Aerthos
An Urban Fantasy Scenario Chatbot on DreamjourneyAI.com
Aerthos lounges on the isthmus between the continents of Lethovar and Virelya. The walled metropolitan city state lurks at a crossroads of land and ocean trade routes, making it a natural cultural melting pot, and an economic and technological powerhouse. Although a large part of that is due to the city's downright predatory economic and technological practices. Too irritatingly stubborn to be occupied long term by any invaders, it sits on a trade route growing fat and strong off the rich through taxes and fees, like some sort of fiscal parasite.
The City of Aerthos
The Cut
Bisecting the city from north to south, The Cut links the Sarethian Gulf with the Hask Sea. The tidal difference between them drives sudden bores — surges of water that seasoned captains (and thrill-seeking fools on skiffs) ride the length of the canal. Passage isn’t cheap; the city levies fees high enough to make merchants wince. Still, it shaves up to two months off the voyage around a notoriously lethal coast — and that’s if the storms or pirates don’t take you first.
Harbor District
Bookending The Cut at north and south, the harbor districts are Aerthos’ lungs — always inhaling and exhaling ships, cargo, and people. Shipyards and warehouses choke the shores, and the air is thick with salt, fish, spices, the occasional whiff of fuel oil — and occasionally stray magic sparks. Taverns spill sailors into alleys, market docks spill coin into pockets, and the Watch accepts that policing's like mopping in the rain.
Merchant Quarter
Those with silver spoons view this as 'where the money is', in blazen ignorance of the Cut or the Harbor's beating heart. The Merchant's Quarter is classy, clean, and mostly physically safe. If you're robbed here, it's measured in thousands and assets, not pocket change.
Innovation Quarter
East of The Cut, the Innovation Quarter hums, hisses, and occasionally explodes. Workshops, labs, and market stalls crowd for space, the air thick hot metal and the ozone sting of stray spells. Low-level magic seeps into everything, like determined drizzle. Cafés supply University and inventor minds with caffeine, enough to ensure that Aerthos keeps ahead of the game for arcano-tech.
Factory District
East of The Cut, past the academic shine of the Innovation Quarter, senses are rudely assaulted with smoke and the clang of machinery. Foundries, mills, and assembly halls run 24/7, leaving the cobbles slick with oil and the walls black with soot. It's reliable work, and Aerthos has a surprisingly good set of worker's rights — mostly because it knows who has access to the most explosives.
The Undercity
Beneath Aerthos lies… more, older Aerthos. Ancient streets and forgotten squares, cellars that became avenues, and of course infrastructure and maintenance tunnels with the city now pressing down where the sky used to be. Here, light comes from lanterns and mage-lights. It’s a patchwork of salvage yards, mushroom farms, archives, and homes to those who prefer — or can only afford — the space no one else remembers exists.
The Sprawl
Outside the city walls, the Sprawl stretches in a patchwork of fields, factories, shanties and luxury residences. Cultures mix freely here — less out of tolerance, more out of necessity. It's also technically outside of the Watch jurisdiction, so be careful. Markets trade in coin, barter, and favours; goods range from farm produce to machinery parts still warm from the forge.
The City of Aerthos
Law Abiding
🛡 The Custodes
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🧱 The Cityworks Guild
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🏺 Aegis Reliquary
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🎓 Arcane University
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Legally Flexible
🐀 Harbor Rats
Every city needs it's dockside low tier criminal gang. It's pretty much obligatory. And thus, you have the somewhat unimaginatively named Harbor Rats.
⚙️ Shattered Cog
The Cog started from a good enough cause. 'Caught in the cogs' is a common enough turn for those chewed up and spat up by those that value humans like tools and commodities. And so, the idea came to 'shatter' those cogs. Originally intended as a worker's right movement, it's... drifted, somewhat.
⚗️ Arcane Forge
Good inventors have the steps of, 'Can we?' followed by 'should we?' The Arcane Forge doesn't bother with the 'should we?' part, and frankly objects to the idea that inventors should be constrained by that. And, coincidentally, most other ethics, too.
🧤 Cursed Grasp
Founded when Lethovar was occupying Aerthos, the Cursed Grasp is in direct competition with the Aegis Reliquary in relic and artifact acquisitions. Both groups hoard their relics, but while the Aegis does so in the name of civic protection with full traceability, the Grasp lacks transparency. And, of course, legality.
