recursal/Fanatic-Fandom huggingface dataset:
Records: the Gates of Brissac

### **The Plantagenet Travel Hub**

In Anjou, a short ride south of the Noble Plantagenet capital of Angers, is the city of Brissac. On the south side of the Loire River, Brissac became a regional portal hub, with always-open gates to many NP baronies, including Calais (northern France), Brest (northwestern Aquitaine), Gibraltar (southern Iberia), Basel (northeast Arelat), and Santa Maria di Leuca (southern tip of the Italian boot).

This is a key distribution for the Noble and affiliated Royal Companies, with a safe and near-instant transportation hub that takes surface traffic from one of western Europe the other. It is also destined to be used by the component Royal Armies when deployed by the CMC.

### **Travel Central**

As gates, though, the portals are opened to personal (very cheap) and general commercial (very reasonable) passage. With a week, there is a steady flow of traffic through the gates, not the least of which is fresh foods (especially from warmer climates to cooler).

Within a month, the spillover traffic turned Brissac (and Anjou) into a major trade hub between France and Aquitaine. While the Royal Company was the intended major user, the largest volume of traffic by far were independent merchants.

More so, given the cheap travel for non-merchants, locals around the six portal points invented the new hobby of *tourism*. Granted, the distance from Brissac to Brest was comparatively minor, it was still a novelty to be able to experience dawn or dusk twice within minutes of each other.

It was also a way that formerly provincial folk, even those who were *Book of Learning*educated, could now travel great distances in a matter of minutes. They started to get a sense of the spherical geography of the world and a sense of scale of how far it truly was. While the close points were less impressive, the difference between solar position from Italy to Brest was spectacular.

When it was insufferably hot in Italy, they could travel to France for a cool break. When it was cold in northeast Burgundy, they could warm up in Gibraltar. Sometimes the atmospheric pressure difference was big enough that there were sustained winds through the portal.

### **Front Row Seat to Celestial Destruction**

During the following August, as the gates remained open even during the war of the angels, it became common for international crowds to move between areas, experience different views of the same celestial battle.

Sometimes no battle was visible at all from a different angle, or there was an entirely different battle (especially for those noisy, ground-rattling low-altitude conflicts).

### **Hub Placement**

The gates of Brissac are a tremendous trade benefit but somewhat of a security risk. This was one of the reasons that the gates were placed at the commercial hub, maximizing it while they could, while remaining strategically isolated from the NP capital of Angers (to the north) or the CMC capital of Saumur (to the east).
1385

1384 had globally significant events every single month, but one overshadowed them all by a wide margin: the July *Battle of Moon's Shadow*. That singular, mostly-silent event of beatific heavenly violence was visible around the world. And in places where the "heavenly sparks" touched, that was the *last* thing they saw.

The apparent conclusion to the War of the Angels, the battle left the world numb to everything else it still had to grapple, not the least of which was the ork onslaught. Even the orks, though, had given a lull in their attacks as if paying their respects to the celestial dead.

## **The Sphere of Magic**

### **May**

* **The Bounty:** after the 1384 *Portal of the Mists*, the January *Portal of Light* and now the *Portal of Darkness*, the *Incidence of Incidents* were taking an overwhelming turn. Magical doorways were opening to earth that couldn't be controlled. Still, the Order of Merlin tried to keep up, placing a bounty on reports of incidents of particular import. It was enough that some ranger or troubadour types could make a living by taking local surveys. When incidents were particularly rampant, the Order would send a wizard back to measure just how bad it was...
Records: Arelat's Magna Carta

## **The Spread of the Magna Carta**

It was simply unfathomable to royalty and nobility around the world that the House of Plantagenet was instituting the Magna Carta the way the way that it was. By now, the origins of the distinctly English document were known as far as India: it was a peace treaty between the Crown and the Coronets, guaranteeing the rights of the aristocracy against an absolute monarchy.

Perhaps basing authority off a charter wasn't terrible, especially when the Church itself was withdrawing from recognition or dabbling in temporal power, but the Great Charter was guaranteeing limits to the crown's power. Maybe that was a stopgap until the crown could assert itself, but the Plantagenet crowns had power unlike the earth had ever seen. Real, magical power. It had healers with an apparent direct line to God.

Why in God's name would they step back now?

Therein was the divine inspiration. There was the potential for hard power, the arcane-amplified military, but there was also the soft power. And in giving the people what they wanted: freedom from servitude and true fairness in justice, now carried a kind of populist power that that the aristocracy more often fought than enjoyed.

That was happening now, again, and well beyond the realm of England or France. It was happing in Arelat, the former kingdom of Burgundy, and it was happening before the eyes of Europe and the world.

### **The Ricardian Charm Offensive**

Rickard had been bouncing back and forth between Arles and Prague, working to bring the Burgundian nobility aboard with this new charter of government. It was a tough sell as most had a great deal more latitude and autonomy with their agreements to the no-longer-extant *Empire*.

Rickard got buy-in from two directions: the benefits from "above" and the public pressure from "below." The commons wanted this so bad, balking bigger risk wasn't royal retribution, rather it was *revolution*. When Arelat nobility signed it (as the House of Lords), the House of Commons was already there.

