The Loanuan Settler War is an ongoing conflict between a coalition of
Weniko tribes and a coalition of settler kingdoms and fiefs under the leadership of the
Kingdom of Analona.
The conflict began when the new
Khilaian Overseer of Loanua, Kova Etavia, conspired with the Queen Lokrek of Analona and Marshal Miskora Urraiyl to launch a coordinated attack of settler kingdoms against key Loanuan tribes to divide and destroy the Indigenous Loanuan peoples once and for all. This was part of Kova's "Fortress
Loanua" plan to transform the island of Loanua into an impossible-to-attack fortress safe from the Apocalypse.
The conspiracy was undercut by an intervention by
Potha Sarana and
Virtue of Norinar, which saw Kova disgraced and the conspirators divided. This setback prevented a quick and decisive coordinated settler campaign and may have prevented the settlers from forming a united front, but it did not mean that war was avoided.
What has happened since that initial move is unknown;
Potha Sarana was forced to flee the island and has not returned.
The Conflict
Prelude
Loanuan Settler-Colonialism
Waves of outsiders have invaded
Loanua for centuries - in the 1100s and 1500s ME, groups of foreigners invaded the island and declared themselves rulers. But in the last few centuries, new groups of settler-invaders have sought to completely eradicate Indigenous Loanuan religion, culture, and politics. Older groups had a tentative settler-colonialism that is more similar to traditional conquest: the Alveran invasion of 900 ME led to the emergence of a very small semi-colonial state known as Whalena in the Southeast corner of Loanua that waged frequent bloody wars against the surrounding tribes. Whalena's dispossessive violence was worsened when Noren Lekarek led a mixed
Zihari mercenary-invasion of the island in 1250. This invasion empowered the small pariah kingdom of Whalena and adopted some of their dispossesive practices to "tame" the island. While these early invasions planted the seeds for later settler-colonialism, they were much more flexible and less explicitly genocidal than the later settler-colonialism of the 1800s and 1900s ME.
Modern Loanuan settler-colonialism arguably dates back to the failed Norikar conquest of the 1740s, which led to the "divided Loanua" policy, that split Loanua between Norikar agriculturalist fiefs in the East and Loanuan mixed-pastoral tribes in the West. This was inherited by the
Kingdom of Linorn when it conquered the Norikar in 1815. The lords of Linorn became more commercial and extractive from 1815 to 1955. By 1900, the Kings of Linorn treated Indigenous Loanuans as a problem to be solved by throwing foreign settler bodies at it. Land theft intensified, as did ecological sabotage and poaching. Linorn, always a bit xenophobic, encouraged foreigners of all cultures entering their territory to settle the "frontiers" - they funnelled incoming merchants and settlers displaced from around the world into Loanua, even as the Kingdom used land speculation to turn un-plundered Loanuan lands into cash.
Linoran Loanua already had a distinct culture: the Norikar of the island had their own culture distinct from Linorn, which became more distinct as it mixed with the existing invader-peoples of the East coast (the Whalenan-Alveran-Lekarek groups that had themselves intermarried with the existed Eastern Loanuan tribes). The influx of foreigners and global market forces led to that distinct "settler" culture really taking off as its own independent force. Settlers formed their identity through constant skirmishes with the Loanuan tribes, building a bridge of shared anti-Indigenous settler identity across incoming religious and cultural groups. The last century has seen this process of division, the creation of a distinct "settler" identity that crosses class boundaries opposed to a strictly enforced Indigenous category, reach near total completion.
The Century of Injustice
In 1939, tensions between settlers and Indigenous Loanuans exploded into violence when foreign aristocrat Zalana of Zonostra led a private military campaign to seize a large number of
Meako birds to be exported to Zonostra for breeding and military use. This war not only broke ancient treaties of peace, but it led to a rebellion by the Walokara: the Indigenous Loanuan tribe that lived alongside the settlers in the
Duchy of Analona. Settlers massacred Walokaran civilians and forced many of them to either assimilate or flee. The Walokara had served a critical role brokering peace and cultural exchange across Indigenous-settler lines, so their betrayal and slaughter was an important step in reinforcing settler colonial categories and sowing mutual distrust.
