| “ | ... the delta, which was one huge swamp two hundred miles across, without one decent channel, obviously totally unfit for human habitation because only Nyueng Bao lived there... So what did he get after cutting through the swamp, damned near building a canal to manage that...[1] | ” |
The Nyueng Bao delta is the massive swampy region where the vast great river of the southern continent empties into the western ocean. The Naghir River, which flows northward from the northern portion of the Shadowlands, also empties into this delta. The swamps of the delta begin not far west of the huge city of Taglios and its port Maheranga, and continue for 200 miles before reaching the sea. The hamlets and temples of the secretive Nyueng Bao De Duang people – including the huge, ancient Vinh Gao Ghang Temple of Ghanghesha – are all found here.
The delta was warm even during the winter.[2] Murgen – an outsider who never visited the delta in person but observed it in a disembodied spirit form numerous times – characterized the region as being full of rice paddies, water buffalo, fishing boats, man-eating crocodiles[3], black water, densely packed trees, loud birds, monkeys, and swarms of mosquitos.[4]
The nearby regional power Taglios claims the river delta, but its Nyueng Bao inhabitants believe it is their own.[5] In the time of the modern Annals, trade between the delta and Taglios proper was coordinated by Banh Do Trang.
The delta is the birthplace of Ky Sahra, Thai Dei, Uncle Doj, and other Nyueng Bao allies of the Black Company. Elements of the Company would have very few but nevertheless noteworthy passages through the delta during the Books of Glittering Stone.
Pre-Nyueng Bao history[]
What little is stated about the distant history of the delta relates to the ancient temple which would later be named Vinh Gao Ghang Temple of Ghanghesha. According to the young scholar Tobo, the temple started as a Janaka shrine, and was later converted by the Gunni into a retreat. Then, very roughly ~1,400 years before the modern Annals, the Stranglers who survived the bloody persecution of Rhaydreynak fled to the swamps and took over the shrine from the Gunni. They hid their sacred talisman, the golden pickax, somewhere in the temple, but over time later generations of Stranglers completely forgot the artifact.[6]
Meanwhile, just east of the delta, the city of Trogo continued to grow "for no obvious reason beyond its being the last viable landing before the river lost itself in the pestilential delta swamps."[7]
Nyueng Bao settlement[]
The Nyueng Bao people were originally Kina worshipers who left Hsien to escape the religious persecution of Longshadow and his ilk. They crossed the glittering plain and passed through the homeworld Shadowgate with a Shadowgate Key. After wandering in the homeworld, they finally settled in the delta swamps. A century after they arrived, Gunni holy men from the cult of Ghanghesha returned to the temple, and eventually the Nyueng Bao put aside Kina and adopted worshipping Ghanghesha.[8] At some unspecified point, colossal statues of the elephant-faced Gunni diety were added to the structure; conceivably this could have occurred before the Nyueng Bao arrived.
The Nyueng Bao would go on to farm rice and hunt crocodiles in the delta for generations. Although their numerous hamlets largely look alike, "their temples vary radically according to the wealth and status and age of the town."[9] In modern times, Uncle Doj idolized his home swamps and insisted that the delta was paradise.[10] Though the Nyueng Bao rarely left the delta, there were two common exceptions: they conducted trade in nearby Taglios, and every 4 years, a subset of them would conduct a pilgrimage of several hundred to Kiaulune and the nearby Shadowgate.
Events in the modern Annals[]
After the Siege of Dejagore was lifted and many of the surviving Nyueng Bao returned to the delta, the swamps were penetrated by Soulcatcher. She personally raided the Vinh Gao Ghang temple, slaughtered the masters of the Path of the Sword who were present, and tortured the priests who eventually surrendered a mysterious relic in their possession.[11]
The Black Company would use the delta to ship vast amounts of Taglian war materiel into the Shadowlands during the Shadowmaster wars. The crated cargo was placed on barges and a series of crude canals were used to bring it all into the Naghir River.[12].
Goblin and his "Shaded Road" commando group traveled westward through the entire delta and boarded a sea vessel to begin their secret expedition.[13]
More than 15 years later, Soulcatcher invaded the delta a second time in Water Sleeps, where she terrorized some Nyueng Bao to punish someone for the recent abductions of her subordinates Willow Swan and Chandra Gokhale.[14] A group of incognito Company members and allies (including Sahra, Tobo, One-Eye, Goblin, Surendranath Santaraksita, and Baladitya) traveled through a section of the delta and then barged up the Naghir River to rendezvous with Sleepy, who took an alternate route toward their common destination via the Rock Road.[15]
References[]
- ↑ She Is the Darkness, ch. 9
- ↑ She Is the Darkness, ch. 50
- ↑ Bleak Seasons, ch. 96
- ↑ She Is the Darkness, ch. 26
- ↑ Bleak Seasons, ch. 15
- ↑ Soldiers Live, ch. 44
- ↑ Water Sleeps, ch. 12
- ↑ Soldiers Live, ch. 44
- ↑ She Is the Darkness, ch. 26
- ↑ Bleak Seasons, ch. 96
- ↑ mentioned Water Sleeps, ch. 16
- ↑ Bleak Seasons, ch. 90
- ↑ Bleak Seasons, ch. 96
- ↑ Water Sleeps, ch. 33
- ↑ Water Sleeps, ch. 52