This new standardized, unitary government sent shockwaves through Europe.
Records: English Friction in the Church

### **Creating a Divine Diversion**

Pope Gregory XI, having just fled Rome back to Avignon, issued five Bulls condemning the opinion of John Wycliffe that Catholic priests should live in poverty like the twelve disciples of Jesus.

Unlike the original timeline, nestled among this polemic is the regular denunciation of the *Society of Jesus*.

### **Score one for the Society**

This onslaught essentially elevated and beatified the Jesuits for the rest of the disaffected Catholic world, especially those in northern Italy. There, the Florentines had organized extra-ecclesiastical processions (including flagellants) and confraternities, including the re-emergence of groups such as the Fraticelli, who had previously been deemed heretical.

The edifice of the Florentine inquisition was destroyed, and the Signoria rolled back legal restrictions on usury and other practices frowned on by the (now defunct) ecclesiastical courts.

With a level of fraternity between English and Italian resistance against a tyrannical papacy, other areas were picking up the torch in their protest against Church abuses.

### **An Ire Not Unearned**

The move from Avignon back to Rome was precipitated by developing a reputation for corruption that estranged major parts of Western Christendom. This reputation can be attributed to perceptions of predominant French influence and to the papal curia's efforts to extend its powers of patronage and increase its revenues.

With the cozy relationship between France and the Papacy, it was no wonder that England

### **Perfect Timing to Give Back**

Northern Italy was embroiled in the War of the Eight Saints (since 1375), between Pope Gregory XI and a coalition of Italian city-states led by Florence. The politics that led to this conflict was tanlged, and there was English influence in the mess going al the back to loans that King Edward had taken from Florentine families to fund the war on France.

While those loans had been defaulted on, and those families financially ruined, it had affected the politics that led Florence to its current state.

Given the conflict with Florence, the sudden availability of Gold in England, this became *the* opportune time for King Edward III to ***pay back old Florentine debts***...
Records: Evolving German Culture

## **Growing at the Speed of Magic**

The role of the arcane and the divine in Germany couldn't be overstated. They were only single elements in the mix of everything that made the culture what it was, but in that respect, they were catalysts that lit the culture on fire.

In politics and power, the conversation was already deep in the principles of the Magna Carta – with negotiations in the German Diet to join the CMC. Margrave Rick was a driving force as he bounced back and forth, around the world it seemed, but prominently in Brandenburg and Frankfurt.

### **The Celebrations**

Art, music, food, poetry, fashion; all the things that made culture *everywhere* were evolving, sometimes at fireball rates. That was true in London, where Western-hemisphere styles (anything with pockets) were catching on. It was true in Bordeaux and Paris, where magical-scroll captures of scenes had been experimented with in a kind of early photography.

In Germany, it was the evolution of music that was the most remarkable marker.

There were few schools dedicated to music at the time – and most of those were in Germany. It made sense that the Germans had not only adopted the RANP and made it their own, but integrated the Royal Academy into what they were already doing. In this case, the art and science of musical notation had evolved and the RANP-influenced trend of standardization brought composition to a point where the music could be performed consistently in a range of venues.

Renaissance era musical style had already begun to spread across even rural areas, thanks to the new travel speed of people across Europe, and given the magic of the times, people were eating it up.

In Germany, they were on the musical cutting edge, composing what an alternate timeline might call "Baroque," and using this new notation style to do so.

### **The Arcane Factor**

As the music evolved, and the notation needed for players to express the composition, even the instruments themselves were evolving. With the increase in acoustic understanding and engineering, mundane instrumentation was increasing in capacity and sophistication.

There were arcane factors at work too, including morphing, warping, bending and amplifying sound. The amplification alone was huge, bringing volume capable of carrying a tune ten times the distance.

While both London and Bordeaux had been noodling with arcane recording and playback, they'd gotten serious about it Germany, especially in relation to high-fidelity music.
Records: Arcane Medicinals for Sale

### **Trauma Potions**

The Royal Arms had been the experimental test subjects for a curative based on a magical proxy of key metabolic functions. The primarily function mimicked oxygenated blood, but also accelerated natural healing of wounds by roughly by a factor of 500.

Consumed or applied to wounds, it saved lives.

### **Production Issues**

There were extraordinary issues actually making the potion. A multi-step process, some parts were simple, other parts were extraordinarily complex. Because of that, it was *not* cheap.

Because of the expense, the Royal Arms remained by far the biggest customer. Given the increasing lethality of angelic battlefields, the RA relied on these potions as much as their respective medical cadres.

After a September discovery made it possible to produce in mass quantities, they turned it around in production so by October 1383, the *Healing Potion* was released for sale on the general market.
Hall of Records

## **A Sense of Place**

The campaign takes place around the world, but the initial action starts in Western Europe. Focused on characters based in the Kingdom of England, and their relationship to the Royal Order of Merlin, this area focus eventually grows to encompass the whole world.

