Teris Empire

The *Regula Turiavi*, or commonly known as the Terian Empire, is an imperial entity that is located on the east side of the known world. It is comprised up of seven fiefdoms and one march, all managed by dukes, who are sworn vassals under the Emperor. The 615 census reported a total of five hundred thousand adult males, with an overwhelming majority of Manfolk.

## History

The formation of the Empire remains a controversial issue, as many events remain obscured by imperial censors. Certain focal issues have become taboo to mention within the court, and can even result in the arrest, trial and execution of those unfortunate enough to be caught.

### Pre-Imperium (??? - 360)

The eastern coast of the continent was and has remained thaumatically more stable than the west, mainly due to the relative lack of any ley lines. As the Twyst are innately connected with magic, this would've inevitably led to inter-species fighting, especially in the West. This, combined with the abundant farmland and abundance of lakes for easy water transport seems to have influenced Hilderic the Journeyman to begin the Long Trek. The exact date and starting point of the Great Trek is unknown, but it involved the mass exodus of Manfolk eastward, with entire villages and settlements of Manfolk seeming to abandon their homesteads to join in the wave of the pilgrims.

The Trek was not without its problems: the large amount of Manfolk was such that the majority of people would not be in sight of the front, leading to tramplings and stampedes when the Trek was forced to stop for the night. In addition, archaeological findings have confirmed that life on the trail almost guaranteed starvation, disease and internal conflict; at least seven mass graves have been discovered along the Great Trek's path that presumably marked the conclusion of some sort of internal violence. The Long Trek also saw the formation of lynch mobs when the Trek reached Twyst villages; many Twyst legends still tell of "The Rift," in allusion to the trail of destruction and desecration that the Long Trek left behind.

The Trek was estimated to have taken three years to complete, carving a path around the Bosphora Sea, through the Fiefdom of Aeristhane and into what will become the Fiefdom of Terre. By then, all of the pilgrims were weathered and discontent, ready to break into an disorganised and self destructive mob. Legend has it that it was then that an army raised by the local Twyst warlord decided to attack. Although vastly outnumbered, the Twyst ambushers managed to cut down scores of the unarmed humans before they were surrounded and overwhelmed. Rallied by their common purpose, the Manfolk vowed to each other to settle the newfound area to the best of their abilities. Twenty noble families, each leading their respective fragment of the settlers, headed out to form their Fiefdoms. The last remaining noble family, the Terienne family, promised to remain and safeguard their arrival.

The ambitious rally of Manfolk was indeed answered: Entire Fiefdoms would endorse what was the "forced relocation" of the Twyst. In the proximal Fiefdoms with more kindhearted Dukes, the friendly Twyst would be marched out and warned to never return. In the more central Fiefdoms, entire villages of Twyst were put to the sword without warning, regardless of their predisposition. During this period, military technology advanced quickly to combat the magic that some Twyst settlements possessed and large roving bands of mercenaries became a common sight.

When the Twyst were declared to be eradicated after years of bloodshed, at the first year of the calendar, many Fiefdoms were left with crippling debt and an increasingly discontent mercenary army. Instead of forcefully disbanding these unruly regiments, each Fiefdom's ire was directed to their neighbours. This would mark the beginning centuries of inter-Fiefdom conflict. Dukes collaborated, schemed and plotted against one another. Assassination and invasion became ever more common. Amongst it all, the original pact of solidarity against the Twyst had long been forgotten. As land was lost, many dispossessed and exiled nobles managed to cling onto their fortunes, becoming the burghers within foreign Fiefdoms. Finally, the prevalence of the mercenary caste was solidified in Manfolk culture, becoming an indispensable staple to the nobility. It was not uncommon for a mercenary to band to be fighting under one banner one week, and then to be fighting against the same banner in the next.

By the second century, the fighting had stabilised and there remained seven regional powers: The Fiefdoms of Tharsis, Misayl, Braythorp, Bellewerke, Thimia, Kloden and Terre. While regional conflicts were still frequent, they no longer embroiled multiple dukes, and could be better described as border skirmishes. The Fiefdom of Tharsis played a large part in this peace; their defensive tactics, effective training and central location prevented ambitious Dukes from achieving their goals. However, this was not to last; Lucretius Terienne, duke of the Fiefdom of Terre from 198-237, declared an unprovoked war of aggression against the Fiefdom of Tharsis. Within weeks, the Fiefdom of Thimia had joined in, eager to finally break the stalemate. Despite the two sided attacks, The Tharsiscans held their ground admirably. In the pivotal Battle of Lake Siofolk, the heavy Tharsiscan regiments were finally defeated by Lucretius Terienne through a series of naval manoeuvres that left the mostly landbound Tharsiscan regiments out of position and unable to defend their flanks. Able to break out of the "Tharsiscan prison," Lucretius went on to fight a lightning campaign that brought all of the other Fiefdoms to their knees, highlighting his brilliant tactical mindset that often danced around the more rigidly disciplined armies, before launching an overwhelming attack that quickly routed the enemy. Some legends suggest that Lucretius had made heavy use of Illusion Thaumatics to swing the battles to his favour, but there is little evidence for either side of the argument.

