Suigan

Sokhei Guryan, Demon of the Comet

Overview

The Myth

Suigan is remembered as a legendary conqueror, a dragonslayer, a demon, and a tyrant. It is said that he was fair at times, but he was rather cruel. Suigan did not care for forgiveness, but was instead a dreadful individual who richly rewarded those loyal to him, but punished severely his detractors.

Name

Suigan is the name most commonly used to refer to the man who was born Sokhei Guryan. The name Suigan is a Tsennari name combining the logographic characters used to write his name; natively, the ruler was formally known as Sokho'ba'dei Turghayan. It is said that the elements used to create the name Suigan, translate to comet, which was the symbol of Suigan's house. He is known to the Arkhit tribe as Tsakhan, and to the Solyeks as Zakhir.

Legend

Early Life

Suigan was said to have been born as the son of a lowly shepherd in the waning days of the Ilsairi Ketsing, with scholars suggesting it to be sometime in the 830s or 840s. The early days of the young shepherd were rough as he learned to survive, ride horses, hunt, and forage. As a teenager however, he was exiled from his tribe after beginning a blood feud by killing a hunter. It is said that this hunter, a despicable figure, had harassed and touched the sister of Suigan. Suigan in his anger, decided not to confront the man but to instead to plot his revenge. It is said that on a hunt, a griffin flew overhead and was to accost the men, Suigan being slower than his rival, shot an arrow into the leg of the other hunter, leaving him time to get away as the griffin mauled his rival. After his exile at only age 15, Suigan adopted the griffin as a symbol of himself on his own personal seal.
In the coming years as an exile, he lived alone, gathering other exiles and vagabonds until he had grown to lead a small tribe of his own as the arbiter of any issues by the time he was 20. Eventually it is said that a man, lusting for his household and property, killed Suigan's father and stole his household. This enraged the young man who led his tribe's men over by horse and attacked the household in the dead of night. Suigan supposedly snuck in first, dragging out the man who killed his father and tying his arms behind his back and trampled him repeatedly with his own horses and livestock. Having begun this blood feud, Suigan gathered his remainly family and tribesmen to be exiled to the far north part of Gentarien where they established a camp at Tahan Moghai in 860.

Middle Years

In his 30s, Suigan formed many alliances and fought his way to become among the most powerful and feared of the Okhotai tribesmen. Among his famed feats in this time was when he made a journey to the north to hunt bison, when a dragon appeared to attack his camp. It is said that Suigan used a rope dart to wrap around the neck of the beast and nearly choke it to death as he climbed it and slew the beast by stabbing his sword Khumin into its ear. Using his shamans help, he is said to have trapped the dragon's soul, gaining the power of the beast. Some say he could transform into a dragon, some say he could summon it to fight for him, while others claim he simply had the sight and wits of one. Regardless, using this power, Suigan defeated his rivals and called a meeting of the tribes at Tahan Moghai, where he was declared ruler of the Okhotai in 869.
Suigan led his armies south in 872 to conquer and plunder the riches of the Gendur, defeating the imperial garrisons and conquering the region north of modern Saralai. He himself thought the greatest prize was that of the city of Korisangtaai - thus leading to his personal leadership over the wars in the south. By the end of the first war, he had pushed the Gendur clans north of Mereste to surrender. Later that year, he dispatched his general Yukhul to the west, where he conquered the regions in modern Thadia, creating a vassal kingdom led by Suigan's son Toghran (who had married Yukhul's daughter). This vassal kingdom was known as Immaskhon after the main tribes that inhabited it. The conquest of Thadia led to the establishment of the vassal kingdom of Vanharmen - led by a Vanhar prince named Mzam-Sotusum. In the next decade, several tribes in the east from northern Ischurrai to Lake Misuvil stood up to Suigan and formed a confederacy known as the thirty princes, who waged war against the Okhotai. A decade of war followed, with the famed victory of Suigan arising at a place known as the "Sosoven" In the Sosoven marshes, the two forces clashed on rafts and almost routed the warlord before a contingent of the thirty princes, an army of the wolffolk changed sides as they were bribed before the battle. This treachery led to eighteen of the thirty princes drowning in the marshes while five were captured and executed, with the remaining seven being absent from the battle. This victory led to the wolffolk being given their own state in the region known as the Khammal.
With Suigan as a major power, he retired his efforts to ruling the valley and allowing his sons and generals to wage war on their own, leading to a large number of decentralized kingdoms dominating the continent. Among the most famous of these was when Suigan requested Yukhul to find the western sea beyond the straits, and so he gathered a large number of tribesman, sending his son Ulghulan to cross the straits. Met by resistance under Faenradama, they eventually conquered the region and built a great dirt and stone path that was above the water at all times. This effort took five years alone, with at the end a gathering of tribes crossing the straits into the western steppes exploring all the way to Ashyllan before returning home. The grand effort caused a huge outbreak of Alisay from Topholepannamkuang that had reached Ashyllan to spread far to the east and weaken the region further.  

Final Years

Having grown older, Suigan's armies and merchants traveled to all corners of the known world, until the shattering came and threatened his very family and house. Suigan, in his older feeble age, called upon the power of the dragon a final time to defeat the spirit Hazkhangan before succumbing to his wounds at the age of 136 according to legend. He was buried in Tahan Moghai in 967, where his body remains to this day under the royal palace. The shattering was a large enough event to shatter his very empire, leading to a large number of tribes riding around the continent and establishing themselves such as the Safi and Ederi.