Political Entities of Alancria

The Dengardian Empire holds dominion over a little more than 20% of Alancrian land, with almost one hundred and fifty million people claiming fealty to the Dengardian Crown. This makes the nation of Dengard the largest and most influential political entity in Alancria, the centerpiece of the international tapestry. Its industrial power, population, and sheer tenacity throughout the centuries of its existence have carved an indelible throne into the land, establishing Dengardian power as the single most influential factor in the continent's history, past and present. Yet despite even this irrefutable prestige, Dengard is in no way an omnipotent presence. The many other nations of the continent hold critical roles in the functioning, albeit tense and ominous, peace and unity of Alancrian politics. While each of their individual, isolated strength of arms, influence, and economic reach differ--and ultimately pale in comparison to Dengard's--there is no question that the stability and success of the continent would slowly buckle and crumble without the participation of each empire, nation state, and territory.

## The Dengardian Empire

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The establishment of Dengard, the unification and coercion of countless smaller human principalities, marked the beginning of Alancrian's international calendar, and 1200 years later, the vast dominion of Dengard stands as the unrivaled center of continent-wide issues. While the founding communities and families of this nation were almost exclusively Human, the empire grew to encapsulate countless, diverse peoples. In truth, it was the Dengardian ideal of unwavering industry and innovation that both unified the previously disparate human powers as well as convinced countless non-human entities to willingly accept the sovereignty of Dengard's monarchy. Independent city states and isolated communities that surrounded Dengard's ever growing borders petitioned, almost always successfully to be accepted into the empire.

Expansion was not without blood, and Dengard found itself struggling more and more to salvage net gains from the countless resistances and wars it wages in its insatiable desire for growth and prestige. Ultimately, predictions of all out international wars and crippling economic consequences compelled the Dengardian leadership to quell its appetite, triggering several centuries of profitable consolidation. The peace bought by this realization of restraint sowed seeds for tremendous economic and social progress, putting the millions of Dengardians to work solidifying and augmenting the nation's industrial and political strength. Valuable colonies and the wondrous advances in technology, paired with the unparalleled labor force of such a vast empire, came together to establish Dengard's primacy in the world, the first true international super power that Alancria had ever seen.

Yet with greater size came greater enemies and troubles. Law enforcement slowly found itself struggling to keep up with tremendous surges in criminal activity, as greater opportunities came not only to lowly peasants, but to ever evolving villains such as the rebellious mob of the Apostles of Cadencia, the Ashen Crescents, and Hextorian extremists; perpetual struggles with these domestic threats took great tolls on the economic success of the nation, as more and more funds were funneled into Dengard's military and law enforcement; advances in education have led to greater unrest within the populace, as the poor begin to wonder about their own place in this supposedly all powerful civilization, turning to ever more revolutionary--and often illicit--methods to voice their frustrations with the status-quo; these obvious weakness led Dengard's historically docile neighbors to grow ever more aggressive, making advances and political moves of their own to consolidate each entity's own influence on the continent--subtle challenges to the historic rule of Dengard.

In the modern era, Dengard finds its hard fought gains compromised by the unforeseen troubles of Industrial Revolution. The people, once unified in the nation's quest to manifest its potential, now find themselves mired in perpetual local struggles. Criminal organizations of unprecedented size and complexity threaten every corner of the Empire; political ties to Dengard's neighbors continue to deteriorate; and Dengard's leadership continues to struggle to accommodate the countless issues that clog the once unstoppable engine of Dengardian supremacy. Perhaps the noble ambition of centuries past has finally revealed itself to be Dengard's greatest curse.

## Fractured Tymbrael

In the centuries before Dengard's unification, the Elvish offshoot of humanity migrated from the temperate hills and fields of central Alancria to the North, establishing settlements all along the northwest coast of Alancria. In the chilled woodlands they settled, the elves established a large dominion, forming a caste-based functionalist society. This elfin civilization became a dominant force in the lumber trade, dealing in immense quantities of the high quality timber that surrounded their homes. This business made them close allies of the growing nation of Dengard, whose demand for lumber was so high that the Tymbraelese nation nearly sparked wars with several small druidic conclaves within the native forests in their efforts to meet the tremendous need.

