The Kingdom of Calotheria

The Kingdom of Calotheria was a major ancient Kingdom that was part of the Calotherian Empire begun by King Kirk and Queen Winona. It was located on the edge of the mountains, all the way through the Calotheria Forest miles behind the Pack's main camp.

## Overview

The Kingdom of Calotheria operated through a monarchical system. The Empire was ruled by King Kirk and Queen Winona, and their children, Princess Hope, Princess Elana, Princess Lora, Prince Zach, and Prince Phillip. The ruling is very different from the Pack; the Kingdom operated in a modern fashion where dogs built the city and worked to earn money, as opposed to the Pack, which has more of a tribal setup of hunt, lead, patrol, and have children. In the Kingdom, classes were divided by income, and class living areas were highly segregated.

The King and Queen would often give speeches in public about private and public plans to improve their Empire. They often traveled to different corners of the Empire, leaving their children to rule the main Kingdom.

One of the many things that the Kingdom stressed was the keeping of peace inside the Kingdom and with the other Kingdoms in the Empire. The rulers believed that peace would lead the Kingdom forward and allow it to stay prosperous for a thousand years.

Collectivist thinking was also often exercised in this society. Dogs, ever since they could start learning, were taught that everything they did had to be for the good of the larger society. Everything they did to aid themselves and their class alone should always be questioned if the good of the society wasn't the most pressing issue for a specific action.

## Laws

Like the Pack, the Empire had a lot of very strict laws. Specific examples of these laws are listed below.

1. Civilians were not allowed to touch the King or Queen without explicit permission from both them and their guards. Failure to abide by this law resulted in excommunication, and in some severe cases, execution.
2. All dogs who were not mages, including the King and Queen, were not allowed to touch the dimension of the dead through any means. Any dog, including mages and the King and Queen, were not allowed to contact the underworld or any members of the underworld. Failure to abide by this law resulted in execution by the King and Queen's order, and damnation to the underworld after death.
3. Mages were not allowed to curse any dog, living or dead, based on their own or for another dog's ego or greed. Doing so would often result in excommunication, and sometimes execution.
4. Mages may share the basics of their training with the regular public, but never advocate for non-mages to attempt their practices on their own. Non-mages who were caught attempt privatized mage training and practices were required to take part in a court of law, many of which ended in excommunication or execution.
5. Mages may not, under any circumstance, mate for the goal of reproduction. A mage that has reproduced will be required to partake in a court of law.
6. Every dog was expected to do their part within their class. The wealthy controlled class and goods, and were responsible for collecting most of the income for the rulers and distributing income to the rest of the Kingdom. The middle class worked for their money by attending public events and private meetings. The lower class took care of farming, hunting, and other resource collection, and prepared them for transport up to the working class. (Note: it was never necessarily against the law for wealthy dogs to help poorer dogs, but there was a lot of public discourse about the interpretation of this law.)
7. No dog shall ever pursue a degree of life outside of their naturally assigned class (i.e. wherever their family is, they need to stay). In rare circumstances, dogs will be promoted or demoted, raised or lowered, by word of the King and Queen themselves.

## Major Cities

The major cities in Calotheria include the capital and cities that serve as gathering places for certain classes and groups of dogs.

### Calotheria City

Calotheria City was the capital of the Kingdom of Calotheria and the Calotherian Empire. The castle where the royals lived was located directly in the center of the city. All of the goods, class, and currency distribution happened through the wealthy dogs living in this city.

Calotheria City was also reportedly one of the most haunted cities in the Kingdom. As stated above, dogs who were not trained and certified as mages were not lawfully allowed to interact with the dead, including demons and members of the underworld.

### Eklommar

Eklommar was a city in the Kingdom of Calotheria that often served as a gathering place for mages and librarians. The Eklommar Library served as the largest domain for spells, curses, communication resources, and brewing tactics and procedures. During mage training, dogs would spend a year and a half living here in order to learn the tactics and secrets of magic.

## Ranks

In the Kingdom, there were many different ranks that a dog could have in the public eye. Certain ranks were available only for a specific class. Dogs that were born into a specific class were encouraged to follow their family's rank, but it was acceptable for a dog that was born into a distributor family to be sworn into the mage rank at a young age to begin apprenticeship. Each rank had its own specialized education system built upon skills and techniques specially needed for the members of that particular rank.

### Wealthy Class Ranks

#### Mages

A mage was a dog that specialized in magic, spells, and the brewing of potions. They must go through extensive training and education in order to get certified as a mage. Only certified mages were allowed to contact the dead. Mage apprentices were never allowed to personally contact the dead without supervision; they learned to do this in the later stages of their apprenticeship.

The lives of mages were often a lot more restrictive and difficult than the lives of the dogs of different ranks in their class. For example, mages of any sex were forbidden to mate for the goal of reproduction, so mages had to be sworn in from distributor and healer families. It was a law that was introduced in the first century before the Kingdom was lost, and its purpose was to keep the potential offspring safe from any spiritual connections that their parents had made during their practices. In the century before the Kingdom was lost, just before this law was introduced, mages found that spiritual connections between parents and offspring ran high and likely influenced their offsprings' spiritual bias.

#### Distributors

Distributors were responsible for the collection, organization, and distribution of income and wages throughout all of the classes.

