Order of Aristea
Structure
There are numerous levels within the Order. At the top of the pyramid sits the High King, a monarch elected by the Council of Houses. The King is served by his King's Circle, though members of the Circle do not gain any particular power by becoming a member. Instead, they are seen by politicians as simply the King's personal circle, and thus gain power as people who have the King's trust and can influence his decisions.
The monarchy represents more of a figurehead to the Order, however, leaving the lawmaking the the High Council and the Low Council. The High Council is a decision making group made up of the leaders of the Order's largest cities. During the reign of the Young King Kora, it is comprised of lawmakers from Trale, Voletaria, Lorain, Honrich, Ruby Mountain, Rikka, and Eaglecrest(more recently, a representative for the Eaglecrest refugees). The Low Council has a lawmaker from every city, town, and village across the continent in order to draft laws and send them to the High Council for authentication.
Each city, town, and village have their own independent leadership structures that the Order allows to remain in power, maintaining only the kingdom-wide laws that the High Council orders.
Culture
The Order of Aristea was founded just as the Free Cities were: surrounded by world powers, the divided city states that comprise much of Arith stand stronger together than apart. However, as the reign of Highlord Gherman demonstrated, focusing too much on fearing the outside world only led to a corruption from within. Fear alone could not keep the Free Cities united, so instead the High Council after the Rebel Princess Aristea's death chose to focus on building a culture of unity under an official pantheon. This play for a united religion worked so successfully that it became known as the Creighton Pantheon, named for the unpresented inclusion of Creighton, Goddess of the Void.
This newfound unity ended with the literal implosion of the Order thanks to the Cindrian Plague. However, with the arrival of the Young King Kora and the sudden influx of new citizens from many different homelands, the Order has become something of a melting pot, with one major unifying presences: a new golden age of Stormlord worship. Just like during the Dratarian Wars, Khoran represents the connection of many different cultures into one single body, the Order of Aristea.
History
When Gherman took the position of Highlord within the Free Cities, he only accentuated the many problems that had been growing within. The slave trade grew in size and in cruelty with many laws put into place protecting slavers from local governmental control. The most devastating change he made was the allowance of slavery to be a punishment for major crimes. With this, many corrupt city leaders began labeling small infractions as major crimes in order to sell bread thieves and drunkards to slavers for profit. One of these thieves, a young Véritian woman named Aristea, would be the catalyst for change.
Aristea was the daughter of a blacksmith, and before she could finish her apprenticeship and start her own trade, her father died of illness and she was thrown into poverty. Upon getting caught for stealing bits of food to survive, she was sold to a wealthy merchant within the city of Calyra and worked as a laborer thanks to the strong body she had developed shaping metal for so many years. She was a pious follower of the Wonderbringer Gond, and would pray often to him during her time as a slave. Rather than give in to her new life, Aristea unified the other slaves she was chained to and struck down her owner, marking the first in a series of battles she was destined to win. With inspiration granted to her by Gond, she melted down all the chains she and her household of slaves were bound with and forged a blade from the raw iron. Aristea poured her heart and soul into the sword, and quenched the blade in the blood of her former master as she forged. It became known as the Chain-Breaker Blade, an artifact of such power that it rivaled legendary weapons such as the Sunspear and Red Obsidian.
With this blade, and a host of freed slaves at her back, she orchestrated an uprising within Calyra, the hub of all slave trade on the western coast of Arith. Within three days the city was hers, and it served as the base of operations for her to unite the Free Cities under her rule. She would send messengers to each city ahead of her, dropping a set of broken slave chains in front of their gates. If she arrived to find their gates remained closed, it meant battle- if they remained open, the slavers had surrendered. It took Aristea only three years to rid Arith of slavery, and only a year more for her High Council to ban it forever more.
After the death of the Rebel Princess, the Free Cities were renamed the Order of Aristea in her honor. Thanks to her lack of children, and the long-standing rule within the Free Cities that a monarch may not be crowned without the blood of the Voletarian Royal Line in their veins, the High Council became the highest power in the continent for some time. This period became humanity's golden age in eastern Thelekar, a period of equality and prosperity unseen even in the mighty World Garden Empire. In an unprecedented move, this golden age was utterly shattered by the Cindrian Plague, a creation of Emperor Xarkanas. Historians have been unsuccessful in determining the cause for such a genocidal act from the former Sunfire Legionnaire; whatever the reason, Xarkanas successfully ravaged Western Arith without expensind a single soldier. The settlements within Voletarian Mountains and the Rhannor Holdings suffered immensely, every death causing mass damage to the towns around them. With the death of a majority of the human population in the region, the Order was on the brink of collapse, and the people of Voletaria had only one course of action left to them: prayer. As the final battle against Xarkanas took place, and Maireed impaled the Emperor on her Sunspear, Khoran's city called out in mourning for aid. The city was a mix of wails of agony, sadness, and anger, and with his champion dead, the Stormlord decided to act. He sent down one of his Stormguard to carry an infant down to the ruins of his temple. That infant was named by Pontiff Ukko II as the Young King Kora.
