The City of Grx (part two)

Continuing our exploration of the Brain Slayer city of Grx-Sel-Vik

The Ministry Below (#4/30; #155/365)

Probably the most powerful of the Brain Slayer city's bureaucratic edifices is the Ministry Below, whose remit covers all interactions with the rest of the Down Below environment, including both military and trading relationships with nearby entities and subterranean states, mining and acquiring of resources, and the procurement of captives to ensure the smooth functioning of these operations and the city itself. As such, the Ministry is housed in one of the biggest buildings in Grx, a centrally located brooding fortress complex of gleaming baroquely-carved black stone, with associated aerial belfries for flying operatives and multiple impressive gateways leading to various containment areas.

The Ministry Below has limited use of portal technology (with the associated Obsidian Portal Keys) to connect it to the more far-flung outposts of Grx's underworld hegemony, but the majority of its agents, who wear black robes, use lots of bat-steeds such as Cave Vampires and Nycterin for fast transport through the caverns and tunnels, as well as directing trained packs of war-beasts, including BONECRUSHERS, GIANT MUDWORMS, and TANTAFLEXES for overt military action against rival beneath-world powers and states. The First Minister Below is Ssv'gua Claw-wing (scarred, scheming), who reports directly to the Archveult Supreme, and holds court in a large central chamber dominated by a psychic-projection map of the three-dimensional labyrinth that is the known extent of the Down Below in all its glory.

The Ministry Urban (#5/30; #156/365)

The least powerful of the three bureaucracies, the Ministry Urban makes up for it by having the most ostentatious basal hulk; an enormous cuboid monument decorated in burnished gold and glowing green metal. This ministry is tasked with the smooth running of Grx itself, and so it is split into various departments governing community facilities and services, including Security. Security operatives number around 50 Brain Slayers and are known as Sentinels, wearing green robes, and armed with clubs made from green metal. They are tasked with maintaining peace and order, which mainly means harassing the non-Brain Slayer population of Grx to see their Obsidian Cards that entitle them to be in the city.

Sentinels have stables of war-beasts, including Bonecrushers and Tantaflexes, for the suppression of periodic urban uprisings and captive revolts, but they are the weakest of the military forces present within the city. The Sentinels report directly to the First Minister Urban, J'kotha of Ra'Ell (overweight, vengeful), a corpulent Brain Slayer administrator but powerful psionicist who is never without their glowing Green Metal Psionic Focus Staff, and who in turn reports to the Archveult Supreme. J'kotha's command room within the ministry features an accurate projection-map of the city and its warren-like sewers and catacombs.

Palace of the Archveult (#6/30; #157/365)

The Palace of the Archveult Supreme is a stone spike encased in purple steel smelted from the Pit itself, that dominates the rest of the city. Archveults are lords among Brain Slayers, selected via a rigorous process that measures psionic powers, combat masteries, administrative rigour, intellectual speed and decisiveness, and all-round general nastiness. The Archveult Supreme of the city of Grx-Sel-Vik is the Mind-Lord Thg'Grq of Thay (very tall, angry), an imposing bat-winged mutant Brain Slayer creature, who has embarked on several pilgrimages to the Demonic Plane of Rust and each time has returned forever changed from their experiences within the Infernal Pit. Thg-Grq is a competent leader, and the city of Grx has prospered under their rulership. Unfortunately, the Archveult has also been possessed and brain-parasitized by a Netherworld entity from the Spirit Plane while on their peregrinations, and it is only a matter of time before things come to a head, so to speak.

Most of the Palace itself is a hub of petty courtiers, flunkies, functionaries and factotums (all mainly Flayers, and not the good kind), while official meetings are held here semi-regularly between the Archveult, the trio of Ministers, and the various High Priests. The 50-strong Palace Guard oversee security and are also the prime military force in Grx, clad in Purple Steel Plate Armour and armed with blue glowing Force-Glaives. Also under their command are a militia of 200 Flayers armed with tentacle-nets and poison tridents - this is mainly an expeditionary force used for dealing with threats close to the city and maintaining perimeter security patrols. Under the remit of the Palace Guard are some war-beasts and flying bat-steeds, but nowhere near the number working for specialist operatives from the Ministries Above and Below.