#### Healers

Healers acted as medicine dogs for any sick and injured dogs in the Kingdom. They were trained extensively with the use of herbs and natural remedies in order to help heal those who needed it.

### Middle Class Ranks

#### Mediators

Mediators were responsible for the lessening of tension and arguments between two dogs or groups of dogs. The Kingdom was built on inner peace, and the mediator's job as an apprentice was to learn about the Kingdom's history and why peace was so important. They used special educational and psychological skills to lessen tension within individuals living in the Kingdom.

#### Diplomats

Diplomats functioned similarly to mediators, but they travelled to other Kingdoms to promote peace and turn away the prospect of any inner tensions that may spark a battle or a war. In order to keep the peace, as little between-Kingdom tensions should have happened as possible, and it was the job of the diplomats and mediators to make sure that battles and war didn't happen.

#### Warriors

Warriors were responsible for fighting in battles and wars. Their purpose was to fight against aggressors to defend the peace in the Kingdom, and to keep the Kingdom safe from threats and dangers. They are trained extensively with fighting and defense techniques for many years.

It is important to note that every dog, regardless of class or rank, had to learn basic fighting techniques to keep themselves and their peers safe. Warriors were the first to be called for a battle, but depending on the severity of a particular fight, dogs from other ranks were sometimes called to assist the warriors.

#### Librarians

Librarians had the task of organizing and filing specific information to be used by particular Kingdom dogs, usually mages. Mages and librarians often worked together, since the responsibilities of information filing and carrying out specific information through practice worked hand-in-hand. Each major city throughout the Kingdom had a library, but the oldest and most skilled librarians were often called to serve at the Calotheria or Eklommar libraries.

### Lower Class Ranks

#### Miners

Miners were responsible for collecting any valuable ores and materials underground that could be used by specific ranks of higher classes. They were responsible for repairing their found natural materials before they sent them to the blacksmiths and distributors.

#### Blacksmiths

Blacksmiths were responsible for building the tools and armor, mainly from the ores and materials that the miners collected, that warriors would use in battle. Most of the ores were used by them, but some were also used by mages for their spells and potions.

#### Farmers

Farmers were responsible for the planting and gardening of healing herbs and food, as well as hunting for living food sources. Like the miners, farmers were responsible for preparing their crops and the meat from their catches before sending them off to the distributors.

Every month, mages and healers would meet with the farmers in each major city for a check-up, in which the mages and healers would assist the farmers in the proper care of growing herbs and ingredients.

## Non-City Locations

The Kingdom of Calotheria had many important cities. There were also multiple non-city locations that served some kind of significance to the Kingdom dogs, as well as the modern Pack dogs.

### The Calotherian Mines

The Calotherian Mines were where the miners would go to collect their ores, minerals, and other natural substances. They were abandoned during the fall of the Empire, and, as Princess Hope has noted, are thousands of years old. They reached from the Kingdom's mining center all the way to around the middle of the moor, a few miles northeast to the Pack's main territory. Many years before Larkstar became leader, a warrior discovered the mines. At first, the Pack didn't believe that they were very significant, until they noticed that it could be used as a place for hunting, since prey had a tendency to hide there in the colder moons or if they were running from something. However, during Larkstar's leadership, a major underground rockfall closed off all the known entrances to the mines.

### Calotheria Forest

Calotheria Forest is a dark pine forest located outside the boundaries of the Kingdom. Like Calotheria City, it is incredibly haunted, perhaps even more so. The Kingdom dogs tended to avoid this area because of its frequent paranormal activity.

In a part of the mine beneath the forest, Zetta kept Princess Hope hostage for a thousand years.

## The Fall of the Empire

The Empire's fall essentially began when King Kirk made a deal with Zetta, effectively breaking one of the biggest laws of the Empire. Even though Kirk's intention was to have Zetta focus on the deal they made with each other, she abandoned it and began a plan of her own. After she trapped Princess Hope in a block of ice deep within the mines, she was able to call on the other ghosts and demons damned to the underworld to attack the Kingdom. The portal that King Kirk had created for Zetta was still open, since he didn't close it with the special spell needed to do so, and the Kingdom was now subjected to numerous attacks from members of the afterlife. The ghosts effectively went for the mages and librarians first, killing all of them with their magic. They then proceeded to destroy the Eklommar Library and all its documents, while others raided the hospitals and food and ore sources. In a single day, all of the dogs were forced to abandon the Kingdom grounds and separate from everybody else. Even though thousands of years had passed since the massive raid and the old Kingdom buildings are still there, albeit barely standing, the place where everything once stood is still incredibly haunted, and very paranormally active.

## Trivia

* The Empire's currency was known as Gobats (pronounced "goh-bahts"). One Gobat is approximately equal to 13 US cents.
* All dogs of royalty within the Kingdom had magic that allowed them to summon a pair of wings for themselves so they could fly. This magic came from the very first mage, who gifted the King and Queen with this ability. The spell was created so this ability would be passed through the family's bloodline.
* The river running through the Pack's territory is connected to the fjord that the Kingdom's bridge is built over.
* Since many of the Kingdom's buildings were made of concrete and stone, the infrastructure of many of these buildings still stand, even though they have become extremely eroded throughout the course of the thousands of years since the Kingdom's downfall.
* At least a third of all Pack dogs throughout the Pack's history have possessed some kind of Calotherian ancestry. It is likely that Reedstar had some of this ancestry.