It was this partnership that while exceptionally lucrative for Tymbrael, ultimately led to its most defining tragedy. Once it became clear that the Dengardian expansion would not stop, and may indeed threaten the Tymbraelese nation's independence, the Tymbraelese elves found themselves mired in a vicious civil war. The central administration, who favored continued and close partnership with Dengard, clashed with the aristocratic castes who saw the allegiance with Dengard as nothing more than subservience, a disgraceful abdication to foreign powers. For almost a decade, these factions warred within the frozen timberland of northwest Alancria, costing tens of thousands of elvish lives. In the end, with the entire nation on the verge of collapse, the two factions came to an agreement, and the once united elvish territories divided.

The aristocratic elvish castes and their serfs, led by their elected Autonomy Council, migrated even further North, laying claim to the thickest, most dense forests, isolating themselves from the rest of the world; the Hierarchs of Concord, the oligarchs who managed the Tymbraelese state, continued their own affairs to the South, expanding into the more temperate zones neighboring Dengard's borders. The former established a society that, while comparatively smaller than their southern ilk, were able to cut off all but the most essential bonds with the outside world. The latter expanded, taking hints from their new allies as they settled beyond their thinned forests and into the chilled grasslands of Western Alancria. The caste system they once upheld crumbled, a tradition left to their Northern brothers, and so arose a more advanced functionalist society that emulated Dengard. This partnership continues to this day, and though the Hierarchs have not been able to reclaim the timber industry they once managed, their mercantile efforts are second to none.

The schism produced few negative feelings between the two brother nations--although the North disdained the South's fraternizing and kowtowing to foreign powers, and the South saw the North as a regressive society destined for collapse in the new world, they are not without a singular bond: their united hatred towards their eternal enemy, the orcish tribes of the Northeast tundras. For as long as anyone can remember, the orcish peoples and elvish peoples have been actively at war, vying over the mineral rich lands that cut through the middle of these two great nations. Countless atrocities and grievances have fed this enmity, and while Fractured Tymbrael feuds a cold war over their people's future, they cooperate in this endless conflict with their eternal foe.

## The Maljevo

No one is certain when the orcish peoples known as the Maljevo
settled the vast icy tundras of Northeast Alancria. it has been established orcish lands for millennium, the lands from the southernmost rocky crags to the northernmost frozen Ignus mountain range that fills the tip of the world: Cape Portent. Even the arctic waters that flow quietly along the curving coast are filled with orcish fishing fleets, just one of the many testaments to the hardy, implacable industry of the Maljevo. Although the smallest of the
national entities in terms of population, numbering less than twenty million, the Maljevo have endured the tides of history for untold centuries, a durable society based on close knit clans led by extended families of ruling Khans.

A marvel of ethnic solidarity, the Maljevo have no records of in-fighting, a legacy of internal peace that has helped them survive, even as their numbers wax and wane unpredictably in their many wars with the elves. The Maljevo have as a matter of principle never tried to interfere with the matters beyond their borders, preferring to continue their spiritual lifestyles within their massive stone cities carved into the land itself. Subsisting on fish harvests, crops of
carrots and kale, and the herds of elk and moose that wander the North, the Maljevo maintain an unchanging existence, with no ambitions beyond the eradication of elves and the thriving of its people within its borders. The Maljevo have had very few relations with their neighbors, although even they were unable to ignore the rapid growth of the Dengardian Empire. Perhaps surprisingly, the Maljevo forged a quiet but steady alliance with Dengard, despite the latter's known connections to Tymbrael. Dengard and the Maljevo tribes have cooperated one only a few occasions, pacifying criminal and militaristic threats in the region, as well as establishing a very lucrative ore trade.

It is this ore that makes the Maljevo as powerful internationally as its larger counterparts. Tremendous amounts of gold and silver hide within the icebound rock of the tundra. The Maljevo, quiet as ever, give no word as to the supply, and for all its neighbors know, there are endless layers of precious metal within the otherwise desolate earth. The Maljevo fish and mine, and when they can, launch vicious, ruthless invasions against repeated Elvish attempts to colonize the lands near the border. The quiet diplomacy of the Maljevo, both in word and in blade, have become infamous, giving them all the space and isolation they strive for.

