Anaean Wars

The **Anaean Wars,** also known as the **Great Sevician Civil War,** were a series of small conflicts resulting in a much larger civil war in the Empire of Sevicia that was fought between 660 and 667 A.S, between the Empire of Sevicia and a partisan breakaway force of republic loyalists calling themselves the Anaean League. The League, as its peak in 662, comprised more than a million members, including more than 200,000 soldiers and mercenaries, including the Iron Sons of Tyno. The war lasted just under seven years and was the bloodiest conflict on the continent in more than a century, with almost two million total casualties. It was somewhat of a turning point in the history of Sevicia and led to significant domestic change that resonated for more than 40 years. It also marked the first proper conflict for Sevician general Harold Byne.

## Background

The leading figure in the formation of the Anaean League was Arelsis of Reila. A native Laeanese, Arelsis was born of peasant stock in the city of Reila in the Lothor region of Sevicia. He spent more than a decade as a hewer of stone before joining the Sevician military at the age of 29, and soon became disillusioned by what he perceived to be a startling disparity in wealth and living conditions between the noble, upper classes of Sevicia's elite and the majority of its poorer population. He met two of his fellow conspirators, Millas of Enix and Rance Olus, at a local meetinghouse in Reila as part of the pro-republic group the Chapter of Workers. Rance introduced Arelsis to his sister, Resibel Olus, who would join their cause as the fourth leader not long after.

Anti-government sentiment reached its fever pitch at the end of the 650s, following Sevicia's humiliating defeat in the First Duscadorian-Sevician War and Imperator Manus VII's seeming incompetence when it came to domestic issues, especially in comparison to his predecessor, Cloe of Ida, widely regarded as one of the greatest leaders in Sevician history. Of the eventual leaders of the Anaean League, Millas of Enix was considered the most extreme; it was with his persuasion that Arelsis made the decision to continue with their plans. In mid 659, the original conspirators began drafting plans for action, using the Chapter of Workers meetinghouse as a base of operations.

Reila, and the Lothor region entirely, had been subject to a number of reforms and policies that were deeply unpopular among the citizens, including a revocation of the farmers' stipend established years earlier. Millas understood that this meant it would be easier to drum up support among the local populace, especially the peasant classes, but also cautioned Arelsis on the dangers of circulating propaganda that targeted the Sevician system of Imperator-as-ruler as a whole; while Manus VII was wildly unpopular, his predecessor, Cloe of Ida, had been the opposite, and Millas was wary of being seen to be propagating disdain for someone who was widely hailed as a hero of the common people.

By the first month of 660, Arelsis and his co-conspirators had planned what was going to come very soon. Month-long propaganda campaigns had proved extremely useful, and support among the base was at an all-time high. Arelsis' main motive seemed to have been driven by a deep-seated resentment of Sevician customs and the ruling elite, whom he believed to have wilfully neglected the vote of the common people. He believed, as did Millas of Enix and the other co-leaders, that a unified Sevicia required the rule of law to be overseen by representative from each societal class and each region, with a central governing body, as opposed to a singular monarch figure and a circle of power centred mostly around the Easterlands.

## Capture of Reila

On the 16th day of Tullena III, 660 A.S, Arelsis, his co-conspirators, and an armed mob numbering no less than a thousand stormed Reila's council house in broad daylight of the population. The councillors in session were violently ejected, with two - Iris Ulepor and Vyncent Amew - being killed in the ensuing chaos. Soon fighting broke out among the general populace, with pro-republic rioters and armed mobs clashing with city guardsmen. Those considered among the elite were forced into hiding or exiled from the city; Senator Charles Honorus, who had been visiting the Lothor region, narrowly escaped under the cover of darkness with a small personal guard. Fighting continued for most of the day and late into the night, with pro-government forces slowly either forced out of the city or into surrender.

