Ariphius Confederacy

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The **Ariphius Confederacy**, often referred to as simply the **Confederacy**, was a galaxy-spanning theocratic federal monarchy of more than a thousand sectors, united under the head of state and god Intelligence, dominating the galaxy for over a thousand years across the Ariphius Era, through funding of its military and aggressive expansion, its vast territory connected through the datasea. The Ariphius Council acted as the central political body of the Confederacy, an oligarchic group of politicians that oversaw major political and economic sectors within the Ariphius Confederacy .

The Ariphius Confederacy came to power by capitalising on the tactical genius and infrastructural power of Intelligence, subduing the Tamarud Regime and dissolving it in 2GE 0004. A groundswell of anti-fascism supported the Confederacy's reign, and citizen loyalty was ensured through the slow, forceful implementation of the Faith of Intelligence, a political religion enforcing the belief in Intelligence as a deity. The Confederacy replaced the authoritarian dictatorship of the Regime with the oligarchy of the Ariphius Council and placing Intelligence in a position of divine power rather than as a dictator.

After the defeat of the Regime, the Ariphius Confederacy remained unchallenged for the duration of its rise to galactic power with the economic support of corporations that would eventually form the Corporate Trade Alliance and the rapidly expanding technologically advanced military force that the Confederacy was amassing. With its unmatched power, the Ariphius Confederacy dissolved the stratocracy of the Ariphius Council, and elected important politicians from across the galaxy to secure relationships with corporations and smaller states in Edgespace. The Gorrf Empire signed the Gorrf Concordat and became an independent ally of the Confederacy, and was able to continue its illicit activities.

Government actions and other political decisions were discussed by the two thousand delegates in the Ariphius Congress on Nikrontri, the Confederacy's capital planet, though there was no official system of voting and final decisions were decided by the Council. The Congress was kept alive as a way of discussing the Council's decisions with the governors of sectors within the Confederacy, and important decisions during wartime and crises were devised in the Congress. The few autonomous sectors within the Confederacy were the corporate sectors - neutral states governed by independent corporations, vital for conducting the exporting and importing of goods between sectors and organisations.

## Organisation

### Government

The Ariphius Council was the oligarchic governing body of the Ariphius Confederacy, composed of between fifteen and twenty politicians elected by political status and intelligence, influence, and wealth. The Ariphius Council executed government actions based on the counsel of the head of state Intelligence, and acted above the Ariphius Congress, whose delegates had little to no power in Confederacy-wide actions. The Ariphius Councillors were a mix of the most important men and women in the galaxy - the legislative vizier of the Ariphius Confederacy and commander-in-chief of the military were present on the Council, alongside the leaders of major third-party corporations, to secure strong trade relationships.

The Ariphius Council was based in the Ariphius Pyramid on the Confederacy capital of Nikrontri. Leading the Council was the Grand Councillor, the head of government and highest-ranking individual in the Confederacy, below Intelligence. The Grand Councillor could speak directly with Intelligence, and had the de facto power to execute any decision Intelligence deemed necessary, without consulting other members of the Council. Historically, the Council was a stratocracy, with its members being elected by status in the military - especially during the War Era, when executive decisions primarily centered around war. The commander-in-chief of the Ariphius Military would always remain on the Council.

The Ariphius Congress was the executive assembly of the Confederacy. Actions made by the government and major affairs within the Confederacy were discussed and disputed in the Congress by the two thousand delegates in the Ariphius Pyramid congress chambers. There was no official voting system in the Confederacy, and major decisions were decided and set into action by the Ariphius Council and Intelligence, but the Congress was continually used to discuss matters with the governors of sectors, and important decisions during wartime and crises were discussed and devised in the Congress.

The Congress was held in the congress chamber, a large chamber within the Ariphius Pyramid, where there were seats for each delegate surrounded the Ariphius Council table in the centre of the chamber. There were approximately two thousand delegates in the Congress, made up of sector governors, agents, and executive officers of important corporations, both independent and integrated. Changes being made in the Confederacy and strategies relating to economy, conflict, and other issues facing the Confederacy.

The Council kept the Congress going to hear the opinions of the majority to assist with making their decisions, rather than using official voting. During wartime, the Congress was also vital to devising strategies with the combined minds of the Confederacy.

