The Afrasiyan Plateau

The old city. The one before.

OVERVIEW

Above Samarkand — north of the current city, elevated perhaps thirty feet over the surrounding plain on a natural plateau — lies the ruin of the city that preceded it. The locals call it Afrasiyan. Nobody knows what the people who built it called it.

The plateau is wide, roughly oval, and its edges are defined by the eroded remains of ancient walls thick enough that in places they look more like earthworks than architecture. Inside them: broken foundations, the ghost-grid of streets, the scattered evidence of a city that was once, by the measure of its own time, very large and very wealthy. The ruins are not dramatic in the way of a collapsed temple. They are thorough. Whatever stood here was dismantled as much as it fell.

Samarkand grew up at the foot of the plateau. The Tulpar Confederation, when they claimed the city, built their administrative center in the valley below. They have not built on the plateau. The ruins are theirs — and they have decided, without announcing the decision, to leave them as they are.

THE MURALS

The most significant thing found on the plateau is underground.

In the foundations of what was once the palace district — identifiable by the scale of its walls and the quality of stone beneath the rubble — excavators in the early years of the Confederation discovered a lower chamber with painted walls. The frescoes survived because they were buried before the fires reached them. They are approximately eight centuries old by the best scholarly estimation, predating the liberation by three hundred years.

What they show: a reception hall. A throne. And ranged before it, in formal procession, delegations from every direction the world had at the time — figures in the robes of the eastern kingdoms, in the dress of the steppe confederacies, in the silks of the sub-continental courts, in the armor of peoples who may no longer exist. They come bearing gifts. The central figure receives them.

There are no Tulpar in the murals. There are figures who carry loads, who stand at margins, who are present without being depicted as present. Scholars have noted this. The Confederation has noted it too, and their response has been to restrict access to the chamber without prohibiting it. You can request to see the murals. The request is reviewed.

The murals are called, in the records of the Confederation, Tilasimli Devor — the Enchanted Wall, or more literally, the Wall That Was Meant To Last. The name is not an endorsement.

THE IMPERIAL REMAINS

The plateau contains the ruins of at least three distinct building phases, the oldest impossible to date reliably, the most recent from the final generations of the empire.

The last imperial phase left the most recognizable fragments:

The Blue Palace foundations — the largest contiguous ruin on the plateau, covering the plateau's highest point. The walls stand in places to shoulder height. The scale of the original structure can be read in the foundations: this was not a building that doubted itself. Ceramic tile fragments in deep blue and turquoise appear throughout the rubble.

The Gate Inscription — a section of monumental gateway, partially standing, partially collapsed. The carved inscription above it is damaged but legible in pieces. Scholars who have worked on it report phrases including "...those who come to dispute..." and "...behold what we have built..." The full text has not been recovered. The Confederation is not actively funding the recovery.

The Processional Avenue — a broad paved road running the length of the plateau from the main gate, still walkable in stretches, its paving stones enormous and precisely fitted. It leads to nothing now. What it led to is rubble.

THE TULPAR'S RELATIONSHIP TO THE PLATEAU

The Confederation does not discuss Afrasiyan with outsiders much, and what they say when pressed is brief: it is ours, and we decide what happens to it.

What they have decided so far is: careful documentation, restricted access to the mural chamber, no construction, no looting, no sale of artifacts to outside collectors. Several pieces removed by imperial administrators in the chaos period have been formally requested back. Some have been returned. The negotiations for others continue.

There is a word in the Tulpar Chain Chronicles for what the plateau represents. It translates approximately as "the place whose silence is also a record." The ruins are not mourned. They are not celebrated. They are kept — in the same way the Chain Chronicles keep the names of those who were lost — because what happened here should not be allowed to become nothing.

Young Tulpar from across the confederation visit the plateau. There is no official ceremony. They walk the processional avenue, look at the gate inscription, sit in the shadow of the Blue Palace walls. Some visit the mural chamber. Most don't need to.

WHAT OUTSIDERS SAY

The plateau draws scholars, historians, and the curious from across Tarim-Shaiel. The Confederation permits scholarly access with documentation. What draws people varies:

• The murals are, by the accounts of those who have seen them, extraordinary. The pigments are largely intact. The detail of the diplomatic procession — the faces, the gifts, the specific cultural markers — is a primary source for what the Silk Road looked like at the empire's height.
• The Gate Inscription attracts people who want to complete it. The Confederation is not obstructing this work, but they are not assisting it either.
• The processional avenue is sometimes walked by people who want to understand the scale of what was here. The scale is, by most accounts, clarifying.

Human visitors — particularly those from the successor kingdoms — tend to go quiet on the plateau in ways they are not always able to explain afterward.

Tarim-Shaiel · Daggerheart Campaign · 2026