Yet perhaps it is the Maljevo society that stands most vulnerable in these changing times, as the demands of the Industrial Revolution threaten to break a people who seem incapable of ambition and expansion. Unwilling as they seem to follow their neighbors into the future, it is only a matter of time before they are dragged fully into the global arena, which they are so unprepared for. The tribalism that reigns within the Maljevo borders may be its greatest weakness, sabotaging the Maljevo's efforts to adapt to the ever quickening changes that sweep through the world to the sound of grinding machinery.

## Tribes of Epimethea

Far to the southwest of Dengard lies a vast arid expanse, almost one million square miles of desolate wasteland, pockmarked by oases and deep canyons. This area is known to the outside world as the Dreadlands, an unforgiving wilderness filled with ferocious beasts and war mongering barbarians. To its inhabitants, those same barbarians, it is Epimethea, the birthplace of humanity and the cradle of the gods themselves. Despite the harsh conditions, Epimethea is a land filled with almost thirty million people, most of them alligned with one of the ten large tribes that roam the wastes in a traditional nomadic lifestyle. Historically, the people who live here are indeed a people devoted to lives of conflict, repeatedly launching wars, raids, and invasions of neighboring territories in order to subsist on plundered goods and food. There are perhaps no other people on the continent so feared for their innate martial ferocity than the Epimetheans of the Dreadlands.

It is uncertain if humanity found its roots in Epimethea. While it is agreed that the Dreadlands were once fertile grounds of endless grasslands, no one can quite agree how it became the sand smothered waste it is today. The natives believe that wars among the gods lay the land to waste, burning the earth of vegetation and water. Outsiders might contribute the change to endless droughts that choked the life of the fields. But regardless of how, these deserts still managed to maintain massive human populations, thanks to the resourceful--or perhaps ruthless--methods of the natives. Epimetheans formed into tribes, each one revering the hardy survivalist spirit of specific animals. While there have been almost a hundred different names for a thousand different tribes throughout their long history, today, ten primary tribes persist: Bear, Serpent, Horse, Lion, Tiger, Wolf, Condor, Ox, Boar, and Wyrm. Epimethean history is soaked in the blood of countless tribal wars, and each of these tribes had at one time ruled over the others after brutally subduing its rivals.

The constant flux of leadership made Epimethean civilization stagnant, and constant nomadic life made progress painfully slow. Yet the merciless, repeated invasions of neighboring countries, especially Eimethea's long history of war with Dengard, allowed Epimthean warlords to plunder tremendous amounst of riches, supplies, and goods, which, with a singular EPimethean flair, were sold regularly in the wandering markets that catered to the countless wandering adventurers of Alancria. Romume, the only Epimethean city to be built, maintained, and developed, was the seat of the Totem Lord, the champion who was able to unite the ten tribes together for a common goal. Few Totem Lords have existed, as the ten tribes have seldom been able to combine their strengths to achieve a multilateral destiny. Yet there have existed Totem Lords who, in times of great change, struggle, or crisis, arose to consolidate Epimethean power and make astounding leaps in their people's future.

In the modern day, Epimethean aggression finally bought a definitive response from the outside world. In the wake of the Mad Man's War, the closest that a united Epimethea has come to conquering Dengard itself, the Epimetheans were crushed, their armies decimated in a two year bloody struggle with Dengard's massive military. Their lands, laid bare by the deaths of so many leaders and the loss of so many working age men, were immediately seized and occupied by the second largest corporate entity on the continent, the Oros Combine--a wealthy scientific business conglomerate. Hired by the Dengardian government to oversee the restructuring and re-education of the Epimethean peoples, the Oros Combine now holds sway over the united tribes, fully controlling matters of business, politics, and social policy.

These occupied peoples face the most defining issues of their histories: the balance between their cultural identity and their futures. Under the watchful eye of the Oros Combine, the Epimetheans must decide how much of their history and culture they will sacrifice in order to join the rest of quickly developing world, which has already begun to leave them behind.

