - were left to rot, with no meaningful restoration or rebuilding attempts.<ref name="RAGM" />
 
   
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YOU - "What was that?"
The Thirties saw a global economic boom. Revachol East took the lion's share of the profits and transformed itself into the world's largest tax haven -- with the international community's blessing.<ref name="joyce">[[Joyce Messier]]</ref> This decade also saw a massive rise in the popularity of foreign music, as Semenese disco took hold.<ref name="RAGM" /> Although the West benefited from it somewhat, the losses were offset by numerous problems. The greatest of these came in '36, the People's Pile on the Esperance failed, leading to widespread radioactive contamination of the river and pushing Revachol West ever further into decline.<ref name="BNR" />
 
   
  +
TRANT HEIDELSTAM - "What's the March decree? I mean the radio transmission sent out to new agencies and world governments by the newly-created Commune of Revachol on the 7th of March in the year '02."
The Forties dispelled the economic like a bucket of ice cold water on the face of a drunk: A market mirage fuelled by cocaine and quantitative easing, sending the economy into a recession and a pan-isolar hangover.<ref name="joyce" />
 
   
  +
ENCYCLOPEDIA - A short-lived legislative foundation for a short-lived utopia.</ref> Their army was the [[Insulindian Citizens Militia]], or the ICM,<ref>ENCYCLOPEDIA - Insulindian Citizens Militia, the official name of the communards' army. The army of the Revolution.</ref> and their political organization was called "le Parti communiste d'Insulinde."<ref>THE DESERTER - "You're the RCM." He stares at you coldly. "You represent the Moralist International, the enemies of humanity, who took this city. I represent their adversary, le Parti communiste d'Insulinde."</ref>
In '52, unbeknownst to most, the world is facing extinction within 28 years due to the encroaching [[pale]]. On March 5th, the only man capable of doing something about it, [[Harrier Du Bois]], wakes up on the floor of the Whirling-In-Rags hostel cafeteria in Jamrock, Martinaise. He is the last Revacholian hero.<ref name="devdiary"/>
 
   
  +
At this point, 50 million people lived on Caillou.<ref>THE DESERTER - "*Death Blow*. you're one of them. Tell me, who speaks like that? We had 50 million people on Caillou alone..."</ref>
Revachol is most likely doomed.<ref name="devdiary"/> If not, it will be destroyed circa '74 by an atomic device.<ref>[[Shivers]]: "''IN 22 YEARS, THE FIRST SHOT WILL BE FIRED. NOT A SHOT FROM A GUN -- AN ATOMIC DEVICE THAT WILL LEVEL ALL OF ME. ALL OF ME.''"</ref>
 
   
  +
====The Civil War====
==Geography==
 
  +
Within Revachol, the Revolution manifested as a civil war between the Communists and Royalists.<ref name=":02" /> Some [[Seol|Seolite]] officers commanded the suzerain's navy and most of them sided with the Royalists at the start of the conflict.<ref>GARY, THE CRYPTOFASCIST - "I'm so fucking sorry I called you *Yellow Man*." He says silently. "Seolite officers commanded the Suzerain's navy. Most of them sided with the King, when..." He shakes his head.</ref> Guillaume "Le Lion" was suzerain at the time, but left. His nephew, Frissel the First, took charge.<ref name=":8" /><ref name=":72" />
Revachol sits on La Caillou a fertile island in the middle of the Insulindian Ocean, the world's largest body of water; in the eye of a great archipelago called Face-A-La-Mer. The island is fertile, self-sufficient and able sustain up to 200 million people; it also occupies a strategic position in the middle of the Insulindic ocean -- the world's connective tissue. At its heart lies Suzerain Revachol, with a radius of 80 kilometres, the crown jewel of the Insulindian isola. On its southern end, in the Old-Old South, Monte Martin, checkered farmland, and the winding Esperance that cuts the city in half.<ref name="Shivers">[[Shivers]]</ref>
 
   
  +
The communists captured and retrofitted a sea fortress in [[Martinaise]], built by Filippe II, in '02. They installed it with an AA gun to protect against airborne landings.<ref name=":12" />
The city is divided into three major regions: East Revachol and West Revachol (International Zone), between them: La Delta. As a city under military occupation, there is a substantial military presence on land, sea, and air. Coalition airships guard over the twenty one cordons of the Special Administrative Region. However, the most important zone of control is the Bay of Revachol. Vast and deep, over 1200 m at its deepest, the bay is crisscrossed by huge cargo ships bearing company logos: Wild Pines, ZAMM, Moriyn. They carry eight percent of the global trade. At the farthest reaches of the Bay of Revachol -- the shadow of [[Coalition Warship Archer]], on perpetual patrol duty, ready to unleash artillery fire if any were to rise up against the market.<ref name="Shivers" />
 
   
  +
Frissel attempted to end the communists in one decisive strike, sending his cousin, Drysant, to put an end to the Commune. At this point, the Royalists wore excessively flashy uniforms;<ref>YOU - Inspect the blue uniforms.
Underwater, iron helmets have sunk deep into the sand and the mud. Helmets of soldiers. And their fingerbones, too. And clavicles. Littering the ocean floor.<ref name="Shivers" />
 
 
===Revachol East===
 
By '21, a little more than a decade after the war, the eastern bank was already fully renovated.<ref>[[Postcard Le Jardin '21]]</ref> The hillsides were lush with gardens and residences, especially in its most desirable district, Le Jardin. Houses with gardens rise along the mountainside, up to Saint-Batiste where two of the world's five largest companies keep their headquarters.<ref name="devdiary">[https://steamcommunity.com/games/632470/announcements/detail/1602643489936624136 Welcome to Revachol Devblog]</ref>
 
   
  +
KNICK-KNACKS STAND - They're not all blue. These figurines also wear gold coats and caps, complimented by orange trousers. They are variously posed, wielding swords and rifles with bayonets.
Other districts include the Stella Maris district - one of the three landing points during the Coalition invasion - and Saint-Batiste, which gives its name to [[Saint-Batiste Pharmaceuticals]]. Known as slums before the Revolution, Saint-Batiste is where Contact Mike, the world-renown boxer, was born and rose through adversity and brain trauma to become one of the greats of sports history. Saint-Batiste is also where the Saint-Batiste Dinghy Races were conceived. Originally intended as a biennial civic pride celebration (and cash cow), they only took place twice, in '31 and '33.<ref>[[Lena, the Cryptozoologist's wife]]</ref>
 
   
  +
YOU - "Wait, this looks like René, the old guy who was playing petanque."
===Revachol West===
 
[[File:Revachol - Jamrock District.jpg|right|300px|thumb|A map of Jamrock, or Revachol West.]]
 
West of the river, it's funky-baby holocaust time all day every day. It's the International Zone, which means: no one gives a shit. It's no one's business. In East-Jamrock, wild animals roam the valley at night – giraffes that escaped from the Royal Zoo 50 years ago. Giraffes – even-toed ungulates from the savannah. The local kiosque chain Fritte employs a private army of 2000 men to guard its properties in Jamrock and Faubourg. That's how bad the crime rate is – you need a private army to run a kiosque chain.<ref name="devdiary"/>
 
 
====Districts====
 
Jamrock is a district of Revachol West comprised of the following quarters: Martinaise, Pox, Villalobos, Central Jamrock, Grand-Couron, Old South and the Valley of the Dogs.
 
   
  +
KIM KITSURAGI - "This is what the loyalists looked like, yes." He inspects the figurine. "At first. Then they wised up and got camouflage."</ref> Drysant himself sported a purple velvet tunic, cockatoo feathers, a gold-plated rifle, and a giant red steed. He marched his men in single file to the communards' position, leading to a massacre at the hands of the revolutionaries.<ref>RENÉ ARNOUX - "King Frissel thought he could end it all in one decisive strike." The old carabineer runs his fingers over the larger medal. "Sent his cousin, Drysant, to put an end to the unrest."<br />RENÉ ARNOUX - "Alas, the young Drysant was all piss and no vinegar, wearing a tunic of purple velvet and cockatoo feathers to battle." He spits. "Even his rifle was *gold-plated*. Shone from five klicks away. Can you imagine the asininity?"<br />KIM KITSRUAGI - "Purple velvet tunic," the lieutenant says thoughtfully. "That isn't exactly *camo*."<br />RENÉ ARNOUX - "To keep the long and bloody story short, Drysant marched us against the partisans in Couron. And when I say 'marched', I mean made us walk into captured enemy territory single-file, like toy soldiers, while he rode in front on his giant red stallion."<br />RENÉ ARNOUX - "The rebels were smart. They let us come real close before opening fire. Suffice to say, it was carnage."</ref> Drysant himself lost his jaw, but survived the battle thanks to [[René Arnoux]].<ref>RENÉ ARNOUX - "The dink had taken numerous flesh wounds and lost a lot of blood, but despite missing his jaw he seemed hesitant to die. Tougher than he looked, that one."<br />YOU - "That's no dink, that's a fighter!"<br />RENÉ ARNOUX - "So I grabbed the *dink*," he says, with a stern look, "and started crawling. Kept going until the 59th Cavalry picked us up."<br />RENÉ ARNOUX - "Through some miracle we both survived. And the jawless freak convinced Frissel to give me a medal for not leaving him to die in his own blood, piss, and shit."</ref>
:'''[[Martinaise]]
 
A great district, filled with a chessboard of wooden houses, 80.000 living souls. Firetraps as far as the eye can see -- from Main Street to Grand Couron, from Precinct 41 to Boogie Street forking into the distant horizon. Before the Revolution it was one of the greatest districts in Revachol, benefiting from [[Wild Pines]] investment and presence. In fact, the district was founded and developed by Wild Pines to support the cargo terminals used to transport goods across the known world. The [[Industrial Harbour]] rapidly became one of its most important parts, but it was the waterfront that became the main attraction for tourists. In '98, Rue de Saint-Ghislaine was teeming with parasol-wielding bourgeoisie and Wild Pines flags buttress the walkway.<ref>[[Postcard Martinaise '98]]</ref>
 
   
  +
Frissel was eventually killed by the communists,<ref name=":8" /><ref name=":14" /> formally ending the monarchy.
They didn't realize that within ten years Martinaise would become a gutted ghetto, scarred by the [[Antecentennial Revolution]] and half-burned down by the [[Coalition]]'s artillery bombardment and subsequent landings. Martinaise's most prominent feature, a twelve story tenement called [[Capeside apartments]], became an allegory: Eight of its twelve floors were destroyed by artillery fire and turned from a desirable urban address into little more than a rundown slum inhabited by drug addicts, disillusioned communists, and broken families. The Greater Revachol Industrial Harbour rises up from among the devastation, an artificial mountain range filled with metal shipping container. A place of wealth, casting a long shadow of the poverty around. Beyond it lies La Drisienne, King Dris's Passenger Harbour, filled with cruise ships flanked by dock arms. The distributary of Esperance separates it from Grand Couron - and further from the East.
 
   
  +
Monuments to the old order were blown up<ref>THE DESERTER - "That's right. Some *advertising* cockroaches erected a cynical, *deconstruction* of it. We tore it down with honest working class plastic explosives -- and there it is again..." He shakes his head in disgust.</ref> and the remains of Filippe III were unearthed and thrown into the Insulindian Bay.<ref name=":13" /> Revachol communists also started "Ask Revachol," a radio show used to address civil issues.<ref>TRANT HEIDELSTAM - "'Ask Revachol' is the name of a war time radio show the communists used to address civil issues," he remarks. "Maybe that helps?"</ref>
There is a perpetual competition between RCM precincts regarding Martinaise: Nobody wants to take responsibility for the district, and so it remains in a gray area. RCM patrols are extremely rare, with the [[Dockworkers' Union]] picking up the slack and acting as de facto police force and government for the district.
 
