Phillip Neptos

**Emperor Phillip Neptos**, known formally by the title **Emperor Rael'Fialt**, was the Emperor of the Second Fialta Imperium during the 5th century A.U.

## History

### Lineage and Rise to Power

Prince Neptos was the son of Prince Wenceslas Rogers and the great-grandson of Emperor Mithranatus of the Second Fialta Imperium during the First Coalition War. Phillip Neptos would go on to lead the Othali branch of the Imperial family, remaining close to his Rogers cousins (Lindon, Bush, and Carter and their heirs) after the Coalition War.

Neptos came from a long line of frustrated claimants to the Imperial throne; his great-grandfather and namesake Neptos had been sidelined from his father's inheritance by his uncle Mithranatus, and Phillip Neptos's grandfather Vermes had been a rival claimant to Prince Felix and Prince Bruscius during the Imperial succession crisis at the end of the Coalition War. Phillip Neptos spent the subsequent forty years following his grandfather's defeat in the succession crisis building a vast network of alliances and relations, drawing on both his Imperial parentage and the resources bequeathed his lineage by his great-grandfather Prince Rogers.

Neptos secured himself as the establishment choice for the Imperial succession after the nomination and death of the non-bloodline heir Claudius. Shortly after achieving the title of Crown Prince, Neptos was raised to the Imperial throne in a coup against his second-cousin, the Emperor Asterion. Neptos came to power due largely to the fiasco of the Imperial invasion of the Thalranese Marches and the subsequent Second Coalition War: in one of the many ironies of Fialta succession politics, the same Othali-linked circle of naval officers who helped bring Neptos to power was largely responsible for orchestrating the war itself (finding a convenient scapegoat in Asterion).

### Emperor of the Fialta Imperium

During the coup and ensuing fallout, Neptos enjoyed the support of the Bank of Valdos, the Church of Dalthad, and the Imperial Navy, but faced opposition from the Imperial Army and some elements of the Fialta Security Bureau as well as being broadly unpopular with the Thalranese segments of the Imperial populace.

The accession of Neptos was characterized by tense renegotiations of the power-sharing agreements made among the great Imperial institutions at the end of the First Coalition War. Ultimately, these agreements were formalized in the first Fialta Constitution: masterminded by the Dalthadi Bakken Alia, the provisions of the constitution established both a near-term succession to the Imperial throne and rules for the appointment and possible removal of future emperors.

As Emperor, Neptos gave the highest priority to building a power-base for his dynasty, through strategic marriages, lucrative sinecures for his relatives and insinuation of the Cult of Othal as his proxy in the highest levels of Fialta military and civilian administration.

### Shantine Relations

Outside of these priorities, the reign of Philip Neptos was dominated by religious and diplomatic crises around the re-ascending Shantine Empire. Although the Shantine reconquest of Zanevuela from the Fialta Imperium marked a radical turn in Shantine foreign policy, Neptos and his court reached a successful policy of accomodation with Theoboda's government. This policy was predicated on a (highly secret) mutual recognition that neither power could meaningfully gain from further conquests against the other due to deeply embedded religious animosity from any would-be subjects: the powers coordinated policies, from migration incentives such as land grants to blunter tools such as mass deportation (especially on the Shantine side), to further homogenize their own societies and deepen the disincentives for wars of conquest. This remarkable diplomatic coup allowed the Fialta regime to focus its resources on undermining the Serene Duchy of Aeldrum, which the Neptine court viewed as the historic enemy not of the Fialta people (that distinction belonging of course to the Shantine) but of the Imperium as an institution.

Ultimately, the pattern of cooperation over ethno-religious matters by the Shantine and Fialta empires provided a diplomatic platform for the Shantine Empress to offer suitable concessions (in the form of Alusian land) for the Fialta Imperium to lend its weight to the Tripartite Peace that Bishant would force on the Alusian Empire at the end of the Alusia-Shantine War. With his prize at Del'Mar under the Tripartite Peace, Neptos was able to largely offset the economic and demographic losses from Zanevuela.