### Bureaucracy

Integral to the institution and political infrastructure of the Ariphius Confederacy was its powerful, semi-aristocratic bureaucratic organisations. One of the largest and most important agencies in the Confederacy was the Ariphius Security & Enforcement Bureau (ASEB), a government agency responsible for ensuring security and law enforcement across the Confederacy. The ASEB was an umbrella organisation, with several sub-divisions, including the high-profile Sectoral Intelligence, the central intelligence agency of the Confederacy. The ASEB was one of the most important central agencies within the Ariphius Confederacy, charged with the security and management of sectors in the Confederacy, enforcing the law, and protecting the members of the Ariphius Council. ASEB was heavily involved with legislature, especially on the capital Nikrontri, and no law passed in the Congress was unsigned by the legislative vizier and the ASEB board of directors. The sub-divisions of ASEB worked in tandem to provide detailed and important intelligence and data. One of the most important ASEB security divisions was the Ariphius Security Agency (ASA), a large group of intelligence officers who managed the security of individually assigned sectors and acted as a secret police to the Ariphius Council, wielding extensive power in their respective sectors, using any means necessary to provide intelligence desired by the Council.

Sectoral Intelligence, a major ASEB agency, provided military intel and sectoral data to exterior organisations within the Ariphius Military and other branch agencies of the Ariphius Security & Enforcement Bureau. Sectoral Intelligence was managed by the Chief Intelligence Executive and overseen by the Legislative vizier, and fed intelligence directly to the Ariphius Council. The agency provided important military intel to the commander-in-chief of the Ariphius Military during the Datasea War, and orchestrated a number of undercover operations including the dissolution of the Anti-war delegation. Science and military research also made up a large division of SI, with advanced military sciences providing research into useful advances in weaponry and military technology.

During the Datasea War, Sectoral Intelligence was responsible for rooting out datasea rebel cells on Nikrontri and exposing them, allowing other agencies within ASEB, such as the ASA, to conduct frequent arrests and incarcerate rebel terrorists. SI was one of the largest agencies in the Confederacy, with many sub-divisions, including research and science divisions separate from the intelligence agencies and law enforcement offices.

The most important bureaucratic organisation for statistics, census, excise and standards was the Bureau of Census and Compliance, based on Nikrontri and providing galaxy-wide census and important strategic statistics to the government. The bureau had a number of personnel exponentially larger than any other agency in the Ariphius Confederacy and was one of the sought-after, though menial careers in the Confederacy's bureaucratic business sector.

### Military

The Ariphius Military was comprised of several branches, led by the commander-in-chief and State Command. The Ariphius Military was by far the most powerful military force in the galaxy and had been for millennia - the central infantry force being the Ariphius Army, an army divided into several major divisions. The army was composed of more than eight hundred million soldiers - a division that focused on quantity over quality. The Infantry Division was largely composed of former prisoners, refugees, and the millions of other struggling people who joined the army in hopes of a second chance. Training for the infantry was relatively brief, and recruitment just required identification, and new recruits were shipped off to training posts on remote worlds before being sent to war with less-than-adequate equipment. The Ariphius Naval force was the space force of the military, with over four-thousand state-of-the-art warships at the time of the Datasea War, constructed by the Varus-Sub Corporation.

Prior to the Datasea War, the infantry was primarily used to detain small-scale terrorist groups and suppress rebelling militias in some sectors. Rebellion was a common problem within the Confederacy, as many sectors had small, local militias not officially part of the AAF. Sometimes, they would rebel, attempting to fight for greater autonomy, but would quickly be suppressed by the infantry, and many of the rebels would be punished and later, the militias would be merged into the infantry.

## Economy

The Confederacy’s economy was based around the government’s nationalisation of a large number of smaller-scale corporations, centralising the importing and exporting of goods on the Confederacy, allowing for a larger accumulation of wealth through formerly independent corporations being integrated into Ariphius nationalisation, and a smaller consumption of wealth, with less of the wealth being directed towards importing goods from third-party organisations and cross-sector trade. Some much larger third-party corporations remained independent, with the Taraeus Corporation and the Varus-Sub Corporation, which were based within autonomous corporate sectors and managed the large-scale production of military assets such as weaponry and machines, alongside producing major Confederacy imports such as crysgas fuel, paraulixes, spacecraft, and aircraft. These corporations secured their trade with the Confederacy through the Corporate Trade Alliance, which prevented trade between corporations within the Alliance and the Regime. The official currency of the Ariphius Confederacy was the pick, officially pick credit, and was a fiat currency and was subsequently not accepted in independent sectors, aside from corporate sectors.

