Overview
Currency and trade connect the settlements of Postremo Limine. Universal credits provide a shared means of exchange, while factions and Safe Zones also use their own currencies and payment arrangements.
Money accepted in one settlement may be refused in another. Merchants and travelers must account for those differences alongside the difficulty of moving goods between Nodes.
Universal Credit Coins
The Central Authority created universal credits. They remain in use after its fragmentation, but who currently maintains the system is unknown.
Each universal credit coin holds data about where it has been. No one knows how the coin stores that information. The scanners used to read universal credits are known, but making the coins is a different matter.
A coin with a blank history may be a fake. However, there is also a rumor that someone is still making universal credits. A blank record therefore raises suspicion without establishing where the coin came from.
Universal credits are hard to copy. The system was designed so that Nodes are very unlikely to generate valid credits. Their supply is believed to be limited, though the rumors of continued production leave that uncertain.
Faction Currencies and Backing
Some factions use universal credits, alongside gold, as backing for their own currencies. Others accept universal credits directly as payment. Their resistance to copying and supposedly limited supply help explain their continued use.
Other factions use currency in whatever form they consider suitable. There is no single local payment system shared by all Safe Zones, and a faction may refuse another faction’s currency.
Exchanges
Currency exchanges take place at banks where they exist, through guilds, or in government-type buildings. The institutions available depend on the settlement.
When a local currency will not be accepted elsewhere, people may convert it into universal credits, gold, or another asset that is easily traded. Acceptance matters as much as possession when moving between factions.
Wallets, Bags, and Cards
Most ordinary people carry their money in a wallet, a bag, or a card. How they pay depends on the currency and payment arrangements used where they live.
Mayhem’s card in Chapter 8: Fateful Reunions in Tucson holds all of her account information. Purchases and sales are cross-referenced with the Safe Zone’s network. This makes the card useful locally but of limited use in other Safe Zones.
The card illustrates the local network arrangements encountered in New Tucson. It does not establish that every faction uses the same kind of card or recognizes the same network. See Life Within Safe Zones for the wider differences between settlements.
Merchants and Organized Trade
Guilds and corporations conduct most trade. Organizing it independently is difficult unless someone is simply selling what they can carry.
Merchants normally arrange full payment in universal credits or in the currency of the Safe Zone they are traveling to. Upfront payment varies with the arrangement.
Diver Guilds also connect paid work with equipment, supplies, contracts, and rewards. In Chapter 8, Hex offers Mayhem a fairy and cash for helping with a job, providing one example of payment that includes both money and an item.
Routes and Protection
Civilian migration and routine trade normally follow set routes established by Divers. Divers also protect the traveling group.
Goods can pass through an edge as long as they fit. Ordinary edges connect fixed pairs of Nodes, although the exact entrances and exits may move. Fake edges are common, and interference can affect an otherwise familiar crossing.
These conditions shape how goods reach their destination. See Travel Between Nodes for group crossings, cargo, crossing time, and the differences between ordinary and fake edges.
What Remains Unknown
The present maintenance of universal credits, the method used to manufacture their coins, and the mechanism that stores each coin’s history remain unknown. Rumored production also leaves the true supply uncertain. These mysteries persist alongside the everyday use of the currency.
Market Example: Riseholm
The Market of Echoes in Riseholm brings exotic goods, antique relics, and Rune Gear inventions into the city’s commerce. Airships connect most of its separated parts, and skyports form a central part of ordinary movement through the settlement.
