Rockridge is an independent city, state, and country located on an island in the north Atlantic Ocean which had remained isolated until its discovery around 60 years ago. Since then, the island has seen an influx of outsiders seeking to reap the benefits of the island’s untapped natural resources and nearly laughable lack of laws. With them, these outsiders brought new technology, trade, and ideas, but the massive culture shock for both the locals and the outsiders has been an increasingly unavoidable source of conflict.
The weather on Rockridge is unexpectedly warm for its location in the northern Atlantic. The Eastern Mountain seems to act as a massive heat source, and the area directly surrounding it consistently sees temperatures around 50-70°F. The west side, however, is much cooler and the temperature gradient between the two sides of the island leads to powerful winds throughout the area and storms moving south-west from the east to the ocean due south from the center of the city.
To the north is a dense, uncharted forest bounded by the Western and Eastern mountains. To this day, the locals remain superstitious about this forest and discourage anyone from entering it. Similarly, the Western Mountain has often been the subject of mining efforts, but most of it remains unused due to these superstitions.
Prior to its discovery by outsiders 60 years ago, the island was home to a small population of about 800 people, whose descendants are now called “locals”. The island was first discovered by an explorer who came via plane, and it is believed that it was as of then undiscovered, due to storms that would sink approaching ships. Due to its isolation from the outside world, the introduction of new pathogens devastated the local population, reducing it to about 200. Since then, the population has grown back up to about 550, though few “pure” local families remain.
There is evidence to suggest that the island was once ruled by a monarch, though no ruler was around at the time of the islands discovery, and it appears that there had not been one for some time. Due to fear of the forest, the city always remained small and dense with as many as five families crowded into small rickety houses. Shortly after the introduction of outsiders on the island, the city briefly experienced some expansion, building larger farms and expanding into the forests and mines. However, disappearances of people who ventured too far out of the town would soon act as enough of a deterrent to restrict expansion yet again.
For the next 40 years, people continued to disappear near the edges of the city, yet no attempt was ever made to find those responsible. Additionally, local crimes ranging from theft to murder often went unpunished, enraging the new outsider families who were not willing to merely accept this as a fact. Several smaller attempts to fix this system were quashed until one particularly loud group, called the Visibility Movement (more familiarly known as the Numbers) was able to slip through the cracks and make enough noise to draw attention. Through large and visible acts of violence, the group hoped to force the people to step forward and form a more robust criminal justice system, but even they fell quiet again after their original leader passed away.
Eleven years after the stir from the Numbers has quieted down, the island once again faces a crisis when nine people, primarily students, are killed or disappear within a short time window. Students from the local school attempt to investigate these disappearances and find the re
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