Red Plain

The Red Plain is a poetic term for a stretch of plains which lie between the Cloud Mountains, on their east, and the Elm Mountains which lie on their west. Being low-lying and easy to traverse, they have historically been the main conduit for travel between the Tarakasane in the north, and the Hashurukasane in the south. As such, it was one of the most contested territories around the Empire's borders for centuries; the plain, even now, is strewn with old fortifications and walls built by both sides.

Names
The struggles for control over this strategic region, with its ensuing bloodshed, is what gained the plain its poetic name, which was in use in Itarakoské by the time of the Elder Anthology and, even before that, from the fragmentary Anthology of the Five and Thirty States. References to bloodshed in connection with this locality also abound in the poetry of Hashurukoské, for example in the Seven Definitions poem.

The more commonly used names, however, differ between the languages, mainly using their own cities as reference points. As such, the Tarakasane called the area the Plain of Nivabésa, or the Plain of Arkhubésa, after two of their major city-fortresses; the Hashurukasane, on the other hand, tend to call it the Plain of the Urekhmis, the Plain of Kiramis, or the Plain of Bakhtomar - the first two names after rivers, and the second after a major stronghold and sometime capital of Hashuru.