Valkadian History

## 0DC to NOW | The Bronze Age Valkadia : **Raising from the Ashes.**

**Overview : Bronze Age - The undying empire**

 Rebuilt upon the Elder's Ashes's from the last great Game and making liberal use of their age old necromantic arts, Valkadia offically calls itself the undying empire in memory of their glorious past and posit that its founding days are called the raise from the Ashes, this mark year zero of their dark calendar (DC). It benefits from a centralized institution under guidance from it's surviving houses system. Trying to reclaim their old grandeur, the valkadian set out to reclaim their old dwellings, traditional noble houses fiefdoms and knowledge.

#### **1 - 200 DC : After the stom : the elders’s spoils.**

With the ardent will to protect their northern border as much as to reclaim some of the Great House's oldest fiefdoms, Valkadia's Darklord Maleum the first orders for their northern colder forests reckoning. Soon following the call, masses of undead workers roam the woods and without much difficulty every soul in the vicinity hear the settler's axes biting in the trunks.  Following the Darklord’s expansion maneuver to recolonize their norther province, the Valkadian court boils anew with unrest. The Houses with eastern interests marshals that it is unacceptable for the imperial cradle -the Pravus wasteland desert- to remain out of Alkand grasp much longer.

The expeditionary corpses send into the ruins scattered all over the Pravus wasteland came back after a few years, securing two campsites their appointed leader decided that the cold desert was secure enough to start the rebuilding in two old cities. With these news in hands, Maleus publicly charged both House Cerreon and House Maligni to mount a conjoined reclaiming operation. Thus outplaying both House head, tying them for a decade in a fierce competition over a shared goal. Soon the whole desert teeming with unlife became a war zone, feral ghoul's rabble and droves of zombies shattering under the ordered Valkadian boots. To keep their public faces, the nobles would tame the desert, whatever the costs. And the Darklord laughed, dreaming of the old empire arcane knowledge, silted up deep under the old cinders.

 Reclaiming the Pravus desert allowed the nascent empire to regain access to their elders's cities. And their elder’s vaults, far below the wasteland’s frosted sand. Sure of the gains to be made, the Darklord’s bought loads of material to fund expeditions into the old capital lower levels. Acquiring hefty supplies of stored Delthorite and regaining access to the archives marking the old empire natural Frostfire deposits. Soon after that, the great houses politically struggled over who owned which deposit and by what right. This quickly sparking public interest over the revitalized nation's magical research, for a few years at least. Believing investing more resources into the oldest vault than their ruler will bear even more fruits ; the valkadian affluent nobles families each tries their luck and succeed in retrieving every last scraps of precious minerals from their past, furnishing their own homes in brand-new ornaments in the process and once more fuelling the fires of their eternal competition.

Following their incontestable successes as a Darklord, Maleum stepped down from the prestigious position and started the age-old rituals to make themselves a new Lich. Following the remnants of century old laws, their chosen heir marched toward their dark coronation, defeating arrogant pretenders and avoiding a myriad of traps, some set decades ago. Once seated, the new emperor decreed that the empire would rise. And rise it did. In the span of 50 years, this new leader crushed discontent to dust under his sharp talons and the Darklord faction rose to power, unprecedented in their Ashen steeped empire. Under their guidance the houses got their due in land and fame, duties and honors were dealt based on public contributions. Before the end of the century, the nation was so large, there were hushed tales of reinstating the imperial titles once again. And as rumor spread, horns sharpened. As the saying goes, silencing open dissidents in Valkadia is a surefire way to walk toward an open grave.

#### **200 - 300DC** : Imperial's comet, a symbol of progress and hope

The new dark crown kept his promises. In under fifty years, every major house had their own stronghold. Even some favored minor nobility had cities to oversee by themselves. The hearsay became more, and as time went by, Valkadia court wanted to be more than a reclusive parody of their predecessor. They wished for flying cities towering in the sky and to be once again a bubbling cauldron of international intrigue, for what would be the best way to accrue power, other than making the playing field bigger ? And so, under a dark sky scared by a comet fiery tail, Valkadia ruler rose and the Darklord seized their age-old right, calling themselves the true and only Dark Imperator. And all in the realm agreed to it, for a time.