The next morning, Arelsis and his co-leaders stood on the steps outside the council house in front of a crowd of thousands and gave what is referred to as the *Speech for Liberty, for Justice, for Enfranchisement, and for Sevicia,* recorded by the writer Cyppian in his account of Sevician history, *The Annals.* The speech contained inflammatory anti-government rhetoric but, as per Millas of Enix's guidance, was quick to praise the reign of Cloe of Ida, while derisively referring to Manus VII as a "pauper in golden cloaks" and a "senile, halfwitted trinket salesman" and outlining the key tenets Arelsis and his compatriots believed in, including returning Sevicia back to the honesty it had enjoyed under the reign of the very first Imperator, Anaeus of Cayna. The speech, which encouraged those listening to either join or depart the city, was met with applause. Cyppian described Arelsis as "a man of unparalleled wit and word, who could talk Orus himself out of choosing him for death."

## The Anaean League

Word of the capture of Reila spread quickly, and not in the way Manus VII intended. By the middle of 660, three other cities - North and South Pyk and Loth Laean - had all met the same fate at the hands of similar mobs. When Arelsis and his companions arrived at Loth Laean in Mandera II of that year they were welcomed into the city with open arms. By late in the year a further three cities had fallen - Greenhorn, Enerin, and Caelum - and a sentiment of general unrest was beginning to stir outside of the northern reaches of the Empire too. It was in the coastal city of Emerald Bay that Arelsis met Fran Etrimor of Emerald Bay, who would quickly become the fifth and final leader of the Anaean League. By the end of 660, more than a dozen cities had announced themselves for the League, and Arelsis, himself once a military commander, held command over an army of approximately 70,000 men.

## Early success

The early parts of the war saw initial success for the Anaean League, in part thanks to the leadership of Arelsis and Resibel Orus, who proved herself a capable military commander. At the Battle of the Five Statues, some 60 miles east of Reila, Resibel led Anaean League forces into combat against a force led by Sevician general Ingma Brai, also known as Ingma Barrelchest or, more commonly, as Ingma the Bastard. Outnumbering the Sevician forces two to one, Resibel won a decisive victory for the pro-republic forces that set the tone for the next year and a half of campaigning. Further military victories came under both Arelsis and Fran of Emerald Bay at the battles of Bandit's Run and Vale Hills respectively, in mid 661.

The most important battle of the early stages of the war came at the Battle of Bandit's Bridge, from the 6th to the 9th of Saturna IV, 661. A joint Sevician-Belisarian force, led by Ingma the Bastard, engaged with Anaean League forces on the banks of the River Mir. With an army numbering some 50,000 (according to Cyppian), the Sevicians held the numerical advantage, but a faint retreat and double envelopment tactic executed by Anaean League soldiers under the joint command of Arelsis and Resibel Olus surrounded and crushed the Sevician forces. Ingma the Bastard was mortally wounded when he was hit in the chest by an arrow and died sixteen days later of complications from an infection brought about by the wound.

The victory was the largest to date by the Anaean League and sent the Sevician capital of Morosea into panic, with many senators calling for Manus VII to immediately abdicate as Imperator. Manus pointedly refused. Cyppian claims that during one particular Senate session, when one senator stood and began to read aloud from a scroll that implied Manus should abdicate, he knocked the scroll from the senator's hands in person and exclaimed, "I rule as I see fit! My word will govern!"

The Sevician Senate introduced a monthly stipend of 50 silver *raex* for any man between the ages of sixteen and 60 who would sign up to fight, in an effort to rouse the spirit for war among the populace and deter anyone who might consider joining the Anaean League. The Saturna season of 661 was a particularly harsh one, with temperatures hitting lows usually only seen in Tullena and rainfall a near-constant, ruining crop yields. The civil chaos, combined with the poor harvest, led to a famine across large parts of Sevicia in 662 that left more than a million dead over a three-year period.

## Stalemate

The year of 663 saw more fighting, this time lower in the continent, as Anaean League forces made their way south across the Southlands, and eventually into the Marshlands. Millas of Enix's suggestion that they try and take the capital, Morosea, by late 662 had fallen apart when it became clear that Sevician forces were not going to be taken by surprise; instead, the plan was pushed back at least a year, with the aim of campaigning first in the southern territories in an effort to replenish forces. With gold procured from cities they had captured, the League purchased the support of the mercenary company the Iron Sons of Tyno, under the command of Berto Hanacar. Cyppian states the price paid was so high ("At least a thousand talents of gold") that it had to be done in secret for fear of what popular opinion would say if word got out. The Iron Sons saw first combat alongside the League at the Battle of Mummersville, where they defeated a Sevician army led by Anessa of Otesia.

