Varangantua

Varangantua is a huge hive city on the planet Alecto in Segmentum Tempestus. It is the setting for the Warhammer Crime stories published by Black Library.

Alecto itself was colonized back in the Dark Age of Technology. It is apparently far from any meaningful front lines - most of its people don't even think Xenos actually exist or know much about anything going on in the greater Imperium, despite implications that the stories set there occur during / after the Great Rift. The Mechanicus maintain numerous enclaves in the city, serving the "nearby" forge world of Zhao-Arkkad. It pays part of its Imperial Tithe in manpower, mustering a regiment of Imperial Guard trained to fight in urban environments.

Its upper class is full of scheming bastards, and everyone else is downtrodden and desperate. You're doing well if you have a Grade-4 Hab, which is basically on par with an old soviet era flat. The local enforcers, the Sanctioners and Probators of the Bastion, have their work cut out trying to keep everything going. The City is divided up into numerous subsectors. There are organ legging gangs, cannibal cults, revolutionaries, and all sorts of nastiness everywhere.

Despite that, in Varangantua's worn down edifices you'd find people of all sorts. There are proud noble houses and merchant princes, various privileged subordinate classes with skills and connections and millions upon millions of people just trying to scrape by. Many of them toil away in manufactoria to supply the Guard and meet The Tithe, but others run greasy fast food places or flog whatever they can scrounge up for some extra slate. When they get some time off, there's music and other mass entertainment (riddled with propaganda). It's not hugely unusual for someone to own a car. People worry about getting their kids into a good schola, how they'll make rent, the state of local politics and how to keep up appearances.

So basically like most other Hive Worlds.

Nothing to see here...move along..

Okay, it does have a few interesting things, including...

• Being a lucrative source of ingredients for Rejuvenat Drugs acquired via "cell draining" - literally kidnapping youths and draining them of the necessary fluids and tissues over years, sometimes without any sedation to cut back on costs.
• A schism among the Adeptus Mechanicus between the followers of Belisarius Cawl and more traditionalist forces.
• Both Ogryn and Ratlings are established, although both are highly discriminated against publically.
• Being a high end producer of Servitors, the bodies are acquired from various "sources" and have a potential chance to relapse due to shenanigans at the local Martian enclaves.
• Having a colossal night-club/pleasure palace built into a grounded battleship.
• Possibly the oldest living baseline human calls Varangantua home. She was the captain of the colony ship that landed their back in the Dark Age of Technology making her easily between 10,000 to 20,000 years old. It should be noted that she has not biologically lived all those years - she repeatedly went into stasis and changed her name several times over the centuries to avoid scrutiny and to set up her own legacy.
• An ancient religion with an awful lot of snake iconography (which is partly carried over into secular life on the planet) which is kept very secret from the regular Imperial Creed, despite its clergy claiming its just another interpretation of the Emperor…
• Another ancient cult based around cannibalism that dates back to the first colonists who had to eat each other when supplies got low. Said cultists are split between rich assholes who want kooky cannibal sex parties and rich assholes who like murdering and eating other people for the sake of it. And the latter faction are almost definitely a Khornate cult in the making.