The plateau edge gives Baoji its most characteristic view: westward, over the forest that drops toward the Malaea Sea coast, with Galshi visible on clear days as a pale smudge on the horizon. The town sits in a cleared space on the plateau's interior face — not at the edge, where the slope is too steep and the wind too constant, but set back enough to use the forest as a windbreak. The architecture is timber-framed and generous with the material, which is the one resource Baoji has in surplus.

The smell of the town is resin. The extraction operations that produce the tar-resin Galshi's shipbuilders require run year-round, and the processing involves heat that volatilizes the compounds in ways that spread through the immediate area. The residents consider this normal. Visitors experience it as distinctive and occasionally overwhelming.

The timber yards are visible from the approach road — long rows of felled and trimmed logs at various stages of seasoning, arranged by species and grade. The scale is larger than the town's population would suggest, because Baoji's timber operation employs workers from several smaller plateau settlements who travel for the work season.

Baoji occupies a cleared plateau section in the cool forest belt of northwest Shoing, approximately thirty miles inland from Galshi's coast and at a moderate elevation that keeps the temperature below the maritime coast's range. The forest — conifer and highland hardwood mixed — extends in all directions from the cleared settlement area. The plateau itself is relatively flat, which makes the extraction operations logistically manageable.

The resin comes from a specific highland conifer variety found only on the plateau at this elevation range. The trees produce the resin as a natural defense compound; the extraction taps the trees in a managed rotation that the Corda family's foresters have been refining for generations. The trees are not cleared — they are maintained as the productive resource they are. The timber operation uses separate stands, managed on a harvest-replant cycle.

The plateau's water is supplied by highland springs and several small streams. There is no significant river access, which is the town's primary geographic limitation: the timber and resin must be transported overland to Galshi's port for waterborne distribution. The road is maintained to a high standard as a result.

Baoji is predominantly human with a significant gnome minority concentrated in the resin processing and precision woodworking operations. The gnomes arrived in the second generation of the Corda family's governance, when the resin processing required more chemical precision than the initial operation could achieve, and their combination of analytical approach and patience with iterative technique improved the output quality substantially. They have been integrated into the town's craft tradition since.

The population includes a seasonal component — highland workers who come for the timber season and return to their home settlements when the season ends. The permanent population is smaller than the working population during peak timber season.

The tar-resin is the foundation. Galshi's shipbuilders specify Baoji resin for hull sealing and waterproofing, and the compound's properties — specifically its resistance to the cold-water cracking that affects other caulking materials — make it the preferred product for Malaea Sea vessels that operate in the northern current zones. The Corda family's extraction operation holds the managed forest rights and is the sole commercial supplier.

Structural timber is the second industry. The highland hardwoods of the plateau — specifically the varieties that the cool altitude and specific soil produce — are the preferred material for construction beams, ship frames, and precision woodworking across the western Shoing region. The quality is consistent and the supply, under the Corda rotation system, has been sustainable for a century.

Baoji eats simply. The highland plateau cooking tradition is practical rather than sophisticated — the cool climate and the physical demands of the timber work produce a preference for dense, caloric preparations. Preserved meats from highland game, root vegetables from the plateau's agricultural plots, highland grain varieties. The cooking uses the resin-tree's byproducts in unexpected ways: a specific smoked preparation of fish and meat uses the resin-wood chips as flavoring smoke, producing a characteristic taste that other Shoing regions sometimes describe as "the plateau smoke" and that Baoji residents consider ordinary.

The drink of the town is a highland grain spirit and a cold stream water that the gnome community has been insisting is the best drinking water in western Shoing for generations. The Galshi merchants who visit regularly have started agreeing.

Baoji's culture is the western Shoing character modified by the specific economics of resource extraction and supply. The honor framework is present but the Corda family's "Duke-Factor" title reflects a genuine cultural emphasis: commercial precision is as much an expression of honor here as military courage or genealogical standing. A factor who delivers the agreed quantity at the agreed quality on the agreed schedule is considered honorable in the fullest sense.

The gnome community's influence on the culture is visible in the town's orientation toward quantification and precision — the forest rotation schedules, the resin processing parameters, the timber grading standards are all documented with a specificity that western Shoing's less analytically inclined towns find slightly exhausting.

The Galshi Western Coast political relationship is substantive rather than nominal. The Corda family participates in the western coast political structure, attends the relevant noble assemblies in Galshi, and is genuinely integrated into the political hierarchy. The Baoji-Galshi commercial relationship is too important to both parties for the political relationship to be merely formal.

When the resin extraction season begins — the spring warming that makes the plateau's highland conifers productive — the Corda family formally opens the tapping. The foresters mark the first trees, the processing works confirm readiness, and the Duke-Factor performs a brief Talbar acknowledgment. This is commercial ceremony, not primarily spiritual, but it is taken seriously by the workforce.