In the peace negotiations held in Ternais, Lucretius shocked all of the other dukes by suggesting the formation of a "supra-Fiefdom," which would effectively bind of all of the Fiefdoms together with mutual vows of solidarity. When pressed for other demands, Lucretius declined and insisted that his only desire was to see all of Manfolk at peace. Eager to take the seemingly lenient peace deal, the other Dukes unanimously accepted and on 224 the First Council was created. The Council nominally had power to vote on collaborative issues, and to intervene to stop infighting. With Lucretius still reigning in the Fiefdom of Terre, the Council moved smoothly and was actually able to ameliorate many of the regional conflicts that remained between the other Dukes. However, Lucretius fell sick in the winter of 236 and soon passed away before the spring of 237. While some blame the Elven healer that was contracted by the wife of Lucretius to heal him, the end result is that Komnike Terienne ascended to the throne. Resentful at the young Duke, the council lost its rallying point and soon fell to petty bickering again. This time, wars were fought in the council room, as opposed to the battlefield. Intrigue soon became the only way that a Duke could hope to survive in the political minefield. Total war would break out every few decades, where land would be exchanged and alliances either reaffirmed or shattered. When fighting ceased, a new council would be formed, from the new dukes, to begin the ouroboric cycle anew. The only consolation is that due to the localisation of conflict, the lives of the lower and middle classes were often very peaceful, allowing for wider swathes of land to be cultivated and culture refined.

The dissolution of the sixth council in 360 would take a turn for the different, however. The exact cause of the war is unknown, but some historians believe it began through a succession crisis in the Fiefdom of Braythorp. what is known, however, is that the war involved the Fiefdoms of Terre, Braythorp and Vasel against the Fiefdoms of Tharsis, Bellewerke, Thimia and Kloden. The War of the Lilies, as it is now known, is named after the characteristic lilies was chosen to represent each side. The Terian lead coalition often flew a banner with the Dorine Lily, a native of the central regions renowned for its pure white blossoms in clear pond water. By contrast, the Tharsiscan coalition utilised the Armach lily, which is said to have adopted a midnight black hue due to their native environment, the Glomburrow Marshes of the Fiefdom of Tharsis.

Unlike all of the previous wars as fought by the council fiefdoms, the War of the Lilies took over eight years and nearly fifty thousand casualties before a conclusion could be reached. Duke Vensill Liantus Crowe finally conceded and signed what is now known as the Treaty of Blood in 368; it formalised the permanent dissolution of the council, the creation of the Terian Empire, and forced all of the other Dukes to swear fealty under the newly crowned Emperor Lerovech "The Bloody" Terienne.

### Imperia Gloria (368-554)

Despite the formalities of the treaty, many factions and factors remained powerful and potentially dangerous to the new Emperor. While the council had tied the political leadership together, each Fiefdom's economy was their own, and free trade agreements were rare. Now, the enforced opening of trade customs meant that competition amongst the burghers became another point of conflict. Burgher discontent began to be redirected towards the administration, and many unsuccessful burghers eventually moved to the Kingdom of Lunthorn for more stable employment under the Lunthornian Charter. This drain of financial power within the empire lead to a general recession, further stalling development and fomenting discontent. To counter this, Lerovech's successor, Lovis I Terienne turned his eyes to the west, back into the Twyst Lands.

In the decades following, Lovis I personally funded no less than fifteen naval colonial expeditions to the Twyst Lands, in the hopes of rallying the people behind a common cause and thus allowing the Empire to recover from the financial slump. Many of the initial expeditions consisted of unprepared nobles eager for vainglory, barely equipped for the magical nature of the Twyst Lands. The only successful colony was established on 408, and would develop into what we know of today as Marchburgh. While the expenses spent on the expeditions left Lovis I almost destitute, the overall imperial economy did indeed undergo a revitalisation; farms were reorganised for efficiency, new animal husbandry techniques were practiced, thaumatic smithing was brought over from the Twyst Lands and incorporated into almost every Terian smithy, and the dockyards became a thriving district for every seaside town. Smaller benefits were also reaped from the establishment of Marchburgh; spices, knowledge and most importantly elven slaves were carried back as fast as the ships could carry them.