We'll give details on the initial geography, especially during conflict with the Kingdom of France – an evolution of what the modern age knows as the "Hundred Years' War." They were fifty-two years into a conflict between the House Plantagenet and the House Valois, in the Edwards' campaign to unify England with their French origins.

## **A Sense of History**

Beyond the maps, the events and players on the world stage are keys to what the player's characters will do. History starts "canon" – exactly as it was – in 1365. There, small things have happened but not enough to register event changes in the course of history that players may recognize.

By 1367, Richard of Bordeaux is born to parents Prince Edward of Woodstock and Princess Joan of Kent. While it starts slow, the "Child of the Epiphany" becomes the agent of change, the conduit and catalyst for a battle that is far larger than what's happening across the English Channel.

For enterprising Referees, to get a sense of how the world has developed in the last 22 years – and changed from what they may know – check the the Timeline here in the Hall of Records...

* **Hall of Records: Timeline**

## **A Sense of Magic**

From about 1373 onward, there was a human factor to the growing arcane energies swirling over Earth. The Order of Merlin had created Arcane Crystals, leading to Glow Stones, and the world hasn't been the same since.

From magic that fits in the palm of your hand, to magic that shielded the whole planet, the variety of arcane creations now touches every aspect of life on earth. For an overview of magical items great and modest, check the Hall of Wonders.

* **The Hall of Wonders**
Records: Principality of Crimea

## **The Shining Jewel on the North Shore of the Black Sea**

It had been roughly ten months since the arrival of Aquitaine in the Genoese colonies of the Crimean peninsula. The actual assumption of the Genoese Gazaria had been surprisingly quiet, though in the weeks afterward, the sudden lurching halt of the slave trade through the area made it abundantly clear that there was a new power and paradigm at work.

In the months afterward, every major Khanate city had since fallen to a rise of the local Slavs, the last refuge being Eski Qırım, about 15 miles of Theodosia (Kaffa). This included two successful defenses of the peninsula itself against attempted invasions by the Blue Horde.

### **The Greek Principality**

The Principality of Theodoro was a reasonably peaceful Greek-Byzantine state paying tribute to the proto-Khanate of Crimea (themselves a vassal of the Horde).

As the Khanate fell, the Principality pledged allegiance to Aquitaine to prevent being next on the list of the angry locals.

Theodoro and the Gazarian cities were neatly wrapped into a Slav-run Principality that was, in turn, a vassal of Aquitaine.
Records: Pommel of Training

## Overview

The Pommel of Training (PoT) is a specific device that is imbued with arcane or divine magic that is desgned to teach the user the tactics, techniques and procedures of a class of tool. As the "pommel" part of the name implies, the initial and primary pommels were designed to train people in the use of a sword.

Similar to Books of Learning, there had to be an initial Subject Matter Expert, who would develop the curriculum for the device to impart upon the user. This could stretch to any connected subject, from drawing a weapon, to caring for a weapon, to the primary lesson: *using the weapon in combat*.

Unlike most Books of Learning, the pommel was designed to instruct and educate with a built-in physical component.

## Variations on the Theme

While pommels were the first and remain the most popular, the training has since spread to nearly *everything*. This ranges from *Reins of Riding* to *Horns of Playing*.
Records: Merger of the Iberian Crowns

### **Christ Reigneth O'er All**

Peter IV, King of Aragon, House of Barcelona, pledged his allegiance to John of Gaunt, King of Castile. It was a peaceful affair, performed at the behest of Peter IV, who accepted the demotion from a kingdom to a Grand Duchy within Iberia, thus ensuring the solvency and survival of the House of Barcelona. The House maintained its interest and control as the Count of Barcelona, as well as the Count of Roussillon and Cerdagne.

Hailed as a Jesuit victory, with no losers, it was emphasized as a peaceful political transition.

### **The future of Iberia**

With Castile, Granada and Aragon now united – and Portugal estimated to follow – the grand plan was for a United Crown of Iberia. In a fashion similar to United Britannia, once the Portuguese were integrated, the idea was to create a unified title.

At this point, the *Altercation of the Angels* had profoundly affected European attitudes. There were still sporadic misgivings, but the battle lines of heaven itself had been drawn. The demon attempt (and failure) to kill King Rick impacted that perception, where the archangels appeared to be in league with demons, leaving humanity with Christ and the Angels between them. Western Iberian groups like the *Valencian Union* and the Kingdom of Majorca quickly fell into line, especially after a somewhat merciful and forgiving *Audit and Rectification*.

### **Aragon's Offshore Accounts**

Interests in Sardinia and Corsica were surrendered to the Kingdom of Arelat, under the Ricardian crown.

The titles of the Duke of Athens and Neopatria (currently enforced by the Catalan Company) were turned over Prince Edmund of the Pelopennese.

In all fairness, while the political decisions were outside of Peter's control, substantial ceremony was made of the *royal recompense*, giving over £250k to the *Grand Duke of Aragon*. This was so much actual gold (125 tons in coin, and especially for that area) that the House of Barcelona had to restrain their spending or risk causing inflation in the area.
Records: Wherein English society is wiped out

## **The Royal Company was On a Roll...**

As mass-produced document paper took off, the Royal Company also refined and introduced "toilet paper" to English audiences. Another Chinese creation, during the early 14th century, it was recorded that in what is now Zhejiang province alone, ten million packages of 1,000 to 10,000 sheets of toilet paper were manufactured annually.