:'''Pox
 
Once a park, a place for reflection and recuperation for the patients of the Old Military Hospital. In the 20s it was used as a quarantine centre during a measles outbreak that killed many children. Most everyone has avoided the hospital and surrounding park ever since. The Pox is completely wild now. Evergreen thickets covered in snow and industrial dust. Feral dogs and even wolves roaming in packs. The police try to keep the deepest corners cordoned off. Heavy drug users do slip through and hole up in the Old Military Hospital, hoping to find something to get high on among the hastily abandoned supplies. Or just to overdose in peace.<ref name="Shivers" />
 
:'''Villalobos
 
Named after a peninsula in [[Mesque]], this district is inhabited primarily by emigres from the isola. It's known for its large housing projects and Mesque gangs, notable for their culture, rather than mere presence - it's par for the course west of the river. Villalobos was notable for a certain mural case handled by [[Harrier Du Bois]]. Nine thousand people subjected to the mural's message -- all of Lakeside (Central Jamrock) and Villalobos, plus half of the Eminent Domain -- participated in a vote whether to remove or preserve it.<ref>[[Ledger of Failure and Hatred]]</ref>
 
   
  +
====Fall of the Commune====
There's an entire street walled off and turned into a poppy field by a deified gangster called The Mazda, while his mortal enemy La Puta Madre exclusively employs former narcotics officers to farm his own fields.<ref name="devdiary"/>
 
  +
Following Frissel's death, the Coalition became involved. INSURCOM<ref name=":18">TRANT HEIDELSTAM - "INSURCOM is responsible for all aspects of the military occupation of Revachol. During the Revolution, they coordinated the efforts of the Occidental and Graadian invasion, but these days their function is primarily logistical."</ref> set forth Operation Death Blow, also called The Landing,<ref name=":15">THE DESERTER - "Aerostatics. The Landing had started. I climbed out -- into hell. There were ships all above. Hissing, whirling, and men pouring out. The chain was submerged so I had to swim back. The fortress was half submerged too, shattered."
:'''Central Jamrock
 
The heart of the Jamrock Quarter, it's a bit more pleasant than the rest of western Revachol, though not by much. Its defining feature is a lake on the eastern edge of the district, formed when a mainline pipe burst in the early 20s. It is also where [[Precint 41]] is located, for better or worse. Although the district has amenities such as a public library, it has its share of problems, such as damaged residential buildings that cannot be repaired properly in the absence of a municipal government. In one notable case, a building with 200 tenants is at the risk of collapse, but there are no real authorities to repair it or provide alternate housing. The best they can hope for is a burned-out building with mold and rot throughout, if someone even notices the damage.<ref>THE COLLAPSING TENEMENT case in the [[Ledger of Failure and Hatred]]</ref>
 
   
  +
THE DESERTER - "They'd all drowned in the lower levels, or got torn to shreds above. The anti-aircraft gun had malfunctioned -- so had I. I left them without idealogical direction..." He opens his eyes and stares right through you. "It was real. I'd seen it. I'd seen it *in reality*."</ref> in '08: a three-part strategic aerostatic bombing of [[Martinaise]], Stella Maris, and the Delta.<ref>RENÉ ARNOUX - "Martinaise was used as one of the three footholds in Revachol during Operation Death Blow in '08. The other two are off in Stella Maris and the Delta." He points to the northeast.</ref> A five-nation army -- including troops from the Occident, Graad, and Mesque -- amassed a large army of airships to complete Operation Death Blow.<ref>VISUAL CALCULUS - A fleet -- the combined armies of Occident and Graad, with Mesque volunteers. A five-nation army. Hundreds of vessels.
Below Precinct 41 there's a kebab merchant called Kuklov, in the market across the bridge. He makes kebabs that make you immortal if you can eat three and survive. It's the fly larvae. Some RCM officers believe eating it will make them immune to food poisoning.<ref>[[Encyclopedia]] and [[Shivers]]</ref>
 
   
  +
VISUAL CALCULUS - They massed airships further down, in the bay of Revachol. The artillery was so powerful, the ships not only required gyroscopic stabilization -- they were anchored into the ocean floor as well.</ref>
Although thought extinguished, traces of communist thought remain in Jamrock, usually among the youth and the odd cafe, where they gather to cope with the brutality of life under foreign occupation and the iniquities of capitalism.<ref>[[Noid]]?</ref>
 
:'''Eminent Domain
 
A working class district between Central Jamrock and Esperance, Domain is a place of hard people and hard lives. Its defining feature is the 8/81 motorway running over the district of Jamrock, a monstrous shadow, high above the firetraps of the Domain, old workers' barracks steadily being torn down to expand the highway. Concrete pillars rise up from the midst of the dilapidated wooden houses. The 8/81 separates Martinaise from Jamrock. Vehicles whoosh past one another day and night, while those who reside in the labyrinthine alleyways beneath the motorway attempt to carry on with their lives in the snow and the slush. <ref name="devdiary"/>
 
   
  +
The operation within [[Martinaise]] took place on May 13, '08<ref>THE DESERTER - "May the 13th, '08, 22 years ago," he looks north. "The horizon was black with Coalition airships. Their petroleum rose to the sky and it looked like... like it *formed* the clouds. Storm clouds. When they started shelling it was... dark magic."</ref> and was called the Beachhead.<ref>RENÉ ARNOUX - "Because this place is the damn Beachhead," he says, pointing to the bay. "Had to soften the commies up first."</ref> The sea fortress captured by the communists and equipped with an anti-aircraft gun in '02<ref name=":12" /> failed to function during the invasion.<ref name=":15" /> [[Martinaise]] was shelled and captured by the [[Coalition of Nations|Coalition]] along with Stella Maris and the Delta.<ref name=":16">JOYCE MESSIER - "I would not have relinquished sovereignty to the Coalition. Not here in Martinaise -- and not in the Stella Maris or Delta beachheads either. If not for my own sake..."</ref>
On the horizon, barely visible, the hazy machinery of the harbour. Life in the Domain is even worse off than in Martinaise. The cold air is stiff from the fumes of motor carriages and lorries roaring overhead.<ref>[[Shivers]]</ref>
 
:'''Grand Couron
 
[[file:Postcard grand couron.png|right|300px|A postcard from Grand Couron, dated '37]]
 
Just east of Jamrock. Grand Couron is a place of impossible contrasts, an island of riches among the desolation of western Revachol. Much of the recovery in Couron is thanks to the thirties, the boom years. As such, it's one of the nicest districts in Revachol West: Tall and handsome buildings rise from the riverside: steel, iron and yellow limestone, with cloud shadows sliding on the facades.<ref>[[Postcard Couron '33]]</ref> One of its most notable places is the Grand Couron Arena, where, in March '52, Arsane-Luc Edelbrock sends the Samaran heavyweight champion, Kostya ''Mjasnok'' Kostunica, to the floor.
 
   
  +
Interestingly, the Communist Party never officially surrendered.<ref>RENÉ ARNOUX - "The rest of the city got cleaned up, but Martinaise they keep as a *monument*." A dark shadow runs across his face. "And now the Union socialists are practically running the place."
Not all places of Grand Couron are as well-off. One of these spots is an ill-advised residential area overlooking the Jamrock Quarter, completed by '37. 13-story buildings lined the hillside like sarcophagi, acting like a punctuation mark at the end of the boom years - in '39 the project failed catastrophically, leaving behind an opiate and hepatitis B infested slum.<ref>[[Postcard Grand Couron '37]]</ref>
 
{{-}}
 
:'''Burnt Out Quarter
 
A stretch of burned, ruined buildings.
 
   
  +
GASTON MARTIN - "Well, it's your own damn fault," the jolly man remarks. "You, we, the Coalition, Revachol -- whoever you wanna blame -- never finished the job. Officially the Party never surrendered. Of course they still hold influence."</ref> However, Revachol relinquished its sovereignty to the [[Coalition of Nations|Coalition]]<ref name=":16" /> and liberal reactionaries signed the Revacholian Instrument of Surrender, ending the Commune in '10.<ref>YOU - "The communards signed the Revacholian Instrument of Surrender."
[[file:Postcard coal city.png|right|300px]]
 
:'''Coal City'''
 
Located in shadow of Mount Saint-Martin, Coal City was a boom town, back when coal extracted from countless shafts near the city was needed to power Revachol. By '52 it's a wretched heap of closed-down mines even west of Jamrock, on the dusty slope of Monte Martin. The remotest possible area of Revachol, no one even wants to exploit those people any more. The reason for the collapse is simple: The coal was supplanted by petroleum from the ocean floor and hydropower from the Esperance. Everything crumbled. These days, only the weakest remain in Coal City. Their hopes of getting rich linger in the defunct shafts under their feet.<ref name="Shivers" />
 
   
  +
THE DESERTER - "Liberal reactionaries signed that instrument -- traitors, who should have been burned alive..." He draws his breath. "I answer to the Communist Party."</ref><ref name=":62">YOU - "Where did it spread from there?"
Below the old mines lies L'Ossuaire Municipal, Revachol's underground cemetery. Les petits rats brave the underground passageways, trying to get to Le Royaume, a vast network of dungeons and burial chambers, where the filippian kings were interred, with their doctors and their admirals. Mausoleums, burial chambers, leaf gold still remains on the Double Door of the Morning. The whole network dates back three centuries. Children under 14 go underground, looking for artefacts to sell to foreign museums -- and for fabled relics. They hunt after rubies, melchiorite, lapis lazuli plundered from Safre and Seol during the time of the Suzerain. In the burial chambers of the kings: Grand Old Filippe, Guillaume II, and even in the mausoleum of Filippe the Opulent.<ref name="Shivers" />
 
   
  +
JOYCE MESSIER - "From Revachol and Graad? Not far. The world managed to cauterize itself. Mazov's government was overthrown in '08, and the Coaltion crushed the Revachol commune two years later. It was *The End*."</ref>
Two kilometres underground, in a winding shaft along whose walls mirrors have been placed so that daylight may eternally fall upon the richest of all the kings. The mausoleum contains untold quantities of gold -- and that special, purest-of-the-pure magenta cocaine favoured by Revacholian royalty.<ref name="Shivers" />
 
   
  +
By the end of the conflict, at least two million people had died in the [[Insulinde]]: an incident called the "Insulindian Deluge."<ref name=":11" /><ref>YOU - "Did the communists and the anarchists shoot back?"
Few *petits rats* return from the shafts -- and even fewer find what they're looking for. A small child steps out of a black tunnel, with silver trinkets in her pockets. All around her, white snow on the extinguished coke furnaces, and on the weather-worn shacks, where fathers beat their sons after drinking. The snow melts on your fingers, turning to water.<ref name="Shivers" />
 
   
  +
JOYCE MESSIER - "Did they ever. Before they got shot themselves, they shot two million people."
===La Delta===
 
