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+Io’lokar, City
+OF KNOWLEDGE
+Free City of Argonnessen, Metropolis, Population
+,000
+From the moment it appears on the horizon, the city is a beacon against
+the darkening sky. Walls of white rise and twist against the highest
+reaches of the black peak, gleaming in the day’s dying light. From one
+of the great towers that ring those walls, dark shapes shoot up—wyvern
+riders, from the look of them, winging into flanking position to shadow
+your approach. Atop the closest tower, dragons are perched, watching
+you idly. Beside them stand giants armed with mighty greatswords,
+the nighttime city beyond them blazing with spell-light as you begin
+your descent.
+Throughout their long history, the dragons of Argonnessen have built no cities for their own kind. However, some thirty centuries ago, a great nondragon city
+called Io’vakas was founded by the Warders—a group
+of a dozen dragons dedicated to improving the lot of
+Argonnessen’s lesser races. With dragon magic and
+the labor of nondragon subjects collected from across
+Eberron, the Warders built a walled enclave deep in
+the south of the Vast. Under the tutelage of their
+draconic lieges, the citizens of Io’vakas—the Gate of
+Knowledge—became enlightened dragon worshipers
+with an advanced understanding of nature, science,
+and magic.
+ Today, Io’vakas is a mass of shattered stone jutting
+up from ground made barren by dragon fi re. But each
+morning as the sun rises above those ruins, it refl ects off
+distant towers against the slopes of a bare peak to the west.
+This place is very much alive; it is Io’lokar, the City of
+Knowledge—risen from the ashes of Io’vakas a thousand
+years ago.
+ Even among the nondragons of Argonnessen,
+Io’lokar is often thought of as myth. Beyond the dragon
+continent, many experienced adventurers have never
+heard of it. Argonnessen is a land of high-level and
+epic campaigns, and nowhere is this fact refl ected more
+than in the City of Knowledge. From the highest to the
+lowest, the Io’lokari are unequaled warriors, brillant
+sages, powerful spellcasters, and masters of the arts of
+a dozen races.
+ Most NPCs in the city have levels in three or more
+classes—a primary vocation (often handed down from
+parent to child), secondary vocations taken from interest, and a spellcasting class (typically adept or sorcerer).
+Children here take their fi rst class levels by early adolescence. The Io’lokari are the masters of vocations both
+great and mundane, and all reap the benefi t of their
+advanced society. A lowly clerk living in the Freeward
+might well be a 7th-level expert/8th-level adept whose
+accumulated knowledge would make a Morgrave professor weep.
+ The people of Io’lokar do not have access to the
+full power of dragon magic. The fate of the giants of
+Xen’drik has ensured that no nondraconic culture will
+ever be granted such a boon again. Nonetheless, magic
+permeates every corner of the city and every one of its
+people, and a fi rst visit to Io’lokar can induce awe in even
+jaded explorers.
+ Within the city, spell-light is infused into the air
+itself, rising and falling according to the time of day
+and the presence of passersby. Residents and visitors
+alike within Io’lokar’s walls can access the powers of
+fl ight (as a fl y spell) and short-distance teleportation (as
+dimension door), though teleporting into or out of public
+spaces is considered somewhat rude. Magic tempers the
+climate and the seasons, feeds the city’s people, and
+hones the skills of its scholars, artisans, and workers to
+unnatural levels.
+ The Io’lokari are not given to ostentation or casual
+displays of power, however. The city has no floating
+towers or wanton exhibitions of sorcerous might.
+Though its walls and buildings are reinforced by arcane
+power, they were raised one stone at a time. However,
+within these nondescript apartments of multicolored
+marble can be found collected lore rivaling that of
+Morgrave, Wynarn, and Korranberg combined—
+all the product of a humble working-class people
+whose lives more closely resemble those of lords
+and kings.
+Leadership: The Masters of Io’lokar.
+ Demographics: 14% human, 13% dwarf,
+% goblin and hobgoblin, 11% elf and halfelf, 11% changelin, 10% orc and half-orc,
+% halfling, 10% gnome, 8% shifter,
+% other.
