Editing Shattered Sun (section)

==The Twilight==
The lands just around the Shardstreams are dotted along the edges of the Light's reach. The denizens of the Twilight use this moderate Light to prosper in agriculture, feeding the Cities as well as themselves. While they are subject to the occasional raid by the more thieving folk beyond the Light's reach, the Twilighters prove to be a hardy and persistent lot. They also happen to maintain a spirit of independence from the others around them. Some of the Cities may believe the rural Twilighters are under their dominion as a Kingdom would its Serfs, but they are quick to rout out any formal City rule from their lands.

===Copesa Village===
The village of Copesa is a mostly quaint place on the outskirts of the Holy City’s influence, upon the very rim of Gargonel’s Light. Named after the supposed fifth King who sought to lay claim upon the lands of the Holy City – and failed miserably – the village has more or less removed said King’s ill repute of failure. Though it is technically a territory of the Holy City and does indeed pay the City its due tribute of food and stock for the City’s protection and representation in its affairs, the sprawling village does not take kindly to anyone from the City trying to make that fact public. Its people are fiercely independent, seeing themselves as more in a trade agreement with the City than anything else.

And it’s not just their spirit which is so resolute. Their fighting ability is rumored to be up to par with the best warriors the City can produce. Time and time again in recent history has the village of Copesa resisted or downright defeated armed groups from the Holy City and other nearby Cities wishing to more formally annex the village into their Cities. Even though there is no mistake that the men of the village are hardy as their agricultural traditions make them out to be, there is another factor that plays into the village’s success: the Innerlight.

====''The Innerlight''====
It is widely known that the Light from the Shards has mystical properties which are harnessed by many: Astronomers who track the Shards and form a bond with them through their study; Alchemists who harness the power of the Light into mechanical form; Brandishers who create a permanent bond between person and Shard with Stardust-imbued tattoos. Being under a constant state of dusk gave some Twilighters, those in a culture already abound with stories of its many travelers full of mystery, intrigue, and magic, a fresh perspective on the Light not known by those basking under the Shardstreams’ glow. When these special villagers focus their eyes in just the right way, they see a faint glow that overlaps the person they are looking at. Depending on the circumstances, this “Innerlight” may simply be residual, or flaring up in various colors and directions.

Some villagers have used this ability as a sort of aural reading to better understand those they meet. Others can determine the subject’s desires and wishes to a degree. Even others have protracted such predictive ability to tell the subject’s future in general terms. But there are some who are somehow able to draw forth the Innerlight itself into the physical realm, conjuring powerful effects even when out of the immaculate shine of the Shards themselves. While there is no one being who can fully extract another’s Innerlight – too much of it removed and it literally saps the life out of the subject – there are those who can reconfigure the Innerlight within someone to make them stronger, more resilient, more able than they ever imagined. There are stories of small groups of villagers fending off an entire army only with a profound mastery over their Innerlight. Spears buckled upon them. Swords dulled on their skin. And woe is the unsuspecting infantryman who got caught in the gaze of one of these villagers for too long.

While Copesa is known to be the first to discover this ability in some of its villagers, many of the other villages in the Twilight are known for their own that are gifted in the Innerlight. For the most part though, this ability seems to reside only within those born and raised in the Twilight, although there has been the odd case of someone from either the Shardstreams or the Strobelands who have picked up the ability in their travels through these villages.

====''The Patriarchy''====
Copesa is also a veritable model of self-sustainable government to many of the other villages in the Twilight. By and large, the people of the village are ruled by a small group of elder men selected by their peers. While matters such as the economy and social affairs are usually left to the people themselves, a sort of common law which most of the villagers grow up to understand, major matters such as diplomacy and military issues are left to these elders. One of the only acknowledged weakness of this system is that the size of this council tends to fluctuate over the years: elders tend to die off over time; there’s usually not a similar number of elders to take up the mantle from generation to generation; there’s sometimes not many who the villagers see fit to lead the village; so forth and so on. Regardless of this bit of chaos in order, the system works for the most part.

The makeup of the council is usually based around the needs of the village at any given time. If the village is at war with a City, it will usually feature a number of former warriors and experts in the use of the Innerlight. In times of economic strife, there will be entrepreneurs in all sorts of fields available. In times of great prosperity, there will be members of a number of vocations to keep the prosperity going. In terrible famines, farmers and hunters will be present in the council. While there is always the issue of popularity and rhetoric within the elders’ politics, people who can address the village’s needs generally trump the best public speakers in the selection of the council.

====''The Economy''====
The village is a primarily agricultural economy, specializing in the cultivation of grains and the raising of livestock. Their supplies are, for the most part, theirs to keep to further sustaining the village, but there is a great portion of it that goes to the Holy City in exchange for its protective services and representation to other Cities abroad. Smaller portions of their products are relegated to Strober traders who bring their goods further in the world in their chase of the Shards. There is also a budding demand for the village’s craftsmen and artisans as the ‘Copesan style’ is growing in popularity among the Holy City’s social elite.

There is also a growing black market of sorts beneath the rustic veneer of the village’s people. Magical baubles and mystic trinkets are hot sellers to those in the know, and for those who are willing to pay a pretty piece of gold for it, lessons in learning how to see the Innerlight. There is even a very small Shard trade which pays some of the elders greatly, though nothing nearly on the scale of the Shard trade of an Alchemical City such as Terec. For the most part, the black market is harmless and understood by the villagers, but can be looked down upon by outsiders, especially if the Holy City found out about the village’s Shard trade.