Over the late 1940s and 1950s, attempts were made to heal the wounds of 1939. The settlers launched a revolt against their feudal overlord, the
Kingdom of Linorn, in 1950: the Archduke of Loanua declared their independence and promised that any Loanuan tribes who would pledge their fealty to their kingdom would be given legal protections against dispossession. Many Loanuan tribes (particularly of the "Blue
Weniko" conciliatory faction) signed treaties of fealty to this new Kingdom of Loanua, though others did not. In 1955, immediately after Independence was secured, a number of settler fiefs declared their own independence from the new Kingdom of Loanua. Many used this opportunity to slip free of their treaties and attack unprepared Indigenous tribes. War broke out across the island. In 1959 the Kingdom of Loanua more or less collapsed and lost its military force in a terrible defeat, but the
Selkie Khilaia purchased the title and launched its own war of conquest in 1960 as the new overlords of Loanua.
The selkies wanted to control Loanua less for its land and natural resources and more as a trade post between
Garadel and
Nafena. They were willing to accept certain treaties signed by the former Kings of Loanua (especially in the North of the island) but also accepted certain rebellious fief's demands that they they be exempted from the old treaties. Essentially, the selkies were willing to let the local elites of the island manage their own affairs as long as they didn't interrupt maritime commerce.
For decades after the selkie peace, settler landlords pushed the boundaries of what they could do without reprimand. At first, the selkies censured and fined any landlord that did more than skirmish (as it created potential disruptions to the profitable status quo), but over time the selkies became more and more apathetic towards settler expansionism. In 1990, an adventurer named Karza Ezekan tested that apathy by organizing a private army and carving out her own
Kingdom of Karzado. The selkies formally rebuked Karza but lacked the political will to actually do anything about it. Karzado was allowed to exist as a technically-illegal squatter occupation that settler lords funded and traded with under the table. Selkie apathy had effectively become a de-facto endorsement of illegal expansion. Land theft was back on the menu and violence rapidly increased from 2000 to 2010.
The Recent Context
The horrific massacres and illegal slave trade of the
Kingdom of Karzado enraged many Loanuan tribes and emboldened the worst of the settlers. The fact that a united Loanuan tribal coalition had been unable to drive out Karzado despite ten years of trying was a bad sign for the Indigenous Loanuans: they lacked the organization, the population, the wealth, and the firepower necessary to win against coordinated settler violence. Many settler fiefs began to wonder what they could do with a better-coordinated and better-funded force than what Karza had. Many Karza imitators pushed at the frontier. All of these "filibusters" failed, but they steadily weakened Loanuan communities by killing their herd animals, capturing their wandering youths, and killing their warriors.
The greatest strength of the Indigenous Loanuans was the divided and distracted nature of the settlers: just as the tribes struggled to cooperate, the settlers fought each other constantly. And the selkies, for all their profiteering and failures to enforce treaty law, worked to keep the settlers divided, distracted, and de-militarized. That is, until the rise of Kova Etavia.
Kova Etavia took the position of Selkie Overseer of Loanua by force in 2014 ME. Kova had been an ordinary merchant before she was ambushed by a group of
Unwilling off the equatorial coast of
Sonev. She built a coalition of other selkies who saw the end of the world coming and wanted to somewhere to hide: she identified Loanua as having the most unexploited resources and the most defended position to do so. She and her forces ambushed the old Overseer, seized the island, and then used what clout they had in the Khilaia to make her actions retroactively legal. Over the next four years, Kova consolidated power and began organizing settlers to act out her plan: conquer the island, unify it politically, exploit its resources, and then fortify it.
Kova's plot was foiled but her reign reversed key selkie policies that had prevented a settler expansionist war. It is unlikely that anyone has the political power and will to actually stop what was been set into motion. The
Zesheko have entered the fray and are eager for the conflict to escalate, to better distract selkie forces in the region. Potha's companions,
Eora Sarana and
Akata Durukasana are building an Indigenous anti-settler coalition to strike the
Kingdom of Karzado. For a century people have pillaged this island and slaughtered its people. The dye may be cast for an era of terrible war.
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