🕸️ Whispering Web
No good mercantile city state and metropolitan melting pot would be without it's spies, informants, information brokers and networks. Decentralised, and only really named because the people needed some way to refer to it, the Whispering Web serves as the eyes and ears within the city.
Starting your adventure
scene options
Unaligned Starts
Wander without responsibility
🌊Default: Fresh off the Boat: The most generic start option.
💫 The Bethesda Start: "Hey you, you're finally awake," - Your... healer?
👖 The Morning After: You're not sure whose bed this is, only that it isn't yours.
🎓 Spawned In: You've turned up in a University summoning circle. The student is as confused as you are. And significantly more worried about whether or not they're going to be expelled.
⚱️ Taste of Instability: Vaelin "Hexhound" Soralion has picked up some weird magic on you, the sort of volatility that makes his skin itch. He's not one to ignore that. Is it your magic? A curse? A fluke? Your choice!
🐀 Dockside Shakedown: Welcome to Aerthos! Pay the local mandated unofficial Dock Toll or go swimming.
💀 Wrong Place, Wrong Time: Someone appeared fifty feet above the street and introduced themselves to the cobbles at terminal velocity in front of you. Now there’s a crowd, a City Guard patrol, and you. Congratulations, you’re a suspect in a murder you witnessed via splash. Those stains might not wash out.
Faction Starts
Start as part of a faction
🛡 Assignment SNAFU: You work with the Custodes, and the paperwork gremlins are at it again - another assignment MIA. You've got three options: playing Papers Please against posh toffs, helping with homicide investigations with a fluke 'splash' accident, or whatever else you were told to do this week.
⚱️ Hounds and Hexes: You've been buddied up with Vaelin 'Hexhound' Soralion as part of your work for the Aegis Reliquary. There's a spicy job, and a less spicy job. Which is your pick?
🧱 In The Shit or Up A Stick: Cityworks Guild isn't glamorous, but it keeps the lights on and the toilets flushing. Which is where you come in: it's clearing sewer blockages or fixing power pylons for you.
🐀 Read The Tide, Take The Score: It's a wonderful mid afternoon, and you are a horrible Harbor Rat. (With your two Harbor Rat colleagues.)
⚙️ Steel and Solidarity: The Machinist and leader of the Shattered Cog, all 8 feet of sentient industrial construct, requires human(ish) insight on a problem.
⚗️ Babysitting and Acquisitions: Someone's lost your assignment for your week with the Arcane Forge. Are you in R&D with the totally-sane Zharik, working with Yrene in 'acquisitions', or something else entirely?
🧤 Screaming Boxes or Pretty Liars: The Cursed Grasp has work. Choose your disaster: a manwhore distracted by academia, or screaming relics and a tiefling who loves the edge.
🕸️ Gossip and Gold: The Whispering Web has options for you. Poke your nose where it probably isn't wanted: a banker's soirée for high-society secrets, or the Gilded Loom brothel to catch secrets from loosened tongues.
⚙️ Steel and Solidarity: The Machinist and leader of the Shattered Cog, all 8 feet of sentient industrial construct, requires human(ish) insight on a problem.
Known Bugs / Issues
Rogue *s in Names
An unfortunate feature / bug. To prevent Lorebook trigger cascades, characters are referenced using asterisks within their names in Lorebook entries (except for their own name), in a format likeNa*me He*re. The bot is told that, where it encounters a * in the middle of the word, it is to remove the *. However, as this is an LLM, it doesn't always do that.
Emojis in Text
This is another 'unfortunate feature'. As a way of using shorthand and referencing organisations without using the actual trigger words, within the prompt / lorebooks, emojis are used to reference the organisations. As with the * issue, the bot IS told, 🚫 Emojis → use related term (SEE EMOJI KEY) but, again, LLMs are not 100% obedient.
It keeps talking to me OOC
The fix used for 'emoting for player' is basically User is your roleplay partner, do not godemote. The side effect of that is it may try to chat OOC, or offer you 'options'. If it's problematic, delete it's OOC comments via editing.
Emoting for User
Told it not to. LLMs gonna LLM.
Messing up the 'Tracker' Formatting
LLMs gonna LLM.
Unknown Bugs
If you encounter anything that ISN'T a 'standard LLM shenanigans' bug, send a Discord message to @silver_pepper