Entertainers

Travelling entertainers: minstrels, actors, acrobats, magicians, and forturnetellers can be found throughout the 2 kingdoms. Such troupes are more common in Hu which kingdom has more liberal policies towards free movement of persons. To legally travel across Long, these groups must obtain a special warrant from the government administration. Some instead activate illegally.

This type of entertainment is popular among all classes including peasants who might take some of the few pennies they have stowed away in order to treat their families to a spectacle or else content themselves with viewing what they could without payment.

It is common for these travelling entertainers to falsely claim exotic origins: they may present themselves as mountain people from the semi-legendary northern land of Ji. Fortunetellers and magicians might claim to possess esoteric knowledge preserved among the Long priestly clans (e.g. the Eryx).

Puffery is also de rigeur with minstrels and actors claiming to have entertained at the courts of Kings and Dukes of the two kingdoms.

The aforementioned exotic origins are particularly alluring to the imagination of the Hu people. In contrast, Hu has less exotic locations and arcane traditions to impress the poeple of Long. Instead, it is the idea of Hu modernity that captivates Long: there are the Hu burghers/merchants who are seen as brash and wealthy, sometimes comical. These figures also represents commoners who are not bound by noble obligations, something which is exceedingly rare in Long (outside of the civil administration). There is also the idea of the Hu mechanic, inventor or innovator. Their "magic tricks" involve clockwork automata and incendiary powder, often in deceptive ways. One also sees Hu (or false-Hu) charlatans peddling ineffective medicines and counterfeit innovations to Long subjects of all ranks.