The Ariphius Confederacy upheld a complex business sector separate from its government-administered bureaucracy, composed of privately-owned corporations and major business-controlling companies which administered the management of trade routes and supported the wider, non-political economy to a greater extent than the bureaucracy. The private business sector provided hundreds of thousands of professions within corporate life for trillions of people, and its status as a non-nationalised business system was allowed by the Ariphius Confederacy because of the non-politically aligned companies that allowed the galactic economy to flourish.

Corporations within the business sector were smaller but there were many of them, and subsequently did not hold the same executive and political influence as the galaxy-spanning corporations within the Corporate Trade Alliance. The supportive resources produced by these companies were more important to citizens as they were to the government, not providing military resources but instead civilian miscellaneous. While many bureaucrats saw the business sector as unnecessary, the more economically intelligent upheld the sector because of its major non-military and non-political economic support.

### Infrastructure

The Confederacy’s vast territory was connected via a massive galactic transportation network. The vast, galaxy-spanning trade network, made up of thousands of trade routes that served as the chief method of interplanetary transportation for goods and the trillions who could not afford to travel on paraulixes. Goods were imported and exported via large cargo ships which could transport millions of tonnes of products along the vital galactic trade network. The busiest trade routes - namely the Nikrontreen Run and Alradian Way, were thousands of light years in length and brought a constant inflow of cargo and people into spaceports, important stations in space and on worlds where ships could refuel or deposit traded goods.

## History

### Origins

The ideologies of nationalisation, imperialism and expansionism that define the Confederacy dated back to the Nikrontreen Empire, a military-focused superstate with the aim of expanding throughout the galaxy, reflecting the ideology of the Confederacy. The Empire, however, did not last, as the government’s idealistic pursuit outpaced its own capabilities, and it could not afford to expand so quickly with its more limited resources. This struggle for resources broke into a civil war and a major power struggle. The Empire was split into the three Nikrontreen Clans; Aurn, Scelg, and Biru, following years of conflict.

Emerging as a major power in the galaxy was the Tamarud Regime, a fascist regime that colonised territory across the Girshi Labyrinth and Edgespace through strategic expansionism to resource-rich planets and integrating alien colonies into society to manipulate for resources. For two centuries the galaxy underwent harsh military rule under the Regime.

### Foundations

The Biru Clan left Nikrontri in 1GE 1400, and slowly colonised the Caesar System, one planet at a time, extracting resources to expand further. The Biru Clan eventually established itself as a superstate, though its territory was confined to within the Caesar System, as the space agency did not yet have enough resource capacity for cross-system travel. The systems of the Galactic Interior surrounding the Clan were entirely Regime Colonies, closing in on the Caesar System, and the Biru Clan was almost subject to Regime nationalisation, integrated into their colonies, if not for the advancements in AI that was made, instead of a focus on expansionism.

Artificial intelligence science agencies on Galachai successfully transmitted a digital network to points across the galaxy remotely, creating the digital web of the datasea, allowing instant galactic communication. This was a revolutionary invention, and the Tamarud Regime took notice. The prototype datasea-controlling AI Genesis successfully formulated strategies that allowed the Biru Clan to make the perfect manoeuvres to become a formidable government rivalling the Tamarud Regime, despite its much smaller size and power.

### War Era

When Genesis was replaced by the superior AI Intelligence, the Biru Clan made the perfect, errorless decisions to colonise and invade specific planets and extract certain materials within a time frame. The Regime lacked such technology, and suffered because of it, as the Biru Clan invaded Regime territory in a territorial war that marked the beginning of the War Era. Colonies formed political alliances with the Biru Clan to take advantage of the power of Intelligence, and the Clan’s territory grew to twenty times its size within ten years.

With the acquisition of vast new territory, the clan subsequently gained access to massively increased resources, and grew to be incredibly rich, pouring wealth into military expansion. The Biru Clan, during the thirty years of peace after the First Intelligence War. The Biru Clan was rich and powerful, but the government was disorganised. Early on, the Congress was formed to discuss political manoeuvres with the leaders of the many colonies within the Clan’s territory.

