Patrick-Leigh
Inkling
In my current project, my deuteragonist spends a portion of his life as an indentured slave in a colony of the Isvaeran Empire. (The details of how he got there are a bit lengthy, so I won't get into them.) Initially, I was thinking that the colony would produce cotton, tobacco, or some kind of spice that was highly prized, but those seemed a little too obvious. Then it occurred to me that the colony could be used to produce something of a more industrial nature, reflecting the magical industrial revolution that is taking place in my setting. After some consideration, I settled on latex being the product. In my setting, Leylines, the fissures through which Aethyr enters the Material Planes, can give the soil of different locations unique properties that in turn give the plants growing in the soil special properties of their own. Thus, if the colony extracted latex obtained from a plant like palaquium gutta that grew in special soil magically enriched by a Leyline running beneath it, the latex could in turn have unique properties that would make it highly prized.
And when I say "highly prized," I mean prized enough for empires to go to war to obtain. The geopolitics leading up to the events of the story involve a couple centuries of nearly constant war between nations to maintain their monopolies over certain goods coming out of the colonies in Arcadia. My deuteragonist sees this first hand when the Draconic Empire conquers the colony while he's stuck there as an indentured slave. They achieve this by using a new variety of Skyship to overwhelm the Isvaeran forces defending the colonial port that controls the colony. The Draconic Empire invented an entirely new kind of Skyship just to gain a monopoly on the goods coming out of the colonies. I want the latex coming out of the colony where my deuteragonist lives to be a priority target so the number of Skyships committed to taking the colony (3) is justified. This stuff needs to be super valuable.
The issue I'm having is figuring out what makes it so valuable. It can't just be a better version of latex because the properties of regular latex can be modified using Alchemy. It needs to have magical properties as well. I have a few ideas I'm mulling over, but I want to hear from other people. The latex extracted from the trees growing in this colony has to be very special. That means it needs to be versatile in its applications and be highly beneficial to both industry and the military. Whoever controls the supply of this latex gains a serious edge over rival nations, in other words. It also needs to justify some factions within the Isvaeran Empire abusing loopholes in the legal system to have people sent as indentured slaves to the colony to increase the production rates of this latex. They are twisting the law to arrest people and have them sentenced to transportation and indentured servitude just to get more of this stuff. My deuteragonist and most of his family are abused and exploited by these factions, who justify their actions on the basis that it's for the greater good.
Of course, the reality is that it's because control of this latex 1) enriches those who own the companies producing it and 2) gives the Isvaeran Empire a significant edge over its rivals both industrially and militarily. The other nations of the Midlands are having to pay through the nose for this stuff, which is why the Draconic Empire dedicates three of their newest Skyships to taking control of the colony from which it originates. So, what is this stuff? What makes it so very special? Do you have any suggestions? Let me know!
And when I say "highly prized," I mean prized enough for empires to go to war to obtain. The geopolitics leading up to the events of the story involve a couple centuries of nearly constant war between nations to maintain their monopolies over certain goods coming out of the colonies in Arcadia. My deuteragonist sees this first hand when the Draconic Empire conquers the colony while he's stuck there as an indentured slave. They achieve this by using a new variety of Skyship to overwhelm the Isvaeran forces defending the colonial port that controls the colony. The Draconic Empire invented an entirely new kind of Skyship just to gain a monopoly on the goods coming out of the colonies. I want the latex coming out of the colony where my deuteragonist lives to be a priority target so the number of Skyships committed to taking the colony (3) is justified. This stuff needs to be super valuable.
The issue I'm having is figuring out what makes it so valuable. It can't just be a better version of latex because the properties of regular latex can be modified using Alchemy. It needs to have magical properties as well. I have a few ideas I'm mulling over, but I want to hear from other people. The latex extracted from the trees growing in this colony has to be very special. That means it needs to be versatile in its applications and be highly beneficial to both industry and the military. Whoever controls the supply of this latex gains a serious edge over rival nations, in other words. It also needs to justify some factions within the Isvaeran Empire abusing loopholes in the legal system to have people sent as indentured slaves to the colony to increase the production rates of this latex. They are twisting the law to arrest people and have them sentenced to transportation and indentured servitude just to get more of this stuff. My deuteragonist and most of his family are abused and exploited by these factions, who justify their actions on the basis that it's for the greater good.
Of course, the reality is that it's because control of this latex 1) enriches those who own the companies producing it and 2) gives the Isvaeran Empire a significant edge over its rivals both industrially and militarily. The other nations of the Midlands are having to pay through the nose for this stuff, which is why the Draconic Empire dedicates three of their newest Skyships to taking control of the colony from which it originates. So, what is this stuff? What makes it so very special? Do you have any suggestions? Let me know!