## The Basin

Tucked away in deep Western Alancria lies a stretch of fertile land known only as The Basin. Here, the sloping grasslands and fecund valleys and hills all lead to a massive, life-giving lake, the largest in the known world--Loch Parthas. The rain washed, famously lush lands of the Basin are the ancient homes of the gnomish peoples, a resourceful, diplomatic offshoot of the Diminutive Peoples, the wide array of small statured, yet ambitious folk who dwell all across Alancria. The Gnomes of the Basin have gathered here from all across the continent, to settle the lands they call their home, uniting in a confederacy of smaller boroughs led by an elected council of delegates. These representatives are chosen from each county, traditionally noblemen and high ranking members of the many mercantile Guilds that govern the territories across the Basin.

Yet despite the obvious Gnomish governance, the Basin remains a fantastically diverse nation, where peoples from all over the continent collect--after being approved and processed by the Perimeter Guard--to discover the inspiration that has captured the attention of many of the world's greatest artists and artisans. Indeed, the Basin has been dubbed the cultural heart of Alancria, where masterpieces of craftsmanship and taste have developed a prominent, bustling economy of international customs and artistry. While the Gnomish Guilds maintain a robust and ever growing network of mercantile interests, The Basin being one of the premier hubs of Alancrian trade, it is their patronage and funding of the fine arts that have defined their character. Most of the greatest composers, painters, sculptors, and writers of Alancria have, in one way or another, credited the Basin and its peoples with their skill and fame. The mentors and masters of craft that live in the Basin have, in many ways, taken the whole of Alancrian talent under their wing, creating (and possibly destroying) the great titans of Alancrian culture. This nation defining focus on the arts, the careful attentions of its ever watchful government, and the skill of the mercantile Guilds--all paired with the famous Gnomish talent for diplomacy--have made the Basin one of the most successful and peaceful entities on the continent.

The Basin itself has become the root of an international conflict, the conflicting claims to origin. Various peoples have contested the Gnomish claim to Basin heritage, each one contending that their peoples are the true Original Basin-dwellers--Halflings, kobolds, half-giants, and dozens of others have at one time or another opposed the Gnomish rule of the Basin. The veracity and legitimacy of these claims has never been confirmed, or decisively denied, and none of these other peoples have had the historical unity or nationhood to organize a compelling case as a cultural entity. However, of all these claimants, the Goblinoid Races have been the most determined--and the most ruthless.

Conflict between the Gnomes and the various Goblinoid peoples has been recorded for millennium, a rivalry to match that of the Elves and Orcs of the North. Few clashes have ever escalated to armed combat. The contest of historical heritage has remained almost exclusively on the international stage of rhetoric and policy, its contenders locked in vicious diplomatic attrition as each one slanders, decries, and otherwise discredits its opponent. In recent years, this conflict has been tempered by international pressure, particularly due to the intervention of Dengard, a historic Gnomish ally. Yet perhaps the matter most decisive in the tense settlement of the Gnome vs Goblin issue was the rise and fall of one of Alancria's most controversial figures, the Goblin nationalist (or war mongering terrorist) Nagel Klinger, who managed not only to become High Mogul of the Goblin nation of Karsah-Gane, but unite the goblinoid races into a single entity, declare war on The Basin, and nearly conquer the contested grounds. In his defeat, the matter of contesting Gnomish ownership of the territory became the territory of scandal.

The Basin, in the modern age, is right behind Dengard in its mastery of the current Industrial Revolution, carefully preparing itself and its people for the next great age of Alancrian history. Yet even as it touts its ostensible success, there are hints of growing dangers. Many speak of Klinger's return, of conspiracies not only among the neighboring Goblin nation, but within the Gnomish government itself. With Dengard's dominance becoming more and more tenuous, the future of the Basin's people becomes murkier and far more worrying.

