the Kingdom of Tzallrach

**vorropohaiah** · 11-13-2018, 03:24 PM

here's the latest map in the Atlas Elyden series, detailing the region of Tzallrach

Click image for larger version.

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the VENATHI EMPIRE

Sizeable relatively-short-lived empire that rose in the wake of the Nathi kingdom in the northern region of the Arid Triptych. The empire grew rapidly from the ruins of Nath, subjugating nearby Naareth, Sarastro and much of Nárthel by 132 RM, growing to a size that, at the time, was the largest in Elyden, exceeding even size of the Korachani empire. However its rapid growth was marred by instability and it had lost its conquered lands by 163 RM, continuing to shrink for the next centuries until the nation of Venthir rose in its wake.

The Venathi empire appeared in the wake of the fragmented Nathi Kingdoms, which until c. -190 had dominated the region. Fragmented and crippled by the so-called Lion Heresies that rose in response to the increasingly hedonistic lifestyle centred around the city of Midal, the regions territories diminished greatly during this time; with lands appropriated from Saostana during the reign of the Defiler Kings taken in c. -90 RM, and its eastern territories lost to the increasing power of the city-state of Taar Al. Few laws survived during this time and banditry and chaos were the rule of the day. Nath was no more.

It was in such chaos that the city of Venath rose in c. -50, bringing a semblance of law and stability to the region, beating Enaath and Teira in managing to bring together the disparate city-states and dependencies that appeared following the dissolution of the Nathi kingdom. In the east Teira remained a power, creating a dichotomous state opposing its advances; with Venath dominating the plains of Hamshen and Teira rising to control the Shara plains. Enaath was abandoned c. -30 RM, its people travelling to the coastal city of Venath, further increasing its size, and Merakhi, which had grown into a relatively prosperous merchant-city, trading with Nárthel and Sarastro. It was around this time that the region became known as Venath, even though no true unifying government existed.

Through Merakhi and Venath was the region able to re-stabilise, renewed trade bringing much-needed money into their coffers. The city of Midal, whose avarice had indirectly caused the Lion Heresies, eschewed its past sins and once more turned to the study of the Atramenta and the alchemical arts, persecuting what remained of the Shie that that emigrated there. The last Shie was executed in -6 RM, leading to a secular fanaticism that rivalled religion in its intensity. This later rapidly developed into a philosophy called Midism, which advocated the tenets of the philosopher-scholars of the city. Teira opposed this pragmatic view of the world, itself having developed a strong spiritual culture in the years following the Lion Heresies. It viewed the epicurean ways that had consumed the old Midal with scorn, knowing that moral laws, such as those imposed by religion, would have stopped such its (and by extension, the Nathi) descent into sin and, ultimately, the death of the kingdom.

It was around -3 RM that legend recounts the tale of Hetepheres, last of the Nathi sphinxes. It is said that under the light of the full Ivory Moon she entered the city of Teira, proclaiming to be the last of her kind. She was the embodied anger and bitterness of her people – slaughtered to near extinction by -309 RM – returned to offer the mortals a chance for redemption. Many in Teira saw her as a living deity, a chance for them to right the wrongs of their ancestors, and a powerful personality cult had appeared around her by -1 RM.

However, Teira was still but a city-state. The main power of the region remained in Venath and Merakhi, both of which were well-along the route to return to the epicurean ways of the old Midal, which itself was following a path of secular chasteness. The three shared little save the common factor that had become Teira and its personality cult. Its people travelled throughout the region spreading the word of Hetepheres who had secreted herself in the city, where she sermonised those who would listen.

Those in the west opposed this belief, thinking that she would siphon power from them and they marched against Teira in 8 RM, capturing her followers. Those deemed most powerful were slain, with the rest exiled from any Venathi city. Hetepheres willingly left the city and settled the ruins of Enaath with her followers. A frantic construction effort followed, with an exodus of people from surrounding cities flocking to the ruins of Enaath, which was reborn as Hetepheropolis. By 18 RM the city had grown to become one of the largest in the region and had allied itself with Teira, forming a powerbase that the cities of Venath and Merakhi could not oppose.

Small cults dedicated to the sphinx appeared in most cities in the region, and though they were quashed, they slowly gained more followers, until by c. 50 RM, Hetepheres had become a dominant force in most of the Venathi region, as well as in the city-state of Taar Al. Hetepheres herself disappeared following a massive sermon she conducted at her main temple in Hetepheropolis in 57 RM, which led to her deification later that same year and the official funding of the religion of the sphinx, which in subsequent years managed to unite the cities of the region, leading to the birth of Venath as a true nation in 64 RM.

By c. 100 RM Venath had grown to encompass all of the former Nathi cities and, under the leadership of the Asanates, grew prosperous once more, though the expansion of the Korachani empire to the west brought increased tensions to its borders, particularly with Nárthel, which since 84 RM had been under imperial control. Border skirmishes increased in magnitude across the Uefir highlands and the Jaela mountains (around which the Jaelan redoubt was constructed by Korachani forces), though it was to be the Cataclysm of Khamid in 101 RM that truly tested its people.

The destruction of over half of Khamid’s landmass caused a terrible tidal wave to sweep across the Dark Sea and the sea of Hautia, crashing against Venath’s coastline, leaving many cities – most notably Nariri and Katlego – in ruins. However, the non-centralised government of the region – the Asanates ruled form the twin cities of Teira and Venath – ensured that it was not allowed to fall into chaos, with many cities effectively self-governing in the tumult that followed the Cataclysm.

