Cultural history about Astocad

The land of Astocad is dwarven territory. They have most of the cities below ground.
Anyone may visit their most populated trading city: Shaddowdeep wich lies just south of the mendralian border. The entrance city is called Zandrake and is one of the few citys above ground.

They trade absolutly everything but their is a lot of fraud going on and you can never be sure that you got what you think you got in shaddowdeep.

They have always been neutral facing international problems. They are known to help anybody who pays them.

When the ruitans where chased from united kingdom territory, some faced difficult decisions. They could eighter go home and carry the punishment for the failure of their task, or they could find another place to do what they were ment to accomplish. So comes that there are many ruitan camps all over Astocad, hidden in the mountains or even integrated into dwarven citys, because their ancestors dealt with dwarves in the wartimes.
As long as you can pay the dwarven king, you can stay on defined Astocad territory: Some minor citys, The great city of shaddowdeep and anywhere in the mountains.

The mountains are rich in materials that are considered very rare in many countrys. Not only gold and mithril, but also a special black metal called Shenkub. It is the most valuable metal to the dwarves. Harder than mithril and flexible as long as it is not exposed to intense soundwaves. A very powerfull sonicburst may even shatter a poorly fabricated senkub item as an armor or a weapon for example. Only the dwarves of shaddowdeep carry the secret of handling the precious metal an forming it to an unburstable item. (However, the Mekshra of Talsablur had been shattered by the mighty bard Nabanox during the gonome inquisitions in south Astocad.
Mekshra - Dwarven translation : Doomhammer of the Father, built in Shenkub and claimed to be indestructable. It did survive enumerous shattering attacks.
Talsablur - Dwarven king during the inquisitions

Most of the land is covered by these mountainchains, however there are old forests wich died or are loosing their lifeforce. The trees still stand but their rakes are dead. These monumental trees are told to be over a 1000 years old. Nobody knows why they loose their essence and never a druid has been able to speak to them.