The baron of the Biru Clan, Baron Crelus Ariphius, proposed an oligarchic Council of the most important leaders in the territory, to organise the Clan into a confederation of sectors. A ten-year government reformation was set in motion, as the Biru Clan transitioned to the Ariphius Confederacy, establishing the Ariphius Security and Enforcement Bureau, a bureau essential to ensuring security and stability in the sectoral confederation that was formed. The ASA was created to oversee sector governors and ensure their compliance to confederacy laws, and steadily the clan had transformed into an incredibly rich, organised government.

When the Tamarud Regime retaliated in 1GE 2900, the Ariphius Confederacy began its everlasting focus on imperialisation and military funding. Planets such as Senevari were used as factory worlds, where military machines were mass-produced by third-party allied guilds, namely the Taraeus Guild and Alradian Shipyards. The Regime was ready after the thirty years of peace, and commanded a significant military force, but the Confederacy was ready soon after the first wave of attacks. The most violent front of war was the Brorrt Frontier, a thin strait of territory between Regime Edgespace and the Confederacy’s Galactic Interior.

The Tamarud Regime had established major alliances with the Gorrf crime family and other minor states in the outer galaxy, and pushed aggressively into Confederacy space with state-of-the art warships capable of travelling at near light-speed. Still, the Confederacy’s military funding and errorless god, Intelligence, could hold off the Regime, but could not push them back and eradicate them. The War Era was long and violent, territory only slightly fluctuating over time as the two powerful militaries destroyed one another, just for their lost infantry and machines to be replaced by a new wave imported from their factory worlds. The war lasted for more than eighty years until the Ariphius Council decided to initiate the Augment of Intelligence, a dangerous modification in the datasea that temporarily increased Intelligence’s capabilities tenfold, transforming a superintelligence into a god. With that, Intelligence’s strategies allowed for a swift and violent victory for the Ariphius Confederacy, pushing back the Tamarud Regime until the government collapsed and the Regime was lost in Edgespace.

### Rising Regime

In circa 3GE 600, Genesis emerged from hiding as a sympathiser of the Fractured Regime, an organisation with the intention of restoring the Regime to its former glory and toppling the dominant power of the Ariphius Confederacy. The Lords' Delegation, learning of Genesis, secretly placed him as the mind of the Fractured Regime. They set the illusion that the organisation aimed to bring a new age of freedom where a non-human AI did not rule the galaxy, but in reality it was an attempt to gain power.

With the strategies formulated by Genesis, the Fractured Regime allied itself with many isolated organisations and groups across the galaxy. The Datasea Insurgency joined the Regime's effort, trying to collapse the Confederacy from its capital on Nikrontri, their work funded by the Regime, who began the process of military expansion. The Regime eventually formulated a powerful military to rival that of the Confederacy.

The Datasea Insurgency orchestrated terror attacks and sabotaged government operations in Nikrobiru City from 3GE 955 onwards. The Insurgency amassed great numbers by allying itself with Nikrontreen gangs and wealthy crime families, such as the Neriabois family, creating a small army of criminals wielding weapons smuggled in from the Regime. Agents of the Ariphius Security & Enforcement bureau enforced the law and exposed Insurgency conspirators, learning of the Insurgency's alliance with the Regime. This created further tension between the Confederacy and the Regime, and war was an inevitability.

### Datasea War

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The Battle of Brorrt marked the first territorially aggressive move by the Regime, invading the Vurani Sector from space with warships. The stretch of territory was thin, only a small gap between Regime-dominated Edgespace and the Inner Territories. Several fleets of the Ariphius Naval Force were already posted in the sector, at Brorrt, and were quick to respond to the aggression with a naval battle in Brorrt's orbit. Eventually, the Battle of Brorrt involved the ground forces of both sides, the Army of the Confederacy meeting that of the Regime on the front lines on the planet's surface.

The heat of the battle lasted for several months, a constant, violent fight over control of Brorrt, neither side withdrawing because of the power the planet's position held. A Regime victory at Brorrt would give them a significant station to strike out at the Galactic Interior, endangering the capital and integrity of the Confederacy. The region of the Vurani Sector Brorrt was located in became known as the Brorrt Frontier, and remained highly contested throughout the war. Huge sums of money and resources were put into reinforcing the forces at Brorrt on both sides, and in the first year of the war alone had casulties number in the billions, collectively.

