003 -- The Geography and Geology of Eos, and a History of Cambric Ore

Excerpt from the introduction to "Geography, Geology, and You: A Modern Look at the Formation of our World" by Hammond, Colmes, and Watson, 4th edition. p. 1183 S.E.

It is impossible to understate the importance of the connection between geology and the geography of our world. Mountains, seas, rivers, lakes, plains, forests, even the very weather we experience every day have all been shaped by the complex and fascinating history of geology. Without studying the earth beneath us, we could not understand how the rest of the world functions -- a comprehensive education that acknowledges the connections between these subjects is key to a modern scientific viewpoint. Every day new advances in technology and research give us fresh insights into the world below our very feet.

As we all know, Eos is shaped much like a large ring. The Inland Sea lies at the center of the continent, linked to the greater ocean by a series of straits and passages to the South. Water that empties from the multitude of rivers into the Inland Sea eventually flows out of these passages. Several smaller bodies of water stretch off of the Inland Sea, most notably the Cimbur Channel to the Southeast through Cimbria. The far North is dominated by frozen wasteland, while the East, West, and distant South are bordered by the greater ocean.

The continent of Eos is dominated by three large mountain ranges. To the West of the Inland Sea and across the Iram Desert lie the Jehara (je Ha' rah) mountains, a vast range running North to South. To the South of the Inland sea and stretching East are the Ifraetes (eh Fray' tees). And finally, East of the sea are the Greyspike mountains, also stretching North to South and spliting into two spurs in the North.

Of the three, the Jehara are the tallest and the oldest. Volcanic activity is nearly non-existent. Despite spanning for hundreds of miles and across multiple climate zones, most peaks in the Jehara mountains are snow-capped year round. Their great height has created the Iram desert -- warm, moist winds coming from the West are forced upwards, grow colder and dump their moisture in vast rain and snowfalls that define the far Western coast of Eos. Coming back down the East side of the mountains, the winds are dry and hot, scouring the Iram desert and creating a pattern of great dunes.

The Ifraetes are unique in stretching East to West instead of North and South like the other two ranges. They are newer geologically than the Jehara mountains, and have some volcanic activity. However, they are the shortest of the three chains in terms of average peak height, with only a very few having permanent snow-caps. They form the spine of a system of islands stretching away from the main continent of Eos to the East, with most volcanic activity concentrated in that region.

The Greyspike mountains are the newest of the three main ranges, though of course are still over a hundred million years old. It is a very violent mountain range, with several active volcanos across it's length. Second in average height, the Geryspikes are famous for bitter winter conditions, espeically in the Eastern Greyspikes which stretch far into the Northern wastes. Most importantly, however, the Greyspikes contain the largest exploitable veins of cambric ore in Eos.

A brief history of cambric ore is called for, due to it's overwhelming importance to the political, economic, and technological climate of today. It was first discovered in 1065 S.E. in the hills outside the village Camber inside the nation of Cimbria. A mineral at first resembling iron, it quickly begins to behave differently when refined. It melts at a temperature slightly above 1700 degrees, but after cooling and returning to a solid state it takes on very peculiar thermodynamic properties. The quantity of heat that cambric can absorb increases tremendously after this first hardening. Depending on the purity of the refining process, cambric can absorb from several hundred to several thousand times the amount of heat energy of the equivalent amount of iron or steel.

This introduces some complications into the refining process -- namely, cambric can only be melted once. The heat cost to melt cambric after it has hardened is prohibitive, as it can take several days of constant heat in the hottest furnace to break down high grade cambric metal.

The other strange property of cambric ore is it's ability to release this stored heat almost on command. A piece of cambric that has absorbed a great quantity of heat is almost indistinguishable from one that has not, except that it will be slightly lighter in color. Their temperature remain the same. However, when this piece is dealt a sharp physical blow at any point across it's surface, it immediately increases to a temperature of between three and four hundred degrees and remains at that temperature until the energy it has absorbed has been expended. Thus, heated pieces of cambric are treated very gently lest they go off prematurely.

The reason for cambric's bizzarre chemical properties is not readily apparent. The atomists theorize that cambric is a naturally occuring alloy, and that after being heated and cooled it's internal structure takes on some sort of unique framework. Alchemists, on the other hand, maintain that a subtle chemical change is actually happening inside the metal. Fluid heat theorists maintain that cimbric has a sort of natural gravity that acts on the weightless, invisible heat fluid. Whatever the reason, it's technological and industrial value is immense.

The story of containers in human history is long and rich. Relics of clay jars from almost ten thousand years ago have been found at the mouth of the Kabir river. Cambric, then, can be thought of as the next logical development -- a storage system for heat energy. Before the discovery of cambric, energy had to be stored and utilzed by chemical means in food and muscle, or by mechanical means through expensive and limiting canals. But with the discovery of cambric ore, we became able to store, transport, and utilize great quantities of energy as heat with relative ease.

Still, cambric did not come into widespread use until the perfection of the steam heat engine almost fifty years later. In 1102 S.E., Johnathan Copper, a Cimbrian, patented his "high-pressure" double acting steam locomotor, common predecessor to the majority of steam engines in use today. In his device, heat energy from either a fire or heated cambric rods was used to boil water in a large sealed container. This water turned to steam, which was fed to a high pressure cylinder and used to move a piston back and forth. These principles are still at the heart of most engines today, from the largest ship to the smallest children's toy.

These two inventions when taken together started an industrial and social revolution of unprecedented scale. Heat could be harvested from any natural source (whether by burning coal, dousing in hot springs, or even focusing solar rays) and stored in cambric. Handled carefully, it could be transported hundreds of miles before being put into a steam engine and being utilized on the spot. 1102 has been christened the "Dawn of the Machine Age."

Cimbria, having both the largest deposits of cambric and the inventor of steam locomotion, was the first to embrace this machine revolution. Today the great hot springs in Cimbrian territory at the foot of the Greyspikes are home to the largest industrial structures in the world. Huge silos of cambric rods are continually submerged and reheated in large pools fed by the hot springs before being distributed to industrial and military complexes throughout the nation. The Ifraetes mountains were also found to contain cambric, and the conflict over who would control those resources lasted for almost a decade. However, only trace amounts of cambric have been found in the Jehara Mountains to the West, a mystery that will surely play into the political situation of the future. A history of the rise of industry, however, is beyond the scope of this text -- it is enough to know that geology and geography are intricately linked to the study of these other subjects, and that nothing can be taken in isolation.