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New construction is everywhere in Richmond. All along the James River new parks and promenades are opening up. Money is pouring out of the municipal government and into every kind of business and tourist promotion imaginable. The city is bursting at the seams and falling over itself to get that best foot forward. The Virginia Opera Company puts out shows at a blistering pace of 8 productions a year at the Landmark Theatre. Monument Avenue is adorned with fresh red white and blue on a regular basis. The whole city is covered in a veneer of affluence, success, and decadence.

Of course not everyone in Richmond is happy. The local government is hellbent on producing a good image and a strong economy for the city. They have more luck with the image. The truth is that the city government is hemorrhaging money. Half of the construction projects in the city are for “beautification” and come directly out of the city budget. Corruption is rife and no bid contracts go out to councilmen’s’ friends and family routinely. The comptroller knows the city will be bankrupt by the decade’s end if nothing changes but the last comptroller that got too loud ended up having to resign after a shocking sex scandal. The new one can read the writing on the wall. The economy is great he says, the mayor a genius.

Even if it is a ride to the bottom, Richmond doesn’t seem to mind. While the city coffers empty the pockets of local businessman fill. Everything looks nice. The homeless are kept off the streets, or dressed up festively when they refuse to enter shelters. The slums have mostly been torn down and redeveloped as condos. The poor that used to live there have mostly been pushed into Northside, on the outskirts of town, or where the city has been even luckier, out of Richmond proper completely and into Henrico County. With the residents flush with money, crime is low and quality of life, for those that can afford it, is high. The parks are beautiful, the streets clean, the arts flourishing, and everyone is content to keep a blind eye to the looming fiscal crisis.

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Kindred’s Richmond

Richmond is what happens when a Harpy becomes Prince. When the Patron of House Calliope slipped into torpor, she never imagined how quickly her Protégé would transform the city. Clara Calliope rose to power in Richmond by her wit and charm. She threw all the best parties, all the right friends, the sharpest and most cutting criticisms, and an uncanny nose for gossip. She hit the city like a whirlwind, and was so enmeshed into the city’s power structure that most assumed the transition when the Elder Calliope slipped into torpor would be seamless.

Indeed, Her Grace Calliope the Younger had no trouble taking ahold of the reigns of power. It’s what she did with them that shook the city. She immediately used the House’s extensive influence to push the city to make itself beautiful. Lonely during the long sleep of her Patron, Clara has thrown Richmond into an endless—and mandatory—party to keep herself distracted. Even as the mortal city around them abandons all responsibility in the name of decadence, the city’s kindred dance every night at an endless stream of grand balls. Lacrima flows alongside blood in great volume and the city’s Kindred of Quality revel in their power, even as they squander it.

Kindred of other covenants are equally expected to join in the festivities, but most cannot afford to keep up the pace, and thus find the task of gaining standing and influence in Richmond operose to say the least. While the Invictus’ decadence is slowly bleeding them of power, they still hold the balance of it, and opportunities are scarce for kindred without great wealth. Even maintaining a haven inside the city proper is difficult without indebting oneself to the numerous Almoners that take up residence there.

The Lancea Sanctum is kept small, and all but banned outright after a previous Bishop had the nerve to criticize Her Grace’s decadence. There hasn’t been a cohesive second estate in the city since. One major obstacle to the Lancea Sanctum is that Midnight Mass inevitably conflicts with the nightly festivities, and party always takes precedence in Richmond. Dragons, on the other hand, thrive on the Invictus’ newfound inattentiveness. The rapid pace of physical change in the city has Kogaion Eric Powell ever on the lookout for new crucibles, and the Academy has employed charm coaches to help the more bookish dragons put on a social face for the Prince. The Circle of the Crone finds itself tolerated as long as they keep their Lacrima prices cheap and their gardens public. Several cults exist within the city and frequently war with each other. Manipulating them is one of the few genuinely useful things that Clara Calliope does for the Invictus anymore, even if she’s motivated more by amusement than any political concern. Carthians of the old sort, who look back to American and Confederate revolutionaries as their forebears and enjoy polite society tend to do well in Richmond. They’ve been quietly eroding the Invictus stranglehold on the mortal government, but its slow going when one has to show his face at a party for several hours a night, every night. Kindred of any covenant who are either lucky or talented at party games may find themselves with a place on the Court, as that seems to have become the way for most positions to be distributed.

Amongst all covenants, the Invictus included, rumors fly about why exactly the Invictus (or for that matter, any other Covenant) hasn’t stepped in and forced Clara of Calliope to abdicate or run her city properly. Masquerade breaches are rare but often go unaddressed for weeks, and the Invictus is slowly but inevitably losing power. Her habit of handing out positions by games and her whims has resulted in a thoroughly incompetent and mismatched court. Gossip about who is or isn’t bloodbound to her flies nightly, but the truth is perhaps more disturbing. Everyone in the city knows that when the Elder Calliope awakens, there will be hell to pay. But right now, unlife is good. Hunting is almost entirely unnecessary, violence nearly unheard of, and society vibrant and entertaining. The kindred of Richmond have grown a terrifying willingness to mortgage their future safety for tonight’s debauchery. No one knows when the Elder Calliope will awaken. No one wants to know, some say not even Clara.

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Hierarchy of the Damned

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