## The Nan'xin League

Eastern Alancria begins in Dengard, vast grasslands that extend into golden, arabel plains. Here, the Dengardian empire has laid claim, covering the massive tracts of land in settlements and farms. Dubbed the Bread Bowl of Dengard, these plains, called the Pin Jang Valley, flow further East until it smacks directly into the largest jungle on the continent, the Wei. This is true wilderness, an almost untouched, untamed expanse of jungle filled with beasts and creatures of every description. This jungle extends across the land, and up into the massive Wei Mountain Range that looms over the Eastern Sea. Along the ridges of these mountains lie countless monastaries and temples, ancient and new, each one dedicated to one or more of the many deities that Alancrians worship as patrons. These shrines are guarded, maintained, and inhabited by devoted monks, devotees of countless respective Orders, thousands strong. Their communtiies, though isolated from the rest of the world, are tight knit, and function together much like any other nation. Villages and towns, even small cities, are built and goverened within the sheltered jungle clearings and mountain passes. It is over these communities that the Nan'xin League presides.

Once its own smaller Order of monks, the Nan'xin League grew to become the largest and most influential Order in the East, followers of the Thousand Paths. The Nan'xin believed in the stringent respect of every walk of life, the observance of the dignity within every "path" that mortals followed. Religions, nations, heritage, occupation, dreams, goals, love, hatred, each choice or simple reality represented one of the countless paths that mortals would take on the road to death, where their disparate paths would ultimately join into one collective journey into the Unknown. This philosophy of acceptance and community became exceptionally popular--and successful--in the dangerous wilds of the East, promoting Nan'xin dominance over all the other more hardline orders. The Nan'xin elders, hoping to stop conflict and envy before it could be given time to fester, immediately used their prestige to found the Nan'xin League, abolishing their own Order in the attempt to create a truly neutral entity that would oversee Eastern matters among the communities and Orders.

The promise of influence drew almost every Order in the East to join the League, forming an extremely powerful union of different yet successful Orders. The Masters of each order swore allegiance not to the Nan'xin leadership, but to the East itself, creating a precedent that would color Nan'xin matters even to this day. While the former Nan'xin Order would act as mediators and moderators of the League's proceedings and ceremonies, all League decisions would be channeled as a focused, collective, multilateral power, devoid of a single philosophy other than Eastern solidarity and the quest for peace. Together, the League managed its own affairs, mediated Eastern issues, and maintained Peace and Order within the Wei Jungle for centuries.

The inevitable clash between Dengard's expansion and the Nan'xin's purview ended in a surprisingly peacful manner. Initial tensions between Dengardian settlers and the different communities under the Nan'xin became friendly, and a fast alliance was formed. Dengard expanded, and its own settlements were given honrary places under the auspices of the Nan'xin, a great aid to the stretched resources of the Dengardian military. Dengard would consult the Nan'xin on Eastern matters, help protect its stability, and maintain strong trade relations. In return, the Nan'xin would allow further Dengardian settlement along the nadir of the Wei Mountain Range and protect the frontier from bandits, wildlife, and any other threat.

Unfortunately, this alliance provoked a tragically unforseen internal struggle. The Tie'dao, puritan followers of Hextor, the God of Supremacy, had been one of the first to accept membership to the League, dedicated to the idea that they, the followers of He that guided the weak to become strong, were needed in any effort to create a successful and powerful empire. While outspoken in their quest for constant improvement both on the individual and national level, the Hextorian Church strayed further and further into extremism as their warnings of complacency and weakness in the East went rebuffed again and again. The Hextorians gre more and more disgusted with the Nan'xin's mediation of the Leageu and the East, disdaining the Nan'xin's openness and lax authority as weakness. Terrified that the Nan'xin were creating a society of subservience, fragility, and indulgence that would crumble and die, the Tie'dao demanded that the League cut off ties with Dengard until they could secure borders, create a formal, standing army of trained soldiers, and establish an uncompromised national authority over all of the East. This policy, too, was shut down by the Nan'xin, who saw the Tie'dao as power hungry, war mongering partisans.

