"And so Nona lived [...] in a city where nearly everyone was unhappy, on a world where everyone said that you could outrun the zombies, but not forever."[1]
New Rho is a dual designation that refers to both the planet of New Rho, as well as the main city on its surface. In the six months since Nona woke up in Harrowhark Nonagesimus' body, New Rho has served as a hiding place for herself, Camilla Hect, Palamedes Sextus, and Pyrrha Dve. The planet faces a crisis with the arrival of Varun the Eater, a Resurrection Beast that parks its spiritual projection in the planet's upper orbit.
Planetary Characteristics[]
New Rho is primarily a desert planet, with scorching daytime temperatures and freezing nighttime temperatures.[2] Denizens are accustomed to wearing protective clothing to combat the temperature, smoke, and sand of their environment. Despite being a desert planet there is at least one ocean, which the city is built along the shore of.
Flora and Fauna[]
The planet supports a relatively diverse range of plant and animal life. The city itself shows signs of fairly extensive landscaping, featuring hardy trees and bushes. There are many tree-filled parks throughout the city.
Animal life, both native and non-native, is decently plentiful. Dogs roam the city and are also kept as pets. Large desert cats live near the outskirts of the city and beyond, and feature venomous whiskers and ruffs. Aquatic life is plentiful, and supports an industrialized fishing industry. The city's harbor is filled with stinging jellyfish.
History[]
Locations[]
The Building[]
See The Building
Civic Center[]
Located in the city downtown, the civic center contains the governmental buildings of the former civic government, and is a meeting space for the populace. During Prince Ianthe Naberius's video message to the citizens of New Rho, the civic center was one of the primary viewing points. The civic center is centrally connected via wide boulevards and has a direct connection to the main motorway that rings the city.
Cohort Barracks[]
Like on all hold planets of the Empire, there is a Cohort barracks on New Rho. The barracks is the Empire's seat of power in the city, and is a stronghold for all Cohort forces. For months, Blood of Eden forces have been laying siege to the barracks, waging a war of attrition on the scant forces still holed up inside.
The building itself is a tall, square concrete structure. A second story balcony rings the outside, with slits above for people to fire out of. The facade of the building, once ornately carved and decorated, has been chipped and worn away by the passage of time and the munitions of Blood of Eden forces. The inside is a maze of floors and rooms leading from a large central hall. The upper floors contain the mess hall and the rooms for Cohort soldiers, as well as visitors such as Ianthe Naberius.
Graveyard[]
A large, multi-tiered graveyard near the harbor. Fear of necromancer activity has caused the residents of New Rho to smash open every tomb and dig up every grave in order to burn all the bones in the graveyard. Over time the graveyard has become a battleground, shelled heavily in the ongoing conflict between the Cohort, Blood of Eden factions, and the citizens.
Motorway[]
Circling the city, this large motorway connects the districts of the city together. At certain points, the road was wide enough to fit twenty vans. Though now abandoned, there was also once a rail network that ran down the middle of parts of the motorway and at points turned off into the large network of underground tunnels beneath the city.
Port of New Rho[]
The port of New Rho serves a dual purpose, hosting the spaceport and space elevator, as well as serving the harbor around which the city is built.
Prior to the arrival of Varun the Eater, there was well developed fishing industry based out of the port. Fisheries along the harbor delivered fresh fish to fish markets and fish shops throughout the city. Since Varun's arrival the harbor has been closed and many citizens have stopped eating fish altogether, believing the common superstition that the blue light coming from the Resurrection Beast has somehow been absorbed into the fish. The port and harbor are filled with stinging jellyfish, due to the lack of maintenance on the barrier nets strung along the harbor entrance.
During a series of riots in the port dockworkers, armed by Blood of Eden, were able to breach the adjacent space elevator facility in an attempt to steal a cargo shuttle. The attempt was unsuccessful.
School[]
Tunnels[]
New Rho is built on a massive network of tunnels that run underneath most of the city. In times when the city was more prosperous, these tunnels served vehicle and rail traffic connecting different areas of the city. Since the decline of law and order and the abandonment of the previous civil government, the tunnels have become a highly dangerous area, known for roving gangs of bandits looking to rob the hapless traveler who may have wondered into the tunnels.
Honesty briefly joins one of these criminal enterprises in the tunnels, helping a crew to steal air conditioner units off the top of the megatrucks that travel along the tunnels. The crew inadvertently attempts to steal an air conditioner unit from the top of one of the megatrucks that make up the "The Convoy", a convoy that Blood of Eden uses to hide the sixteen members of the Oversight Body of the former Sixth House.
Water plant[]
A water plant that once served the city. The plant was one of the first targets that Blood of Eden destroyed during the siege of the Cohort barracks, in an attempt to force out the remaining members of the Cohort.
Notes[]
In As Yet Unsent Judith Deuteros claims that "Lemuria" is Blood of Eden's term for New Rho. This conflicts with later statements in Nona the Ninth that refer to Lemuria as The Angel's place of birth. As described in Nona the Ninth, Lemuria is a hold planet that was rendered uninhabitable by thanergetic decay. It is unclear if this is a retcon, mistake by Tamsyn Muir, or a narrative choice intended to show Judith Deuteros' fallibility as a source of information.
References[]
- ↑ "Nona the Ninth", Day One, Ch. 2
- ↑ "Nona the Ninth", Day One, Ch. 4