Bolstered by the success of Marchburgh, the Terian Empire turned its eyes to other avenues of expansion. Several wars were waged against the dwarves residing in the Kingdom of Zundinar before a peace treaty was hammered out and trade began again. Several more crusade-styled incursions into the Twyst Lands in 424 and 447 lead to the destruction of elven sanctuaries and the capture of yet more elven slaves.

While imperial unity was high in this period, inter-Fiefdom conflict was not unheard of; in particular, the brief surge of nationalism in the Fiefdom of Vasel sparked the War of Glass and Shadow, which lead to the reinforcement of the Fiefdom of Tharsis as a regional power and evolution of mercenary companies into more regimented divisions such as the Tharsiscan Knights.

Finally, in 483 did the Empire turn its eyes towards what was known as the Gulley. Known to be a region teeming with kobolds and other Twyst and yet low in strategic resources, development there was limited before this point. As such, Emperor Hilderic granted an imperial commission to the Duke of Bellewerke, placing the Gulley under his care.

### Bellewerke to March (554-555)

The Duke of Bellewerke in 554, Olto Hessault began his rule with a heavy debt incurred by his father in the zealous development of Aeristhane. Resentful towards the rebellious colony and also towards the emperor to burdening Bellewerke with the task, Olto petitioned to share the colony's financial burden with the rest of the empire. When he was rebuked by Emperor Lovis IV and told to instead take tighter control of colonial administration, Olto redirected his discontentment towards the Emperor, believing that the Emperor desired Bellewerkian lands and was using the colony to weaken Olto to make annexation possible. From this, a flurry of plotting and intrigue began in the spring of 554, in which Olto gathered a large amount of support from the Fiefdom of Braythorp to overthrow the Emperor and resume what would be the seventh council.

Unfortunately, the plot was revealed much too soon when several elven slaves under the employ of the Duke leaked the information to the Black Wolves, confirming the petitions of the many dukes. This led to an immediate political crackdown in which the Emperor issued the formal arrest of both Dukes of Bellewerke and Braythorp. While Braythorp did not resist, and the former Braythorpian duke forced to abdicate in favour of his heir, Bellewerke issued a declaration of war and marched on Ternais, intent on ending the Terienne family's hold over the Empire.

Fortunately, or perhaps quite unfortunately for the Duke of Bellewerke, the Aeristhanians chose this precise moment to declare their independence. Burgeoned by a war on two fronts, Olto's army quickly collapsed and the traitorous duke captured and publicly executed. In a show of power, Lovis IV dissolved the Fiefdom of Bellewerke and replaced it with "The March," more politically independent than a normal Fiefdom but also bound by rite of sword and soul to serve the Emperor's military pursuits. A new noble family was elevated to take control of the March, and the empire's war focus now turned towards the rebelling colony in Aeristhane.

### Treaty of Eastmarch to Present Day (556-618)

See War of Aeristhanian Independence

Humiliated by the inconclusive war in Aeristhane, Lovis IV lost much of the prestige that he had gained in putting down the Bellewerkian revolt. As a result, the dukes of the empire began their own plotting once more, and much of the Imperial power in the recent decades have been spent appeasing and mediating between the ambitious dukes. In particular, the Fiefdom of Vasel have been chafing under the new slavery laws which require the formal documentation of all imported Twyst slaves, leading to the outcries of many Vaselian burghers and nobles.

Lovis IV, still reigning at the age of 86, maintains a heavy cohort of advisors and functionaries to run the court, and mostly makes ceremonial appearances at festivals and celebrations. The heir expectant is Letterech, current steward of the empire and regent cognito.

## Geography and Climate

The Teris empire stretches from the Burrower's Foothills in the west, to the Everpeak Mounts in the north, and the Meridatic Ocean in the east and south. Encompassing a plethora of different biomes, the climate in the Teris empire is extremely diverse but much more predictable than the magically influenced weather in the Twyst lands.

Due to the large abundance of lakes and other water reservoirs, the climate in the centre of the Empire is particularly stable, consisting of the a wet and dry season. Due to the basin-like elevation of the central lands in relation to the highlands surrounding it, ice-melt and run-off tends to flow first into the low-lying lands first, before being carried away in tributaries to the Meridatic Ocean. From the transient nature of the water flow from the surrounding regions, rivers can quickly dry off or coalesce into miniature lakes in mere years. As a result of this, the low lying lands of the Fiefdom of Tharsis and the Fiefdom of Thimia are rife with swamps and marshes. This has been largely remediated through centuries of leveé building and fen draining, and only small areas remain undrained, largely for nature reserves and hunting grounds. In particular, the immense scale of elven slave import after Marchburgh's establishment allowed the Fiefdoms to construct and maintain an intricate system of dams, dikes, and canals to prevent the annual rainfall from causing a flood.