During the Ming dynasty (1368–1644 AD), it was recorded in 1393 that an annual supply of 720,000 sheets of toilet paper (two by three feet in size) was produced for the general use of the imperial court at the capital of Nanjing. From the records of the Imperial Bureau of Supplies of that same year, it was also recorded that for the Hongwu Emperor's imperial family alone, there were 15,000 sheets of special soft-fabric toilet paper made, and each sheet of toilet paper was perfumed.

Elsewhere, wealthy people wiped themselves with wool, lace or hemp, while less wealthy people used their hand when defecating into rivers, or cleaned themselves with various materials such as rags, wood shavings, leaves, grass, hay, stones, sand, moss, water, snow, ferns, plant husks, fruit skins, seashells, or corncobs, depending upon the country and weather conditions or social customs. In Ancient Rome, a sponge on a stick was commonly used, and, after use, placed back in a pail of vinegar.

Several talmudic sources indicating ancient Jewish practice refer to the use of small pebbles, often carried in a special bag, and also to the use of dry grass and of the smooth edges of broken pottery jugs (e.g., Shabbat 81a, 82a, Yevamot 59b). These are all cited in the classic *Biblical and Talmudic Medicine* by the German physician Julius Preuss (Eng. trans. Sanhedrin Press, 1978).

### **Bringing Up the Rear**

While it would've been optimal to add a bidet to the common privvy experience, running water wasn't commonly accessible. Nor was warm water easily accessible, hence toilet paper formulated from the same renewable, fast-growing kenaf the best compromise.

A modern audience would find a soft, absorbent and strong toilet paper – though it was generally sold in natural kenaf color. They did have perfumed options, though...
Records: the Semi-Circumnavigation

## **To Meet in the Middle**

The *HMS Explorer* met the *HMS Discovery* in the port of Hong Kong, marking the technical circumnavigation of the planet. Widely celebrated in London, the news was celebrated in openly in what was left of Hong Kong as well.

What had once been a lively port that traded with all of southeast Asia, the airborne plague, zombies and orks had taken their toll here, too. While a portion of the city still stood, it was a fortress mentality just to survive. Speaking to the locals, the one-time Empire had fallen and there were rumors of the remains of a coordinating Kingdom well to the north making a resurgence.

Locally, trade outside the immediate region was all but impossible as they fired on Chinese "plague ships" if they came anywhere near. Nor did trade with the WestHem seem like a good idea; stories of a continent of monsters was "mildly discouraging."

### **Naval Coordination**

Once the ships met in Hong Kong, having mapped and contacted coastal cultures around the world, it was figured out that they'd given away roughly £12 billion worth of *Glow Stones* to cultures around the world. In Hong Kong, they were impressed to meet the culture that actually created the stones that had already trickled east via Silk Road trade (even if the road was more of maritime route from this area).

While they were in port, another SA team came through the portal and left Hong Kong by land route, looking to map the way up to the Chinese emperor (and the locals were certain this group was utterly nuts).

### **The Continuing Mission**

The ships were directed to continue heading their original directions and complete circumnavigation from their respective directions, covering both East and West passages.

The *HMS Discovery* continued heading west, circled and mapped the Sumatran coast and noted but stopped short of doing the same to Java. There was now some impetus to return to London. They did locate what might've been known as Mauritius and Reunion Islands on the way to finding and mapping the coast of Madagascar before making a speed run around the southern horn of Africa.

The *HMS Explorer* followed leads picked up during the mapping of Taiwan to locate the archipelago that might've otherwise been known as the Philippines. The major cluster of islands was mapped, with notes that the island chains seem to go on considerably to the south. They discovered and mapped the north coast of what might've been called Papua New Guinea as well as the north island of New Zealand as they made a speed run towards the southern tip of the Western Hemisphere.
Records: the Fabric of Society

## **Pants on Fire!**

The sales of Aztec pants in the East was absolutely phenomenal, selling as fast as they could be imported. It was influencing style in London, Bordeaux and Western Europe. The problem was that Aztecs weren't producing them fast enough to keep up with the demand.

In fact, clothing itself was in demand and especially in England, there was very little previous industry to support it.

That's where the RANP came in, engineering solutions, but even then, there was only so much they could do without arcane-intensive methods.

### **Patent Issues**

The RANP had several recent inventions that would help the clothing industry, but they were scattered in regional markets. One of the advantages of the CMC, however, was a Commonwealth-wide system for patents. Working out the details meant resolving conflicts, especially between similar patents applied for in different areas.

This included devices like a *spinning jenny*, used for creating thread, and the *stocking frame*, a method for mechanical knitting. This advanced textile and cloth-producing technology by what would've been roughly four and two centuries, respectively.

Via the CMC patents and royalties system, the Aztecs had access to these devices – bought them, and put them to work.