At the end of the timber season, the full year's production is formally inventoried and graded. The results are read publicly and compared against the prior year. In good years, this is celebratory; in poor years, it is sobering. The practice has been continuous for as long as the Corda family has governed the operation.

The gnome community's precision woodworking includes instrument-making — specifically small string instruments whose resonant quality benefits from the highland hardwood varieties. These instruments have found their way into the broader western Shoing musical tradition, where they are recognized as having an unusual tonal quality attributed vaguely to "the plateau wood."

The human community's artistic tradition is primarily practical — the carving and decoration of functional objects using the off-grade wood that doesn't make the timber standards. The quality of these objects is high because the material, even at off-grade, is excellent.

Talbar is Baoji's defining god: precise exchange, long contracts, and the idea that honest measure is a form of honor. The market temple doubles as the arbitration room where resin volumes and timber grades become binding truth.

Caminus is strong in the precision woodworking cooperative and the gnome-run processing works; tools are blessed, and flawed work is treated as shame. Chamastle is a practical household faith in a cold plateau town where shelter is not a metaphor. Ancestor shrines are maintained with unusual documentation rigor, and Shen-Li is invoked by name in the gnome families' records work as often as in human household rites. Martus is common in the timber season's wages, wagers, and risky hauling runs.

A few private circles experiment with resin-drunk trance and pain-rites, but Baoji does not sustain a stable underground cult economy; the forest rotation schedules make secrecy hard. When accidents turn fatal, Shinigami's rites are brought in to ensure the dead are properly ended and the plateau does not become haunted by neglect.

Baoji predates the Corda family's governance by an unknown period — the plateau has been used for timber harvesting since before the current settlement's formal organization. The Corda family arrived approximately one hundred eighty years ago, formalized the forest rights arrangement with Galshi, and established the governance structure. The "Duke-Factor" title was created at the Corda founder's insistence: she argued that the role required both noble standing (for the governance authority) and commercial designation (for the trade authority that was the role's primary function). Galshi found this argument unconventional and has been about to standardize the title for sixty years.

The formalization of the multi-decade exclusive supply arrangement between the Corda operation and the Galshi shipbuilders. The contract's original terms — which included a quality guarantee, a volume floor, and a specific price escalation formula — are the legal foundation of both parties' commercial relationship. The current version has been renegotiated six times; the core structure has not changed.

The arrival and integration of the first significant gnome craftspeople into the resin processing operation. The processing quality improvement in the decade following their integration is documented in the Galshi shipbuilders' quality records. The Corda family at the time treated the gnome integration as a commercial decision; the result was a cultural shift that has been permanent.

Baoji is commercially productive and stable. The forest rotation is well-managed. The resin contract is current. The Corda household is in good standing with Galshi's political structure. Duke-Factor Lena is in her forties and has been in the role for twelve years; her two children are being prepared for the eventual succession. The active concern is the supply road — which is in adequate condition but requires significant maintenance investment that the town is managing without external assistance. Lena has been considering whether to make the road a formal request to Galshi's infrastructure commission.

The Corda family holds the Duke-Factor position by Galshi recognition and hereditary claim. Their governance is primarily commercial and forest-management: the forest rights, the resin contract administration, and the timber operation are all within the family's formal authority. The political functions — representation at Galshi assemblies, tax administration, minor judicial authority — are secondary in daily practice but taken seriously.

Human, Female — mid-forties

Lena has been Duke-Factor for twelve years, following her father's retirement. She is commercially competent and politically effective in the Galshi Western Coast context. She manages the resin contract negotiations personally and has twice improved the pricing terms against experienced Galshi commercial negotiators. She is also the person who knows that the plateau's accessible conifer stands — not all of them, but the highest-elevation zone that produces the most resin-rich trees — have been showing reduced yields for three seasons. She is investigating whether this is a management issue or an environmental one.

Gnome, Male — fifties — the processing works
Finn has been supervising the resin processing operation for twenty years and is the person whose quality approval the Galshi shipbuilders require before accepting a shipment. His family has been in Baoji for three generations. He is aware of the yield reduction in the high-elevation stands and has been running analysis on the resin chemistry from different elevation zones to determine whether the reduction is also affecting resin quality.

Human, Male — sixties — the forest
Hako manages the forest rotation and is the person responsible for the long-term health of the productive stands. He has been in the role for thirty years and has seen yield variations before; he considers the current situation within the range of normal cycle variation. Finn Trell disagrees with this assessment. The two have been having the same professional disagreement for three years.

Human, Female — mid-twenties, Duke-Factor's daughter
Saya manages the supply road maintenance operation and has built a detailed case for the road's infrastructure investment needs that she has been presenting to her mother and to Galshi's relevant commission. The presentation is thorough, the data is accurate, and neither audience has yet committed to the investment.