Goblin Crusades

The Goblin Crusades were a series of wars during the third century IF that culminated in the annexation of the Kanik peninsula and the subjugation of the Hahgi. Significant theological and cultural movements accompanied these wars, which ultimately defined the geopolitics of the region right up to the modern day.
Few records pertaining to The Hahgi can be found from the early second century IF. Sightings of strange men on the sides of The Broken Spires, visible from trading vessels on the Sea of Toys, were not uncommon, growing less so as the Gnomish Luxury Trades became more established. However, the first official report of the Hahgi came only after the founding of Lucria and Selucia, after the Taming of the Yethis, in 169 IF. The burgeoning Imperial colony of Lucria saw many early scouting missions ambushed as they travelled into the mountain's shadows and in 171 IF, the first orkhish raid took place. After the founding of Thrane and the birth of a maritime trade route between Lucria, Thrane and Lak Fip, the lowland akraghoblins and their piratical fleets became a real problem in the region. These early hostilities would play a key role in future propaganda painting the Hahgi as evil savages, as well as supplying ample reason for local merchants to support future wars.
Over the course of the next few decades, the Empire focussed its colonisation and exploration efforts on the rich lands of the Aelder Wood. Early encounters with the native Aeldrin, a group of elves who had migrated from The Isle of Aoleir millennia ago, were far from friendly and around 180 IF it is recorded that an Redcloak army of nine thousand Imperial soldiers had been sent to aid in the ongoing Aeldrin-Imperial Frontier Battles, in spite of rising tensions in Cyrin. The Aelderin were unable to coordinate sufficiently in repelling the invaders and, as the years progressed, they found their borders shrinking more and more. In 193 IF, a coalition of younger leaders from among the Aeldrin, including Volodar , convinced enough of their kin to coordinate the signing of a treaty between the Empire and the Aeldrin, which would come to be known as Volodar's Pact. The region of Volodaria was born, and the Volodarin split from their Aelderin brethren. Over the course of the next two decades, the colonies of Astria and Luria  began to grow, migrants from Cyrin and the northern Yethis among the most common of those to join the burgeoning towns.
It was in the wake of these colonial successes that some began to turn their eyes west. Many expeditions were funded, aiming to explore the mysterious land of Kanik (a name prised from the Kanik Gnomes who, while excellent trading partners, held their secrets tightly). Most of these were unsuccessful, the orkhs of the Broken Spires and the ghoblins of the Shattered Coast capturing any and all newcomers to their land. Expectations began to grow however when intrepid explorer Fragg Blaethwyn declared his own desire to explore the region. Fragg had had much success within the Aelder Wood, even securing friends from among the native Aeldrin, a feat few had managed to accomplish.
After several months of preparation, Fragg's expedition left Lucria in the early weeks of spring 212 IF, and met with immediate difficulties. His party was captured in an orkhish raid just a dozen kilometres from the city of Lucria and most of his men killed. Only Fragg himself and his manservant, whose name remains lost to time, were left alive. Fragg's strange mannerisms and language had amused the orkhish chieftain sufficiently that he was kept imprisoned, and taken back to their base within the Broken Spires. Over the course of the next few months, Fragg would be taken all over the mountain range, in the chieftain's tow. It was during this period that Fragg noticed the abundance of golden treasures among the orkhish tribe. Indeed, they possessed such an abundance that many of their tools were formed from the precious metal - a sign of unimaginable riches hidden beyond the Broken Spires. After nearly a year with the tribe, an incredible stroke of luck allowed Fragg a chance to escape. The annual flu struck the group especially hard, nearly wiping the tribe out. Those that survived could not afford to keep a captive and so Fragg was abandoned. Over the course of a week he was able to gnaw his way free and survive by subsisting off of the few leftover rations the tribe had left.
In 213 IF, Fragg entered the city of Lucria, bedraggled and unrecognisable. Clothes encrusted with dirt, whispering of golden treasures and laughing orkhs, Fragg served a week in prison before at last convincing the local militia of his sanity. Fragg was soon-after granted an audience with the local governor, one Baron Di Mari, an early scion of the influential Di Mari Family, whose later fortunes would be secured by the Baron's greed. While it took some time for the Baron to believe Fragg, eventually the promise of golden fortunes convinced him to gather a group of his close friends in The Senate and began plans to take the gold for himself.
The Crusaders Coalition, as they came to be known, the group was formed of landed nobles whose coffers had begun to run dry. The members began to weave their webs, employing various tactics to produce funding and armies for an invasion into Kanik. The descendants of this group would later found the controversial Minters guild.