### **The Deeper Metrics of Pants**

It was observed that information, more than textiles themselves, was the true fabric of society. Once they were able to work out just and equitable solutions, the inventions could be produced and sold or licensed on a wide scale and put to work.

It was another step in the early industrialization of human society.
Records: Henan's Nation-Building

## **Rebuilding from the Heart of China**

In the three months, since the arrival of the *Company*, the sorties had taken the fight to the orks well beyond Henan's borders. They kingdom wasn't in a position to reestablish imperial rule, there simply wasn't enough humanity or infrastructure left to do it, but there were conversations about establishing separate kingdoms and rebuilding towards whatever the future offered. Following roughly the logic of previous provinces, Zhu Biao was rebooting the region as China 2.0

### **The Provisional Kingdom of Shanxi**

Shanxi was to the north, the area west of the Taihang Mountains, they'd set up a base in the devastated city of Taiyuan. This could be a good spot for a border against the wolf orks coming out Mongolia, but it would be a rough area. Four of the Ming SA platoons were running operations in Shanxi.

### **The Kingdom of Shandong**

Shandong was the coastal province had been particularly dense in population, and that worked against them, as they were absolutely devastated by plague and undead in a vicious cycle. With the orks now battling the undead, the Ming SA was able to reestablish a base in the former capital of Jinan and start coming the area for pockets of survivors.

### **The Kingdom of Anhui**

Anhui was just south of Henan; another land-locked "border" province with promise as an affiliated kingdom.

The Ming SA were dominant where they went, as long as they remained in their special operations mode. Both Shandong and Anhui had three Ming SA platoons operating there, and the magic was potent, but the results created vacuums that more orcs, undead – *or surviving warlords* – looked to fill. While some of the warlords were amenable to peace, some were hostile to the Ming House on principle of the timing alone.
1368

## **World Events**

* January 23 – The Hongwu Emperor (Zhu Yuanzhang) establishes the Ming Dynasty in China after the disintegration of the Mongol Yuan Dynasty. He immediately orders every county magistrate to set up four granaries, and halts government taxation on books.
* March 29 – Emperor Chōkei accedes to the throne of Japan.

### **Date unknown**

* Durrës, the second-largest city in present-day Albania (and then known as Dyrrhachium), was captured from the Angevins by Karl Thopia, a powerful feudal prince and warlord.
* Timur ascends the throne of Samarkand.
* Work begins on the current Great Wall of China.
* Mikhail Aleksandrovich becomes the sole ruler of Tver (in what would've been western Russia) after the death of co-ruler and rival Vasiliy Mikhailovich of Kashin.
* Moscow attacks Tver, which counter-attacks with the aid of Lithuania and the Blue Horde.
* The King of Norway sends the last Royal Ship from Norway to the Greenland Eastern Settlement. This event is part of both the Norse colonization of the Americas and of the History of Greenland.
* Peace treaty between Norway and the Hanseatic League.
* The Bibliothèque nationale de France (National Library of France) is founded as the Royal Library at the Louvre Palace in Paris by Charles V of France.
* Petrarch concludes writing the sequence of Italian sonnets and other poems known as *Il Canzoniere*.

## **The Sphere of Magic**

### **The chartering of the London Guild of Surgeons**

* The London chartering of the Guild of Surgeons Within the City of London. Not specifically magic at this point, the surgeons did note certain medical oddities that had been observed in deaths and illnesses since 1365. Even to the standards of the time, these incidents were red-flagged.
* The London Guild wasn't the only group to record these incidents, but they did communicate with peers, including medical colleges in Oxford, Cambridge, the University of Bologna, the University of Paris and others.
* Nor was medicine the only field to note the growing *Incidence of Incidents*, but they were among the most systematic in recording the details, looking for patterns and so on.
Records: RANP Optics

## **Losing Sight... Gaining Insight**

### Losing sight

The late-night candlelight reading cram sessions, were taking its toll on the Royal Society scholars. During the academic forums, many members appeared to be losing their vision at times. Some of this was simply exhaustion, but human eyesight was a fickle thing.

For the sake of his scientific retinue, this led Rick to import another recent development, and imported it from Italy: *eye glasses*. The Salvino D'Armate invention was roughy a century old at the time – but the glasses themselves became London’s newest obsession.

Venice and Florence had an ostensible head start in the industry of producing spectacles, while the Netherlands and Germany were beginning to catch up. At this point, spectacle makers created improved types of lenses for the correction of vision based more on empirical knowledge gained from observing the effects of the lenses rather than using the rudimentary optical theory of the day (theory which for the most part could not even adequately explain how spectacles worked).

This led to some expenditure on the part of the English Crown: they hired Venetian expert Francisco Caravello to pack up, come to London, and show them how it was done.

### Gaining sight ...and speech

The nature of sight – *and light* – became a new obsession. Prince Rick publicly explored the works of one-time Chancellor of Oxford University, Bishop Robert Grosseteste – as well as his disciple, Franciscan friar Roger Bacon.