With crop harvests still not having recovered from the famine of 662 and with the poor weather conditions having hampered transport in much of southern Sevicia, war movement on both sides slowed to a crawl. By late 663, the fighting had devolved into minor skirmishes and raids on both sides, with neither gaining much of an advantage. The Senate, in a further desperate attempt to regain public favour, began offering reimbursement to anyone who had lost either a family member or goods of any kind at the hands of the League, at incredible cost to the state. This, too, proved ultimately futile.

## A different kind of conflict

The first major battle of 664 came at the Battle of Austaea, some 30 miles outside of the city. It proved to be yet another major victory for the Anaean League in their campaign, routing a Sevician force of more than 30,000 regulars in pitched battle in a single day of fighting. The war soon devolved into a harsher kind of conflict. Now fully aware that any potential attempts to sway public opinion with monetary incentives were pointless, the Sevician government resorted instead to using fear. When a pro-League mob broke out in the city of Enix in Mandera I, 664 (the birthplace of Millas, one of the League's leaders) Sevicia responded by hanging more than 7000 people in the city. Similarly brutal acts were carried out in Cayna, Aerril, and Karran. In retalation, after routing a Sevician army led by Anessa of Otesia, Hanacar and the Iron Sons sacked the city of Otesia. In what would become known as one of the most brutal acts of the war, more than 30,000 citizens were slaughtered in a three-day period, including members of Anessa of Otesia's family.

The massacre at Otesia would prove to be a costly turning point in the war for the Anaean League. Widespread public opinion, which to that point had been mostly supportive of the League's populist approach, began to sour. The League suffered its first major military defeat of the war at the Battle of Blood Sky on the thirteenth day of Saturna IV. A Sevician force led by renowned general Petr Engarden, of the illustrious House Engarden, and a young military upstart by the name of Harold Byne, shattered the Anaean League forces and inflicted a critical blow that took months to recover from. Hundreds of miles from Reila and their northern strongholds and cut off from significant resupply, the Anaean League seemed to be losing grasp of the war. The following six months were marked by periods of similar extreme violence and retribution on both sides, with thousands being executed across Sevicia for their political allegiances.

## The wrong war

The next two years of the war were marked by ineffectual leadership, failures to secure resupply lines, and fierce in-fighting among the Anaean League leaders that threatened to collapse the entire war. In mid 665, against the wishes of the other leaders, Arelsis hired the Bloodcrows, a notorious mercenary company led by Willem II Cettayne, to fight alongside them. The next major battle came in late 665, after months of skirmishes, at the Battle of Serpentswood, just north of the River Mir. Bringing to bear an army of more than 50,000 regulars led by Petr Engarden, it was the largest Sevician army of the war to date. Aided in part by the efforts of the Bloodcrows and the Iron Sons, the Anaean League inflicted heavy casualties on the Sevician forces, and 24 hours later, on the 12th of Saturna V, the Sevician army retreated. The victory, however, was a pyrrhic one; Engarden had ordered a contingent army under the command of Harold Byne to head northwest and cut off the League's possible retreat to Reila and the Pyks.

Fearing encirclement from two sides, Arelsis understood that the only way to safety was through the treacherous Lothor mountains. It took more than two months for the League to clear the mountains, arriving on the northern side near the city of Gadat in the early part of 666 A.S with less than half their force, many having perished in the bitterly cold and awful mountainous conditions. Engarden did not give chase, content to let them flee. Cyppian claims that when asked, Engarden remarked, "They fought the wrong war," alluding to the League having chosen to engage in a pitched military contest, rather than an ideological war against the oppression of the Sevician nobility and ruling class, as originally intended.