The ranges of the Everpeak mountains mark the northern border of the Teris Empire. Due to the magical nature of the Everpeaks, the Fiefdoms of Misayl and Braythorp are the most magically concentrated regions within the empire. With its closer presence to the Meridatic Ocean than similar biomes such as the Fiefdom of Aeristhane, the extreme weathers of the northern Fiefdoms are somewhat moderated as well. One unique weather phenomenon is the wide fluctuations during the coldest months of winter; frostchaser winds tend to arrive after a harsh storm, quickly blowing any errant weather system into the southern provinces to be dissipated and carrying a warm front to the northern Fiefdoms. These sudden swings in temperature, when combined with relatively high magical output has been known to cause brain-numbing migraines that can paralyse unprepared travelers.

The northeastern highlands border the dwarven Kingdom of Zundinar, and are known to be dotted with abandoned dwarven mountain outposts, unmanned and full of intricate machinery yet to be salvaged. It is rumoured that the Teris empire have lost many siege engineers trying to recover the dwarven technology, and that whatever is left is well protected by the remaining traps and automatons, perhaps forever lost to either the ravages of time or fortuitous and well-informed adventurers...

The southern and eastern coast of the Teris Empire, consisting of the Fiefdoms of Terre, Vasel and Kloden, have very temperate climates that have attracted many prospective settlers. As such, it is no surprise that the Imperial population is most concentrated in these fiefdoms. Interestingly, much of the flora close to the shores are have become accustomed to the high salinity of seawater, and actually prefer it to freshwater. Several Imperial botanists have recently began a series of ambitious experiments intending to create a strain of salt-tolerant maize.

## Politics

The Teris Empire is, as its name implies, a feudal state lead by an Emperor. The current reigning head of state is Emperor Lovis IV, who is advised both by the noble dukes/marcher lord and also the council. Furthermore, ever since The Concordat, the Following of the One has had its own needs and ambitions represented in the court by the Lord Spiritual. Historically, the extent of power of each faction is quite mercurial and can vary vastly depending on the courtly intrigue. Currently, due to the sick and infirm nature of Lovis IV, the empire is largely run by a series of courtly functionaries and the joint wills of the council, with many of the nobles choosing to follow the imperial decrees at their own choosing. Church taxes are a matter of contention between the local nobility and the lay persons of the area, marking another layer of rivalry and opposition in the already byzantine political games.

The noble dukes and marcher lord are bound by fealty to serve under the Emperor. They are to relinquish a portion of their mercenary army and levy in times of war, and to pay a portion of their income as a tithe. Loyalty is by no means definite, and only the marcher lord is obligated to join his liege's war. This indirect system alleviates the troubles of an overbearing bureaucracy, but also means that power is often very disproportional and inter-Fiefdom conflicts a common sight. To make matters worse, many Dukes have further divided up their demesne to be managed by the lesser nobility, elevating select few into Counts, of which will nominate their own bevy of Barons. This feudal contract extends all the way down to the Knights, often a series of rich burghers that have just bought their nobility.

The council is composed mostly of influential burghers and public figures. The number of council members have varies slightly, but it has never surpassed twelve or decreased beyond eight; currently nine members sit on the council, representing the major businesses of the Empire, as well as two magus, with one from the Ternaisé Thaumatics Institution and the other from the Iorgrilsettian College of Quaematics. The council seats are for life, but it is customary to see the resignation of any council member should they fall from fame and prominence.

The creation of the Following of the One originated from pragmatism, as having a concentrated deity to focus one's devotion and magical energy into would ostensibly also create a deity that had more power to accomplish the very things its follower want it to do. However, through centuries of worship the Following of the One has taken a much more dogmatic role in Terian life.Each town or rural district is under the management of a Confessor, who is in charge of the dispersal of the the One' teachings. Several Confessors then report to the regional Dioseres, who then report up to the Archdioseres. The Archdioseres, instead of administering the faith out to the public, convene in the Grand Abbey to discuss matters and trade ecclesiastical revelations. Most importantly however, the Lord Spiritual is elected from the college of Archdioseres. The Lord Spiritual holds control over all aspects of the Following of the One. He is seen as the prophet and herald of the One's teachings. The regions used by the Following are often similar to the divisions used by the feudal lords to divide up their holdings, however several regional differences persist and have caused undue strife between the clergy and the nobility.