  +
  +
YOU - "Truly a *kerfuffle*."
  +
  +
JOYCE MESSIER - "Yes. The *Insulindian Deluge* they call it."</ref> The communists and anarchists were massacred by the [[Coalition of Nations|Coalition]] and buried in mass graves in [[Ozonne]].<ref>JOYCE MESSIER - "Indeed. They piled them in mass graves in Ozonne and, well -- that's the last anyone heard of those people."</ref>
  +
  +
===Zone of Control ===
  +
  +
====Early Years====
  +
In the wake of the [[Antecentennial Revolution]], Revachol became a Zone of Control, or ZoC,<ref>THE DESERTER - "*Let* me be here?" He looks around. "The ZoC is an unlawful successor of the Commune of Revachol. We took this fortification from the loyalists. Even the Claires understand this..."</ref> divided into 21 cordons.<ref>SHIVERS - Higher yet, Coalition airships guard over the twenty one cordons of the Zone of Control. The air is criss-crossed with radio transmissions, the hair on your neck rises...</ref> It exists under the jurisdiction of the [[Coalition of Nations|Coalition]].<ref name=":17" /> INSURCOM, which represents the interests of the [[Moralist International|Moralintern]],<ref>COALITION WARSHIP ARCHER - "For instance, as second signaller we represent Coalition Warship Archer, which in turn represents INSURCOM and the Coalition more generally, which in turn represents the Moralist International, which itself represents the interests of 1.2 billion people across the world."</ref> handles the military occupation of the city.<ref name=":18" /> The ZoC's flag is signal blue.<ref>KIM KITSURAGI - The lieutenant does not bow to the flag -- it accepts your salute with quiet dignity.<br />ESPRIT DE CORPS - It is not my flag, he thinks -- my flag is the signal blue of the Zone of Control.</ref>
  +
  +
The [[Revachol Citizens Militia]], or RCM, was organized by the citizens of Revachol to restore order to the city under the [[Coalition of Nations|Coalition]].<ref name=":03">ENCYCLOPEDIA - The RCM, or the Revachol Citizens Militia, is the police force you and him are part of. A self-organized peace corps of the occupied city of Revachol, the RCM operates within a legal twilight, yet its authority is rarely questioned. It's *super useful* to know this.</ref><ref>KIM KITSURAGI - "The RCM was formed by the Coalition Government to restore order in the International zone after the Revolution. So we did. Now we attempt to *maintain* that order, no more, no less."
  +
  +
KIM KITSURAGI - "For... perhaps it is better to say wer were *allowed to form*. It's a point of contention whether the citizens of Revachol or the Coalition Government founded the RCM."</ref> It's décomptage system is most likely a descendent of the [[Insulindian Citizens Militia]], or ICM.<ref>YOU - "What's a 'décomptage'?"
  +
  +
KIM KITSURAGI - "Décomptage is the hierarchical system employed by the Revachol Citizens Militia. It means counting down to twos."
  +
  +
ENCYCLOPEDIA - The countdown is modelled after the dual-leadership system employed by the left during the Revolution. Which in turn was developed by last century experimental psychologists in the University of Koenigstein.</ref><ref>STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - "Julia Dobreva came from Graad. Jean Abadanaiz was born in Revachol. She was brilliant, charismatic, a revolutionary comet. He was her partner and stabiliser, the planet who kept her in orbit."
  +
  +
ENCYCLOPEDIA - It's too bad they wound up equally dead on some nameless island in Ozonne...
  +
  +
STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - "It's from them we get the notion of dual-leadership, the *décomptage*, Revachol's truly great contribution to revolutionary thought. I believe it even persists in some form in the RCM, even to this day."</ref><ref>YOU - "Where does the RCM fit into all of this?"
  +
  +
COALITION WARSHIP ARCHER - "The RCM exists under the umbrella of the Coalition, just as the Coalition exists under the umbrella of the Moralintern..."
  +
  +
COALITION WARSHIP ARCHER - "At the same time, the RCM is not exactly *of* the Coalition."
  +
  +
YOU - "You mean because of the décomptage?"
  +
  +
COALITION WARSHIP ARCHER - We're not that familiar with RCM lore and practice, but we believe that may be the case. As we recall, the décomptage originated with the Revacholian Commune itself."</ref> Even so, the [[Revachol Citizens Militia|RCM]]'s Emergency, Wayfarer, and Aliments Acts were designed to keep Revachol in a laissez-faire state that benefitted foreign capital.<ref>JOYCE MESSIER - "The RCM's responsibilities are defined by the Emergency, Wayfarer, and Aliments Acts -- Three pieces of legislation keeping the city in a -- let's be honest -- laissez-faire stasis to the benefit of foreign capital."</ref>
  +
  +
==== Decades ====
  +
'08 to '19, according to [[Joyce Messier]], was "hell."<ref name=":19">JOYCE MESSIER - "The Twenties saw a decade of urban war: West of the river levelled, offshore platforms in flames... Still, it's regarded as an improvement on what came before: '08 to '19 was simply hell..."
  +
  +
YOU - "And after that?"
  +
  +
JOYCE MESSIER - "The Thirties? Things settled down in the Thirties. Revachol East transformed itself into the world's largest tax haven -- with the international community's blessing. For the first time in a long time it seemed like things were *going* somewhere."
  +
  +
INLAND EMPIRE - Then *you* happened. Your youth in the Thirties.
  +
  +
CONCEPTUALIZATION - All that untaxed income must have fuelled *The New*. That can only mean one thing...
  +
  +
YOU - "That's when they discovered Disco."
  +
  +
JOYCE MESSIER - "Yes. And quantitative easing. It was a market mirage, unfortunately. The Forties dispelled it. And isola-wide hangover, you might say. So, here we are..." She curtsies.
  +
  +
JOYCE MESSIER - "Welcome to reality, baby."
  +
  +
EMPATHY - From the looks of it the Fifties haven't been much better for the Zone of Control -- you can see it in her eyes. Days slipping away....</ref>
  +
  +
The Twenties weren't much better. Revachol West was leveled in a decade-long urban war<ref name=":19" /> and there was a measles outbreak that killed many children. The Old Military Hospital was used as a quarantine center, but now it is completely overgrown and renamed the Pox.<ref>YOU - The Pox...
  +
  +
SHIVERS - ...was once a park, a place for reflection and recuperation for the patients of the Old Military Hospital. In the Twenties, it was used as a quarantine centre during a measles outbreak that killed many children. Most everyone has avoided the hospital and surrounding park ever since.
  +
  +
SHIVERS - The Pox is completely wild now. Evergreen thickets covered in snow and industrial dust. Feral dogs and even wolves roaming in packs. The police try to keep the deepest corners cordoned off.
  +
  +
YOU - But Still...
  +
  +
SHIVERS - ...heavy drug users do slip through and hole up in the Old Military Hospital, hoping to find something to get high on among the hastily abandoned supplies. Or just to overdose in peace.</ref>
  +
  +
The Thirties saw an economic boom in Revachol East, which transformed itself into the world's largest tax haven. The surge of untaxed income led to The New:<ref name=":19" /> a cultural era of disco and ultraliberalism.<ref>YOU - (Point to yourself.) "This is what a *modern* cop looks like."
  +
  +
KIM KITSURAGI - "In the New, twenty years ago. It's what a modern cop looked like then."
  +
  +
ENCYCLOPEDIA - He means the New, the third decade of the current century. The decade of disco, decadence, and the victory of democracy-powered free market economy over it's critics.</ref><ref>YOU - "The *New*?"
  +
  +
JOYCE MESSIER - "The New, a cultural era -- and the name of the decade it ravished, the Thirties. It came out of post-revolutionary Revachol. It was... ultraliberal."
  +
  +
JOYCE MESSIER - "It involved *lots* of partying, as you might imagine. And champagne coloured *everything*. By the looks of it -- that would have been when you came of age. Now..." She raises her eyebrow at you.</ref>
  +
  +
However, in Faubourg of Revachol West,<ref>BIRD'S NEST ROY - "The clean-up happened fifteen years ago. I was young then. Later my second aunt died, left me this shack and the assorted junk in it."
  +
  +
BIRD'S NEST ROY - "So I came to Martinaise. People told me don't go there, it's a *shit-hole*. I said: people, we just had a *nuclear pile meltdown*. I'm gonna get as far from Faubourg as I can. Still in the same city, but..." He shrugs.</ref> the People's Pile happened. A Type U particle decay generator, whose construction had started during the Commune of Revachol, failed immediately after leftists finished it in the Thirties. Radioactive waste spilled into the River Esperance.<ref>YOU - "The People's Pile? What's that?"
  +
  +
BIRD'S NEST ROY - "A bad idea. Some poor leftists built a particle decay generator in hopes of bringing affordable electricity to under-served communities. It malfunctioned. Radioactive waste everywhere, probably some of it in *you*, too."
  +
  +
ENCYCLOPEDIA - The People's Pile was a Type U particle decay generator that failed immediately after entering service, releasing radioactive waste into River Esperance.
  +
  +
YOU - Why is it called the *People's* Pile?
  +
  +
ENCYCLOPEDIA - Construction began during the Commune of Revachol. The *people* continued work on it after the Commune fell -- they wanted a cheap source of energy for Revachol West.</ref> The Emergency Relief Brigade was organized to contain it,<ref>YOU - "Tell me more about this Emergency Relief Brigade you were part of."
  +
  +
BIRD'S NEST ROY - He points at the white triangle on his orange safety jacket. "We were an all-volunteer force, self-organized. Tried to help fire brigades contain the spill."
  +
  +
PERCEPTION (SIGHT) - On the patch -- gamma radiation lines crossed with a red drop of blood.</ref> but unfortunately, many of them contracted cancer and there wasn't much that the brigade could do.<ref>BIRD'S NEST ROY - "There wasn't much the volunteer force could do, however. We wasted years in the river mud. Years getting sick..." He looks at the spiralling light and stops.
  +
  +
YOU - "It must have been tough -- radioactive clean-up."
  +
  +
BIRD'S NEST ROY - He hesitates. "There's a reason why everyone's tried to forget any of it ever happened, and why no one has tried to repair or replace the Pile."
  +
  +
BIRD'S NEST ROY - "So much disappointment -- and early deaths, cancer mostly. And we knew all that was coming even as we were *cleaning up* as best we could."</ref>
  +
  +
The Forties dispelled the decade of economic success. Quantitative easing turned out to be market mirage, sending the economy into a recession.<ref name=":19" />
  +
  +
As of the events of ''Disco Elysium'', set in the spring of '51,<ref>LENA, THE CRYPTOZOOLOGIST'S WIFE - "Oh no, dear! It's the early spring of '51."</ref> Revachol is still in that recession.<ref name=":19" />
  +
  +
==== The Future ====
  +
In around two months from in-game events,<ref>YOU - What is she waiting for?
  +
  +
SHIVERS - For Gloria. Soon these clouds will all fall down as rain. Spring will come. Two more months. Maybe less. It's time.</ref><ref>SHIVERS - Her thoughts trails off. The wind picks up again. Above her, a great cumulus cloud rises -- ready to fall down as precipitation. April will come, then May; a month, maybe two months from now... you shudder. The feeling dissipates. The thought ends.</ref> The Return, or Le Retour, may happen in Revachol West. It is part urban myth, part political science, that promises an "event" where Revachol may become self-governing.<ref>KLAASJE (MISS ORANJE DISCO DANCER) - "The Return, well... It's part urban myth -- part political science. It's a fool's hope, sir, and it's also all I've got. They say there will be an *event*. That it will happen somewhere here..." She looks around, then at the sky.
  +
  +
KLAASJE (MISS ORANJE DISCO DANCER) - "In Revachol. Revachol West. They say it will happen soon -- and that it will change everything."
  +
  +
KIM KITSURAGI - "*Le Retour...*" the lieutenant says. His forehead furrowed, he puts his notes down.
  +
  +
YOU - "Is this why you said you would like to surrender in a *free* Revachol?"
  +
  +
KLAASJE (MISS ORANJE DISCO DANCER) - "Yeah..." She looks at the sky, then at you. "I guess it is."
  +
  +
RHETORIC - So she thinks -- at least partly -- that this Return will feature a self-governing Revachol. She has already placed her bets.</ref> It is implied that [[Ptolemaios Pryce|Ptolemy Pryce]] and [[Nix Gottlieb]], of [[Precinct 41]], are directly involved in it.<ref>ESPRIT DE CORPS - Somewhere under the curved roof of a former silk factory, shaped like a ladybird with two chimneys, Police Captain Ptolemy Pryce sits behind a heavy wooden desk. Resident medic Nix Gottlieb pours him a coffee. It's silent in the captain's office...
  +
  +
ESPRIT DE CORPS - They speak of change. The city. The tension on the streets. They speak of the events of April and the blood on the streets in May.</ref>
  +
  +
[[Harrier Du Bois|Harry Du Bois]] predicts Revachol will be destroyed circa '73 by an atomic device unless something is done.<ref>SHIVERS - IN 22 YEARS, THE FIRST SHOT WILL BE FIRED. NOT A SHOT FROM A GUN -- AN ATOMIC DEVICE THAT WILL LEVEL ALL OF ME. ALL OF ME.
  +
  +
YOU - But... what can I do about it?
  +
  +
SHIVERS - YOU ARE AN OFFICER OF THE CITIZENS MILITIA. YOU MOVE THROUGH MY STREETS FREELY IN MOTOR CARRIAGES AND ON FOOT. YOU HAVE ACCESS TO THE HIDDEN PLACES. YOU ALSO CIRCULATE AMONG THOSE WHO ARE HIDDEN.
  +
  +
SHIVERS - I NEED YOU. YOU CAN KEEP ME ON THIS EARTH. BE VIGILANT. I LOVE YOU.</ref>
  +
  +
==Geography==
  +
  +
=== Overview ===
  +
Revachol is located on the island of Le Caillou, also called "The Pebble,"<ref name=":0">YOU - "What's the name of this island?"<br />JOYCE MESSIER - "Caillou." She looks to the waters. "Imagine a pebble, a smoothed over pebble amidst a great blue sea. Mis-shapen, cracked. The cracks are the River Esperance. We're in the delta of this river, on the sixth branch -- the Martinaise distributary."</ref> on the northeast side of the [[Insulinde|Insulindian Isola]],<ref>JOYCE MESSIER - "On Caillou..." She studies your reaction. "The Pebble, the largest of the fertile, uninhabited islands of the northeast Insulindian archipelago. Four centuries and two revolutions later."</ref> on the world's largest body of water: the Insulindic.<ref>JOYCE MESSIER - "Yes. We are on an island in an ocean. The world's largest body of water -- the Insulindic."
  +
  +
ENCYCLOPEDIA - Known to the early Revacholians as *les Immensités Bleues* -- The Blue Immensities.</ref> Le Caillou, which is sometimes mistaken as an archipelago, is the fourth largest island in the world.<ref>ENCYCLOPEDIA - Technically, the neighboring Ozonne and Face-à-La-Mer island groups are archipelagos, while Le Caillou, by contrast, is a single, fertile land mass, the fourth largest island in the world. It is not an archipelago.</ref> It is fertile, self-sufficient, and able sustain up to 200 million people.<ref>JOYCE MESSIER - "We are standing on a fertile, self-sufficient island able to sustain up to 200 million people; in the middle of the Insulindic ocean -- the world's connective tissue..." She smiles. "It's where the money is."</ref> The city itself has a radius of 80 kilometres<ref>SHIVERS - Radiating outwards from you -- the Suzerain Revachol. With a radius of 80 kilometres. Still, the crown jewel of this isola would be barely visible.</ref> and is split by the River Esperance into Revachol East and Revachol West.<ref name=":0" /> The north side of the island is shattered by the delta of the Esperance, and is named La Delta.<ref>MAP WALL - The north coast of a verdant island is shattered by the delta of a river. It is the River Esperance. Countless bridges put the shards back together, connecting city blocks to river islands. *La Delta*, says a great, artificial heart in the centre, teeming with lifeforms and construction.</ref>
  +
  +
The Bay of Revachol, which is on the side of La Delta, is 1200 meters at its deepest<ref>SHIVERS - The Bay of Revachol, vastness, great depth -- over 1200 m at its deepest. Water, air brinier than here. It is crisscrossed by huge cargo ships bearing company logos: Wild Pines, ZAMM, Moriyn.</ref> and feeds into the Insulindic.<ref>JOYCE MESSIER - "It's not really a sea. It's the Bay of Revachol. And the bay feeds into the ocean."</ref> In its farthest reaches lies the Coalition Warship Archer.<ref>SHIVERS - And, at the farthest reaches of the Bay of Revachol -- the shadow of Coalition Warship Archer, on perpetual patrol duty, ready to unleash artillery fire if you were to rise up against the market. You shudder.</ref>
  +
  +
=== Revachol East ===
  +
Revachol East is the nicer part of Revachol. By '21, a little more than a decade after the war, the eastern bank was already fully renovated.<ref>[[Postcard Le Jardin '21]]</ref> The hillsides were lush with gardens and residences, especially in its most desirable district, Le Jardin. Houses with gardens rise along the mountainside, up to Saint-Batiste where two of the world's five largest companies keep their headquarters.<ref name="devdiary">[https://steamcommunity.com/games/632470/announcements/detail/1602643489936624136 Welcome to Revachol Devblog]</ref>
  +
  +
Other districts include the Stella Maris district - one of the three landing points during the Coalition invasion - and Saint-Batiste, which gives its name to [[Saint-Batiste Pharmaceutics]]. Known as slums before the Revolution, Saint-Batiste is where Contact Mike, the world-renown boxer, was born and rose through adversity and brain trauma to become one of the greats of sports history. Saint-Batiste is also where the Saint-Batiste Dinghy Races were conceived. Originally intended as a biennial civic pride celebration (and cash cow), they only took place twice, in '31 and '33.<ref>[[Lena, the Cryptozoologist's wife]]</ref>
  +
  +
=== Revachol West===
  +
[[File:Revachol - Jamrock District.jpg|right|300px|thumb|A map of Jamrock, or Revachol West.]]
  +
West of the river, it's funky-baby holocaust time all day every day. It's the International Zone, which means: no one gives a shit. It's no one's business. In East-Jamrock, wild animals roam the valley at night – giraffes that escaped from the Royal Zoo 50 years ago. Giraffes – even-toed ungulates from the savannah. The local kiosque chain Frittte employs a private army of 2000 men to guard its properties in Jamrock and Faubourg. That's how bad the crime rate is – you need a private army to run a kiosque chain.<ref name="devdiary" />
  +
  +
[[Jamrock]], [[Greater Revachol Industrial Harbour]], [[Faubourg]], and possibly [[Résurrection]] are known districts of Revachol West. [[Martinaise]], The [[Pox]], [[Villalobos]], [[Central Jamrock]], [[Eminent Domain]], [[Grand Couron]], [[Burnt Out Quarter]], and [[Coal City]] are sections of [[Jamrock]]. [[Martinaise]] has no currently district delineation.
  +
  +
=== La Delta ===
 