+Economics: None (see the Commerce
+in Io’lokar sidebar).
+HISTORY
+The creation of Io’vakas thirty centuries
+ago was preceded by centuries of debate and
+anger among the dragons of Argonnessen.
+With the Chamber still in its infancy, most
+dragons opposed the Warders’ plans for
+empowering the lesser races. The idea of
+sharing even a small amount of draconic
+knowledge was anathema to many dragons,
+the fate of Xen’drik still sharp in their
+memories. In the end, though, the Warders
+prevailed. Io’vakas was built in the Vast with
+the tacit blessing of the Conclave and the
+Eyes of Chronepsis, and for two thousand
+years, the city thrived. Then the yuan-ti
+came from Sarlona, and the doomsayers
+proved correct.
+ When the serpent folk arrived in
+exile, the best among them were invited
+to Io’vakas. There, they joined the other
+nondragons of the city in a bountiful
+life that included worship of the fifteen
+ascended spirits of the Sovereigns—a gift
+of faith to the nondragons from their
+dragon masters. However, at least one
+sect of the Io’vakas yuan-ti sought more
+power than the Sovereigns could grant.
+In secret, this group claimed the direct
+worship of the Dragon Gods—and the
+deepest mysteries of dragon magic—for
+themselves.
+ When this blasphemy was eventually
+discovered, the dragons who opposed the
+Io’vakas experiment demanded a swift
+and final response. Refusing to distinguish between those who transgressed
+and the bulk of the loyal yuan-ti, or even
+the Io’vakas citizenry as a whole, draconic
+might was unleashed. Under a storm of
+lightning, frost, and fire, Io’vakas was
+leveled. A dozen or so yuan-ti escaped to
+the catacombs beneath the city; the rest of
+the serpent race, including all the priests,
+was destroyed. From ruined Io’vakas, a
+pathetic few nondragon survivors fled
+to the plains beneath a sky darkened by
+gathering rogues, anxious to add these
+so-called scions of knowledge to their
+own herds.
+ Then Arnaarlasha, a noble gold dragon
+great wyrm of the Warders, descended to the
+Io’lokar,
+City of Knowledge
+FV
+_95729_Ch1.indd 41 7/20/07 11:16:49 AM
+DRAGONS OF ARGONNESSEN
+wasted plain. She and a dozen elder dragons loyal to her
+formed a protective cordon around a thousand desperate survivors of the city. On foot, they shepherded their
+charges across hostile territory to the slopes of Mount
+Erishnak, a granite peak in the center of Arnaarlasha’s
+own adjacent territory. To the assembled rogues and the
+Soldiers of the Light who had pounded Io’vakas and her
+inhabitants to rubble, Arnaarlasha declared the surviving nondragons free subjects of her dominion. Over the
+year that followed, high on the mountainside, Io’lokar
+was raised.
+ Arnaarlasha never spoke of what drove her actions
+that day on the plains, nor will she ever do so. Four
+hundred years ago, the great wyrm’s death marked the
+city’s darkest hour, and a turning point. Within a day,
+Io’lokar was besieged by a coordinated attack of rogue
+dragons intent on claiming Arnaarlasha’s territory and
+razing the city. Beneath arcane defenses honed over
+six centuries, the city’s mages stood fast. Alongside the
+Keepers, fl ights of wyvern riders launched themselves
+from the Moontowers, harrying rogues in the air as they
+rained arcane fury against their reinforcements on the
+ground. After four days, the rogues retreated. Io’lokar
+stood fast, and its victory in the Battle of Arnaarlasha’s
+Fall is celebrated to this day.
+ Throughout the great battle, the Eyes of Chronepsis and the Light of Siberys were conspicuous by their
+absence, a display of indifference they maintain to this
+day. As long as the Io’lokari are careful to stay within
+the boundaries of behavior proscribed for them when
+Io’vakas was new, the Conclave seems content to leave
+the city be. However, both the Io’lokari and the Keepers
+accept that the city exists at the Conclave’s whim. If any
+nondragons seek the forbidden lore of dragonkind once
+again, or should any yuan-ti presence be again tolerated, no force of will or lesser magic will be enough to
+save them.
