World
The World of Authority of Ash
Authority of Ash is in a way a puzzle. If you would like to help unravel that puzzle, then you are in the right place. The World Archive is here to help you delve into the mysteries, subplots, and deeper rooted ideas implanted into the Authority of Ash ecosystem. There will be many mysteries to solve. You will need to have your eyes and ears open to ensure you do not miss any clues that could help solve what is happening inside the Authority of Ash ecosystem. Follow the threads and interconnections to help you and others determine what is happening in Garza. Maybe you’ll uncover the next great mystery or idea to unfold. Be sure to discuss your ideas with everyone else in the Community pages.
WHAT IS HAPPENING
The world of Authority of Ash centers on the city of Garza, a modern metropolis built on infrastructure, planning, and institutional order. From the outside it looks like a city designed to function efficiently: bridges spanning the river, transit networks linking districts, redevelopment projects reshaping older neighborhoods, and research institutions quietly expanding their influence across the region.
In recent years, however, a growing number of unusual discoveries have begun to challenge that sense of stability. Construction crews have uncovered objects embedded within walls and foundations where nothing should exist. Survey teams have documented sealed chambers hidden inside structural spaces that appear on no architectural record. Investigators studying these discoveries have begun assembling a growing archive in an attempt to understand what they are seeing.
What started as scattered anomalies has slowly become something larger. Certain organizations have begun cataloging discoveries, forming investigative groups, and quietly debating how much of this information should remain hidden from the general public.
Most people living in Garza remain unaware that anything unusual is happening at all. A smaller number are beginning to realize that the city may be changing in ways no one fully understands.
The sections below introduce the major elements shaping the world of Authority of Ash.
Explore the sections below to understand the people, discoveries, and organizations shaping the future of Garza.
GARZA
Garza is a river city defined by growth. Its districts stretch outward along transit corridors, research campuses, and redevelopment zones that continue to reshape the skyline. The city was designed to function through layered systems of planning, engineering, and civic oversight, making it one of the most structurally organized urban centers in the region.
That stability is precisely what makes the recent discoveries within the city so unsettling. Many of the anomalies being documented have appeared inside structures that should be completely understood by engineers and planners. Objects have been found sealed inside concrete walls, embedded beneath foundations, or hidden within infrastructure spaces that were never meant to contain anything at all.
These discoveries have drawn the attention of research groups, private investigators, and government offices attempting to determine whether the objects represent isolated incidents or part of a larger pattern. As more discoveries appear across multiple districts, Garza itself has become the central location for a growing investigation that may reshape how the city understands its own foundations.
The story of Authority of Ash begins here, within a city that appears ordinary enough to trust, but has begun revealing evidence that something unexpected may be embedded within its structures.
Click the Garza link or click on the Garza page to explore the districts, locations, and investigation sites connected to the earliest discoveries.
ARTIFACTS
Artifacts are unusual objects that investigators find throughout Garza’s built environment. Construction crews, demolition teams, and infrastructure workers uncover most of them when their work exposes objects embedded in places that should not contain anything at all. Investigators also encounter other objects in everyday locations such as shopping districts, river walkways, parks, thrift stores, and many other parts of the city. These objects rarely appear dramatic at first glance. Many resemble ordinary items that someone appears to have misplaced or forgotten.
The difficulty begins when investigators attempt to document them more closely. Some artifacts appear to influence the environment around them in subtle ways. Others behave differently depending on who interacts with them or where they are located. Many cannot be explained through normal manufacturing or construction processes. Even when they appear inert, their discovery often coincides with unusual circumstances that investigators struggle to fully document.
Because of these patterns, artifacts have become the primary focus of the growing archive within Garza. Investigators catalog each discovery carefully, recording its location, physical characteristics, and any unusual effects they observe during handling. Over time these records have begun to reveal similarities between objects discovered across different parts of the city.
Artifacts are now considered the most significant category of discoveries within Garza. They are studied, contained, and debated by every organization involved in the archive.
Visit the Artifacts Archive to explore known classifications, investigation files, and featured discoveries.
ENHANCERS
Enhancers represent a second category of anomalous objects currently being studied in Garza. Investigators discover some enhancers within the city just as they do artifacts, while other enhancers emerge from experimental work as researchers attempt to interact with or stabilize unusual objects. Unlike artifacts, enhancers are often smaller and more volatile in their behavior. Some appear as treated materials, powders, coatings, or modified objects designed to interact with other items in controlled environments. In certain conditions enhancers can amplify, suppress, or stabilize unusual effects associated with artifacts. In other situations they can produce unpredictable outcomes that escalate an already unstable scenario.
Because enhancers can influence how artifacts behave, they have become one of the most controversial areas of research within the archive. Some investigators believe they represent an important tool for understanding the discoveries appearing throughout the city. Others argue that experimenting with enhancers risks creating problems that are far more difficult to control.
Enhancers have also revealed an uncomfortable reality within the archive: once investigators begin interacting with these discoveries directly, observation becomes intervention. Each new experiment introduces variables that cannot always be reversed.
Visit the Enhancers page to explore how discovered and experimental enhancers are being studied across Garza.
ATTUNEMENT
As artifacts and enhancers became more widely studied, investigators began noticing that certain individuals appeared to interact with these objects differently than others. Some people seemed more capable of detecting unusual properties in an artifact before it was fully documented. Others were able to handle objects that produced unexpected reactions when handled by someone else.
Researchers eventually began referring to this phenomenon as attunement, though its exact nature remains poorly understood. Attunement does not appear to follow clear patterns of training, profession, or background. Some investigators develop it gradually through repeated exposure to artifacts. Others appear capable of noticing unusual details immediately upon encountering them.
The existence of attunement has complicated efforts to standardize how artifacts and enhancers are studied. If individual perception influences how these objects behave, then research methods that assume identical results for every observer may be incomplete.
For now, attunement remains a working theory within the archive. Some factions consider it an essential factor in understanding the discoveries appearing across Garza, while others remain skeptical of drawing conclusions too quickly.
Visit the Attunement page to learn how investigators are attempting to measure and document this phenomenon.
FACTIONS
As discoveries continue to appear across Garza, multiple organizations have stepped forward, each promoting its own philosophy for handling the archive. These factions do not always agree on the best approach, and their disagreements have become an increasingly important factor shaping events within the city.
There are 4 main factions throughout Garza and 1 sub-faction. The main factions are HAWK, FISH, BEAR, GTFU, and the sub-faction is the INDEPENDENTS. They all are posturing for their place in the ever expanding world of artifacts, enhancers and the controlling force behind them.
Some factions focus on documenting and containing these discoveries until they determine exactly what they are dealing with. Others argue that the phenomena appearing in Garza represent an opportunity to learn something entirely new about the world. Still others believe that pushing research further, even at considerable risk, may reveal answers that cautious investigation cannot.
These competing perspectives have produced alliances, rivalries, and occasional confrontations as each group attempts to influence how the archive develops.
Explore the factions page to understand the organizations shaping Garza’s response to the archive.
BLOG & NEWSLETTER
The Authority of Ash Blog and Newsletter provide a deeper look into the discoveries unfolding across Garza. Through lore articles, development updates, investigation reports, and archive files, readers can follow the expanding world beyond the events of the novels.
Subscribers to the newsletter also receive exclusive content not published elsewhere on the site, including additional investigation records and world-building materials connected to the series.
New newsletter subscribers will receive a free prequel story entitled “The Archive Incident,” which takes place before the events of Book I and introduces one of the earliest documented investigations connected to the archive. If you are already a subscriber and would like to read the free prequel then use the contact form on the Contact Page.