In a narrow sense, La Delta refers to the financial district, west of Revachol West. Twenty-two kilometres from the centre of the world, the district includes some of the most important areas in Revachol: The Bank of the World building (called a soldering iron), which contains the INSURCOM - Coalition Government Insulindian Mission Command - on the bottom floors.<ref>[[Joyce Messier]]</ref>
 
In a narrow sense, La Delta refers to the financial district, west of Revachol West. Twenty-two kilometres from the centre of the world, the district includes some of the most important areas in Revachol: The Bank of the World building (called a soldering iron), which contains the INSURCOM - Coalition Government Insulindian Mission Command - on the bottom floors.<ref>[[Joyce Messier]]</ref>
   
Line 109: Line 253:
   
 
===Nearby regions===
 
===Nearby regions===
:'''Ozonne'''
 
An archipelago 80 to 100 kilometers - two days' travel - away from Revachol. Its moneyed residents, used to posh restaurants and upscale boutiques, rarely have reason to visit Martinaise. Ozonne was also a staging area for the [[Coalition]] in '08. Hundreds of ships prepared here for the Landing, while powerful artillery aerostatics were anchored to the sea floor and bombarded the city for three days straight, to soften the defenders and civilians for occupation. Its major cities are the Fond de l'Air and Virmandeux.
 
:'''Resurrection'''
 
Way beyond Martinaise -- a popular spa destination for ample-bodied Ozonne kids with equally ample pockets, established in '18.
 
:'''Laurentide'''
 
Located on the other end of Le Caillou, its major city is Deora-of-the-Seven-Seas.
 
:'''Archipelagos'''
 
Croyant-Morain is a major city in this region.
 
{{-}}
 
   
  +
* [[Ozonne]]: An archipelago that is 80 to 100 kilometers (two days' travel) away from Revachol. Its major cities are the Fond de l'Air and Virmandeux.
  +
* [[Résurrection|Resurrection]]: Way beyond Martinaise -- a popular spa destination for ample-bodied Ozonne kids with equally ample pockets, established in '18.
  +
* [[Laurentide]]: Located on the other end of Le Caillou, its major city is Deora-of-the-Seven-Seas.
  +
* [[Archipelagos]]: Croyant-Morain is a major city in this region.
  +
  +
==Economics==
  +
<br />
 
==Politics==
 
==Politics==
Following the collapse of the Revolution and the mass executions of communists, Revachol became a neoliberal's paradise: A tax haven and a vital hub for cheap labor and overseas shipping. Since the fall of the Revolution, the Coalition has maintained a grip on the city under the the Emergency, Wayfarer, and Aliments Acts -- three pieces of legislation keeping the city in a laissez-faire stasis to the benefit of foreign capital. The Wayfarer Act is one of the most perfidious, designed to limit the authority of local institutions. Part of it prohibits the RCM from requesting most documents and licenses without permission from a Coalition representative.<ref>[[Encyclopedia]]</ref>
+
Following the collapse of the Revolution and the mass executions of communists, Revachol became a neoliberal's paradise: A tax haven and a vital hub for cheap labor and overseas shipping. Since the fall of the Revolution, the Coalition has maintained a grip on the city under the Emergency, Wayfarer, and Aliments Acts -- three pieces of legislation keeping the city in a laissez-faire stasis to the benefit of foreign capital. The Wayfarer Act is one of the most perfidious, designed to limit the authority of local institutions. Part of it prohibits the RCM from requesting most documents and licenses without permission from a Coalition representative.<ref>[[Encyclopedia]]</ref>
   
 
Death penalty remained a staple of criminal "justice" in Revachol since time immemorial. Under the Suzerain and the commune, the preferred method was a firing squad. The Coalition's occupation forces are more fond of the electric chair. Those who dodge the executioner's blade still have to deal with lengthy prison sentences in the River Esperance Correctional Facility (nicknamed Reunion), an infamous military prison.
 
Death penalty remained a staple of criminal "justice" in Revachol since time immemorial. Under the Suzerain and the commune, the preferred method was a firing squad. The Coalition's occupation forces are more fond of the electric chair. Those who dodge the executioner's blade still have to deal with lengthy prison sentences in the River Esperance Correctional Facility (nicknamed Reunion), an infamous military prison.
 
===Factions===
 
===Factions===
* [[Coalition]]: The occupying force of overseas nations that imposed a brutal, exploitative capitalist economy on Revachol.
 
* [[Revachol Citizens Militia]]: A volunteer police force organized with the tacit approval of the Coalition.
 
* [[Dockworkers' Union]]: A labor union, socialist faction, and/or corrupt mob depending on who you ask. Considered the de facto government of the abandoned [[Martinaise]].
 
* [[Loyalists]] (a euphemism for “fascists”): A defeated faction of Revacholian royalists who blame all the evils of the world on the failed Revolution, 50 years ago. Their philosophy is best summed up as follows: "If good, kind king Guillaume were still around, he'd drive the moneylenders and the homo-sexuals back into the ocean! Once we were an octopus that straddled the world, sucking up natural and human resources from Iilmaraa to South-East Seol. The city state that screwed the whole world. Then deranged commies pushed the king under a street car and lost the civil war to foreign intervention, damning us to financial servitude."<ref name="devdiary"/>
 
* [[Communists]]: The communards, mostly dead. Okay, one is still alive and teaches cultural theory at the Ecole Normale de Revachol, east of the river. And there's talk of two more employed by a failed radio-game studio. But the rest are all dead, bulldozed into mass graves after the Coalition Army retook Revachol in '08.<ref name="devdiary"/>
 
   
  +
*[[Coalition]]: The occupying force of overseas nations that imposed a brutal, exploitative capitalist economy on Revachol.
===Miscellaneous===
 
  +
*[[Revachol Citizens Militia]]: A volunteer police force organized with the tacit approval of the Coalition.
;Decorations
 
  +
*[[Dockworkers' Union]]: A labor union, socialist faction, and/or corrupt mob depending on who you ask. Considered the de facto government of the abandoned [[Martinaise]].
* The Croix de Bravoure, cross of valour, was the highest battlefield decoration in Suzerain's armed forces, awarded for exceptional bravery in the line of duty in service of king Frissel the First.
 
  +
*[[Loyalists]] (a euphemism for “fascists”): A defeated faction of Revacholian royalists who blame all the evils of the world on the failed Revolution, 50 years ago. Their philosophy is best summed up as follows: "If good, kind king Guillaume were still around, he'd drive the moneylenders and the homo-sexuals back into the ocean! Once we were an octopus that straddled the world, sucking up natural and human resources from Iilmaraa to South-East Seol. The city state that screwed the whole world. Then deranged commies pushed the king under a street car and lost the civil war to foreign intervention, damning us to financial servitude."<ref name="devdiary" />
* The Setting Sun was a decoration used to distinguish seasoned combat veterans in service of king Frissel the First during the revolution.
 
