Shathenaten

Shathenaten in front of the his Governor's Palace

Shathenaten was the former governor of the core city of Bruhmethius. However, he would create a plot involving schemes and kidnappings that would cause the April Uprising, and open rebellion against the Empire of Kufmal. After the uprising's failure, he presumably escaped into hiding.

## History

### Early History

Shathenaten grew up in Bruhmethius, obtaining a minor position in the local government. He ran a public campaign to gain the office of Governor by promising to turn Bruhmethius into a proud and majestic core city that could compete with the capital. This campaign was successful, with the Emperor appointing Shathenaten for the office in February of 2022.

### Reign of the "God-King"

After Shathenaten's elevation to Governor, he began to make true on his campaign promise. The governor had one goal in mind: to bring glory to himself and his city. The first part of this plan was to transform Bruhmethius into an Imperial Core City. This was put in motion with a massive construction plan, funded by heavy tax reform. The increase in local taxes was justified by extravagant projects to bring pride and opportunity to the city's residents. These taxes were acceptable to most at first, but only increased as time went on, causing some silent discontent.

This plan involved a rate of design and construction that could not be handled by Bruhmethius' Kappa engineers alone. He ordered the Kappa to tirelessly work to create new designs for structures, and the pace was so fast that they even dug up old designs. One of these was a plan for a yellow lighthouse, the same one that was supposed to go to the city of Cape Lookout before their designers swapped blueprints by accident. This old blueprint became the Yellow Lighthouse.

Even with the rapid pace of development, Shathenaten was not pleased with the pace. He then hatched a plan to abduct the best architect in the empire, Master Architect Illotep, using the justification that he was born in Bruhmethius and thus should stop making projects for other cities. This plot was carried out when he sent his agent Hunter Hardy (under the alias *Agent H*) to kidnap the architect from the construction site at the Imperial Summer Palace in Uxban. This was carried out in mid-March of 2022. The Bunbunmaru Kufmal Gazette reported on the disappearance, but was oblivious to the true cause Shathenaten kept the architect locked up in secret, forcing him to design various large building projects for the city.

Shathenaten's next step was sending Agent H to case out Kufmal City's Temple of the Yellow Sun for inspiration on decorating a pyramid of his own. However, Hunter accidentally found the hiding place of the avatar of a sun god called the Yatagarasu, who was being kept a secret by one of the temple's priests. This information caused another plan to form, and the governor decided that if he could harness the power of a sun god, he could become a king, or even a god himself. He ordered a secret containment chamber be installed in his pyramid design.

   Soon enough the Pyramid of Shathenaten was completed, which at the time was described by the Gazette as "a place of worship, as well as serving several other governmental roles" and "shows the dedication and glory of its governor". However, some failures of hiding construction of the containment chamber on the top floor led the Gazette's head Tengu reporter, Aya Shameimaru, to grow suspicious. Shathenaten, realizing the architect had a watermark made of rare calcite in his construction style that was in every building he built, sent Agent H to burn down the house of Illotep in Uxban to hide evidence of this link.

Hunter succeeded in burning the house, but some documents survived, and the information was found by a private investigation led by Aya and the businessman Fren Banklin. An assassination of the crow Tengu was attempted, but failed. This prompted the team to investigate further, obtaining enough proof to present to the Emperor.

In the meantime, Shathenaten began to be more restrictive on personal freedoms. He began a cult of personality around himself, which would eventually evolve into a short-lived religion. He also began actively restricting public grievances against his regime, with guards whipping those caught for "crimes against unity".

### The April Uprising

   Shathenaten decided to move up his timeline, having his agent kidnap the somewhat dim-witted Yatagarasu and locking her up inside the pyramid on the night of 4/6/2022. That same night, he announced that Bruhmethius was separating into its own kingdom, with himself as its new God-King and head of his own state-enforced religion. He revealed that his prison for the Yatagarasu could harvest her power and create a solar weapon no one could counter. This did not deter the Emperor, as he rallied the Kufmalian Army under general Roy Bateas and the Kufmalian Navy under admiral Aquarius.

Despite Shathenaten's rapid construction of defenses around the city and mass conscription, the Imperial forces conducted a naval invasion on the ninth of April. Once a beachhead was established, most of Shathenaten's forces defected to the imperial side, with the rest retreating to the Pyramid of Shathenaten. A quick siege led to an assault the next morning, with imperial forces breaching the wall and storming the lower levels and rescuing Master Architect Illotep from a dungeon below the pyramid. However, when the army made it to the entrance of the containment chamber, a mechanism in the roof focused the Yatagarasu's power into beams that blasted holes in the side of the pyramid, vaporizing anyone caught in their path. With quick thinking, a charge led by the Emperor himself gave him room to fire enchanted arrows at the cage's mechanisms. This freed the Yatagarasu, which turned out to be a Hell Raven named Utsuho Reiuji. Upon breaking free, she turned her powers against the remaining rebel forces and turned the tide. Shathenaten himself fled in the confusion using some unknown magical assistance, and all remaining resistance surrendered.

To this day, Shathenaten has never been found, despite an active arrest warrant and a labeling as imperial public enemy number one.

## Legacy

Shathenaten has had a devisive legacy in the minds of the empire's citizens. Most outside of Bruhmethius have a mainly negative view against him for his uprising, kidnappings and assassination attempts. This view is elevated to pure hatred in the form of the followers of Yellowism, who view the kidnapping and abuse of the Yatagarasu as a cardinal sin. This hatred is so public that the imperial government has warned the religion's priests to stop burning Shathenaten effigies, and the Emperor himself has reminded them that Shathenaten needs to be captured alive, not dead.

However, Shathenaten's legacy is more mixed to those in Bruhmethius itself. Many hate the tax hikes that were normal under Shathenaten's short reign, but most citizens benefit from infrastructure and economic growth under his rule, such as the University of Bruhmethius. There was an undeniable boom for the city, despite damage from the April Uprising.

Another example is that of Shathenaten's restrictions on freedoms of speech, which were universally unpopular. However, Shathenaten's own personal God-King religion only existed for a handful of days, too short of a time to be properly studied. The general consensus is that Shathenaten was an efficient ruler whose obsession with his own vanity did him in.