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To this day, the Comet tail is known as a sign of hope and prosperity in Valkadia.

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During the 100 years following the passing of the comet Valkadia knew what would go down in history as an industrial Golden Age : the population standard of living grew to unequalled height since centuries and the Houses bloated themselves on the flux of riches and manpower generated by their new fiefdom. Sadly, such times never last forever, and some nobles started to thing that the new Emperor was doing well ... too well, and maybe there was a catch, or maybe they could do better. All history remember is that when Valkadia rose again, knives got sharpened in the shadows, as usual.

#### 300DC - 350DC : A rock, a rat and a bear-snake poisonous hybrid.

A full century of political peace is way more than any Valkadian leader is in right to expect. And yet it happened, after the “Imperial Comet” century, Valkadia had grown by leaps and bounds, their population busting and the undead legions of workers got bolstered when the Dark Imperator reclaimed the few uncharted territories of the wild lands under their patronage. Getting ahold of mindless undead hordes, their reclaimed more and more infrastructure, day and night. But even a golden age has to stop at some point… As their power grows the nobles stir, and intrigues unfold in Valkadia. Following a very convoluted scheme, involving twelve tons of skyfallen mana infused stone, a bold faced Skaver majordomo and a poisonous hybrid between a bear and a snake, the Dark Imperator saw his demise in 345DC, no one ever knew the source of this strange intrigue. By happenstance, their direct chosen successor has been reported to have imported a huge cargo by sea from the eastern city of Fleuvfroy

#### 350-400 : Tide of death

All Valkadian industries have always depended upon deathless workers. While delicate craftsmanship is the affair of the living and the sentient undeparted, mass labor like farming or mining falls into the cold hands of dead throngs of necrotic minions. According to their needs and knowledge of their strength, Valkadian artisans have fostered heavy research into better ways to develop their mindless thrall's efficiency. Following heavy noble investments into new necromantic rituals, great progress was made on flesh preservation. Carnomancy (the art of fleshcrafting) has historically been a poor bastard parent of Necromancy, useful to develop stronger squishy constructs, lifelike prothesis, and increased food production. But new ways of preserving dead flesh for a long period of time gave it a new breath, after a few years the forlorn masters of Carnomancy saw themselves with a surge of eager new apprentices, snowballing in new, more useful, worker constructs.

##### 375 DC : Necromancy, or how to fabricate friends.

> *“Give an amiae a fish and he will eat for the day, teach him necromancy, kill him and raise him back and he will never be hungry again … for fish” - Baladak Necromancer.*
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#### 400 to 450 DC :

*"To become what they strive to be, one shall only find a way surpass what they currently are." - Beyond the veil, Anonymous treatise recovered from Cinderash ruins in 420DC*

Recent transformation in the necromantic practices started a general upheaval in the sorcery practices of the empire. In the previous centuries, Valkadian noble houses tended to hoard their magical knowledge, trying to get every edge possible on their competition. Seeing the waste, and after a century of meticulous planning and political maneuvering Caleus the Third, the freshly crowned Valkadian Imperator (who followed the untimely and extremely departure of Caleus the Second "the unfortunate", which themselves followed the surprisingly peaceful demise of Caleus first of the name, who died in their sleep earning them the moniker of "the fortunate"), started the Scientific Academy of Splendid Sorceries (SASS) ; at first an academy intended for the noble House's child, but in Caleus mind, a tool to spread stronger sorcery in their population and one day reclaiming their birthright.