  +
*[[Communists]]: The communards, mostly dead. Okay, one is still alive and teaches cultural theory at the Ecole Normale de Revachol, east of the river. And there's talk of two more employed by a failed radio-game studio. But the rest are all dead, bulldozed into mass graves after the Coalition Army retook Revachol in '08.<ref name="devdiary" />
;Culture
 
* When it comes to cigarettes, contemporary Revacholians prefer Drouin (a local blend from the southern islands) or Astra, the legendary cigarette from Graad. Tioumoutiri is favoured by older men for its paper filter tips, sweet smell, and added tar.<ref>[[Encyclopedia]]</ref>
 
   
  +
==Culture==
== Notes and references ==
 
  +
When it comes to cigarettes, contemporary Revacholians prefer Drouin (a local blend from the southern islands) or Astra, the legendary cigarette from Graad. Tioumoutiri is favoured by older men for its paper filter tips, sweet smell, and added tar.<ref>[[Encyclopedia]]</ref>
=== '''Notes''' ===
 
<references group="N"/>
 
#↑ 005 is Revachol SAR.<ref name=":0"/>
 
   
=== '''References''' ===
+
==References==
 
<references />
 
<references />
   

Revision as of 18:57, 13 September 2021

Revachol (Re-va-shol) is a city on the Insulinde.

Revachol Vista

View of Revachol from the bay.


Background

Revachol, pronounced RE-va-shol, is the disgraced former capital of the world.[1] Currently, it is a Zone of Control under the jurisdiction of the Coalition[2] and is the primary setting for the events of Disco Elysium.

History

Founding

Following the Insulinde's discovery by one of Irene La Navigateur's expeditions,[3] Revachol was founded in the Dolorian century, 380 years ago,[4] as a colony of the Kingdom of Suresne (modern day Sur-la-Clef).[5] It was built by settlers from the Occident, migrant workers from Semenine and Iilmaraa,[6] and herdsmen of Ubi Sunt?.[7]

Revacholian Suzerainty

DE Revachol Flag

Mockup of the flag of the Suzerainty of Revachol.

Golden Age

At some point, Revachol gained independence from the Kingdom of Suresne and became the "capital of the world."[1] It was a constitutional monarchy.[8] Around 97% of the population were Iilmaraan Aeropagites.[9]

The flag of the Suzerainty of Revachol displays the Sevenfold Sun Miracle, an optical atmospheric anomaly that the first settlers of the Insulinde saw. Six suns orbit a larger one in the center.[10]

Revachol's economy of this era relied on a diverse range of territories producing commodities for export. These included apricots from the Empire of Safre, marble and archeological treasures from Ile Marat (modern-day Iilmaraa), sugar from the Semenine, and unprocessed magenta cocaine from Supramundi and Saramiriza.[11]

Siigay, derogatorily known as the "Apricot Suzerainty,"[12] was a Revacholian colony on Samara.[13] To this day, it supplies apricots for Revachol.[14] Tioumoutiri was a Revacholian colony on Iilmaraa and supplied tobacco.[9]

The oversupply of cocaine led to the suzerain introducing it to Safre under exclusive contract. Therefore, they created an extremely valuable captive market for an extremely addictive product.[15] It is implied that Filippe I, or Grand Old Filippe,[16] is the one who initiated the contract.[17] This era of mass cocaine production is called "Regnum Cocainum."[18]

There was a king named Guillaume II[16] though it is unclear if he is related to Guillaume "Le Lion."[19]

Decline

The groundwork for the Suzerainty's collapse was laid by the Filippian dynasty in the "penultimate century." Iosef Lilianovich Dros claims that Filippe II, the Opulent, was congenitally deformed,[20] and the entire Filippe bloodline had a poor history of mental health.[21] His son, Filippe III, the Squanderer, is credited as the most instrumental in the fall of the monarchy.[22]

King Filippe III, who was king 150 years ago,[23] was known for his profligacy.[22] Most notably, he converted his bedroom into the Sol Aurum: a treasure chamber allegedly full of krugerrands, bars of gold, ornate weaponry, armor, chalices, and a bed of gold-dipped feathers.[24] Moreover, Filippe III spent a lot of money on his cocaine addiction, specifically of purple Filippian cocaine.[17] In fact, his mother, during childbirth, had received a dose of it.[18] Such expenditures over his 25 year rule[25] led to the depletion of the national treasury, and therefore the fall of the Suzerainty.

Royalists claim that the Filippian kings used cocaine for "clarity of vision," though it is a thin excuse for their cocaine addiction.[18] There are also untrue rumors that Filippe III had syphilis; he was simply mad.[25]

Filippe IV, the Insane, is only mentioned by name.[21] He presumably failed to reverse the effects of his father due to his madness.

By the Antecentennial Revolution, Guillaume "Le Lion"[26] was suzerain. He briefly attempted to bring Revachol back to it's former glory; his Ikeira Operation forcefully united the people in the southeastern part of Le Petit Continent, collectively known as the Ikeira tribes, under the Revacholian banner.[27]

However, Guillaume fled the Insulinde before the fighting got too bad, becoming a successful venture capitalist in Graad. His nephew, Frissel the First, took his place as king.[28][26] Frissel was eventually killed by the communists,[28][29] formally ending the monarchy.

Commune of Revachol

DE Communist Flag

The star-and-antlers, symbol of the Revolution.

Figurine set revolutionary

A figurine of a Revolutionary

Founding

The Antecentennial Revolution—also known as the Civil War within Revachol[30]—was a series of interisolary conflicts primarily between the Communists, known as the Communards, and the Moralintern and royalty. It began in Graad, in '02,[31] sparked in part by a virulent prion pandemic, called "tzaraath."[32]

On the 7th of March in '02, the new Commune of Revachol transmitted the Le Décret de Mars (The March Decree) to world governments, announcing their creation.[33] Their army was the Insulindian Citizens Militia, or the ICM,[34] and their political organization was called "le Parti communiste d'Insulinde."[35]

At this point, 50 million people lived on Caillou.[36]

The Civil War

Within Revachol, the Revolution manifested as a civil war between the Communists and Royalists.[30] Some Seolite officers commanded the suzerain's navy and most of them sided with the Royalists at the start of the conflict.[37] Guillaume "Le Lion" was suzerain at the time, but left. His nephew, Frissel the First, took charge.[28][26]

The communists captured and retrofitted a sea fortress in Martinaise, built by Filippe II, in '02. They installed it with an AA gun to protect against airborne landings.[20]

Frissel attempted to end the communists in one decisive strike, sending his cousin, Drysant, to put an end to the Commune. At this point, the Royalists wore excessively flashy uniforms;[38] Drysant himself sported a purple velvet tunic, cockatoo feathers, a gold-plated rifle, and a giant red steed. He marched his men in single file to the communards' position, leading to a massacre at the hands of the revolutionaries.[39] Drysant himself lost his jaw, but survived the battle thanks to René Arnoux.[40]

Frissel was eventually killed by the communists,[28][29] formally ending the monarchy.

Monuments to the old order were blown up[41] and the remains of Filippe III were unearthed and thrown into the Insulindian Bay.[23] Revachol communists also started "Ask Revachol," a radio show used to address civil issues.[42]

Fall of the Commune

Following Frissel's death, the Coalition became involved. INSURCOM[43] set forth Operation Death Blow, also called The Landing,[44] in '08: a three-part strategic aerostatic bombing of Martinaise, Stella Maris, and the Delta.[45] A five-nation army -- including troops from the Occident, Graad, and Mesque -- amassed a large army of airships to complete Operation Death Blow.[46]

The operation within Martinaise took place on May 13, '08[47] and was called the Beachhead.[48] The sea fortress captured by the communists and equipped with an anti-aircraft gun in '02[20] failed to function during the invasion.[44] Martinaise was shelled and captured by the Coalition along with Stella Maris and the Delta.[49]

Interestingly, the Communist Party never officially surrendered.[50] However, Revachol relinquished its sovereignty to the Coalition[49] and liberal reactionaries signed the Revacholian Instrument of Surrender, ending the Commune in '10.[51][52]

By the end of the conflict, at least two million people had died in the Insulinde: an incident called the "Insulindian Deluge."[25][53] The communists and anarchists were massacred by the Coalition and buried in mass graves in Ozonne.[54]

Zone of Control

Early Years

In the wake of the Antecentennial Revolution, Revachol became a Zone of Control, or ZoC,[55] divided into 21 cordons.[56] It exists under the jurisdiction of the Coalition.[2] INSURCOM, which represents the interests of the Moralintern,[57] handles the military occupation of the city.[43] The ZoC's flag is signal blue.[58]

The Revachol Citizens Militia, or RCM, was organized by the citizens of Revachol to restore order to the city under the Coalition.[59][60] It's décomptage system is most likely a descendent of the Insulindian Citizens Militia, or ICM.[61][62][63] Even so, the RCM's Emergency, Wayfarer, and Aliments Acts were designed to keep Revachol in a laissez-faire state that benefitted foreign capital.[64]

Decades

'08 to '19, according to Joyce Messier, was "hell."[65]

The Twenties weren't much better. Revachol West was leveled in a decade-long urban war[65] and there was a measles outbreak that killed many children. The Old Military Hospital was used as a quarantine center, but now it is completely overgrown and renamed the Pox.[66]

The Thirties saw an economic boom in Revachol East, which transformed itself into the world's largest tax haven. The surge of untaxed income led to The New:[65] a cultural era of disco and ultraliberalism.[67][68]

However, in Faubourg of Revachol West,[69] the People's Pile happened. A Type U particle decay generator, whose construction had started during the Commune of Revachol, failed immediately after leftists finished it in the Thirties. Radioactive waste spilled into the River Esperance.[70] The Emergency Relief Brigade was organized to contain it,[71] but unfortunately, many of them contracted cancer and there wasn't much that the brigade could do.[72]

The Forties dispelled the decade of economic success. Quantitative easing turned out to be market mirage, sending the economy into a recession.[65]

As of the events of Disco Elysium, set in the spring of '51,[73] Revachol is still in that recession.[65]

The Future

In around two months from in-game events,[74][75] The Return, or Le Retour, may happen in Revachol West. It is part urban myth, part political science, that promises an "event" where Revachol may become self-governing.[76] It is implied that Ptolemy Pryce and Nix Gottlieb, of Precinct 41, are directly involved in it.[77]

Harry Du Bois predicts Revachol will be destroyed circa '73 by an atomic device unless something is done.[78]

Geography

Overview

Revachol is located on the island of Le Caillou, also called "The Pebble,"[79] on the northeast side of the Insulindian Isola,[80] on the world's largest body of water: the Insulindic.[81] Le Caillou, which is sometimes mistaken as an archipelago, is the fourth largest island in the world.[82] It is fertile, self-sufficient, and able sustain up to 200 million people.[83] The city itself has a radius of 80 kilometres[84] and is split by the River Esperance into Revachol East and Revachol West.[79] The north side of the island is shattered by the delta of the Esperance, and is named La Delta.[85]

The Bay of Revachol, which is on the side of La Delta, is 1200 meters at its deepest[86] and feeds into the Insulindic.[87] In its farthest reaches lies the Coalition Warship Archer.[88]

Revachol East

Revachol East is the nicer part of Revachol. By '21, a little more than a decade after the war, the eastern bank was already fully renovated.[89] The hillsides were lush with gardens and residences, especially in its most desirable district, Le Jardin. Houses with gardens rise along the mountainside, up to Saint-Batiste where two of the world's five largest companies keep their headquarters.[90]

Other districts include the Stella Maris district - one of the three landing points during the Coalition invasion - and Saint-Batiste, which gives its name to Saint-Batiste Pharmaceutics. Known as slums before the Revolution, Saint-Batiste is where Contact Mike, the world-renown boxer, was born and rose through adversity and brain trauma to become one of the greats of sports history. Saint-Batiste is also where the Saint-Batiste Dinghy Races were conceived. Originally intended as a biennial civic pride celebration (and cash cow), they only took place twice, in '31 and '33.[91]

Revachol West

Revachol - Jamrock District

A map of Jamrock, or Revachol West.

