Three roads come out of the wilderness and run together to head to Rockcliff City on the slopes of Mount Dupe. A watchtower on each road is 12 miles away from Rockcliff City. Two miles after the watchtowers a traveler enters 100 square miles of farmland that stretches out to the west and south of Rockcliff City. After the farmlands, a stone wall, 6200' long, 30' high, 10' thick, runs west from the base of the mountains for over 2000'+, then cuts south for another 2000'+, and the heads east back to the base of the mountain for the last 2000'+. A city of over 5000 people, divided into 8 provinces and 10 districts is laid out in multistory buildings crowded together inside this 103 acre enclosure. At the foot of the mountain, where the land rises in a steep hill, lies Rockcliff Castle surrounded by a second wall.

The Gate Towers

Gate Towers are set on the outer city wall, the outer castle wall, and the inner castle wall.

Rockcliff Castle Gate Towers from the outside

Rockcliff Castle Gate Towers from the inside

History

Rockcliff had just passed over 1200 people in population when the local priest called a village meeting and drafted the Langley Ordinance of the Blessed

Rockcliff Community Charter. A theocracy was founded with Osman Langley named the high priest, and under his guidance they began to trade with

Goldenshield Kingdom and became very prosperous. Undoubtedly, Langley's lawful good nature is what brought the rakshasa named Yuttubit Ordu.

The rakshasa disguised itself in the form of a merchant and began to infect the newly formed town with cursed magic items. The town's people began to act

irrationally and violence and crime came to the town for the first time. The town found itself in need of a police force and judges and jails all for the first time.

This so tested the leadership of Osman Langley that he was ready to institute capital punishment. But he held out long enough to send a delegation to

Goldenshield Kingdom. While the whole town waited, a heinous crime was committed against children. All evidence, including eyewitnesses and

blood evidence pointed, to an otherwise innocent farmer, but the murder weapon was not found. Osman Langley was ready to execute the farmer but right at that time, a paladin from Goldenshield kingdom rode up and commanded that the town cease the execution and that all responsible parties should be brought to the paladin for judgement.

Osman Langley about to commit murder for the sake of vengence

That paladin was Aldo Goldenshield, youngest son of the Paladin King. It took two weeks but the paladin searched out and discovered that the murderer was a look alike to the farmer and was actually responsible for the many cursed items that caused the small fights and squabbles that plagued the budding town. The paladin unsuppressed evidence that showed the farmer was in two places at once, which is impossible, and the conclusion was that a mimic or shapechanger was the murderer. The Paladin began to gather the cursed magic items and destroyed them one by one. When the evidence of the origins of the magic cursed items pointed to Yuttubit Ordu as the perpetrator, the paladin set out to confine and question Yuttubit. But they found that Yuttubit Ordu had fled seconds before the truth came out.

The farmer was innocent, the crime had been committed by a shapechanger pretending to be the farmer. Osman Langley was so grateful for not having committed murder against an innocent man that he gave up his theocracy and convinced the town people to crown Aldo Goldenshield king of Rockcliff. Aldo accepted. He allowed the people to continue to govern themselves and even built them the amphitheater inside his castle that would come to be known as the House of Commons. Aldo's contributions to the town were to form a strong military force against outside forces, built both an outside wall and an inner keep to protect the town's people against gnoll raids or hobgoblin attacks. He also created a police force and a system of courts and jails that was run by his daughters.