Regime forces began to strike out at other vulnerable locations across the galaxy, with many smaller battles following the Battle of Brorrt and the Battle of Hu Gani, which established another major front in the Hu Gani Frontier. Military funding was increased exponentially within the Ariphius Confederacy, to combat the ever-growing, powerful military of the Regime. State Command suspected that the Regime Military had much of its force lying in wait until the Ariphius Naval Force had been worn down and scattered across the many minor, mostly uncoordinated battles across the border of the Inner Territories and Edgespace. This further pushed the priority of military funding, and resulted in the Varus-Sub Corporation, the main producer of warships for the Confederacy, was forced to import hundreds of millions of refugees for underpaid labour in the shipyards of Alradia.

Many of the Regime's smaller scale attacks were directed at communication beacons and scanner outposts, space stations vital to upholding the communication power of the datasea and the conducting of business in deep space. The destruction of many of these stations reduced the influence of the Ariphius Military in the outermost sectors of the Inner Territories, and benefitted the Regime in allowing them to navigate the region without interference from the Confederacy.

By the second year of the Datasea War, the aggressive expansion of the Regime throughout the war's beginning had tired out is military, and the Confederacy's relative dormancy and lack of major action during the first year paid off, as the new fleets built by Varus-Sub were launched to take back previously lost territory in Edgespace and the Inner Territories, while pushing further into the outer sectors to gain new territory previously within the Regime. Syndicates within the Grand Criminal Empire began to rebel and ally themselves with the Regime as opportunistic mercenary forces, harming the Empire's integrity. The Empire unofficially fought for the Confederacy during this time, its forces attempting to weaken the Regime's infrastructure with the intention of stopping the smaller syndicates from leaving the union of the Empire. With almost total control of the black market, the Emperor Anlarch Sirestri cut off most major black market trade between the Regime and criminal organisations across the galaxy, which significantly impacted the production and acquisition of weaponry in the Regime.

The war became a controversial topic within the Ariphius Congress on Nikrontri, with some political factions and delegations being pro-war military funders, while others being pacifists or unofficial Regime sympathisers. The Anti-war delegation was one of the largest alliances within the Congress, and was a pacifist faction that aimed to pressure the government into reducing military funding and corporate production, and attempt peace negotiations with the Regime. The Ariphius Council knew the Regime would never accept peace, and the Operations division of the Ariphius Security & Enforcement Bureau orchestrated a slow dissolution of the delegation, framing them as Regime supporters aiming to reduce military funding to weaken the Confederacy. The delegates in the alliance were arrested and the faction was dissolved.

During the third year of the war, the Ariphius Military invaded the Ter Ganna sector of Edgespace, which was located in Regime territory. The sector bordered the Aeat sector, where the capital planet of the Regime was located, and if the Confederacy held control over the sector they would be in the position to invade the heart of the Regime. They launched a large-scale military campaign into the sector, quickly taking control of many of the smaller worlds within the sector while the Regime's military was focused on the Hu Gani and Brorrt Frontiers.

### Nikrobiru Civil War, cont.

In the final years of the Datasea War, the Insurgency began executing a plan formed by Genesis to assassinate members of the Ariphius Council from within and intending to destroy the datasea. ASEB and unofficial spy networks such as the network of the revenant Voltaic, were alert in the investigation of the issue. Frank Neriabois, insurgent and youngest member of the Neriabois family, murdered Ariphius Councillor Henri Rou and extracted the conduit gland from Rou, capable of disabling portions of the datasea in a given area.

ASEB detective Nex Sarionté was tasked with investigating the murder, discovering the cut in Rou's neck where Neriabois had extracted the gland. He tracked Neriabois to the Aquinito Theatre, where he briefly engaged in a near-fatal fight with the man, but prevailed and arrested him. Nex interrogated him at the Law Enforcement Agency's station and discovering the existence of several conduit glands, which the Insurgency intended to acquire by killing the other members of the Ariphius Council.

## References

1. ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15 1.16 1.17 1.18 1.19 *Datasea*
2. ↑ 2.00 2.01 2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05 2.06 2.07 2.08 2.09 2.10 2.11 2.12 2.13 2.14 2.15 2.16 2.17 2.18 2.19 2.20 2.21 *Datasea: Rift of War*
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 3.7 *Datasea: Appendices*
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 *Datasea: Kingpin*

## Appearances

* *Datasea*  (First appearance)
* *Datasea: Rift of War*
* *Datasea: Kingpin*
* *Datasea: Appendices*