West of the river, it's funky-baby holocaust time all day every day. It's the International Zone, which means: no one gives a shit. It's no one's business. In East-Jamrock, wild animals roam the valley at night – giraffes that escaped from the Royal Zoo 50 years ago. Giraffes – even-toed ungulates from the savannah. The local kiosque chain Frittte employs a private army of 2000 men to guard its properties in Jamrock and Faubourg. That's how bad the crime rate is – you need a private army to run a kiosque chain.[90]

Jamrock, Greater Revachol Industrial Harbour, Faubourg, and possibly Résurrection are known districts of Revachol West. Martinaise, The Pox, Villalobos, Central Jamrock, Eminent Domain, Grand Couron, Burnt Out Quarter, and Coal City are sections of Jamrock. Martinaise has no currently district delineation.

La Delta

In a narrow sense, La Delta refers to the financial district, west of Revachol West. Twenty-two kilometres from the centre of the world, the district includes some of the most important areas in Revachol: The Bank of the World building (called a soldering iron), which contains the INSURCOM - Coalition Government Insulindian Mission Command - on the bottom floors.[92]

In a broader sense, it refers to the delta of the River Esperance. Faubourg, the district immediately adjacent to the river that divides the city are about as well-off as Revachol West, that is, not very. The People's Pile, a Type U particle generator (a nuclear reactor, basically) that started construction during the Commune and entered service after its collapse. The occupation government did not help and the ad hoc construction failed due to a faulty emergency valve. The resulting damage took out the turbine and the fuel containment vessel, leading to a massive radioactive discharge into the Esperance. Emergency Relief Brigade, a volunteer, self-organized cleanup crew, tried to salvage the situation, only succeeding in working themselves into an early, cancer-ridden grave.[93] Despite the failed reactor, Faubourg expanded and by '51 it's a seemingly endless stretch of urban sprawl.

Nearby regions

  • Ozonne: An archipelago that is 80 to 100 kilometers (two days' travel) away from Revachol. Its major cities are the Fond de l'Air and Virmandeux.
  • Resurrection: Way beyond Martinaise -- a popular spa destination for ample-bodied Ozonne kids with equally ample pockets, established in '18.
  • Laurentide: Located on the other end of Le Caillou, its major city is Deora-of-the-Seven-Seas.
  • Archipelagos: Croyant-Morain is a major city in this region.

Economics


Politics

Following the collapse of the Revolution and the mass executions of communists, Revachol became a neoliberal's paradise: A tax haven and a vital hub for cheap labor and overseas shipping. Since the fall of the Revolution, the Coalition has maintained a grip on the city under the Emergency, Wayfarer, and Aliments Acts -- three pieces of legislation keeping the city in a laissez-faire stasis to the benefit of foreign capital. The Wayfarer Act is one of the most perfidious, designed to limit the authority of local institutions. Part of it prohibits the RCM from requesting most documents and licenses without permission from a Coalition representative.[94]

Death penalty remained a staple of criminal "justice" in Revachol since time immemorial. Under the Suzerain and the commune, the preferred method was a firing squad. The Coalition's occupation forces are more fond of the electric chair. Those who dodge the executioner's blade still have to deal with lengthy prison sentences in the River Esperance Correctional Facility (nicknamed Reunion), an infamous military prison.

Factions

  • Coalition: The occupying force of overseas nations that imposed a brutal, exploitative capitalist economy on Revachol.
  • Revachol Citizens Militia: A volunteer police force organized with the tacit approval of the Coalition.
  • Dockworkers' Union: A labor union, socialist faction, and/or corrupt mob depending on who you ask. Considered the de facto government of the abandoned Martinaise.
  • Loyalists (a euphemism for “fascists”): A defeated faction of Revacholian royalists who blame all the evils of the world on the failed Revolution, 50 years ago. Their philosophy is best summed up as follows: "If good, kind king Guillaume were still around, he'd drive the moneylenders and the homo-sexuals back into the ocean! Once we were an octopus that straddled the world, sucking up natural and human resources from Iilmaraa to South-East Seol. The city state that screwed the whole world. Then deranged commies pushed the king under a street car and lost the civil war to foreign intervention, damning us to financial servitude."[90]
  • Communists: The communards, mostly dead. Okay, one is still alive and teaches cultural theory at the Ecole Normale de Revachol, east of the river. And there's talk of two more employed by a failed radio-game studio. But the rest are all dead, bulldozed into mass graves after the Coalition Army retook Revachol in '08.[90]

Culture

When it comes to cigarettes, contemporary Revacholians prefer Drouin (a local blend from the southern islands) or Astra, the legendary cigarette from Graad. Tioumoutiri is favoured by older men for its paper filter tips, sweet smell, and added tar.[95]