+LIFE IN IO’LOKAR
+In the twelve hundred years since, the City of Knowledge has grown from a mountainside fort (part of
+what is now the Freeward) to its present form. Within
+its walls, scholars, crafters, and artisans from a dozen
+non dragon races live side by side in common cause and
+culture. Though the Warders long ago stepped back to
+let the Io’lokari run their own affairs, the city remains
+dedicated to allowing nondragon culture to flourish
+on its own terms.
+ Even after three thousand years, however, many
+of the city’s sages believe that the Warders had a deeper
+purpose in their creation of a nondragon city within the
+dragon continent. In the same way that the dragons are
+said to shun Sarlona because they have seen that land’s
+destruction in the unfurling of the draconic Prophecy,
+some suggest that the Prophecy predicts the eventual
+destruction of all nondragon life on Eberron. Whether
+this destruction will come at the hands of the quori, some
+unknown magical or natural disaster, or through the
+actions of the lesser races themselves remains unknown.
+Either way, Io’lokar (and Io’vakas before it) might have
+been created as a safe haven for humanity—a place in
+which the scions of Sarlona, Xen’drik, and Khorvaire
+might live on.
+ Today, the city is home to the some of the finest
+crafters, artisans, and spellcasters in the world. However, mercantilism does not drive the art, craft, and
+magic of Io’lokar as it does in Khorvaire. Though the
+city has no effective gold piece limit, coin has no value
+here. Gems have use as currency only if they appeal to
+an individual Io’lokari’s eye. All Io’lokari work toward
+the continued survival of the city and the betterment of
+their own lives.
+THE IO’LOKARI
+With the exception of the kalashtar, all the advanced
+nondragon races of Eberron were present at the creation of Io’lokar, and they remain a part of the city to
+this day. The descendants of lesser races gathered by
+the dragons of old from across Eberron, the Io’lokari
+have long since developed a culture all their own.
+Given names are a unique blend of Draconic and a
+dozen other languages, while surnames are unknown
+here. The folk of the city have an in-depth knowledge
+of their own genealogy (a necessity in such a closed
+population); an Io’lokari knows which of his fellow
+citizens he is closely related to. Even so, he and his
+relatives are considered full family to the elves,
+orcs, changelins, and all the other races they work
+alongside. Likewise, the goblins and dwarves working side by side in the Freeward would be culturally
+unrecognizable to their distant kin in Darguun or the
+Ironroot Mountains.
+For the people of the City of Knowledge, wealth lies
+in the life of learning and wonder that each new day
+brings. Goods and services are traded on the basis of
+effort alone—a day’s labor from a city street sweeper is
+considered equal to a day’s labor from the highest-level
+spellcaster, warrior, or sage.
+ Many high-level adventurers from Khorvaire have
+trouble adjusting to the idea that wealth built up over a
+lifetime is all but worthless in Io’lokar. In the taverns of
+the city, the Io’lokari drink for free, trading their day’s
+work for the labor of brewer and barkeep. Visitors to the
+city have no such capital, though PCs can typically trade
+a fi rst night on the town for tales or songs of the outside
+world. Characters staying longer in the city need to establish what goods or services they can offer that are worthy
+of barter.
+ The Io’lokari want for very little, but fi ne jewelry,
+magic weapons, magic armor, and wondrous items usually retain their value in the city. This value is relative,
+however, and does not scale in the same way as gold piece
+pricing. A tavernkeeper willing to barter a month’s lodging for a magic weapon makes no distinction between
+a +1 dagger and a +5 holy vorpal short sword of wounding. Either
+option satisfi es his desire for a magic blade, and is thus
+fair trade for the PCs’ need for a comfortable room and
+good food.
+(voir dragons d'eberron)