Elgan the Lustrous

Elgan was known to be a tall man with a burly, laborer's physique, although that slowly softened as he aged and focused more on his writings and governance. However, despite this, most artistic depictions of him present as he was younger, when he first came to the eventual site of Auronim.

As the Golden One, he had crafted for him a special, ceremonial suit of gilded armor that is worn as a sort of uniform during almost any important political meeting. This armor was then passed on to his successors, being held by the Scions in the meantime.

Little is known about Elgan's youth. In fact, his birth year is merely a guess based on how old his body appeared upon death. What is known is that he originated somewhere on the Shelyb Plains and left home young because he knew he was destined for greatness. He saw the squabbles between people and wanted to gain enough power to enforce peace on all of Belkora.

His life story becomes more concrete when he found the gold mine that marks the center of what would become Auronim. He came to the mine with a group of people that would each represent one of the Scion Families. Elgan and his followers built a camp around this mine and used that wealth to slowly build up a city, a city that would help Elgan accomplish his dreams.

Over the several years of them building up the city and having others move there, Elgan slowing created the governmental system of the Scion Council and gave himself power as the Golden One. He also formed the Golden Blade, which began the formation of the Aurous Consortium that his successors further cement. He eventually died of old age, but not before giving the Council a directive to choose his successor based on who would carry on his vision of a peaceful world under their gilded wing.

Elgan's greatest accomplishment was the creation of Auronim and its establishment as a world power that can control trade. Beyond this, he also wrote a plethora of books describing his takes on morality, governance, and economics. These books are considered to be guiding texts by modern Consortium officials.

Elgan believed that the ultimate goal of society is to prevent violence, and constructed his nation state to do such a thing. According to his writings, the greatest power a person can wield is that of authority and economy. These twin ideas led to Elgan's method of using soft powers to take influence over regions to prevent war from breaking out. However, peace was his only goal, meaning he was willing to sacrifice things like equality, freedom, and justice to achieve his goals.

After some unknown incident in his youth, Elgan's main drive was to end all conflict on Belkora, specifically by taking it all over and ruling it through non-violent methods, primarily economic.

Elgan was known to be an incredibly persuasive man, almost always able to locate precisely what talking point would convince someone that he was correct. This skill was incredibly useful in building his city and the Consortium.

Elgan is considered one of the most influential figures in recent times, as he founded the Aurous Consortium, generally considered to be the current driver of geopolitics. Especially after The Mad King's War and Aurous hegemony, Elgan's philosophies on governance have spread far and wide across eastern Belkora and even into the islands. Within the Consortium, the Golden One is still in charge like he was, and the position is filled based on who would rule most similarly to Elgan with the hopes of continuing his influence directly from beyond the grave.