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 ENCYCLOPEDIA - Revachol is the disgraced former capital of the world, divided into zones of control under foreign occupation -- half a century after a failed world revolution. She is central to our moment in time.
  2. 2.0 2.1 LENA, THE CRYPTOZOOLOGIST'S WIFE - "Nope. Sadly not. Revachol is what's called a Zone of Control. Under an alliance of foreign powers called the Coalition. We have no government of our own and what democracy we have is..." She thinks. "Market driven."
    RHETORIC - Meaning: buying is voting.
  3. YOU - Okay, what else? Was she smart?
    ENCYCLOPEDIA - Terribly. Women of the court were expected to play both contract bridge and chess sufficiently well to prove and interesting challenge to a man -- a similar grasp in matters of philosophy, theology, and science was encouraged. She was, by all means, a kept woman...
    ENCYCLOPEDIA - She made the most of her position in the Antedolorian court -- a court visited by the most prominent thinkers and artists of the day. In secret, she was becoming the era's pre-eminent philosopher of the state. A scalpel, a piercing gaze...
    ENCYCLOPEDIA - She was an almost preternaturally magnetic and intelligent individual. To her contemporaries she appeared out of time, a messenger from the future of the species. We *all* fell in love with her, head over heels. Even before she was declared an innocence her influence was tremendous.
    YOU - How come? It was on her advice that Irene La Navigateur sponsored a number of voyages into the pale. A costly, often tragic endeavour, ultimately vindicated by the discovery of the *New New World*, the piece of reality you're standing on...
    ENCYCLOPEDIA - She was crowned two years after the first expedition returned, setting in motion what is widely considered the greatest era in history -- the Dolorian Era.
  4. YOU - "*When* was Revachol built?"
    JOYCE MESSIER - "In the Dolorian century, 380 years ago."
  5. ENCYCLOPEDIA - In the very, very early days of colonizing this archipelago, the Kingdom of Suresne, a precursor of modern Sur-La-Clef, used to own the city of Revachol. An obscure detail in the bigger picture, but still -- worth dropping.
  6. YOU - "Okay. *Who* built this city?"
    JOYCE MESSIER - "The nations of the Occident. Or migrant workers from Seminine and Iilmaraa, depending on your creed."
  7. YOU - "Is there such a thing as *Ubi Dolorianism* or did I just make that up?"
    NOID - "Good catch, Art Cop." He crosses his arms. "The herdsmen of the Ubi Sunt? islands came here on the first boats. Their flowery version of Dolorianism could be what we're standing in."
  8. JOYCE MESSIER - "Some were rich enough to stay with the Constitution; with monarchy -- *big mistake*. Others bet on the Revolution, they were called the Ultras, or ultraliberals. They fared well."
  9. 9.0 9.1 ENCYCLOPEDIA - Tioumoutiri was a Revacholian colony on Iilmaraa. The suzerainty's population was mostly Iilmaraan Areopagites -- up to 97%. The region was known for its tobacco export. Hence the name.
  10. ENCYCLOPEDIA - This is the flag of Revachol the Suzertainty. YOU - What's with the sun? ENCYCLOPEDIA - This isn't just one sun, but there are little suns dancing around the big sun. This is the Sevenfold Sun Miracle. YOU - What's the Sevenfold Sun Miracle? ENCYCLOPEDIA - It's an optical atmospheric anomaly the first settlers saw. Happens in cold weather: six small suns around the big one. This complex halo-phenomena is how old Revachol got its flag.
  11. SUZERAINTY: THE BOARD GAME - In addition to the worker and building tokens used by each player, there are also several piles of colourful resource tokens, each representing one of the game's four principal resources...
    SUZERAINTY: THE BOARD GAME - From the Empire of Safre: orange apricot tokens. From Ile Marat (the ancestral name of Iilmaraa): gray marble block tokens. From the Semenine Islands: white sacks of sugar tokens. And from Supramundi and Saramiriza: magenta tokens for unprocessed cocaine leaves.
  12. RHETORIC - *Apricot Suzerainty* calls to mind an era when the Siigay archipelago was colonized by Revachol. It's a bit of a slur, in other words.
  13. ENCYCLOPEDIA - This man probably comes from Siigay, sometimes known as the 'Apricot Suzerainty,' an archipelago in the Samaran isola.
  14. ENCYCLOPEDIA - By the way, the raw materials were most likely exported from Siigay (the Apricot Suzerainty) and processed in Sur-La-Clef into the apricot-flavoured chewing gum loved by kids of today -- and yesterday. Hmm. Something about it *is* familiar... And not only to your fingers.
  15. ENCYCLOPEDIA - Well, the suzerain was looking for new markets for all the cocaine it was producing, and it settled on Safre...
    ENCYCLOPEDIA - By introducing cocaine into Safre under exclusive contract, the suzerain created an extremely valuable captive market for an extremely *addictive* product.
  16. 16.0 16.1 YOU - What's in the west?
    SHIVERS - More winding coastline lined with abandoned buildings. Crumbling piers salt water lapping at their dark piles. Grey and red, forgotten city blocks. What remains of the pre-revolutionary effort to gentrify the coast.
    YOU - And beyond that?
    SHIVERS - The waters turn black. Coal City in the shadow of Saint-Martin, a boom town, back when coal extracted from countless shafts near the city was need to power Revachol.
    SHIVERS - No more. The coal was supplanted by petroleum from the ocean floor and hydropower from the Esperance. Everything crumbled. These days, only the weakest remain in Coal City. Their hopes of getting rich linger in the defunct shafts under their feet.
    YOU - What is there?
    SHIVERS - Below the old mines -- L'Ossuaire Municipal, Revachol's underground cemetery. *Les petits rats* brave the underground passageways, trying to get to Le Royaume...
    YOU - Le Royaume...
    SHIVERS - ...where the Filippian kings were interred, with their doctors and their admirals. Mausoleums, burial chambers, leaf gold still remains on the Double Door of the Morning.
    YOU - Les *petits rats*...
    SHIVERS - Children under 14. They go underground, looking for artefacts to sell to foreign museums -- and for fabled relics. Their parents let them. They go deeper...
    YOU - Deeper...
    SHIVERS - ...after rubies, melchiorite, lapis lazuli plundered from Safre and Seol during the time of the Suzerain. In the burial chambers of the kings: Grand Old Filippe, Guillaume II, and even in the mausoleum of Filippe the Opulent.
    SHIVERS - Two kilometres underground, in a winding shaft along whose walls mirrors have been placed so that daylight may eternally fall upon the richest of all the kings.
    SHIVERS - The mausoleum contains untold quantities of gold -- and that special, purest-of-the-pure magenta cocaine favoured by Revacholian royalty.
  17. 17.0 17.1 ENCYCLOPEDIA - You see, Old Filippe wasn't just good at squandering the national treasury on gold and ceremonial weaponry. He was also a prodigious snorter of nose candy.
    ELECTROCHEMISTRY - Not just *any* nose candy, though. We're talking royal *Filippian* blow, allegedly twice as potent as the stuff you find nowadays. And purple, Filippian cocaine was purple.
  18. 18.0 18.1 18.2 RENÉ ARNOUX - "That's why the Filippian kings used cocaine -- for clarity of vision, to aid in their work... Regnum Cocainum -- Revachol's finest years." He seems to grow taller, brimming with pride about the past.
    KIM KITSURAGI - "Of course," the lieutenant marks dryly. "Clarity of vision. *Awareness*."
    RENÉ ARNOUX - "Filippe III was even brought into this world with the help of cocaine -- the court medic administered a dose to his mother when she was in labour. And it is well known that with the help of cocaine -- only the purest, of course -- he was able to connect with higher realms..."
  19. RENÉ ARNOUX - He catches your glance and nods. "This is the uniform of the Royal Carabineers in service of Frissel the First, Guillaume *Le Lion*, and the valiant King filippe the Fifth before him.
  20. 20.0 20.1 20.2 YOU - "What is this place? This island..."
    THE DESERTER - "It's not an island, droite." He looks around. "It's a defensive fortification of the Commune of Revachol and I am its last surviving defender."
    YOU - "What was it used for?"
    THE DESERTER - "The congenitally deformed King Filippe II built it to restrict access to the Bay of Revachol. We captured it in '02, retrofitted the fort with an AA gun to defend against an airborne landing -- against the whole world."
  21. 21.0 21.1 HORSEBACK MONUMENT - A silver plaque on the statue's pedestal reads: 'I am Filippe III, the Squanderer, the Greatest of the Filippian Kings of Revachol; Son of Filippe II, the Opulent; Father of Filippe IV, the Insane.'
    VOLITION - Not a good track record of mental health in that family.
  22. 22.0 22.1 ENCYCLOPEDIA - Even by the standard of the Filippian kings, Old Sumptuous Filippe was known for his profligacy.
    YOU - In what way?
    ENCYCLOPEDIA - Well, he blew through the whole national treasury, starting the decline of one of the penultimate century's greatest superpowers: the Suzerain of Revachol...
    ENCYCLOPEDIA - His own maladministration foreshadowed the fall of the monarchy during the Antecentennial Revolution, an end to his family line and the monarchy on the Insulindian isola.
  23. 23.0 23.1 YOU - So he was addicted to nose candy. A bloated druggie?
    ENCYCLOPEDIA - That's what the revolutionaries said -- 150 years later. Right before they emptied out the royal mausoleum and dumped His Majesty's mortal remains in the Insulindian Bay.
  24. ENCYCLOPEDIA - Stories have it that he had his bedroom converted into a treasure chamber where he stored unfathomable wealth: *krugerrands*, bars of gold, ornate weaponry, armour, and various chalices.
    ENCYCLOPEDIA - He called it the *Sol Aurum*. It was obscene. There were whispers he slept on a huge pile of gold-dipped feathers like some obese dragon, instead of a bed like a normal person.
  25. 25.0 25.1 25.2 THE DESERTER - "The bacteria entered his brain and made him squander trillions on sparkling wine, *cocainum*, and monuments of himself. His son Filippe IV the Insane contracted syphilis in the womb..." he breathes in with a wheeze of hatred.
    ENCYCLOPEDIA - That is technically possible, although Filippe III was not actually syphilitic, he was just mad.
    THE DESERTER - "And he *still* went on the govern Revachol for twenty five years! We lost 2 million lives toppling that mode of government -- and those grotesque statues too, hundreds of them."
  26. 26.0 26.1 26.2 RENÉ ARNOUX - He catches your glance and nods. "This is the uniform of the Royal Carabineers in service of Frissel the First, Guillaume *Le Lion*, and the valiant King filippe the Fifth before him.
  27. ENCYCLOPEDIA - 'The Ikeira Operation' was a seven-year campaign during which Suzerain Guillaume's army forcefully united the people in the southeastern part of Le Petit Continent, collectively known as the Ikeira tribes, under the Revacholian banner.
  28. 28.0 28.1 28.2 28.3 YOU - "Anyone else get shot in the head -- on the opposing side?"
    JOYCE MESSIER - "Oh, lots of people. Even the king got shot in the head, or thrown beneath a horse. Or drowned. Accounts differ. It was unceremonious." She shakes her head. "Just as well -- he wasn't actually the king. Just the king's nephew."
    JOYCE MESSIER - "The real king abdicated and lived out a long and productive life as a venture capitalist in Graad." YOU - "Smart king."
    JOYCE MESSIER - "Yes, King Guillaume had a nose for bad PR. He ran before it -- what is the expression -- *went down*? Anyway, Gil got out alive and his nephew Frissel got shot in his place..."
  29. 29.0 29.1 THE DESERTER - "Calm down? I'm not angry..." His hand still trembles. "I *adore* him. He reminds me of everything we fought for. At least we killed that Frissel and his kingsmen..." He's overtaken by a coughing fit.
  30. 30.0 30.1 YOU - "Who pinned them? Which side?" KIM KITSURAGI - "The revolutionaries: so the communards and the anarchists. White's their colour. But the custom started in the Suzerain's army so it held meaning for the kingsmen too." KIM KITSURAGI - "It's about girls and boys more than *sides*. Girls sending off boys who are going to their deaths -- then also dying themselves in the ruins, from dysentery and consumption. It's a symbol of the Civil War."
  31. JOYCE MESSIER - "The Revolution began in '02, on the isola of Graad, though by the end nearly the whole world had gotten involved."
  32. JOYCE MESSIER - "It wasn't a *who*, but a *what*. A pandemic of tzaraath, a particularly virulent prion disease, which the authorities in Graad proved unable to contain. Then Mazov came along and overthrew the government."
  33. YOU - "What did the revolutionaries do with those advanced tape computers?" TRANT HEIDELSTAM - "They used them for military communications," he says, while his son looks up idly chewing on the corner of his würm-themed colouring book. "But also to write and send out press releases. The most notorious example being Le Décret de Mars." YOU - "What was that?" TRANT HEIDELSTAM - "What's the March decree? I mean the radio transmission sent out to new agencies and world governments by the newly-created Commune of Revachol on the 7th of March in the year '02." ENCYCLOPEDIA - A short-lived legislative foundation for a short-lived utopia.
  34. ENCYCLOPEDIA - Insulindian Citizens Militia, the official name of the communards' army. The army of the Revolution.
  35. THE DESERTER - "You're the RCM." He stares at you coldly. "You represent the Moralist International, the enemies of humanity, who took this city. I represent their adversary, le Parti communiste d'Insulinde."
  36. THE DESERTER - "*Death Blow*. you're one of them. Tell me, who speaks like that? We had 50 million people on Caillou alone..."
  37. GARY, THE CRYPTOFASCIST - "I'm so fucking sorry I called you *Yellow Man*." He says silently. "Seolite officers commanded the Suzerain's navy. Most of them sided with the King, when..." He shakes his head.
  38. YOU - Inspect the blue uniforms. KNICK-KNACKS STAND - They're not all blue. These figurines also wear gold coats and caps, complimented by orange trousers. They are variously posed, wielding swords and rifles with bayonets. YOU - "Wait, this looks like René, the old guy who was playing petanque." KIM KITSURAGI - "This is what the loyalists looked like, yes." He inspects the figurine. "At first. Then they wised up and got camouflage."
  39. RENÉ ARNOUX - "King Frissel thought he could end it all in one decisive strike." The old carabineer runs his fingers over the larger medal. "Sent his cousin, Drysant, to put an end to the unrest."
    RENÉ ARNOUX - "Alas, the young Drysant was all piss and no vinegar, wearing a tunic of purple velvet and cockatoo feathers to battle." He spits. "Even his rifle was *gold-plated*. Shone from five klicks away. Can you imagine the asininity?"
    KIM KITSRUAGI - "Purple velvet tunic," the lieutenant says thoughtfully. "That isn't exactly *camo*."
    RENÉ ARNOUX - "To keep the long and bloody story short, Drysant marched us against the partisans in Couron. And when I say 'marched', I mean made us walk into captured enemy territory single-file, like toy soldiers, while he rode in front on his giant red stallion."
    RENÉ ARNOUX - "The rebels were smart. They let us come real close before opening fire. Suffice to say, it was carnage."
  40. RENÉ ARNOUX - "The dink had taken numerous flesh wounds and lost a lot of blood, but despite missing his jaw he seemed hesitant to die. Tougher than he looked, that one."
    YOU - "That's no dink, that's a fighter!"
    RENÉ ARNOUX - "So I grabbed the *dink*," he says, with a stern look, "and started crawling. Kept going until the 59th Cavalry picked us up."
    RENÉ ARNOUX - "Through some miracle we both survived. And the jawless freak convinced Frissel to give me a medal for not leaving him to die in his own blood, piss, and shit."