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> ##### 415 The first batch of the SASS (Scientific Academy for Splendid Sorcercies)
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> Following the will of Caleus the third, also called the erudite imperator il later centuries ; all the major houses grudgingly pooled resources to raise a new fortress from the ground. Located in the heart of the Valkwald (PID 35) the sorcery school was isolated enough to allow the student to practice their dangerous arts, but near enough to the major trading hub of Oryn that the Houses would not lose sight over them and therefore could continue their great game inside the Academy grounds. Founded inside the ruins of ancient ruins and tombs, the Scientific Academy for Splendid Sorceries opened its door to a first promotion of novices. Be it in the common art of necromancy, the esoteric art of lore-threading, or the more subtle applications of valkadian sigilism in transmutation, there was much to learn for Valkadian sorcerers. And as Caleus the third divined almost a century before this grand opening, only a well-rounded sorcery was able to transcend Valkadian inherent limitations : their internal division. For power was, and still is, the path to Valkadian triumph over the limits of the material world.
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> ##### 427 Raising the worthy turtles.
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> South to Valkadia lies the Eltharian isles, there the Valika prosper. For the valkadians they are a sort of primitive peaceful neighbour. A people living to tell tales and living without much, not trying to understand the world around them so much as to live inside and with it. Some Valkadian sages and lore masters attribute great wisdom to this specie, while many youngling listen to tales of their exploits. Yet for the ruling noble House, they are not much more than a dangerous tool, having the south be colonised by another sentient specie is a risk. But along the centuries, a symbiotic relationship formed nonetheless.
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> A weekly tradition emerged, where once a week fearless Valikas come ashore with bodies of their recently departed, they come to *the point* (PID 268) a very short peninsula where the houses maintain a great city with a very long pier. There, Valikas bring their dead, then in a bastardised language, that arose between both parties, they recall their tales and memories. By doing so, they hope to catch a necromancer’s attention, for their comrade to be raised again to continue venturing in the world. Alas, most of the dead Turtles are of little notes to the Valkadian, tales of adventures are always welcome, but it requires two things for a demilich to be raised. The soul of the dead must still be there and a necromancer goodwill (and efforts).
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> Those dubbed unworthy are raised as mindless thrall, send to the sulphur mines for their natural strength or used as undead sailors by valkadian boats for their natural amphibious abilities. The other, thoses few brilliant souls that piqued someone eye, they are raised as sentient dead, needing no air and strong as they ever were, these demilich have their soul attached to their flesh-less bones. With no risk of rot and feeding on energy emanation, they can venture once more to continue their sagas.
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> ##### 449 They come to take our riches, so we hope bones will do.
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> Around the year 445 DC a small farming community near Deepbarrow (PID 1580) got raided by a neighbouring tribe. Valkadian knew almost nothing about them, but saw a horde of screaming barbarian charging their homes and their fields, bringing fire and lightning to their houses and destroying perfectly functional undead. Taken by surprise, after centuries of relative peace, following the Elder Ashes, the empire noble houses didn’t bother of pointing spears outward and the Dark lord armies couldn’t be everywhere at once. Following this debacle, and wanting to prepare for an uncertain future, great defensive work were started all around the empire, spread and bows were prepared, and the old armies of faceless death were roused once again. The valkadian were getting ready for war, and as necromancer they knew one thing : it is wasteful to raise and refurbish a body only to hunt and kill, but it’s also very cost-effective.
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> ##### War song of 449 DC :
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> Raise your bow and raise your bones, because the barbarian is coming and the dead will be send sprawling. Lift spears and build walls and show them why everywhere we live there's this famous saying For one day the tide will come for them, once they tried, but death always prevail. And so, dead men tell no tales.
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#### 450 - 500 DC : Have you heard about our lord and savior the sewer ?

Five decades of modernization had uniformed the empire territory. Some place even had their millennia old road system refurbished. I most of Valkadia, the old ruins bristled with life once again, far from being able to rebuild them to their pristine glory, Valkadian used harder than steel rocks to protect their more rudimentary architecture. But living in haunted relics of the past had other perks. Namely, sewers, the Emperor, guided by ancient texts and schematics, opened several dried up tunnels, a promising venue for better sanitation in all Valkadia.