In the end, both the Nan'xin and the Tie'dao proved the other true. Led by Patriarch Fah, the Hextorian Order, one of the largest and unrivaled in its military readiness, led a massive rebellion against the League, throwing the entire region into a bloody civil war. Ruthless, Fa's fanaticism sent the Hextorians into a blood addled rage, destroying whole swaths of jungle in the attempt to erase the weak from the nation. The Nan'xin, in a cruel twist of irony, could not definitively stop the Tie'dao. While their own military was comprised of seasoned masters of the martial arts, with fists and steel, it was scattered, divided by geography and philosophy--many joining Fa. As the two factions continued to tear the region to pieces, the Nan'xin made one final effort: sending delegates to Dengard, they pleaded for aid. Dengard, primarly following the Church of Heironeous (the historic tradtional arch nemesis of Hextor), immediately accepted, sending its massive army to crush the Tie'dao.

Victory came swiftly after, but the damage had been done. Peace and order was restored, but at the cost of trust and stability. No longer were the Nan'xin seen as heroes and noble leaders--they were just as weak and powerless as the now dissolved Tie'dao had claimed. While the League persisted, its influence slowly faded, as Dengard's insidious colonial powers in the region increased. The East became all the more dangerous, as the disbanded Tie'dao continued to practice, though now as outlaws and bandits, exiled from Hextorian led cities. Ultimately, the lack of faith in the League came once more to a head, as the Tie'dao regrouped and returned, this time striking at the heart of the League, killing almsot all of its leaders. Now occupying the East as true dominators under the leadership of the charismatic Patriarch, the young Fray Kai-Rex, the Tie'dao began to purge the region of dissenters, driving the Nan'xin from its home, and scattering them all across the continent.

The League exists now only as an underground rebellion, a frail organization of slowly dying Orders vying to topple the Hextorian control over the East. Most of its constituents and members have been driven from the East, a tragic diaspora known as the Sorrowful Wandering. These wandering monks, disgraced and crestfallen, now act as vagrant servants in a neverending penance. Even as Dengard struggles to help the League's remnants face Fray Kai-Rex, the question of the Nan'xin's continued existence is anything but secured.

## Karsahgane

Nestled to the South of Ordin Wood, Alancria's largest forest, is a small range of mountains called the Dustries, the home of the united goblinoid peoples of Alancria, Karsahgane. Though small in size, Karsahgne boasts a massive population, its millions of citizens confined into the nation's few cities built into and within the Dustry Mountains. Cramped and confined, the tirelessly industrious Karsahganians labor in the factories and foundaries that made Karsahgane the industrial titan that it is today, the continent's capital of manufacturing. Yet despite its irrefutable influence on the world's economies, providing the lion's share of machinery and industrial innovation, Karsahgane is often seen as the ogre of the continent, the black sheep who lives under more suspicion than respect, more caution than friendship. Goblinoids are by far the most alien sentient creatures of considerable number in Alancria, their short stature complimented by large reptilian heads, huge fanged mouths, and inordinately big hands. Their appearances are more akin to the beasts that plague civilization than they do the civilized, even as goblin sartorial fashion has borrowed from neighbors such as The Basin and Dengard. Yet perhaps more than their phusicality, it is the checkered history of the goblinoid races that give their neighbors pause.

Karsahgane itself was a prize fought for. Records are vague, but historians know that the Dustry Range was once uninhabited. This barren land was settled by nomadic goblinoids thousands of years ago, but even then it remained a wild country of orderless savagery and endless war. The years went by as conflict wracked the Dustries, a brutal, primitive place, where all manner of unsavory races vied for control and supremacy. The long centuries of mountainous feudalism and triablism that killed untold goblins spread into the surrounding regions, sparking wars with the as of yet separated Human city states and Gnomish communities. The collateral damage from these wars ravaged the land, leaving leveled villages and torched forests in their wake. It was only when the fighting began to eat at the neighboring Ordin Wood that action was taken against the leaderless goblinoids. Druidic enclaves who called Ordin Wood their home gathered Human and Gnomish militias to pacify the region, killing an untold number of goblins in an attempt to quell the endless war. Yet while this slowed and eventually stopped the internal goblin conflicts, it ultimately sparked a war that would define an entire region for centuries. The goblinoid hero, Kars Ahgus, gathered the many quarreling warlords and chieftains together, convincing them to bury hatchets and unite as a single people, to found a glorious homeland and nurture the inimitable goblinoid potential. All that stood in their way were the clueless human and gnomish coalition led by the Ordinian Druids.