In the early months of 214 IF, the group set to overcoming their most stubborn obstacle. Then-Emperor Juvo was not inclined to allow his lords to go to war without good reason. Indeed, Juvo had grown paranoid after assassination attempts by noble houses in the north, and was disinclined to allow any kind of mass recruitment among the nobility, out of fear of a coup. The Coalition had done a lot of work, however, among the nobles of the Senate as well as the many churches and temples across the Empire. The richest men and women of the Empire saw war in the west as an opportunity, especially those invested in the lumber and weapons industries, not least of these being House Raducci and House Firezzi; while, the common masses had been infected with religious fervour after connections were formed between the goblinoids and ancient adversaries of mankind. Frigg's tale had included many references to Hahgi gods, and allied clerics had been quick to connect them to the devils and demons of Zakhrim, one of the greatest threats to humanity during the Warring Times. With the peasants rallying behind religious leaders; and the nobles of the Senate issuing their own edicts in the Coalition's support, Juvo was given little choice but to sanction the conflict, though he still refused to send his own Redcloak soldiers to fight in it. The First Goblin Crusade had officially begun.
The First Goblin Crusade is considered to have lasted from 214 IF till 219 IF. Though ultimately unsuccessful, the saga of this conflict would set the scene for future wars and inspire crusaders from across the Empire. Early exploratory missions into Kanik from the Shattered Coast had met with little resistance from the Hahgi, and so in 215 IF the Coalition gave the green light to a much larger invasive force which they hoped would be sufficient to establish a stronghold on the continent. The force was led by one of their own, a lord by the name of Lan Sidar, who was a devotee of Tymor(article:45564e29-ddb6-4eb2-86b7-c46566b3e16a) , a child of @[Alython . Sidar's force, around 2000 strong, were mostly made up of local peasantry, as well as some Jarnish Mercenaries, yet records extol their professionalism, inspired by Sidar's own professional example. The invasion successfully landed on the shores of Haven, easily dispatching the Hahgi defenders and building the first Imperial settlement at the site. Missives between Sidar and members of the Coalition indicate that a secondary invasion force was intended to meet with them just a month after their arrival, yet just a week before these plans could be executed, Sidar's men were met with disaster. Their presence had not gone unnoticed by the natives, and fear of these strange invaders had been sufficient for a large number of the lowland ghoblins to unite against them. In midsummer of 215 IF, the town of Haven was attacked by a force of 5000 ghoblins, and Sidar's army was driven east into the mountains. Sidar's letters continued arriving in Lucria over the course of the next few months, recording the slow death of his men on the march across the Broken Spires, before at last stopping. None of Sidar's 2000 lived to tell their tale. Meanwhile, the second invasion led by Vanis Gia was repelled by the newly constructed Crimson Fleet. Over the course of the next two years, the tale of Sidar's heroism would inspire many more attempted invasions, yet none would succeed in landing on Kanik's shores, the newly united ghoblins of the lowlands successfully repelling every attempt, thanks mostly to their fleet. In 218 IF, the Coalition halted their attempts.
On the mainland, religious fervour against the Hahgi heretics had risen to an all-time high. Sidar's tale had inspired many in righteous fury, and it wasn't long before a religious movement was born from his story: the beginnings of the Sidari Church. The Mylosian Church, and many temples in the north capitalised on this movement, issuing decrees in support of another conflict in an effort to heighten their support within the Empire. The Goblin Crusades had reached significance Empire-wide and funding came from all quarters, though Emperor Juvo still refused to commit Imperial troops to the cause. Over the next seven years Lucria and Thrane exhibited unprecedented growth as migrants from all over Aelderin arrived in the region, looking to join the cause. The newly-emerging Sidari Church also grew to local prominence during this period, finding many willing converts among the bloodthirsty masses. It is estimated that over 20,000 willing soldiers had gathered for the purposes of crusading by 226 IF, when the Coalition declared the official beginning of the Second Crusade.
With the Crusading forces many times larger, the Coalition could no longer maintain absolute authority over their armies. A large proportion of those assembled owed loyalty to the Mylosian Church or to the Dominia, while others obeyed local leaders and captains. The most disorganised forces were first to travel west, seeking to force their way past the Crimson Fleet and make landings along the Shattered Coast. These early attempts were fantastically unsuccessful, the Fleet employing its priest-mages to conjure great storms that smashed the Crusader fleets against the jagged rocks of the coastline, decimating them. Many lords of the Dominia began to employ Circle mages to counter these tactics, with some success. Over the course of the next decade, however only twenty landings were successful, and not a one of these resulted in any permanent progress. While many men were lost in these attempts, this did not dent the Crusader's armies, whose ranks were consistently buoyed by recruits from all over Aelderin.