  41. THE DESERTER - "That's right. Some *advertising* cockroaches erected a cynical, *deconstruction* of it. We tore it down with honest working class plastic explosives -- and there it is again..." He shakes his head in disgust.
  42. TRANT HEIDELSTAM - "'Ask Revachol' is the name of a war time radio show the communists used to address civil issues," he remarks. "Maybe that helps?"
  43. 43.0 43.1 TRANT HEIDELSTAM - "INSURCOM is responsible for all aspects of the military occupation of Revachol. During the Revolution, they coordinated the efforts of the Occidental and Graadian invasion, but these days their function is primarily logistical."
  44. 44.0 44.1 THE DESERTER - "Aerostatics. The Landing had started. I climbed out -- into hell. There were ships all above. Hissing, whirling, and men pouring out. The chain was submerged so I had to swim back. The fortress was half submerged too, shattered." THE DESERTER - "They'd all drowned in the lower levels, or got torn to shreds above. The anti-aircraft gun had malfunctioned -- so had I. I left them without idealogical direction..." He opens his eyes and stares right through you. "It was real. I'd seen it. I'd seen it *in reality*."
  45. RENÉ ARNOUX - "Martinaise was used as one of the three footholds in Revachol during Operation Death Blow in '08. The other two are off in Stella Maris and the Delta." He points to the northeast.
  46. VISUAL CALCULUS - A fleet -- the combined armies of Occident and Graad, with Mesque volunteers. A five-nation army. Hundreds of vessels. VISUAL CALCULUS - They massed airships further down, in the bay of Revachol. The artillery was so powerful, the ships not only required gyroscopic stabilization -- they were anchored into the ocean floor as well.
  47. THE DESERTER - "May the 13th, '08, 22 years ago," he looks north. "The horizon was black with Coalition airships. Their petroleum rose to the sky and it looked like... like it *formed* the clouds. Storm clouds. When they started shelling it was... dark magic."
  48. RENÉ ARNOUX - "Because this place is the damn Beachhead," he says, pointing to the bay. "Had to soften the commies up first."
  49. 49.0 49.1 JOYCE MESSIER - "I would not have relinquished sovereignty to the Coalition. Not here in Martinaise -- and not in the Stella Maris or Delta beachheads either. If not for my own sake..."
  50. RENÉ ARNOUX - "The rest of the city got cleaned up, but Martinaise they keep as a *monument*." A dark shadow runs across his face. "And now the Union socialists are practically running the place." GASTON MARTIN - "Well, it's your own damn fault," the jolly man remarks. "You, we, the Coalition, Revachol -- whoever you wanna blame -- never finished the job. Officially the Party never surrendered. Of course they still hold influence."
  51. YOU - "The communards signed the Revacholian Instrument of Surrender." THE DESERTER - "Liberal reactionaries signed that instrument -- traitors, who should have been burned alive..." He draws his breath. "I answer to the Communist Party."
  52. YOU - "Where did it spread from there?" JOYCE MESSIER - "From Revachol and Graad? Not far. The world managed to cauterize itself. Mazov's government was overthrown in '08, and the Coaltion crushed the Revachol commune two years later. It was *The End*."
  53. YOU - "Did the communists and the anarchists shoot back?" JOYCE MESSIER - "Did they ever. Before they got shot themselves, they shot two million people." YOU - "Truly a *kerfuffle*." JOYCE MESSIER - "Yes. The *Insulindian Deluge* they call it."
  54. JOYCE MESSIER - "Indeed. They piled them in mass graves in Ozonne and, well -- that's the last anyone heard of those people."
  55. THE DESERTER - "*Let* me be here?" He looks around. "The ZoC is an unlawful successor of the Commune of Revachol. We took this fortification from the loyalists. Even the Claires understand this..."
  56. SHIVERS - Higher yet, Coalition airships guard over the twenty one cordons of the Zone of Control. The air is criss-crossed with radio transmissions, the hair on your neck rises...
  57. COALITION WARSHIP ARCHER - "For instance, as second signaller we represent Coalition Warship Archer, which in turn represents INSURCOM and the Coalition more generally, which in turn represents the Moralist International, which itself represents the interests of 1.2 billion people across the world."
  58. KIM KITSURAGI - The lieutenant does not bow to the flag -- it accepts your salute with quiet dignity.
    ESPRIT DE CORPS - It is not my flag, he thinks -- my flag is the signal blue of the Zone of Control.
  59. ENCYCLOPEDIA - The RCM, or the Revachol Citizens Militia, is the police force you and him are part of. A self-organized peace corps of the occupied city of Revachol, the RCM operates within a legal twilight, yet its authority is rarely questioned. It's *super useful* to know this.
  60. KIM KITSURAGI - "The RCM was formed by the Coalition Government to restore order in the International zone after the Revolution. So we did. Now we attempt to *maintain* that order, no more, no less." KIM KITSURAGI - "For... perhaps it is better to say wer were *allowed to form*. It's a point of contention whether the citizens of Revachol or the Coalition Government founded the RCM."
  61. YOU - "What's a 'décomptage'?" KIM KITSURAGI - "Décomptage is the hierarchical system employed by the Revachol Citizens Militia. It means counting down to twos." ENCYCLOPEDIA - The countdown is modelled after the dual-leadership system employed by the left during the Revolution. Which in turn was developed by last century experimental psychologists in the University of Koenigstein.
  62. STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - "Julia Dobreva came from Graad. Jean Abadanaiz was born in Revachol. She was brilliant, charismatic, a revolutionary comet. He was her partner and stabiliser, the planet who kept her in orbit." ENCYCLOPEDIA - It's too bad they wound up equally dead on some nameless island in Ozonne... STEBAN, THE STUDENT COMMUNIST - "It's from them we get the notion of dual-leadership, the *décomptage*, Revachol's truly great contribution to revolutionary thought. I believe it even persists in some form in the RCM, even to this day."
  63. YOU - "Where does the RCM fit into all of this?" COALITION WARSHIP ARCHER - "The RCM exists under the umbrella of the Coalition, just as the Coalition exists under the umbrella of the Moralintern..." COALITION WARSHIP ARCHER - "At the same time, the RCM is not exactly *of* the Coalition." YOU - "You mean because of the décomptage?" COALITION WARSHIP ARCHER - We're not that familiar with RCM lore and practice, but we believe that may be the case. As we recall, the décomptage originated with the Revacholian Commune itself."
  64. JOYCE MESSIER - "The RCM's responsibilities are defined by the Emergency, Wayfarer, and Aliments Acts -- Three pieces of legislation keeping the city in a -- let's be honest -- laissez-faire stasis to the benefit of foreign capital."
  65. 65.0 65.1 65.2 65.3 65.4 JOYCE MESSIER - "The Twenties saw a decade of urban war: West of the river levelled, offshore platforms in flames... Still, it's regarded as an improvement on what came before: '08 to '19 was simply hell..." YOU - "And after that?" JOYCE MESSIER - "The Thirties? Things settled down in the Thirties. Revachol East transformed itself into the world's largest tax haven -- with the international community's blessing. For the first time in a long time it seemed like things were *going* somewhere." INLAND EMPIRE - Then *you* happened. Your youth in the Thirties. CONCEPTUALIZATION - All that untaxed income must have fuelled *The New*. That can only mean one thing... YOU - "That's when they discovered Disco." JOYCE MESSIER - "Yes. And quantitative easing. It was a market mirage, unfortunately. The Forties dispelled it. And isola-wide hangover, you might say. So, here we are..." She curtsies. JOYCE MESSIER - "Welcome to reality, baby." EMPATHY - From the looks of it the Fifties haven't been much better for the Zone of Control -- you can see it in her eyes. Days slipping away....
  66. YOU - The Pox... SHIVERS - ...was once a park, a place for reflection and recuperation for the patients of the Old Military Hospital. In the Twenties, it was used as a quarantine centre during a measles outbreak that killed many children. Most everyone has avoided the hospital and surrounding park ever since. SHIVERS - The Pox is completely wild now. Evergreen thickets covered in snow and industrial dust. Feral dogs and even wolves roaming in packs. The police try to keep the deepest corners cordoned off. YOU - But Still... SHIVERS - ...heavy drug users do slip through and hole up in the Old Military Hospital, hoping to find something to get high on among the hastily abandoned supplies. Or just to overdose in peace.
  67. YOU - (Point to yourself.) "This is what a *modern* cop looks like." KIM KITSURAGI - "In the New, twenty years ago. It's what a modern cop looked like then." ENCYCLOPEDIA - He means the New, the third decade of the current century. The decade of disco, decadence, and the victory of democracy-powered free market economy over it's critics.
  68. YOU - "The *New*?" JOYCE MESSIER - "The New, a cultural era -- and the name of the decade it ravished, the Thirties. It came out of post-revolutionary Revachol. It was... ultraliberal." JOYCE MESSIER - "It involved *lots* of partying, as you might imagine. And champagne coloured *everything*. By the looks of it -- that would have been when you came of age. Now..." She raises her eyebrow at you.
  69. BIRD'S NEST ROY - "The clean-up happened fifteen years ago. I was young then. Later my second aunt died, left me this shack and the assorted junk in it." BIRD'S NEST ROY - "So I came to Martinaise. People told me don't go there, it's a *shit-hole*. I said: people, we just had a *nuclear pile meltdown*. I'm gonna get as far from Faubourg as I can. Still in the same city, but..." He shrugs.
  70. YOU - "The People's Pile? What's that?" BIRD'S NEST ROY - "A bad idea. Some poor leftists built a particle decay generator in hopes of bringing affordable electricity to under-served communities. It malfunctioned. Radioactive waste everywhere, probably some of it in *you*, too." ENCYCLOPEDIA - The People's Pile was a Type U particle decay generator that failed immediately after entering service, releasing radioactive waste into River Esperance. YOU - Why is it called the *People's* Pile? ENCYCLOPEDIA - Construction began during the Commune of Revachol. The *people* continued work on it after the Commune fell -- they wanted a cheap source of energy for Revachol West.
  71. YOU - "Tell me more about this Emergency Relief Brigade you were part of." BIRD'S NEST ROY - He points at the white triangle on his orange safety jacket. "We were an all-volunteer force, self-organized. Tried to help fire brigades contain the spill." PERCEPTION (SIGHT) - On the patch -- gamma radiation lines crossed with a red drop of blood.
  72. BIRD'S NEST ROY - "There wasn't much the volunteer force could do, however. We wasted years in the river mud. Years getting sick..." He looks at the spiralling light and stops. YOU - "It must have been tough -- radioactive clean-up." BIRD'S NEST ROY - He hesitates. "There's a reason why everyone's tried to forget any of it ever happened, and why no one has tried to repair or replace the Pile." BIRD'S NEST ROY - "So much disappointment -- and early deaths, cancer mostly. And we knew all that was coming even as we were *cleaning up* as best we could."
  73. LENA, THE CRYPTOZOOLOGIST'S WIFE - "Oh no, dear! It's the early spring of '51."
  74. YOU - What is she waiting for? SHIVERS - For Gloria. Soon these clouds will all fall down as rain. Spring will come. Two more months. Maybe less. It's time.
  75. SHIVERS - Her thoughts trails off. The wind picks up again. Above her, a great cumulus cloud rises -- ready to fall down as precipitation. April will come, then May; a month, maybe two months from now... you shudder. The feeling dissipates. The thought ends.
  76. KLAASJE (MISS ORANJE DISCO DANCER) - "The Return, well... It's part urban myth -- part political science. It's a fool's hope, sir, and it's also all I've got. They say there will be an *event*. That it will happen somewhere here..." She looks around, then at the sky. KLAASJE (MISS ORANJE DISCO DANCER) - "In Revachol. Revachol West. They say it will happen soon -- and that it will change everything." KIM KITSURAGI - "*Le Retour...*" the lieutenant says. His forehead furrowed, he puts his notes down. YOU - "Is this why you said you would like to surrender in a *free* Revachol?" KLAASJE (MISS ORANJE DISCO DANCER) - "Yeah..." She looks at the sky, then at you. "I guess it is." RHETORIC - So she thinks -- at least partly -- that this Return will feature a self-governing Revachol. She has already placed her bets.
  77. ESPRIT DE CORPS - Somewhere under the curved roof of a former silk factory, shaped like a ladybird with two chimneys, Police Captain Ptolemy Pryce sits behind a heavy wooden desk. Resident medic Nix Gottlieb pours him a coffee. It's silent in the captain's office... ESPRIT DE CORPS - They speak of change. The city. The tension on the streets. They speak of the events of April and the blood on the streets in May.
  78. SHIVERS - IN 22 YEARS, THE FIRST SHOT WILL BE FIRED. NOT A SHOT FROM A GUN -- AN ATOMIC DEVICE THAT WILL LEVEL ALL OF ME. ALL OF ME. YOU - But... what can I do about it? SHIVERS - YOU ARE AN OFFICER OF THE CITIZENS MILITIA. YOU MOVE THROUGH MY STREETS FREELY IN MOTOR CARRIAGES AND ON FOOT. YOU HAVE ACCESS TO THE HIDDEN PLACES. YOU ALSO CIRCULATE AMONG THOSE WHO ARE HIDDEN. SHIVERS - I NEED YOU. YOU CAN KEEP ME ON THIS EARTH. BE VIGILANT. I LOVE YOU.
  79. 79.0 79.1 YOU - "What's the name of this island?"
    JOYCE MESSIER - "Caillou." She looks to the waters. "Imagine a pebble, a smoothed over pebble amidst a great blue sea. Mis-shapen, cracked. The cracks are the River Esperance. We're in the delta of this river, on the sixth branch -- the Martinaise distributary."
  80. JOYCE MESSIER - "On Caillou..." She studies your reaction. "The Pebble, the largest of the fertile, uninhabited islands of the northeast Insulindian archipelago. Four centuries and two revolutions later."
  81. JOYCE MESSIER - "Yes. We are on an island in an ocean. The world's largest body of water -- the Insulindic." ENCYCLOPEDIA - Known to the early Revacholians as *les Immensités Bleues* -- The Blue Immensities.
  82. ENCYCLOPEDIA - Technically, the neighboring Ozonne and Face-à-La-Mer island groups are archipelagos, while Le Caillou, by contrast, is a single, fertile land mass, the fourth largest island in the world. It is not an archipelago.
  83. JOYCE MESSIER - "We are standing on a fertile, self-sufficient island able to sustain up to 200 million people; in the middle of the Insulindic ocean -- the world's connective tissue..." She smiles. "It's where the money is."
  84. SHIVERS - Radiating outwards from you -- the Suzerain Revachol. With a radius of 80 kilometres. Still, the crown jewel of this isola would be barely visible.
  85. MAP WALL - The north coast of a verdant island is shattered by the delta of a river. It is the River Esperance. Countless bridges put the shards back together, connecting city blocks to river islands. *La Delta*, says a great, artificial heart in the centre, teeming with lifeforms and construction.
  86. SHIVERS - The Bay of Revachol, vastness, great depth -- over 1200 m at its deepest. Water, air brinier than here. It is crisscrossed by huge cargo ships bearing company logos: Wild Pines, ZAMM, Moriyn.
  87. JOYCE MESSIER - "It's not really a sea. It's the Bay of Revachol. And the bay feeds into the ocean."
  88. SHIVERS - And, at the farthest reaches of the Bay of Revachol -- the shadow of Coalition Warship Archer, on perpetual patrol duty, ready to unleash artillery fire if you were to rise up against the market. You shudder.
  89. Postcard Le Jardin '21
  90. 90.0 90.1 90.2 90.3 Welcome to Revachol Devblog
  91. Lena, the Cryptozoologist's wife
  92. Joyce Messier
  93. Bird's Nest Roy
  94. Encyclopedia
  95. Encyclopedia