With the news of a divine child arriving in Voletaria spreading, millions of worshippers made their way to Arith and helped in the rebuilding process. It was a mass pilgrimage the likes of which has never been seen in history, and with it, the Order of Aristea was saved from collapse. Many of the pilgrims chose to stay in the new cities, and the Kingdom of Lorain joined the Order, lending them the military strength they needed to resist invasion. Under the guidance of the new King and his King's Circle, the Order once again stands as a player on the stage of world politics.
Territories
The Order of Aristea has dozens of towns and cities within its borders, but can be categorized by their geographical locations and borders of ancient dynasties. In the current year, Voletaria and its surrounding towns and villages account for the leadership of the Order under the Young King Kora. Previously, House Rhannor held the title of High Lord thanks to their large tracks of land known as the the Kingdom of Rhannor, the woodlands and hills that make up southwest Arith. Gaignes, Seamount, and Mardieu are a trio of kingdoms that are located between Rhannor and the Coligrave Woodlands, and while they are all independent of Rhannor, they are often grouped under that title when discussed at a large, continental scale. The Coligrave itself found itself within the borders of Viret, named for one of the founding families of Eaglecrest who represented the halfling capitol on the High Council. Following the Sundering of Eaglecrest, it has been dissolved and brought under the governance of its northern neighbor, Lorain. The northwestern kingdoms of Lorain and Blueridge are better known as Holy Lorain, a union of the beastial kingdoms under one religion. This kingdom makes up a sizable portion of the Order's military, and because it agreed to join the Order as a united kingdom rather than a half dozen city states, they follow one elected leader.
Tysha marks the Order's furthest reach north, settled within the Girdellan Peaks. The region is technically not even part of Arith, but rather the continent of Greater Heima, where Agder and the Northern Wards are located. This frigid land is home not only to a large population of humankind, but has also taken in many thousands of Eaglecrest refugees, increasing both their overpopulation issue and their influence on the High Council. Wedged in a corner between Tysha, Voletaria, and the World Garden Empire lies the Cities of Cinder, a duo of volcanoes where the remains of the slain fire god Maliece landed after Khoran threw them from Mount Celestia. The two mountains have become hotspots for elemental activity, with many in the scholarly community hypothesizing about a potential portal to the Elemental Fire within the interior. Whatever the cause, the population of just these two cities reaches high into the millions, giving them much sway in the High Council.
Zid Štita(Together We Are Unbreakable)
Founding Date
731 Fourth Age
Type
Geopolitical, Kingdom
Alternative Names
The Free Cities
Predecessor Organization
Training Level
Elite
Veterancy Level
Experienced
Demonym
Aristean
Head of Government
Government System
Democracy, Parliamentary
Power Structure
Confederation
Economic System
Mixed economy
Currency
Upon the signing of the Snow-Rose Treaty, the document that both secured peace between the World Garden Empire and the Order of Aristea and set up multiple trade routes through their shared seas, the Order officially began to use Imperial Drakes as their gold standard. Older currencies such as Voletarian Coins and Rhannor Emblems still hold value, but are not commonly accepted by foreign merchants and will usually be melted down and re-stamped as official Imperial Drakes.
Legislative Body
The Order allows for its member states to hold much of the autonomy they were used to before the union. Towns and cities may choose their own form of governance as long as the few Order-wide rules are followed. These larger laws are agreed upon by a council made up of elected representatives from the largest cities in the Order, such as Voletaria, Trale, and Honrich. The council does not meet often, having only met a total of 18 times since their founding. Such meetings signify decisions that can alter the very functions of the Order as a whole, such as the abolition of the Gherman-era slave trade and the declaration of war against Draica after their invasion of Cremmevia.
Official State Religion
Subsidiary Organizations
Deities
Controlled Territories
Neighboring Nations
Related Ethnicities
Comments