Geography

The Otterbear river and its principal tributaries, the Otter and Bear rivers, receive water from the eastern third of the Whitewood Valley, north of the Northern Barrier Mountains. The watershed includes parts of the West Shuizu State and the Shanbei Province, with the Otter and Bear rivers forming part of the historic borders of these regions. The river opens into the Otterbear Bay at Apana Town, the administrative center of the region and a major northern port.

Northwest of Apana Town rises the Northern Divide, a cliff that divides the highlands of Yongganguo from the cold peatbogs of Nitan State and the West Shuizu State.

The Perpetual Peace Mountains are actually the site of longstanding vulcanism and were given their Common language name in a spirit of optimism. They produce abundant sulfur, arsenical sulfides used for pest control, and cinnabar. The cinnabar is associated with its alkaline hot springs. There has been no eruption in historical memory, though oral tradition of the indigenous earthbending tribes tells of an eruption some centuries prior to contact with the literate civilizations of the South.

Transport and Economy

The Otterbear river is important to the economy of the region, both for trade, fishing, and various riparian products. The river system brings products to Apana town, where they are loaded onto oceangoing ships for the North Sea trade (including sometimes transport to Beigang, bound for the central heartland and Ba Sing Se via the Grand Canal.) The Otterbear river system is linked to overland transit by the Ba Sing Se Highway, which crosses the mountains to Manbao and the Astringent River system opening into the Third Sister Bay. At Wangshi, the Bear River Road connects the Otterbear river system with the Far West River system, providing a trade link to the north of the Five Grains Province and an additional connection to the Grand Canal to Ba Sing Se.

The Bear River Road, which runs alongside the Bear River, is nowadays somewhat redundant as the river is navigable from Wangshi year round thanks to the building of a dam at Wangshi. However, in the past, during dry years the river would not be navigable southeast of Gubao, or, in extraordinary dry seasons, of the confluence with the Perpetual Peace River, a tributary between Gubao and Nancun and originating in the mountains of the same name.

Economy of the region is predominantly agricultural. Crops are grown in the fertile river valley, and although it is too cold for rice, many typical crops of northern landraces thrive there. The woolly riverpig is raised for food, and the assgoat as a work and dairy animal. Tamed giant badgermoles, and domesticated members of the Shanbei Forest Badgermole breed, are used as work animals and for dairy products by the Yonggan minority. There is some mining activity, of coal and metal-bearing ore minerals, in the vicinity of Wangshi and the more mountainous parts of the area. Peat is commonly used in the north of the region, near Apana town, where it can be cut nearby. However, upriver, coal and wood are favored as they can be sent downriver. Mercury (quicksilver) and sulfur are also exported via the Otterbear river, as they are mined in the Perpetual Peace Mountains, though they are also exported via the Everstrong River system.

The watershed is heavily wooded and market hunting and trapping is economically significant. Both fur and meat are important. The otterbear is treasured for its warm and waterproof fur, but has become difficult to find since the introduction of foothold traps from Temene Town, which made them much easier to take than with the traditional methods of hunting with spears and bending.

Up the Bear and Otter rivers near the confluence, and in the Otterbear river, there are a number of boatmills which are used to process grain.

General Yi has a number of people engaged in building a canal from the Otter River to the Elephant Bird River. This would connect Apana Town to the Elephantbird River and ultimately to the Western Sea. Such a canal project was contemplated in the final years of the Ri Dynasty, but the project was abandoned after only about ten kilometers of canal were built due to political infighting between Yonggan princes. The Yonggan warlord Gioro Emoto Dabciku has agreed not to interfere with this canal project in exchange for eventual mercantile access and recognition of Yonganguo's annexation of parts of West Shuizu State.

A drying oil produced from the Shanbei Paint-Nut is a major forest product. Mixed with "green whale soap" (a copper fatty acid salt, i.e. a metallic soap, prepared from train oil) as a pigment and drying agent, it is used in great quantity as a green paint. Of course, many green paints are made and known in the Earth Kingdom, but the product of the paint mills of Apana town, "Apana Green Quick-Paint," is treasured as fast-drying, even in cold weather. The Paint-Nut, which grows on trees, is also edible, though somewhat of an acquired taste and has a low smoke point, unsuited to frying.

