System: Ashio

Discovered during the 24th century, this prefecture capital is a world of high mountains and deep oceans, mostly owing to the planet’s low gravity and young geological age. The surface land is divided among three mountainous continents and a handful of island chains. Modest mineral deposits and limited expanses of arable land prevented Ashio from developing large manufacturing and agricultural industries, until the commercial potential of the planet’s extremely large native mammoths led to the rise of a ranching industry. These elephant-sized, cattle-like creatures, whose flesh is nearly indistinguishable from Terran beef – thanks to geneticists from the now-destroyed University of Ashio - helped the world attain a better-than-subsistence-level economy, becoming one of the largest exporters of beef in the galaxy.

Ashio’s most prominent geological feature is the giant Mt. Vesuvius Major. This ten-kilometer-tall volcano, said to be the largest in the Inner Sphere, is located on the southern island continent of Vesuvius Prime, at the crux of three major — if inactive — fault lines. The volcano and its surrounding lands became the center of extensive mining operations, focused on the minerals and ores churned up by ancient lava flows. Though the mountain has long been dormant, local experts have predicted that an eruption would blast enough ash and sulfur into the atmosphere to block out Ashio’s yellow sun and plunge the planet’s mild climate into an ice age.

Ashio was once home to Ashio University, a political and military college that boasted among its alumni members of the Kurita royalty. After it was destroyed in the First Succession War, a second Ashio University rose from its ruins under the auspices of the Combine’s short-lived People’s Reconstruction Effort, only to be destroyed again by a fire, believed to have been set by anti-Kurita insurgents.

Ashio’s two other continents, northeastern Rhodesia and northern Zaire, support the planet’s beef industry, with the fertile soil of the continents including the planet’s agricultural co-ops. Ashio’s capital, Iscariot, is the main distribution center, with its three Starports for exporting the beef and ores for the world.

There are no functional factories located on this planet.