Edrana

Edrana is ruled by a monarch descended from the Duchess who declared independence from Allesend. Traditionally, an heir must not be an Immortal to rule. Currently, Queen Llynforth sits on the throne.   Nobles make up the ruling caste as vassals to the crown. In turn, they have their own vassals in the form of knights and other land-holding citizens.   There is a severe shortage of nobles to rule over newly-settled lands, however. Frontier towns and outposts typically elect a mayor or reeve. Since this land legally belongs to the crown, taxes are paid directly to the Queen.   The existing nobles are growing increasingly worried about what these direct vassals mean for their own futures. Some have even begun to send bands of hired thugs to extort these towns before they grow out of control.

Native Edranites are typically well-fed while still prizing manual labor, so they tend to be taller and stronger than people from other nations.   The wide variety of dyes grown here lead to Edranites utilizing bright colors in their lives. Changing hair color is as natural for Edranites as it is changing clothes.   Despite their noble and vassal tradition, Edranites value independence and personal strength. Most have a love of nature and adventure.   Edranites value family strongly, and often the family is defined by the shortest relational path to an Immortal. Clans are ever-growing around the undying spirits, and there is an interconnectedness between families who share a common Immortal relative. It’s a rare time when an Edranite can’t find a “cousin” to house them on their travels.

The history of Edrana is a rich and storied one. In its earliest days, beginning after the Pliscian Winter, it was inhabited by roving tribes of barbarians, a mixture of human and halfling ancestries making up the majority of the population, with a smattering of gnomes mixed in. These barbarian tribes worshiped the spirits of nature, calling upon Essaria’s natural phenomenon to aid in their travels. For hundreds of years, the tribes traveled the region as they were guided by weather patterns, herd migrations, and by the song of the winds themselves.   In 913 BE, the mountain Srolgistnir, located on the southeastern side of the Reshdul Mountains, erupted, sending pillars of ash and fire high into the atmosphere. Though the mountain range protected Edrana from the majority of the cataclysm, the eastern reaches were still ravaged by the event. The tribes left the eastern reaches behind, believing the area to be cursed.   One tribe, the Edrein clan, was fleeing the clouds of smoke and ash when they established a camp on the western shores of the Jetloch, the lake of deep blue water separating the east from the west. When they realized the place was filled with wild wheat and barley, the tribe stayed put in when winter arrived, to better cultivate the lands in preparation for spring. And so, the first permanent settlement of Edrana, Ravenmere, was established. Over the next few decades, other tribes would settle in similarly abundant areas. The groups that refused to remain static either became nomadic traders, traveling from town to town, or outcasts, wandering the wilderness as they continued following the ways of old.  

The Rise and Fall of the Scyphants

With the rise of a new agrarian civilization came conflict between the largest powers. Chief among these were the Scyphants, a cabal of necromancers residing in the northern regions. Utilizing the reanimated dead to perform their labor, the Scyphants rose to rival the Edrein clan. For generations, the two groups clashed with one another until finally, in 698 BE, the necromancer Zachariah Sharpe rose to lead the Scyphants to victory over the Edrein and the other clans, subjugating them under his totalitarian thumb.   For three hundred years, Zachariah Sharpe and his necromancers ruled the nation of Scyphan with an iron fist, using their armies of the dead to keep the populace in line. But in 353 BE, Zachariah Sharpe abruptly relinquished his crown and vanished. Rumors spread that he had grown ashamed of his deeds, others that he had lost control of the necromantic powers keeping him alive. In either case, the leadership of Scyphan was thrown into chaos. The remaining necromancers fought for power, and as they did, a band of heroes from the Edrein clan known as the Cerulean Order rose to unite the rest of the nation against their tormentors. In a great battle outside the city of Scydale, the armies of the dead were defeated.   The leader of that band of heroes was raised up and became the first King of the new nation of Edrana. A great castle was constructed in Ravenmere, which became the capital of the fledgling nation. The remainder of the adventuring party were established as nobles of Edrana, and were granted dominion over the abundant farmlands located west of the Inuware River.   For the next three centuries, the nation grew into a powerhouse of agriculture. Still guided by the spirits of nature, the people cultivated wheat, barley, and flowers beyond count. As the remaining nomadic tribes were pushed farther and farther east, Edrana established itself as a world power by its sheer ability to produce food.  

Imperial Rule

When God-Emperor Alles-Taluus established the Allesend Empire to the north, the Edranites resisted assimilation, but were ultimately only able to hold out for a few short years before the sheer might of the Empire assumed control of the region. However, the God-Emperor knew the benefits of having a continent-spanning supply of food, so established the former king as the ruler of the new duchy of Edrana.   The region flourished under Imperial rule. A stretch of the Imperial Highway was constructed to connect Ravenmere with the capital of Allesar, and to the rest of the continent. Along that highway flowed endless bushels of crops, and in flowed wealth beyond which the Edranites had even dreamed.   In 113 AE, Edrana struck gold – or rather, bronze. Far to the south and east was discovered a Pliscian Working capable of absorbing latent heat around itself through bronze metal, utilizing the energy to smelt ores at an incredible rate. Soon, the new city of Bronzehall was established around the Foundry, quickly growing into a city even larger than Ravenmere. Now, in addition to being the breadbasket of the Empire, Edrana had established itself as the primary source of iron and steel ingots.  