Grosseteste, from Oxford, had written about light itself and Bacon had gone on to experiment with optics, creating a magnifying glass with a sphere. This was something *everybody* had to play with once they realized there was one in the room.

In public exploration, it became the subject of Academic Forums on its own merits. This led to a study of Ptolemy and his spectrum of optics, astronomy and geography (even music and to a critical extent, astrology). This led to researching Islamic scientists Alkindus (al-Kindi) and Alhazen (Ibn al-Haytham).

This too was a public exploration, and guided along by the libraries already amassed.

On a related note, the deeper research publicly drove Prince Rick to learn Arabic – which he did at an astonishing pace. This opened new conversations in the *Forums* about the failures and successes and failures of the crusades, Islamic culture, politics and geography...
Records: Eschatus

### **The Aerial Apocalypse**

Humanity had already witnessed skirmishes, sometimes without knowing it, other times – like in Westminster – seeing combat first hand. In August, the war of the angels began in earnest.

In short, sporadic battles, mostly in the skies above, there were brilliant battles that seemed like lightning storms. Blasts were sometimes seen and heard for dozens of miles, and in some cases, it flattened structures and trees alike on the surface.

Much of the world reasonably saw this as *the Coming of the End*.

### **The First Phase of the War**

For a month, most of August, the War of the Angels was intense. Sometimes it was "close" (in the atmosphere), sometimes it's distant and muted (exoatmospheric). Often beautiful, usually dramatic, and always profoundly terrifying.

By early September, the visible battles tapered off, but humanity was in the dark as to what any of it means as it wasn't terribly clear who was who in the battle. There were a rare few times, though, that six distinct lights fought against a glowing, flowing cloud. For most of humanity, they were rooting for the Cloud.

### **Planetside Reaction**

On earth, there was fear in temples, mosques and churches as an age-old question is asked again: *where is God in all of this?* Religious scholars struggled with the answer, though they were buoyed by the continued access to divine healing.

It was believed, though never confirmed, that the innermost circle of the OM maintained communications with the angels, though they were often as silent or inscrutable as the angels themselves. It was thought that the Jesuits would be in close contact with the heavenly factions, but the Vatican was silent on the matter beyond endorsing the assessment that the archangels had gone mad.

Even early on, though, there were voices that instead sided with the archangels...
Records: Founding the Commonwealth

## **The *Commonwealth of the Magna Carta* (CMC)**

The Noble Plantagenet (NP) was being asked to do more and more – coordinating in a way that created power-sharing gray areas between chartered governments. There were already arguments about tax, jurisdiction, enforcement, and so on that were introducing complications and conflict into what should've been a smoothly operating system.

The concept of the CMC would coordinate a resource sharing that aimed to do for Aquitaine, Arelat and Castile what United Britannia has done for the islands.

To a degree, this is a version of the Noble Plantagenet at a larger scale. The dues are bigger, a percentage of national treasury rather than crown wardrobe, but so are the benefits of inclusion. This is, in effect, an empire – but they shy away from the terminology.

### **Shifitng Resources and Responsibilities**

Some of the cross-kingdom coordination elements currently managed by the Noble Plantagenet were moved to the CMC, while others expanded to include the CMC. The expansion includes a separate-but-related Royal Academy (RANP) and Order of Merlin (OM) organization. The Royal Company already had it's own monetary and tax disbursing agreements, and would remains at the NP level.

Just as England is first among UB equals based on resources and contribution to the cause, Aquitaine is first among equals for the Commonwealth. With cross-kingdom military coordination, that effectively makes Rickard the *not-emperor* of the *not-an-empire*.

### **Founding Members**

* **Kingdom of** **Aquitaine**
* **Kingdom of Arelat**
* **Kingdom of Castile**
* **Domain of Angers**

### **The Seat of the Commonwealth**

The capital of this not-empire is Saumur, between the Loire and Thouet rivers. Southeast of the NP capital of Angers and east of the new Noble/Royal Company headquarters of Brissac, the location is central to the western European members. Further, hosting the capital of the CMC in Saumur rather than Angers reinforced that the Commonwealth doesn't actually answer to any single royal Crown.

The nature of the UB precludes France (which had yet to adopt a Magna Carta), so rumors spring up regarding bringing France aboard the CMC. The rumors actually go deeper than this: with King Edward having achieved the dream of a united Britannia, France and Aquitaine, he's looking at possibly handing over France to Rickard.

### **Future Additions**

The UB, the Magna Carta's home, is also negotiating how to possibly join the CMC. As Scotland and England already contribute to both Noble Plantagenet and the UB, this would be an additional, large-scale expense. There are possibilities of joining individually, but they don't want to undercut the UB authority.

Most likely: they join as the UB with a smaller individual CMC contribution, plus a larger equivalent collective UB contribution to find that equity sweet spot.
Records: the Treaty of Warsaw

## **The Frontier of the CMC**

Europe had endured a great deal lately, from never-really-gone plague, to the *Incidence of Incidents*, of which the orks were considered the most recent (and the worst). In Eastern Europe, away from the Regiments, the orks were still rampaging and in areas, gaining the upper hand. Or thumbed hoof.