Bleaching powder is a product of Wangshi, which has a nascent chemical industry of its own.

Politics

The region is part of the Earth Kingdom, however, central control is not strong here. The notorious warlord General Yi makes his headquarters in Apana town, and the population generally pays taxes to him rather than Ba Sing Se. Wangshi is a notable exception on the Bear River, and some Yonggan villages in the West are also resistive. That being said, some of the towns do have appointed earth kingdom officials, who have maintained their administrative positions (and stipends) by supporting General Yi's work.

Most of the population is not politically engaged. General Yi is resented for his conscription (particularly of earthbenders and military-age young men) but his military administrative structure has actually been, if not less financially demanding, more predictable and consistent in its demands than the prior structures of power. The elimination of these informally corrupt structures, and the inflow of spoils and tax money from General Yi's activities outside the region, has produced a modest increase in material prosperity.

Apana Town is under blockade by the Fire Nation, who seek to deny the North Sea trade to General Yi. The general's Northern Army has a small navy, manned partly with Shuizu waterbenders local to the region, but they are too small to break the blockade openly and have been mostly engaged in nighttime raids on the blockading vessels.

Settlements

Bear River

Wangshi. A larger settlement founded by an Earth King of the Ting dynasty to trade with frontier peoples. Not under the control of General Yi.

Dongcun. One of the four "Cardinal Direction Villages" founded, in legend, by four brothers exiled from their home in the mountains. It is a local agricultural community, and the site of a Zang community and a Ganjinese factory involved in the fur and clothes industries. After the Zang were expelled from Gubao by General Yi (following their refusal to cooperate with his younger brother), many of them resettled in Dongcun, putting pressure on the fur and game animal populations.

Huangcun (黃村). Huangcun is the location of the royal sulfur market, established during the early Hao Ting dynasty to regulate the trade in brimstone mined in the Perpetual Peace Mountains. It is said that in the past, the roads from the mountains to the market and the docks were yellow with spilled sulfur powder, as the regulations in force at the time forbid any registered sulfur miners to come to Huangcun themselves, and at the same time forbid anyone but a registered sulfur miner from collecting sulfur. Regulations were altered after many lives were lost to the poisonous fumes of an accidental fire.

Gubao (固堡). Named for its formidable walls, Gubao is second only to Apana town in size and population among the settlements on the Otterbear river system. It was an ancient capital of an indigenous earthbending civilization which was wiped out in high antiquity by proto-Beituzhu, before they were themselves subjugated by the Zhongzu settlers, who continued to dominate it after the lands north of the Bear river became part of the West Shuizu State. After centuries of decline - it had never fully recovered from its sack by the forces of Qin the Conqueror - it has been revived as a stronghold and shipbuilding center by General Yi, who has appointed his younger brother General Manseok Yi as its commander. A toll chain controls the Bear river at Gubao, and there are water-driven sawmills.

Nancun. A modest village known for its pottery, and the presence of a good marina which is connected to the Bear River and is the Western terminus of the Bear River road.

Beicun. A fishing village of Shuizu people, under indigenous governance. There is a Yonggan minority involved with mineral extraction and earthbending.

Baisha village. Known for its whitestone quarry and shrine to a spirit associated with the same, who is propitiated by offerings of water and said to threaten droughts when angered.

Ding village. Originating as a woodcutting camp. There are some Shuizu loggers and carpenters here; they use waterbent ice-blades to cut trees. The technique is a local secret.

Shuimo Town. A mixed-ethnicity village which includes a Ganjinese trading factory and bathhouse. It is best known for being the site of production of boat-watermills. It is administered by General Yi's military government directly, after a dispute between the general and the elected headman, who felt that too many of the village's young people had been drafted.

Zhai village. This village dates only to the Hao Ting, during Kyoshi's era. It was built by a group of refugees from Beigang, of mixed ethnic and linguistic stock, at the site of an old Shuizu fishing camp that had been abandoned due to a malevolent fish spirit. The spirit was subdued by Kyoshi and confined to the village well, from which water now springs spontaneously under pressure.

Otter River

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Otterbear River

Hubao (匯堡) A town at the confluence of the Bear and Otter rivers.

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