Valkadia breadbasket, situated in the central Idarian plains, was quite difficult to reach from the empire capital. having to pass shipment of grain and cattle through the bone-vale was a chore for centuries. With recent discoveries and engineering progress, several professors at the SASS came together with new building techniques involving bone-powder and skeleton embedded in the pavement to keep it clean easier.

following the incursions from mainland barbarians, the Empire realised they needed more than phalanx of spear-man zombies. Those would do for patrols, but they would be utterly inadequate to protect the borders. Following this train of thought, every noble house pledged several hundreds of necromancer warriors to resurrect the dreaming monster that was Valkadian war machine. In the following year, the Sorcerous academy was also invited to propose more aggressive curriculum, with the introduction of battle necromancy and war construct as common subjects.

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> ##### Necromancy and war
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> When one talks about necromantic battle power, they usually think of the most grand scenic moves, raising hundreds of skeletons, zombie plagues and giant undead dragon soaring the sky to bombard infantry. But there are lots of subtler approach, namely using necromancy energies to siphon someone life-force, placing those spell as traps on the battlefield in advance would seriously hamper any army mobility. Another dangerous use would be to order zombies with short spear to burrow under bottleneck to raise behind the enemy or attack them from under. One most rare use would be to throw higher level undeads to stalk enemy, using their lack of vital signs to keep them cancelled making them efficient assassins and spies. Also, to go with freshly raised armies of the undead, Valkadia needed a solid navy. Luckily the large and recent importation of waterborne corpses eased that process tremendously.
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> ##### 451 DC : Uncommon sighting in the Eltharian sea
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> The sea south to Valkadia has been known as the Eltharian sea for quite some time to Valkadian Scholar. Home to the Valika on their islands, and a lot of diverse marine species. These are generally troublesome waters, full of predators and magical storm during winter, in contrast to their placid summer counterpart. In that context, it is quite usual to sight great white whales moving south from the landmass, from the east during the hotter times. But for some unknown reason, Valkadian fisher folks reported a great white migration during the year 451 DC. A never seen before event, that marked the next few years as “the Decade of the Whale”. Half a century later, loremaster finally correlated those movement with the drastic changes observed by Valkadian raider ships sailing eastward.
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##### 450-500 DC : Ghost fleet or zombie pirate, why not both ?

It has never been Valkadian will to haunt the high seas in search of preys, by nature and history the specie turn itself toward land and the skies whenever possible. But being a coastal empire has it's uses when it a nation require resources to grow. For more than a century testimonies and sightings abounded in the ever-chains about bones-clad, undead crewed ships. Never pirating or attacking anyone at seas ; thoses kept to themselves. Until, during some dark nights, the dread ships came ashore to slaughter small communities and gather corpses, leaving only shells of burned civilisation behind.

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> ##### 454 DC : Starting the harvest
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> Thanks to Valika paroling southern water and granting Valkadian safe passage against the Empire services, some expeditions were targeted against some fishfolk island refereed in some ancient parchment belonging to an old vault. Following the Valkadian effort to raise their militant potential, they needed bodies, a lot of them, and what better way to secure their coastal provinces than having amphibian unit at the ready in the future.
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> ##### 455 DC : A thirst for more water
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> Following quickly on their raids over Wrokingmar, other noble houses wanted their own spoils, their own amphibian workers too. Another expedition was mounted in a hurry by some Houses before everything around them was plundered to ashes by their competitors.
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> ##### 467 DC : New Valkadian expansion politic
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> Raising a new city so far from the capital, when we are already raided upon, call for preemptive measure. No land will be settled any more by Valkadia without protective detail armies and their relatives accommodations.
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> ##### 468 DC : settling the Valkwald
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> With influx of new bodies to put at work, the nobles are once again on the prowl, always hungry, they want more. The emperor keen on satisfying them, after their participation in the empire defences, set several hundred settlers and thousands of zombies on the march, for them to conquer the last stretches of the western Valkwald.
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