The Soulplague

In 299 AE, a magical plague began to swiftly spread through the nation. It was named the “Soulplague” due to its nature of assaulting the spirit itself. Manifesting as a bright glow from deep within the victim’s chest, the plague spread via heat and light rather than by any microorganisms later scientists might discover. In short time, the Empire erected barriers across the Imperial Highway, quarantining the nation and depriving them of relief.   By the time the plague had run its course, one in every five people in the nation had been killed by the disease, close to one million souls. When the Imperial quarantine was lifted, the survivors discovered that the rest of the Empire had grown close to the brink of collapse without their breadbasket. The former nation of Faloriand soon declared its independence from the Allesend Empire. As citizens of Edrana were forced to meet unreachable quotas, they too began to consider independence from the government that had abandoned them.  

The Independence War

In 308 AE, Edranite farmers drove Imperial forces out of their territory. The duchess and the nobles quickly rallied to support their people, declaring themselves a sovereign nation once more, recrowning the Queen, and joining their neighbors in war against the Empire.   For the next ten years, Edranite soldiers fought along the northern reaches of their country, conquering territory from their old masters and extending the borders by hundreds of miles. Year after year, they pressed the Empire back north until the war reached a stalemate in 316 AE.   It was around this time that teenagers across the nation began to have strange dreams, remembering faint memories of times before the Soulplague. These memories gradually grew clearer and more concrete as these young people realized something incredible – they were the victims of the Soulplague, now returned to life.   These Immortals, as they were being called, came from all walks of life, and remembered everything from their previous existences. Included in their number were a group of veteran soldiers. The Queen established them into an elite fighting force, the Immortal Legion. These soldiers joined the war effort and turned the tides of battle, finally defeating the Empire once and for all at the Battle of Corlesca in 318 AE.  

Modern History

Since the fall of the Empire, the Immortals have become a centerpoint to Edranite culture. Now, in 462 AE, they make up about 10% of the total population. Unofficial “clans” are formed based on the shortest familial distance to an Immortal. They fill all manner of positions in the nation, from expert craftspeople to master farmers, from studious wizards to nomadic barbarians. But notably, very few nobles are Immortal, and none of the royal family has ever been Immortal.   Bronzehall continued to grow, and is swiftly approaching a million inhabitants within the three-mile radius where the Foundry’s magic reaches. Due to scientific and arcane breakthroughs on the behalf of Dahlia Harkk, new technologies have been developed as a sort of “magitech” within the city’s borders. The adventuring college of Chalice University, established by Immortal Damien Gamble, produces young heroes that set out to solve issues elsewhere in the nation and throughout the world.   In 452 AE, the Third Moon abruptly vanished from the night sky. Riots and chaos ensued throughout the nation, but when no other apocalyptic events transpired, life eventually returned to a facsimile of normal.   Prospectors near Argent Falls discovered great deposits of silver and iron in 455 AE, prompting a swift migration of settlers to head east. Discovering that the lands east of the Inuware were not as barren as legends once told, new settlements have arisen to take advantage of the wealth offered by the sparsely populated area of the country. With these settlements, however, has grown a new tension between the Crown and the nobility.   When the Cerulean Order had been granted the titles of nobility, no forethought had been made for how to handle the new country’s growing borders. As such, there was not enough of the noble class to be granted domain over the new eastern reaches; this meant that all trade and income from these regions were taxed directly to the Crown, bypassing the need for nobles at all. When it had just been Bronzehall, the nobles were willing to grit their teeth and bear the inequity, but with hundreds of miles of untapped resources, the nobles could feel their control slipping.   In recent years, a Nobles’ Alliance has formed under the leadership of Lord Arthur Vinson. They have sent brigands and highwaymen into the eastern reaches to “steal” the wealth that they believe is rightfully theirs, terrorizing new settlers. They have funded occult organizations to instill fear in the populace, and have presented a unified front against Queen Llynforth. However, a significant number of these nobles were murdered by the lich Theo Walsh in a terrorist attack in 459 AE, providing a significant setback to their plans.   Unable to take direct action against one another, the Crown and the Nobles’ Alliance are engaged in a kind of cold war, with much of the conflict being fought by proxy within the new settlements.   Three years ago, Old Essarian Deities were awoken within the Divine Prison, an extradimensional Iterum designed by the Pliscians to hold these entities. With the weakening of the Pliscian’s Legacy, however, these beings are able to extend their powers out of the prison and into Essaria. While many Edranites continue to worship and revere the nature spirits their ancestors followed, some have taken up following these returned deities. New temples and churches have popped up in every corner of the country.