The so-called Lion King of Labaisingia, better known as Labaisingh, inherited this devastated land from his predecessor, the Asanate Agiasingh II. He oversaw the mass abandonment of devastated cities, and the ensuing rebuilding of the Venathi trade-route farther inland. He promoted industry and, through increased slave-raids on surrounding areas, increased the nations’ workforce. Through the colony of Arraga in Tamar (established in 7 RM) he controlled imports and exports of exotic items, allowing the nations’ coffers to grow once more. A charismatic king, he attracted a loyal following by 108 RM and came to oppose worship of the sphinx queen as a religion, but did not impose his beliefs on others. Under his leadership, the borders of Venath began to expand, his armies looking to the west. In 114 RM Sarastro was conquered, Venath’s armies marching into the capital of Solonia after two years of siege. The Saoshyants remained its rulers though they became subservient to Labaisingh and the Asanates, paying tribute in the form of wealth and conscripts. The last Saostanan Dynast was executed in this time, effectively ending the Dynast lines.

Following the victories in Sarastro, Venath’s borders continued to expand south-west, with new settlements appearing close to the oasis city-state of Tartai, which by 116 RM became part of the Venathi empire. Naareth was then conquered in 121 RM, with Nárthel attacked 6-years later in 127 RM. Following a bloody 5-year siege, the nation was taken in 132 RM; the first nation under the banner of Korachan to fall. In the span of 2-decades, Venath had more than tripled its land area and rivalled Korachan in power. His advisors cautioned him to slow down and consolidate his position, stabilising the conquered nations before looking elsewhere, though Labaisingh ignored their words and turned north to Char Mâthi.

It had always been the dream of Labaisingh to unite Char Mâthi and Venath as legend of Agha Llyr Vâna spoke the two had once been (this, was a corruption of true historical events where Char Mâthi was little more than a vassal to the Nathi kingdoms, its people raised to be slaves taken to the south). Though in his eyes Venath was strong in the wake of the Cataclysm of Khamid, the truth was far more complex. Through the efforts of his spies and diplomats the impression was given to foreign nations that Venath was strong – indeed its recent conquests made the pretence plausible, though in truth, Sarastro remained weak following the reuniting of its lands in -37 RM, with the majority of its military might concentrated in the south of the region. Naareth had never been a war-like nation, and fell relatively easily to Venath’s larger more-organised. Nárthel had been the last nation conquered by the Archpotentate Malichar before his disappearance and the empires reign over the region remained somewhat uneasy. Labaisingh came to believe his own lies with such conviction that he allowed his desires to unite Char Mâthi and Venath overpower the wisdom of his advisors, and he attacked the nation in 135 RM.

In Midal, the studies of the alchemist clans required ever-increasing amounts of umbra. By c. 130 RM sub-par reserves in the mines in Asoab had begun to dwindle and new sources were required. Exploration of surrounding regions in c. 135 RM revealed a concentration of the stuff in an arid area known as the Shamal, in the north-west of Anubia. Private forces were sent there to exploit the resource in c. 140 RM, with raw umbra shipped north-east into Midal in vast quantities.

Initially, the attack was diplomatic; with economical gifts offered to the nation, in return for vassalage, though these were refused. The true attack of Char Mâthi began later that years, though its defences proved difficult to penetrate, and the siege dragged on into a war of attrition that ended up consuming Venath’s economy. Labaisingh was killed in battle in 151 RM, leading to the defeat of Venath’s forces, which withdrew quickly following his death. His demise dragged an already ailing Venath further down, and with the Korachani empire growing in strength in the north-west, its days were numbered. The capital of Venath was in chaos, with various factions vying for control in the wake of the Asanate’s death. The unrest in the capital allowed Teira to grow in strength and it wrested control from Venath in 154 RM.

The new capital’s first move was to grant Naareth suzerainty, allowing it to focus on its woes in the north-west – Korachan saw in the death of Labaisingh an opportunity to wrest from Venath territories that were taken in 132 RM and over the next decades it reclaimed those lands, advancing the Korachani border many miles east. Despite the new Asanate’s efforts, Sarastro was allowed to break free following a year of bloody fighting in its main cities, leaving the Venathi empire sundered; Teira wresting control of the region from Venath in 154 RM, with the region crumbling by 157 RM. Its retreat from Sarastro also resulted in the abandonment of its colonies in Tarati in 159 RM. Unrest in Naareth, fomented by an increasingly aggressive Taar Al in 161 RM resulted in outright war between Naarethi nationalists and the occupying forces, leading to its full independence from Venath in 162 RM. To further exacerbate the region’s woes, the umbra quarries of the Shamal became the target of Sarastroan attacks in 161 RM, a conflict that would lead to the so-called War of the Triptych. The small regional war dragged on for two decades, leaving Venath in control of the area, though its dominance there was not to last.

Crippled by the rapidity with which it had lost its territories, the empire suffered. As chaos continued to grip the city of Venath, no one faction was able to out its opponents, leading to the fracturing of its lands. Coupled with that was the noticeable retreat of the entire regions’ coastline, which, being a relatively flat expanse, was more apparent than elsewhere. This period of unrest was ended with the reappearance of the sphinx Hetepheres in Hetepheropolis (which had continued to grow in her absence) in 194 RM. Her reappearance sparked great religious fervour amongst her faithful, which over the next few years would grow exponentially, gaining no small measure of political influence. In 201 RM Hetepheres had the capital moved from Venath (its increasingly retreating coastline causing havoc on its ports and sea trade) to Hetepheropolis, and the region renamed Venthir in accordance to the local dialect.