Yumen
Yumen is a fortified nomadic city of Yan.
Background
Located in the furthest north of Yan wandering in the dry Gobi Desert, Yumen is a grand monument of Yan's Great Hunt that immortalizes the empire's victory against Sui and other Feranmuts.[1] To this day, the city still serves as the sole garrison defending the incursion of the northern Collapsals and other surviving Feranmuts into the civilized world. The city is filled with thick iron walls, tall pagodas decorated with ornate lanterns, and brave soldiers under the leadership of Yan's Imperial Guards and the elite Tianshi. Day after day, countless warriors fall to the demonic power, yet Yumen still persists while standing alone in the wilderness and protecting both the empire and the whole of Terra. Under the administration of its general-magistrate Zuo Xuanliao and the military grandmaster Chongyue, the city's military is still maintaining such uplifting spirit for many decades.
True to its name, Yumen is famous for both its veneration of martial arts and its military technology. The city has many sites that have connections with kung fu and wuxia culture such as an arena where a battle between two warriors occurred for two days and night until an eventual stalemate and the avenue where Qi Qingqiu and Ruan Qidie met. Once in a year during early spring, the city will also hold the three-day "Wangfeng Festival" (望烽节), the festival of beacons, to commemorate its deceased warriors by drumming seventeen times during nighttime.[2] Yumen is also heavily industrialized as it is the center of Yan's arms industry and swordsmithing. Many pagodas and beacon towers are installed with advanced dust-prevention system by the Tumu Tianshi titled "the Wind Aegis" (屏风卫), the Four Guardians of Yumen (玉门四卫), that fend the city from heavy sandstorms and Catastrophes through enormous walls and filters.[3] But perhaps the greatest architecture Yumen possesses is its Sand Sluices (沙渠), an engine system featuring propellers expelling excessive sand onto series of giant channels while using it as thrust for movement on sand. These Arts-powered dams are said to be inspired by the water wheels that can be found in the Jiangnan waterways, and the Tumu Tianshi themselves fitted them into the city's architecture.[4]
Due to its specific role, Yumen has never departed from its location. However, it can be mobilized and move somewhere else for refurbishment, to avoid upcoming Catastrophes, or for other purposes. Whenever Yumen is docked with other cities, it will temporarily open up as a tourist site for outsiders. Even some film makers are willing to travel there to take shots for their kung fu shows as in the popular Heroes of Yumen.
Long ago in the past, Yumen's control over travelers' flow was much relaxed that today, and the city's garrison soldiers were willing to cooperate with the local martial artists to run the city.[5] However, around twenty years ago (the year 1082), the Shanhaizhong, an extremist Feranmut worshipper group, took this opportunity to infiltrate the city quietly and created havoc in the streets. Even though the Sui Regulator and the garrison soldiers arrested much of its members after trapping them in the city, the damage done was immeasurable.[2] Since then, General Zuo tightened his rule and has been holding distrust onto the commoners, creating an accumulating tension between them.
As Sui's revival draws nigh, the Shanhaizhong once again harassed Yumen under the cooperation of the pro-Feranmut factions within the imperial palace led by the Ministry of Rites in hope of gaining the authorities' attention.[6] In the meantime, under the Grand Tutor's order, the city is currently heading towards the imperial capital where Sui's body is sealed in preparation for an ultimate war against the furious god.[1]
Notable
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- He Xi'an (何昔安): A Sargonian Pythian traveller who inhabits Yumen as one of the local martial artists. His love for kung fu comes from his hobby of watching wuxia dramas. He claims that the Grandmaster himself taught him to fight back in Sargon, learning a bit of Yanese history beforehand.[7]
Gallery
Places
Yumen's main gate
The streets of Yumen
Ditto, at night
The suburbs of Yumen
A marketplace in Yumen
The arena outside Yumen's garrison
The forges of Yumen
The halls of the Lord Exorcist's manor
The deserts outside Yumen
People
An male Savran Yumenite
Ditto, but older
A female Liberi Yumenite
A Millenion of Yumen carrying a guandao
Ditto, carrying a baton and a shield
Etymology
Yù mén means "jade gate" in Chinese. The name derives from the Yumen Pass, a part of the Great Wall of China and the main entrance on the west to the Chinese heartland during the Han dynasty. The place is also used to name the eponymous city in the province of Gansu where the pass is located.
Trivia
- Yumen is a reference to modern Northwest China, specifically Gansu and Xinjiang, which is regarded as the door to the Silk Road and the sole garrison to protect the Chinese heartland from nomadic invasions.
- The city itself is likely a parallel to Dunhuang, a desert city in Gansu which serves as the entrance to the Silk Road.
- In a lesser extent, Yumen could also allude to the Anxi Protectorate of the Tang dynasty which composed much of modern Central Asia.