Urgir

Urgir

(City)

Nation

Hold of Belkzen

Region

Urgir

Size

Metropolis

Population

28,700

Demographics

24,100 orcs, 1,430 dromaars, 1,150 humans, 574 giants, 290 elves, 275 aiuvarins, 881 others

Government

Overlord

Alignment

Chaotic evil

Ruler

Ardax the White-Hair

Leader

Nogalt the Unpure

Source: Belkzen, Hold of the Orc Hordes, pg(s). 18–21 (1E)
World Guide, pg(s). 38f. (2E)

Published maps conflict on Urgir's location. See Talk:Urgir/Conflicts.

Urgir is the unofficial capital of the orc-ruled Hold of Belkzen. The nation has no true capital as Belkzen has no centralized government, yet the ruler of Urgir is generally seen by most orcs as the most powerful chieftain in the area. The disparate tribes of Belkzen are fiercely independent and fight against each other even more than they fight outsiders. Urgir's leader as of 4724 AR, the intelligent Ardax the White-Hair, has instituted changes in the hopes of encouraging cooperation and greater unity.

History

Koldukar

Urgir was built not by the orcs but by dwarves, as the Sky Citadel known as Koldukar erected upon their emergence on the surface of Golarion during the Age of Darkness. At its height, more than 100,000 lived in Koldukar, the largest population of any city in northwestern Avistan.

However, the orcs driven from the Darklands by the dwarves' Quest for Sky had migrated to the surface before them and organized near Koldukar under the leadership of the great warlord Belkzen. The orcs laid siege and eventually overran Koldukar during in the Battle of Nine Stones in -3708 AR, and Belkzen renamed the city Urgir, meaning "first home" in the Orc language.

The victory over the dwarves led to the orcs' second great golden age, which historians call the Reckoning. Much of the masterful stone and metalwork by the city's dwarven builders has been vandalized, repurposed, damaged by earthquakes or otherwise left to fall into ruin over the years, but despite this, Urgir remains a testament to its creators' talents and vision.

Rise, reign, and fall of Grask Uldeth

Grask Uldeth, chief of the Empty Hand tribe.

For thousands of years after Urgir's capture by the orcs, the city served primarily as the stage for the ambitions of countless orc chieftains who led their tribes against their competitors in a struggle for dominance. This began to change when the mighty warlord Grask Uldeth gained control of the Empty Hand tribe and the city in 4692 AR. After years of eliminating his rivals and consolidating power, he began instituting fundamental changes in orc society within the city in 4702 AR in an attempt to curtail some of the most violent excesses of its inhabitants and create a semblance of order.

Many of Uldeth's reforms were informed by Arnois Belzig, a Pathfinder who had fallen out of favor with the Pathfinder Society, and included the opening of the city to all ancestries and a token system to grant foreigners safe passage through the Hold of Belkzen. These reforms greatly increased trade and raised the profile of commerce as a means of acquiring wealth. Uldeth also dispatched dromaar advocates to attract merchants in exchange for tax incentives and promises of security, and instituted the Closed Fist as an elite security force to enforce his will. His chief advisor and majordomo Ardax the White-Hair, a rare orc to live to middle-age.

Urgir prospered under Uldeth's rule, which ended with his assassination in 4716 AR, the culprit of which was unknown. Ardax succeeded him as overlord of Urgir but continued the reforms Uldeth had first introduced.

Battle against Tar-Baphon

Upon gaining his freedom in 4719 AR, the lich-king Tar-Baphon sent a delegation of envoys to Urgir to regain the allegiance of the orcs. Remembering that their ancestors had ultimately not fared well under his rule 15 centuries previously, Ardax had the diplomats slain as soon as they finished their speeches, and mounted their heads on the city's walls. Their decapitated bodies he tied to their horses, which he sent back over the border with the Gravelands with their diplomatic entreaties stuffed down their necks. Tar-Baphon was so incensed by this that he sent an army of his undead soldiers to Urgir to teach the orcs a lesson. Ardax quickly organized the local tribes into an irregular army and met the undead at the Battle of Nine Broken Skulls and won. Even though Tar-Baphon had intended to break the orcs' morale, he instead reinforced the benefits of cooperation.

Geography

Urgir is located in the southern Hold of Belkzen along the Flood Road, the region's central highway. Built on a small hill, it is a mass of stone spires, dwarven monuments, and deep underground warrens that descend into the Darklands. Above ground, the city resembles an eight-layered cake with concentric walled tiers that ascend to the highest, innermost level.

