Country

Âmaliâ is a small country in the north-east. Its coastline is very long for the country's size due to its situation around a long bay. Most of the population lives in cities by the sea, including the capital city, Vol-bur. Anywhere outside the cities is referred to as the Âmalij Outlands.

Winter sports are common in Âmaliâ and for many people these are just their normal mode of transport. Water-based sports are seen as quite fashionable, because of the effort taken to heat a pool or keep a boating lake from freezing over.

Laws in Âmaliâ are racially stratified. Who you are defines where you can live and what you can get away with. These laws have been relaxed in some areas in the past fifty or so years, with the biggest change coming in when the king wished to marry outside his race and had to legalise it for everyone.

Like most ex-Impirij territories, Âmaliâ still uses the gera. The Âmalij gera is no longer tied to the Impirij gera. 1 Impirij gera is currently worth about 1000 Âmalij gera.

Sobakaâ is the official language of Âmaliâ. There's a noticeable difference in dialect between the cities and the Outlands, and the Outlands dialect is often looked down on and considered incorrect by speakers of the city dialect.

Further into the Outlands, people often don't speak Sobakaâ at all, with Ashis being commonly spoken instead.

Âmaliâ is very cold, with permafrost in the north and the possibility of snow fall even during the summer.

Plants which can naturally grow in Âmaliâ are usually inedible or too small to effectively farm. A variety of plants imported from other places are currently grown in greenhouses, but not always with much success due to a lack historical knowledge and unwillingness to learn from outside sources.

A history of living entirely on animal products has left much of the Âmalij population intolerant to gluten and other plant proteins.

147 years ago Âmaliâ was invaded, colonised and assimilated into Impiriâ. The war only lasted thirty-five days before the Âmalij natives, who had never fought a war before, gave up. Impiriâ broke up from in-fighting twenty-six years later, but the damage was already done.

A country-wide ban on vaccinations two decades ago caused a distemper epidemic which killed 80-90% of children under five. A lot of people left the country, either hoping to save their children or because they wanted a new start. When the crown prince's wife (who had always had a weak immune system) and two of their children contracted distemper and died, the ban was lifted.