Crimson Lions
The Crimson Lions are known throughout the planes as one of the most relentless military order in existance. Some say they neither eat nor sleep but simply move towards their enemy, cleansing the realms of anything that stands against them. Although they are only mortals, the Crimson Lions carry the weight of responsibility held for millenia as they swear to uphold their oaths. Once you becomes a Crimson Lion, you are bound for life to dedicating everything to their cause. They are not knights in shining armor but the blood, sweat and tears of War, wearing the rags and scraps that were once armor.
At the heart of every Crimson Lion is their oath, sworn by every member to be upheld until their death. The oath varies between the members as they operate not as a singular army, but legions spread across the world, each with their own mission. Theses legions are known as the Crimson Lions oaths, with each one having their own oath they follow. Some have sworn to cleanse the land of demons while others stand against the supposed goodwill of celestials. Regardless of their oath, they all share the same goal - to keep Midranor safe from the outer realm's influence.
Structure
The Crimson Lions is broken up into several oaths, each operating independently of each other. Their sizes vary from a handful of members to over a thousand for some of the largest oaths. At first they are indistinguishable from each other with the exception that they all have their own oath they follow but as they honor their oath for a prolonged time and are faithful to it, their oath naturally changes to include a number. This number comes naturally to the members and dictate where in the line the come chronologically, something that no member would be aware of by themselves as new oaths form across Midranor continually.
The lower the number of an oath the longer they have remained and most of the time they are also extremly formidable. New members always fill the ranks but the old oaths always turn recruits into battle hardened veterans in short time. Many of the oaths have disappeared due to being killed of or because no new members joined them. There are only a handful of cases where the oaths where considered completed and they disbanded. If two oaths with similar oaths meet and believe they would benefit from joining together rather than operating separately, they would take the oath of the older oath.
Culture
To the Crimson Lions, nothing is more sacred or important than their oath. Not all will live up to their duty but within the oaths that carry it wholeheartedly, they commonly become quite distant from society. They always move towards their next objective, entering settlements only to restock what is needed before they move on. The Crimson Lions who have spent their entire life in the oath usually only knows the joy of fulfilling their oath, regaling stories of it between themselves or with other Crimson Lions if two different oaths meet or work towards a common goal.
The Crimson Lions share only a single holy day - the 5th Rend - which is the day the first oath was sworn by the first Crimson Lions. It is not a day of celebration or rest, but a day to keep those that marched before them in mind. Once you become a Crimson Lion there are no more rest days, holidays or days of celebration. The only thing that matters is the oath, honouring and fulfilling it to your best ability regardless of external circumstances. For most Crimson Lions they do not start by upholding the oath to this degree and many will never reach that point. Regardless of this they are still welcomed by oaths to aid in the mission of keeping Midranor safe.
History
The first oath
At the siege of Kirnborg during the darkest hours of The War for Midranor, a single suicidal choice was made by a small group of soldiers that redefined the war against the devils of the Nine Hells and in time - the entire war. As the first walls of the city where falling, a group of 101 soldier volunteered to go out into the land between the walls of Kirnborg where the devils now started to take over. They performed near impossible sabotages against the infernal war machine destroying their equipment, assassinating their generals and killing of thousands of devils. Each and every soldier that went out against the army swore an oath to protect the city and fight the devils until they died. In the end - only a handful of them survived the siege, breaking the devils advance and securing the life of the people deeper inside the fortress city. The survivors where named the Crimson Lions and their oath became the foundation for many who wanted to follow their footsteps.
Now the first oath only has a single member left, bound by an oath impossible to achieve. But it does not matter to the Crimson Lion if the task is impossible. They do it for the ones that follow, for the ones that cannot protect themselves. The first flame of the Crimson Lion will burn the Nine Hells to ash, one way or another.
The fall of order
By the 36th century the Crimson Lions had grown massively and hundreds of oath fought throughout the continent dealing with invasions of the outer planes regardless of where they occurred. One of the largest oaths was the regiment in Kirnborg that handled the flow of information and aiding the oaths spread across Midranor to find their enemies and work together. Unlike other Crimson Lions, these members where far more scholarly then warriors but their duty had provided the Crimson Lions benefits far beyond any other oath. What they were not prepared for, was an invasion of their city in this time of relative peace.
It was not a war between nations or a planned attack of the outer realm that brought Kirnborg to ruin - it was bad fortune. The largest elemental rift in history opened up in the middle of the city connected to the elemental plane of earth. At first the city took action to subdue and attempt to close the rift, gathering the guards and soldiers throughout the city. Kirnborg was a fortress city that had held out against the odds countless times but by the time the guards got to the rift it had already grown to the size where the flood of elemental was to much for them. In desperation, the district the rift was in started evacuation to beyond the surrounding walls, as not even the frequent giant attacks had broken them. As the city prepared itself to surround the rift it had grown to the size of a castle and through the rift fell a zaratan. Curled up it rolled through the streets, crushing buildings beneath it and finally crashing into one of the city walls. A roar was heard as it started to break its surrounding, causing earthquakes with its step, and the once mighty wall started to show cracks. As panic spread among the guards on top of the wall a second zaratan stepped through the rift, seemingly equally mad it started to tear through the city.
By the end of the day, there where thousands buried beneath the buildings of the city and even more crushed under the falling walls that had once protected the city. The mountains walls that had once acted as barriers around the city had come falling down leaving many ways out of the city blocked of and in the end only the lucky people on the outskirt of the city was able to make it out. Almost all of the Crimson Lions in the city had died, leaving their communication network broken. Since then they have been unable to reestablish a organised communication within the Crimson Lions and although many wish to reclaim their place of origin, they are bound by their oath to continue their own mission.