The war that followed lasted all of several months, a successful campaign that established goblin dominance in the region. Although Kars Ahgus was killed in the closing days of the war, the nation that would be born by his life's work would ultimately bear his name: Karsahgane, Crown of Kars Ahgus. Karsahgane flourished quickly, the once squabbling goblin hoardes cooperating with a new nationalistic fervor, the same sentiments that would eventually serve as the inspiration for the founding of Dengard. The goblin peoples built large cities that rose from the base of mountains to the very peaks, where, with innovative techniques of construction and engineering, they were able to create an unrivaled industrial empire. They produced weapons, farming tools, galleon designs, power producing mills--the needs of the continent were serviced by the Karsahagen foundaries. Royal Moguls, who acted like warrior kings, led Karsahagen into centuries of vast wealth and success.

Yet as time went on, and success continued, the goblin nation was confronted by unforseen obstacles. As the quality of life improved, lifespans increased. Soon, goblin procreative productivity rivaled its economic productivity, and the population spiked out of control. Famines and unemployment dealt huge blows to goblin society, and as the outside world advanced, it slowly began to catch up to Karsahgane's technological superiority; as the playing field leveled, successful nations such as Dengard and Tymbrael discovered groundbreaking inventions and techniques on their own, becoming worthy rivals of the once unrivaled Karsahgane industrial machine. Karsahgane's once spacious borders began to constrict as Dengard's own borders grew broader. Goblin expansion became increasingly difficult, and overppulation continued to wear on the infrastructure of the nation.

It was in the century leading up to the modern day that gave birth to a second Goblinoid visionary; this time, however, the visionary's status as hero would become one of the great controveries of Alancrian history. Nagel Klinger, an ambitious nationalist who served as vizier to the Mogul of his time, sparked a new wave of goblin patriotism that soon boiled into outright jingoistic fervor. The question of The Basin's true Chosen Folk came to a head once more, as Klinger defied the Gnome's strict control over the Basin territory, prompting a year long vicious political clash between the Gnomish leadership and the Karsahgane aristocracy. The centuries of strictures that the continent had placed on the goblon peoples, the cold shoulders, the ignored issues, the disrespect shown to the dignity of Karsahgane--the grievances of centuries past fueled this unprecedented public outrage at the Alancrian geopolitical arena. Klinger soon managed to negotiate a pact of neutrality from Dengard and Tymbrael, the two closest political powers in the region, and, the way clear, led a massive military campaign into The Basin, intent on conquering the lush territory for Karsahgane, to reclaim, according to him, the original goblin homeland.

Yet even as Klinger's army stood poised to strike down the Gnomish government and claim the land as goblin, he was betrayed. Thanks to the efforts of a young Gnomish ambassador, Dengard and Tymbrael had been convinced to join The Basin in defying Karsahgane aggression. Overwhelmed and outmatched, Karsahgane's military was devestated, utterly obliterated by the allied forces and forced into submission. Demilitarized, the goblin nation lay in ruins, all the investments into its military liquidated, its cities stripped for reparations. A more docile Mogul was instated, and Dengard and The Basin arranged a new set of laws that would keep Karsahgane penned into its own constricted borders. Klinger, the would be hero of the goblin nation, was exiled in disgrace, never heard from again.

Today, Karsahgane has reclaimed much of its former glory, even as it desperately struggles to make due with its limited space and lack of access to natural resources. Even as it adapts and grows to the Industrial Revolution rolling across the continent, its stability and future remain in question. Still, it clings to relevance, its factories and foundaries still producing a majority of Alancria's manufactured goods, still innovating in fields such as defense, construction, and mechanical production. While the world relies on the goblinoid peoples for industrial success, its disdain for Karsahgane still fuels a palpable bitterness in goblin peoples all over the continent, and although Klinger is no longer in power, it all but certain that he has not given up on his dreams of conquest.