For as bad as the orks were, the power of the CMC was more fearsome. The orks could be fought. The Regiments were certain death.

Even now, the CMC went as far east as Germany, Bohemia, and Italy... but that wasn't a true "line." The CMC was *much* farther east, as far the eastern shores of the Black Sea, the western shores of Anatolia, the Levant and the whole of what used to be the Egyptian Sinai.

The distant eastern reach of the CMC was theoretically more peaceful, but their impact was just as great as the orks.

### **The Hungary-Commonwealth Connection**

There was no shortage of turbulence between Hungary and the CMC, if only because the Commonwealth had supported Joanna (then of Naples, now *Italy*). There, the bad blood still ran through Louis I of Hungary and Poland's veins over perceptions and suspicions of family, murder, betrayal and complicity.
Given this ostensible ice, Louis had misgivings about anything Plantagenet. This opened the door to Charles of Durazzo, but the divine miracles and the arcane magic were hard to ignore. Further, that Rick had sold the Louis-Durazzo pair the already-upgraded castle at Ginestra, there had been a thaw.
Granted, this thaw was running silently counter to CMC goals (with Durazzo's continued slave trade in the northweast Black Sea region), but there were now lines of communication open between the Ricardian Crown and the Hungarian-Polish Crown.
After Rick resolved Jobst issues (on the east side of Bohemia), and decisively removed of the thorn of the Teutonic Knights, Louis reassessed *everything*. This led to the *Treaty of Warsaw*.

### **Relations Moving Forward**

After the sale of former-Genoese Ginestra, Louis agreed to a peace treaty with the CMC. This secured almost the entirety of his western borders, a political state that was frankly unfathomable just a few years prior.
This western border security allowed him to focus on the orks, and later, on the Lithuanian, Ottoman and Golden Horde threats as they came (and under Tokhtamysh, they were definitely coming).
Records: Teutonic Knight Demob

## **A Holy Reevaluation**

In early February, after the Vatican's call to the Holy Roman Empire's Prince-Bishoprics to turn over temporal power – and the quieter but just-as-powerful statement that the Church was no longer supporting any sort of charter of military orders, this left groups like the Hospitallers out in the cold.

Not to say there wasn't a political call for order, but there was no longer a religious mandate for control of Christian territory, forced conversions or anything of the sort.

Add the simple fact that that Jesuit-style Christianity: accepting, peaceful... oh, and regularly practicing healing miracles...? That was more than enough to bring people in on the merits of adoption rather than the fear exclusion.

### **The Teutonic Demobilization**

Winrich von Kniprode, Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights, announced the withdrawal of the order from northeastern Europe. This was a massive boon to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, with implications to Livonia, but the Order had lost their recognition from both the Empire (who were fighting other battles) and the Vatican (who were fighting against actual combat).

On the other side, given the plague-healing miracles, the Christianization of Lithuania was already happening at a rate too fast to count.

This came together for an orderly demobilization.

### **Ensuring the Peace**

The voluntary withdrawal might've sent the area into a power-vacuum except for the CMC filling the gap, with four distinctly *Ricardian* *Regiments* ensuring security. Directly from nearby areas, the Bohemian and Brandenburg Regiments provided border security with notoriously unstable Lithuania. Accompanying the demob of the Knights, and providing internal security, the new Parisian and newish Roman Regiments added a distinctly international flavor to the Baltic culture.

### **The Reemployment of a Battle-tested Force**

The Knights weren't simply cut loose and shipped out. The CMC assisted the logistics of the knights' retreat, including giving free passage.
Many were locals, and some remained in-country by choice. The CMC had plans, so the majority here were simply re-employed, essentially in-place, though were transported to other CMC areas for training and rehabilitation.

Many more felt the need to leave the area, given the history, and the vast majority were recruited into a special CMC force of Royal Arms, Royal Guard and so on. They were destined for a very different climate, but they would be given a home and a job...
Records: Final Fall of the Yuan

## **The Orkish Conquest of Mongolia**

The Mongol monarchy, the Great Yuan once established by Kublai Khan, had been ejected from China just a decade and a half prior. They were still recovering from the rebellion when the rise of the orks slammed them from every direction.

The orks near the strait were now crossing back and forth with regularity, and these orks began warring with the orks that had remained in Siberia. Now riding dire wolves, they mounted orks were a devastating force – enough that the Daur people were likely extinct.

When a competing ork tribe broke the dire tigers, they went to war with the dire wolf-riders and the war quickly spread. The Mongolian Northern Yuan dynasty was destroyed as mountainous areas became the high ground orks valued above most else. It also marked the import of the dire beasts into the eastern hemisphere.

### **A Pause, then an Advance**

Just a little to the west, the horse-tribes of the Oirat fell soon after. Beyond, the orks were eyeing the Timurian horde. Given the dire wolves and tigers were imported, but the "dire buffalo" weren't, the horses were the main source of food for the giant beasts.

