It is a dark time for Korvosa. King Eodred II, the venerable monarch of the largest city-state in Varisia, is dying. His health has been waning for years, but his time is running short. As he has no heirs and the rule of his young, vain wife is easily challenged with enough popular support, no one knows what the city will look like after the chaos subsides. Will Queen Ileosa hang onto power and continue to bleed the city dry with her tastes for luxury? Will the five noble houses band together to set up some sort of council, or will they fall to infighting? Will the so-called Council of Thieves, the shadowy organized crime syndicate, seize control of more than the lucrative trade of illicit goods and services? Will Cheliax, long-absent former colonial masters, try to reassert control of the city? Who will the Korvosan Guard, the Sable Company, and the Hellknights throw their support behind? Whoever gains the support of the people of Korvosa, whether through loyalty or fear, can potentially gain the throne. There is much to take into account. Long-standing racial tensions simmer in the city, with Varisians and Shoanti treated as second-class citizens and tieflings blamed for most of the city's ills. Class warfare looks ready to erupt, especially in the Shingles and Old Korvosa, where the inequality between rich and poor has reached staggering levels. The Academae, long renowned as the greatest arcane school in Varisia, shudders under the internal debate as to how much of a focus it should have on the summoning of malicious beings from the Outer Planes. The holders of power in the current status quo are girding for the coming conflict, with greater and greater repression of dissent as they attempt to quell a rebellion before it happens.