## The beginning of the end

When they arrived at the city of Gadat, the city turned them away. Fearing what might happen to their already wavering public support if they decided to take it by force, Arelsis headed west for Andalacia. They arrived almost a month later, where they were turned away a second time. Arelsis' plan to march south to Emerald Bay and replenish what remained of their army was met with intense resistance; Rance Olus and Fran, who was born in Emerald Bay, insisted on turning around and marching east again. The two groups could not come to a decision, and on the 14th of Mandera I, 666, Rance Olus and Fran of Emerald Bay took a force of nearly 6000 soldiers and departed the rest of the League. Exactly a week later, on the 21st, Arelsis was informed that the Bloodcrows under Willem II had refused further payment and broken contract, ending their support in the war. With little left of their support, the Anaean League made the march for Emerald Bay.

## The end

The western half of the fractured Anaean League were turned away from the city of Gadat for a second time almost two weeks later, on the 26th of Mandera I. Opinion was split on whether the correct course of action would be to regroup with what remained of the League marching on Emerald Bay or to continue southwards, potentially towads Galadael. On the nineteenth of Mandera II, 666, some 50 miles outside of the city of Galadael, the League forces under Rance Olus and Fran of Emerald Bay met an army of more than 30,000, led by Harold Byne and Anessa of Otesia, at the Battle of Yellowgrass Flats. The heavily outnumbered League forces were crushed in a matter of hours. Rance Olus was killed in a battle and Fran of Emerald Bay's body was never found.

In the west, news reached the Arelsis quickly. Fearing panic from what remained of the League's capable fighters (some 40,000 men), he neglected to tell anyone but Millas of Enix and Resibel Olus. Resibel, distraught over her brother's death, suggested surrender, which was shot down immediately. When the force was turned away from Emerald Bay a few weeks later, Millas suggested taking the city by force, which was dismissed by Arelsis as they would not have the adequate supplies to withstand a prolonged siege. Instead, the League spent most of that year's Saturna inbetween towns in the flatlands northwest of the Lothor Mountains. A similarly harsh season to the one endured in 661 saw unusual amounts of snowfall and colder temperatures than the League had anticipated. A month before the new year the Iron Sons' contract with the League expired, and their cost was so high that Arelsis could not pay it. The Sons departed a week later. Despite civilian support for the League still numbering more than 200,000 across Sevicia early in early 677 A.S, it was clear to Arelsis that the military effort was becoming desperate, and the support was so divided that it was impossible to make any concerted effort at reinforcement.

On the third day of Tullena II, 667, League forces met a Sevician army of more than 40,000 under the command of Petr Engarden, not far from the Laean Valley River. Wary of being trapped in the treacherous terrain of the valley by approaching forces from the north, under Harold Byne, Arelsis made a decisive first strike. The battle, known as the Battle of Laean Valley, proved brutal; fighting raged for more than two days, with little break, and despite early success the League forces fractured and split. The three surviving leaders of the coalition - Arelsis, Millas of Enix, and Resibel Olus - were captured during the battle, as were thousands of others.

## Aftermath

The war had immediate as well as lasting consequences on Sevicia and Sevician society. A number of small-scale riots and revolts rocked the Empire for more than a decade following the collapse of the League, though most never amounted to much success. It had a significant impact on Sevicia's manpower and economy; over two million had perished during the conflict, the majority civilians. The three coalition conspirators were publicly hanged in Morosea's Golden Square on the fifth day of Tullena III, 667 A.S, in front of a crowd of more than two thousand packed into the square. A number of political dissidents and powerful nobles were also murdered regardless of whether they were involved or not. Manus VII faced extreme pressure to abdicate and stubbornly refused, triggering a constitutional crisis. A decision was passed by the Senate to vote in favour of forcing Manus to relinquish the throne by constitutional law in early 668, but Manus passed away before the vote could take place.

The conflict is remembered across Sevicia as one of unnecessary loss and shortsightedness on both sides; for Sevicia, a failure to comprehend the motives of the League; for the League, a failure to maintain public support and achieve any proper long-term goals beyond rebellion. It is commonly referred to across Sevicia as "the war" for its significance. In literature, the war is most famously chronicled by the writer Cyppian, in volume seventeen of his *Annals of Sevicia.* For their roles in the war, Anessa of Otesia and Harold Byne were awarded the Grand Eagle with Cross, and Petr Engarden was awarded the Grand Eagle with Wreath Cross and Crest, Sevicia's highest possible military honour. Ingma the Bastard was posthumously awarded the Grand Eagle for his courage.