As Koldukar was being built, the dwarves dedicated each tier to a dwarven deity: from lowest to highest, Torag, Folgrit, Angradd, Grundinnar, Dranngvit, Trudd, and Magrim. Each tier included religious structures dedicated to its deity and buildings associated with that deity's concerns in dwarven society. After conquering the Sky Citadel, orcs destroyed the structures most obviously associated with religion, but lacked any understanding of the tiers' intended meaning and ignored or repurposed the remaining buildings.

As Urgir, many of the city's sections are abandoned or underpopulated, particularly the earthquake-damaged and structurally unsound upper four tiers.

• The first tier includes the city's outermost wall and its four massive gates, and houses the relatively untouched Plaza of Sky, a dwarven depiction of history that local orcs have adopted as their own. This tier also includes the Market District and residences for most of the city's non-orcs, and bears the least damage from the city's frequent earthquakes.
• The second tier is predominantly composed of orc residences.
• The third tier contains most of the city's workshops and industrial buildings, as well as the Closed Fist's headquarters and most of the Big Hole, a sinkhole used as a refuse dump.
• The fourth tier contains the Sharpened Axe fighting academy and Black Tower school of Belkzen war alchemy. As Koldukar, the tier contained the city's embassies and administrative structures.

The city is supported from below by giant pillars of stone and iron deep beneath the earth. For more than 60 years these supports have been subjected to a large rust monster infestation, and the pests' devouring of the columns causes the city's monthly damaging earthquakes. The fact that as much of Urgir has stood as long as it has despite these tremors is a testament to the dwarven engineers and builders who laid its foundation, but the entire city is at risk of eventually collapsing. As of 4715 AR, the orcs remained unaware in the mounting structural damage and occasional localized collapses, and lacked the engineering expertise to address them.

Entrance to the Darklands

As one of the places where dwarves emerged onto the surface world at the end of their Quest for Sky millennia ago, the countless tunnels below Urgir still connect to the realm of Nar-Voth in the Darklands. The tunnels beneath the city lead directly past the hryngar city of Fellstrok, although the hryngars rarely take this path to the surface for fear of the rust monsters.

Government

It has historically been difficult for orcs to maintain a stable government, and metropolitan Urgir is no different. For much of its history, the city has beem controlled by a countless procession of powerful warlords. This slowed in recent years with the rule of the Empty Hand tribe since 4692 AR, first under Grask Uldeth and then under his direct successor Ardax the White-Hair since 4716 AR.

Envious of cities in neighboring and distant nations, Uldeth opened Urgir to foreign traders and travelers in the hopes of benefiting from trade with non-orcs in 4702 AR. To facilitate this, Uldeth created a token system to allow non-orcs safe travel through southern Belkzen, encouraged merchants to relocate to Urgir, and instituted the elite Closed Fist to enforce his rules.

Since Uldeth's demise in 4716 AR, his successor Ardax the White-Hair has reached out to neighboring nations to find allies in their mutual fight against Tar-Baphon.

Ardax's innovations

Ardax the White-Hair consolidated power upon Uldeth's assassination using the strength of the Closed Fist, the police-like force his predecessor had instituted in the city to crack down on his opposition and protect the lives of the non-orc merchants. He armed the Closed Fist with dwarven weapons and armor found in several caches found in the undercity, and captured and trained a huge herd of rust monsters also found there for use by the Closed Fist.

Inhabitants

Outsiders

The large majority of Urgir's inhabitants are orcs and dromaars, but the presence of other ancestries has grown in recent years. Grask Uldeth opened the city to "pinkskins," and now a small population of humans, aiuvarins, and elves lives in the city's more trade-friendly outer tiers. However, taunts and discrimination remained prevalent from orc natives, and while their safety might be guaranteed by law, these outsiders tend to stick mostly to themselves to avoid mistreatment from their hosts.

Each of these non-orc inhabitants must buy and display a token from a tribal chief that indicates that they are protected by that tribe, and such tokens are difficult to obtain and can cost a great deal in bribes and favours. Outsiders can negotiate with tribes for tokens at the Table of Ralock or in Freedom Town, with prices scaling from 50 to several thousand gold pieces with the offering tribe's size and capabilities. These tokens are honored only as far north as Urgir, and not universally among individual orcs.

Even with the city's rules on their side, token-bearing outsiders have been killed by outcast orcs living in the city's underground warren. Although such a crime is punishable by death, these outcasts often ignore such consequences.

Languages

In addition to the Orc language, the most commonly spoken languages in Urgir include Taldane as the Common tongue of Avistan, as well as Giant.

Organizations

Urgir is home to several brutal fighting schools, some of which focus on unarmed combat, such as that of the fierce Masha the Seven-Limbed.

References

Paizo published a chapter about Urgir in Belkzen, Hold of the Orc Hordes.

For additional as-yet unincorporated sources about this subject, see the Meta page.