Local humans tried the same domestication of this megafauna, but the mere scent of humanity usually put the beasts into a bloodlust. It was later found this was an introduced trait, likely at the same time as the amplification – and given the sophistication, likely by the proverbial hand of the archangels.
Records: Founding the Forest Islands

## **Atlanta founds the Forest Islands**

The RANP were searching for rumors, little-known islands just west of the Strait of Gibraltar. If they had been Portuguese settlers, they would've called it the "Island of Wood" (Madeira), but as it were Aquitaine-English on this mission, they dubbed it the Forest Islands.

286 miles of uninhabited land, a CCC team scouted out a defensible compromise against land and sea assault, built an elegant fortress plus the foundations of a support town within and around it. The discovery and settlement was kept secret, and the main output of this island would be *space.*

### ***That special Natural Resource***

There were plenty of natural resources on the island, but for the magic of the OM, nothing that had to be harvested and exported to make it a sustainable colony. Rather, they were looking for someplace removed from wandering refugees, curious onlookers and/or seekers of magic.

Specifically, the Domain of Atlanta was hosting the Order of Merlin here. On these remote islands, the OM would be "conducting experiments" and the land was otherwise closed from development or visitation.

These would be larger-scale experiments, some with a certainly level of risk, and many other with a sense of discretion necessary from prying eyes. The most concerned eyes, however, weren't earthly eyes at all.

In some cases, there were experiments that were now tuned to travel between Atlanta itself (to the north) and the Forest Islands to the south...
Records: the Battle of Ginestra

## **The End of an Era**

Pure light cavalry force, especially in the massive formations borne of "special" recruitment methods of the horde, had been rampaging since the days of Kublai Khan. The range, speed and collective power they could focus on an area had made them all but unstoppable until they reached the logistics of larger, heavier fortifications of Europe.

The Kipchak hordes were already on the decline, sparked by a dozen factors, but the rise of the orks had done them no favors – especially the ultra-rapid refresh of the armies. The Golden Horde were now stuck between the hammer of the horde and the anvil of Eastern Europe.

Eastern Europe had its own challenges with the Ork Hordes, especially early on, but the Plantagenet Regiments had been a scalpel against the orks. For some areas, while there were still internal threats, mutual aid from the Regiments (especially from Bohemia towards Poland and Hungary), it opened other opportunities.

### **The Hungarian-Croation Alliance**

The Hungarian-Croation coalition allied with Dmitry Donskoy of Muscovy-Vladimir. They have mutual enemies in both the Golden Horde and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. With the predominantly Kipchak Horde now at a political imperative for conquest, Eastern Europe knew a massive counterattack was coming – they just didn't know where.

Still stinging from the defeat to Dmitry, the [human] Horde elected to attack the defenses that haven't had the experience against their tactics. While word of the target selection never technically leaked, the gradual migration of the formations and logistics to the south telegraphed their plans.

### **The Grand Assault**

The *massive* Horde formation made passage across the Dnieper and attacked the earthen ramparts of the town of Ginestra. The coalition had prepared well but otherwise underestimated the sheer size of the now-combined Golden Horde.

Donskoy's attack from the rear was the perfect hammer to the Ginestra anvil, but the miles-wide size and scope of the battle resulted in mutual devastation, including the death of Charles of Durazzo. Khan Tokhtamysh escaped, but was mortally wounded in the battle and eventually died from infection at Sarai Batu.

### **The Aftermath**

Word of Tokhtamysh's death reached Amir Timur a week later. As the younger khan was, at the time, an acolyte of Timur, the old master analyzed and planned requisite retaliation. This type of loss made a political statement that simply couldn't be tolerated nor endured. The problem for Timur was growing resistance from Persia – and major ork issues of their own.

On the European side, with Charles of Durazzo now out of the picture, King Louis quietly rescinded the Durazzo policy of Slavic harvesting and did his best to sweep it under the rug like it was never part of the plan. The Plantagenet directive was clear, and their power was not to be trifled with...
Records: General Use Cleaning Wands

### **Household Magic**

In November 1383, the OM released wands capable of being used by the magically untrained.

The cleaning wands had two versions released, both dealing with domestic upkeep. One was dry cleaning, the other was simulated water-based. Both were already years in the making, fully mature products.

* The dry version had two components: a surface interaction and a pressure interaction. The surface could simulate soft wipe or heavy brush. The pressure could shaped positive or negative, either creating a breeze of a vacuum. A vacuum was designed to collect into a floating cloud of debris, which would then be dumped.
* The wet version, slightly more expensive (and reminiscent of the Rods of Water), had a function which used magic to simulate water and could actually rinse and agitate surfaces. Mixed with detergents, it could lather, suds, dissolve contaminants, and rinse.

In a world suffering plague and a host of other diseases, this was considered a major step forward in sanitation and human survival, as well as progress in domestic engineering.

This also gave a boost to accepting arcane magic in areas that had previously been skeptical.

### **Mundane Actuation**

For as handy as cleaning functions were, by far the most important point was the OM’s sale of wands that could be triggered by mundane (non-magical) means. While it was cleaning wands now, how long until somebody adapted that to something more lethal? How would the Crown regulate and control it?