Empire of Adamant

The **Adamant Empire** is an empire that occupies the entirety of the continent of Ekrustia. It is lead by Potentate Vannon. The people are fiercely loyal and dissent is not tolerated.

## History

Over 1,000 years ago, the Adamant Empire conquered a cervidian kingdom. The remaining Cervidians spread out and tried to fit into human society. Many were killed or enslaved. The survivors struggled on until about 100 years ago, which was also when Potentate Fecht rose to power. They were starting to recover and resist the Empire. To crush the resistance, Potentate Fecht put a bounty on cervidian antlers. The bigger the antlers, and therefore higher leveled, the higher the reward. This bounty has resulted in Cervidian-hunting even on other continents, and practically caused a genocide of Cervidians who subsequently went into hiding.

At one point, the Empire was fighting the Watch. The conflict remained unresolved because of some sort of divine intervention as it threatened to end in a cataclysm.

## Organization

The strength of the Empire lays in its numbers, and less with strong individuals like the DKE. However, several exceptional individuals make up the elite of the Empire, chief among them Potentate Fecht himself, who is reportedly a platinum-plate, i.e. above Level 75. While he looks about 40 years old, in truth he is over 100. Fecht has personally subjugated Lightbreaker, an Osaran noble who is strong enough to kill Goldplates with relative ease (as demonstrated when he killed two Citizens of the DKE), and uses him to eliminate enemies of the Empire.

Fechton Stone explained that "Called" is not a word for awakened per se, but that awakened people need to distinguish themselves before becoming *"Called"*, and likened it to the Ascension rank of *"Entrusted"*.

Regular people in the Empire are called "Undama", and propaganda has it that *“Undama are the heart of Adamant, its flesh and its blood and its bone.”* Nobility may be called *Dimae*.

The armies of the Empire are organized in legions and battallions. A legion comprises of 5000 soldiers. Each battalion is 512 soldiers in strength (that means, 64 parties/squads of 8). Given the nature of the world providing levels, there are many specialized roles within the armies, among them:

* Regulars... a patrolling group Ameliah encountered was comprised of a Swordsman in command, two male Shield Defenders, three female Mages (among them a Mentalist and a Barrier Mage), a bowman Tracker and a male Tamer.
* Eyes (Diviners able to survey a perimeter of 10 leagues, or 50 km)
* Hounds (elite trackers and scouts)
* Knives (Assassin kill teams, various offensive classes)
* Minds (one Mind for many Eyes: information-processing and Memory bank)
* ... (more)

Commanding officers are ranked into (in brackets: known officer names):

* *Dominus* (Illus, Alarus, Bekerim) - apparently commanding a legion
* *Principes* (Magus-Princeps Markus of Atillery, Princeps-Praesidium Gavek) - apparently specialized sub-commanders within a legion
* *Cento* (Pina) - apparently commanding a vessel
* *Sereni* (Berix, Kentus) - apparently commanding a batallion

It is not currently laid out if the *beacons* (awakened to a level 5, then forced to take all seasonal auras and march with the army) are counted as soldiers within the army, or as part of the support train. Beacons allow everyone else not to take the seasonal auras, because beacons would provide all mana, health, stamina and sustenance needed in the army.

The Empire makes ready usage of Incarns, who are level 20 soldier at most, enhanced with fatal magic. These feel no pain, and their bodies will give out under the strain of the magic, but for a short time they are exceedingly strong.

The empire also has control of plenty of low-level lairs which they farm for essence monsters. Anything level five or higher goes to the army regulars. They wouldn’t waste a higher than level five essence monster on a slave/beacon.

## Current situation

In 3060, the Empire declared war against the DKE. Just as was predicted at the start of the war, the Empire gained the upper hand in the conflict after conquering the southernmost cities of the DKE.

*A breakdown of the war may be found under* **Empire-DKE war**
## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Chapter 235
2. ↑ Chapter 065
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Chapter 094
4. ↑ Chapter 027
5. ↑ Chapter 93
6. ↑ Chapter 027
7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Chapter 191
8. ↑ Chapter 88. Exact break-down unknown: 10 batallions, or eight batallions with smaller strike groups?
9. ↑ Chapter 167
10. ↑ Chapter 168
11. ↑ Chapter 91
12. ↑ Chapter 032
13. ↑ Chapter 26