# Badger Isles - Maps & Charts - Angrean Atlas :::section ## Badger Isles :::subheading{level="2"} **Status:** Imperial Territory | **Climate:** Alpine Forest | **Type:** Multi-Island Archipelago ::: :::intro *The inhabitants of the Badger Isles are known to be ill-tempered and solitary. Their main export is history professors, which does little to change either piece of their reputation.* ::: :::intro "A small clearing, a good book, and solitude. That is home." — Professor Leon Tsukinai, Solanth University History Department ::: ::: :::section ## Overview The Badger Isles occupy an unusual position in the Empire: technically integrated, functionally autonomous, and constitutionally disagreeable. The inhabitants have elevated territorial privacy to an art form and respond to outsiders with suspicion that borders on ritual. Dense alpine forest covers most of the terrain, broken by settlements the locals have long preferred difficult to find. The archipelago’s academic institutions are of surprising quality, a fact the Empire has learned to mention about as often as the Islanders themselves do. **Population:** Difficult to census. Badgerites consider inquiries about population to be the first step toward invasion. Estimates suggest modest but stable numbers. ::: :::section ## The Library Question The alleged Subterranean Library is either the greatest repository of knowledge in the Isles, or a modest collection exaggerated by the few locals to ever let word of it slip. Most outside scholars willing to discuss the matter agree there is something to the rumors. Badger Isle scholars produce exceptional historical research, have a knack for unearthing sources unavailable in any other collection, and are notoriously tight-lipped about methodology. House Satariel’s information brokers have standing commissions for anything the Badgerites will let leave the archipelago, and a considerably longer list of requests they have given up hoping to have filled. No outsider has confirmed its existence. No Badger Islander has admitted it on the record. The Imperial Academic Council has officially classified the question as “perpetually tabled.” The Empire has declined to press the matter. The scholars are productive, the territory is peaceful, and forcing the issue seems likely to destroy whatever exists. Persistent rumour among the most senior Canae archivists holds that the collection includes material pre-dating the Neuros Coup by some margin, which if true would account for the Empire’s continued lack of curiosity. ::: :::section ## Islands :::intro *Three roughly equal islands lined up from sunward to nightward. Badgerites take pains to treat the three as interchangeable; visitors who remark on differences between them tend to receive a look that suggests such distinctions are somehow rude.* ::: :::card-list :::card{title="Cairnia"} :::subheading{level="4"} **Type: Sunward Island | Status: Conditional Access** ::: The sunward-most of the three, reached from the others by ferry when the ferry is running. Cairnia is, the locals insist, indistinguishable from its neighbors in every respect that might interest an outsider; asking whether they really mean that draws a colder response than the climate itself. ::: :::card{title="Thornia"} :::subheading{level="4"} **Type: Middle Island | Status: Conditional Access** ::: The middle island, alpine-forested in the same pattern as its neighbors and populated by the same sort of academic households. Locals shrug at questions about how Thornia differs from Cairnia or Brocanthia: “it doesn’t, really,” they say, and ask about the weather. ::: :::card{title="Brocanthia"} :::subheading{level="4"} **Type: Nightward Island | Status: Conditional Access** ::: The nightward-most of the three. Brocanth and the Academy of Quiet Study both sit on Brocanthia, and outsiders who reach the archipelago at all generally disembark here. The island is tolerant rather than welcoming, a distinction, the locals will note, that is true of the other two as well. ::: ::: ::: :::section ## Notable Locations :::subheading{level="2"} *Information about Badger Isle locations may be incomplete.* ::: :::card-list :::card{title="Brocanth"} :::subheading{level="4"} **Type: Small City | Status: Relatively Accessible** ::: The largest settlement documented in the Badger Isles. Visitors are tolerated here, though not welcomed. Contains the only public academy outsiders may attend. ::: :::card{title="The Academy of Quiet Study"} :::subheading{level="4"} **Type: Educational Institution | Status: Application Required** ::: Produces scholars of exceptional quality who refuse to discuss their curriculum. Graduates frequently find employment in Imperial institutions, House Canae recruits roughly half the graduating class each year, spreading Badger Isle irritability across the learned world. ::: :::card{title="Various Other Settlements"} :::subheading{level="4"} **Type: Unknown | Status: None of Your Business** ::: The islands contain additional settlements that locals decline to discuss. Cartographers who have attempted comprehensive surveys report “navigation difficulties.” ::: ::: ::: :::section ## Travel Information ### Getting There - **By Airship:** Limited service to Brocanth only - **By Sea:** Possible; harbors are few and unwelcoming - **Uninvited:** Not recommended ### Travel Advisory :::travel-advisory{level="caution"} ##### PROCEED WITH SENSITIVITY The Badger Isles are not dangerous to visitors, but the inhabitants have strong opinions about privacy. Respecting boundaries is essential. Asking questions is discouraged. ::: **Local Cautions:** - Stay in Brocanth unless specifically invited elsewhere - Accept that locals will be rude, and don’t take it personally - Leave when asked, or before Visitors to Brocanth will find functional but unwelcoming accommodation, bookshops curated with an aggression bordering on editorial, excellent preserved foods (the islanders prepare for isolation), conversations that end abruptly, and a general sense that one should probably leave. Academic credentials may improve reception, slightly. ::: :::section ## Historical Notes The Badger Isles joined the Empire through negotiation rather than conquest; a rarity that speaks to either diplomatic skill or the inadvisability of the alternative. The Treaty of Quiet Integration (1176 CR) preserved substantial autonomy in exchange for nominal acknowledgment of Imperial authority, and has not been formally revisited since, many whisper that is because the Empire fears it would end up worse off than it did in the original negotiations. The arrangement has held because the isles produce valuable scholars, they cause no trouble for anyone else, forcing integration would be costly and irritating, and whatever the Islanders are protecting appears to benefit from continued existence. The Empire has made peace with not knowing what is actually there, some say the only thing more dangerous than a dragon is an angry librarian. :::