After a decade of war, many of the crusader-lords had fallen into complacency. They maintained sufficient presence in the region to earn status, yet made no significant attempts at invasion, out of fear of losing their own manpower. It had become popular for many of the Dominia to keep small holdings in the region, as well as their own holdings in the north, and as a result the Crusader's Coalition swelled with new members. Some began to call it the Little Senate, filled as it was with some of the most powerful houses in the Empire. Not all of those assembled had grown so idle however. The Crusades had grown to such significance across the continent, that if any force could manage a significant victory in the conflict, they would gain immeasurable prestige. In the summer of 237 IF, a Mylosian commander, one Prelate Anousias, coordinated a landing of 7000 men on the western shores of the Bukwit, breaking previously established treaties with the Kanik Gnomes in the process. They proceeded to march on the gnomish city of Lak Fip and loot its legendary Hoard, before moving eastwards through the Bukwit with plans to march on the Hahgi from the west. These plans would be doomed to failure however, for the Crusaders had incurred the wrath of Gnebik, the protector of the Bukwit gnomes. The great white dragon breathed huge clouds of icy death, and pursued the Crusaders all the way to the shores of the Drak Ib. Of the original 7000, only 200 survived the dragon's fury, Prelate Anousias not among them. Anousias' Folly would become a recurring theme in southern culture, as a symbol of utmost foolishness. In 238 IF, with news of this terrible defeat finally reaching the capital, Emperor Juno issued a decree that the Crusades end immediately so that new treaties could be drawn up with the Kanik gnomes and the trade in gnomish luxuries could resume.
Two more decades passed with peace once more reigning in Lucrenia. During this time, religious fervour began to die down in the north, though the Sidari Church remained strong in the south. This was when the stereotype of the Lucrian fighting man was born from the popularity of duelling in the south and the devotion of many to the Sidari precepts of honour and chivalry. While Juvo reigned, the Coalition were denied their Crusades, and most of the original group died without ever seeing their golden vision come true.
In 260 IF, opportunity would strike once more for their descendants. The death of Emperor Juvo and the subsequent selection of Ancio, a son of House Firezzi, led to a rise in popular support for the Crusades to begin anew. In 261 IF, Ancio (coronated Lius) began a project to rejuvenate the Imperial Armada, constructing many smaller vessels which were better designed for manoeuvrability in the treacherous waters of the Shattered Coast. In 262 IF, Lius declared his intent to annex the region of Kanik for the Empire. The Armada set sail from Nara Tok in the spring of 264 IF, carrying a force of 20,000 Redcloak soldiers and 66 Circle mages, and arrived in Lucria just a few weeks later. The Third Crusade began in the first month of summer of that same year.
With the Armada, the Imperial forces were able to effectively negate the effectiveness of the Crimson Fleet, yet the treacherous waters of the Shattered Coasts prohibited any quick landings of any real size. Smaller landings were attempted but were quickly picked off by roving bands of ghoblin warriors. The two sides were effectively at a stalemate. Meanwhile, across the gulf in Lucria, popular support for the Crusades were once again rising to a fever-pitch as war-hungry recruits arrived in numbers unseen since the Second Crusade. In 266 IF, the Crusader's Coalition, now formed of a new generation of greedy nobles, were able to gather 10,000 willing recruits, officially beginning their own separate Crusade, now commonly called the Fourth Crusade. However, the leaders of the Fourth Crusade, especially the new Baron di Mari, had developed a new axis for attack. A previously unknown pass through the Broken Spires allowed a sizable force to make their way through, easily dispatching the roving bands of orkhs that tried to stop them, and with the lowland ghoblins focussed on repelling invasions from the Redcloaks, the Crusaders were able to sweep through the region and secure Sidar's first landing, the town of Haven. After some diplomacy, Lius' Redcloaks were granted permission to land their own forces in Haven, in the early months of 267 IF. It took the lions share of two years for these combined forces to push onwards, across the Kanik lowlands and to the very edge of the Bukwit forest. This is when the story of The Exodus is said to take place, though this is more myth than historical fact.
Kanik had been annexed into the Imperial fold, more than doubling the size of the Imperial province of Lucrenia. In recognition of his role in the Fourth Crusade, and his family's role in previous Crusades, the young Baron Di Mari was granted his own position as Exarch of the province, the Exarchcy remaining in the family's possession to this day. The Coalition was also granted special rights over the Mines of Minera, and with the subsequent formation of the Minters guild, the gold mines of Shuld Makar would no longer be the largest supplier of gold in the Empire. With the subjugation of the Hahgi (which would last for another century and a half until the time of Abahk Stuz and the Hahgiahk), the Empire had established a dangerous precedent - many link the annexation to rising tensions between the Halfling Crews and the Empire, which culminated in the legendary Race for the New World. The degree to which the Goblin Crusades defined the course of history and the world we now live in cannot be overstated.