Domus Serpentium
This secluded order of high elf warriors practice an ancient fighting style that is based on swiftness, accuracy and deadliness employed by snakes when they strike their prey. Mastering polearms such as spears, staves, glaives, halberds, tridents and pikes, coating their weapons in toxin poisons and venoms extracted from the various flora and fauna that live in the Thavelis Jungle. The order refrains from any affiliation with the Illamel Riocht, keeping to a cloistered life deep within the jungle away from the greed, pride and corruption that stems from the politics and society of their kin.
Structure
The Domus Serpentium is split into five doctrines, each have developed the martial arts they practice based around different snakes and utilise a certain polearm. These doctrines are led by masters, the most skilled and often oldest monks within the Domus. All five of these doctrines and their masters follow the teachings and leadership of one grand master, the Serpentas.
Serpentas
Head of the order is the Serpentas, the oldest and strongest of all the warriors they have trained and mastered all five doctrines in the Domus earning their title by besting all the other masters of the doctrines. The current Serpentas is Aelia Palama, a several hundred year old master of all the serpent forms. She is dedicated to keeping the Domus as an apolitical order, remaining secluded and focusing on honing the knowledge and talents of her disciples. She has a deep love and respect of nature, dedicate a lot of the Domus to protecting, preserving and learning from it.
Boidas
This doctrine emulates the strength and force of boas and anacondas. Using mighty halberds they combine speed, strength and encorporate grappling techniques to their attacks to overpower and subdue their opponents. The master of this doctrine is Gallienus Botaniates, a bold and headstrong master. He feels that the Domus should be more prescent in high elf society, protecting and serving the people similar to the Chūmon. The Boidas are considered the strong arm of the Domus, the physically strongest doctrine and always first into a fight.
Colubridas
The agile and fast Colubridas doctrine employs the hunting style of swift racer snakes with the power of king and rat snakes. Mastering the spear as their weapon of choice, they use a blend of defensive control and deadly lunging thrusts. Using the spear to deflect their opponents strikes and create openings. Their master is Valeria Lascari, a studious and patient woman she has a lot of time for her disciples, often taking on many apprentices at once. She favours the Domus' ideals of seclusion and safeguarding knowledge so it can be passed to the next generations.
Elapidas
The wild Elapidas doctrine craft deadly unique toxins from the venoms and poisons they collect from the jungles. Applying them to their glaives while goading, insulting and throwing challenges at their opponents, enraging and destabilising them into making a mistake. At which point they strike, one swift and deadly strike to end them. Like the beautiful and dangerous cobras, taipans and mambas they based their techniques on. Their master Victorinus Cantacuzene is as skilled as he is arrogant, he cares not for the direction of the Domus, he seeks to be the best and that is all.
Pythonidas
Size and strength is what the Pythonidas doctrine embodies, wielding enourmously long pikes they lunge forward into the fight sacrificing much of their defense in order to overwhelm their opponents with relentless powerful strikes. The enourmous pythons that they mirror have guided this doctrine into focusing on offense over defense, they are all about power and strength of will teaching temperance first and foremost. Their master Cyra Attaliate is an intimidatingly huge woman with a warm caring heart, she believes that the Domus should offer more charity and homes to those ill treated by the Illamel.
Viperidas
Like the Elapidas this doctrine applies deadly toxins to their tridents and bidents, but are oppossed to their flashy style of combat and have instead embodied the stealthy, ambush methods of vipers and adders. Camoflauging and hiding their actions, not being seen and keeping their opponent guessing as to what comes next until a single deadly strike lands administering the toxins and ending them before the fight begins. Their master Sabbatius Rhagabe is a cold, silent man that leads the Viperidas to be the hidden arm of the Domus, acting as spies and assassins doing whatever is required of them by the Serpentas
Public Agenda
The Domus Serpentium is dedicated to the teachings of the ancient martial arts of the serpent. They take in high elves who have forgone their lavish or impoverished lifes in the Illamel Rìocht, seeking to embrace a life of temperance, diligence and a more naturalistic way. Protecting the jungles within which their temple stands, they do not tamper with the natural order and expect the same of others.
Assets
Numbering around seventeen hundred in total, though a few hundred of that number are children and disciples which in time will be added to the ranks of Domus warriors. Lacking much in terms of currency and material wealth, the true fortune of the Domus comes from knowledge. Writings of their martial techniques, toxins, history and life experience passed from generations.
History
In times past, back when the Ulluvian Empire dominated the world, the emperors employed elite guards to act as a small personal army answering directly to the emperor. The Praetóireach Guard. These elites were handpicked by the emperor and trained in a unique martial art. One that emphasised hand to hand combat combined with polearms, the art was developed by an elven warrior called Valens Glycas. He was a master of the spear, pike, glaive, halberd and hand to hand fighting. As such the first itteration of the Domus Serpentium was born.
For centuries the Praetóireach Guard served as the highest ranking, most elite military unit of the whole Ulluvian army. To be selected to join their ranks was the highest of honours. They lived in the grounds of the imperial palace, dined on the finest foods, sweetest wine and slept in feather beds. They were a cut above the rest both in skill and status, their weapons and armour forged by the greatest smiths. On the battlefield they were second to none, during the Dragún-Elf war (Lóng-Jīnglíng war, to the lóngzhu) they became pivotal to winning battles for the Ulluvians. Besting the elite Hǔ Zhànshì and Jìnwèi of the Zhízun Lóng, nothing could stand against them. When the human Kingdom of Polliers rose to challenge the Ulluvian Empire, the Praetóireach fought against their heavily armoured mounted Paladins and Gendarme. Their spears, halberds and glaives a perfect counter to the heavy cavalry, but the Praetóireach alone could not win the war. With the end of the Elf-Daonna war and the humiliating defeat the Ulluvian Empire faced, the elvish people rose up in rebellion against the weak emperor.
The Praetóireach defended their emperor, though many within the guard shared the same thoughts of dismay and anger. While others in the guard were sickened at the thought of harming their own people. The results of which caused a scism, a small amount of what was several thousand elite guard stayed to defend their emperor and way of life. The rest either went one of two ways, some allied with the revolutionaries and fought the old regime. Many more however fled into the jungle, taking with them their secret teachings of their martial arts. Those who remained to fight were eventually betrayed by those who fought alongside, the new Illamel Ríocht sought to remove all remnants of the Ulluvian Empire, that included the Praetóireach. They were put on trial and executed for their service to the weak, corrupt emperors.
The Praetóireach that fled into the Thavelis Jungle avoided the purge, and once they had heard about the fate of their brethren vowed never to return, exiling themselves to the wilds. These vestiges of the once proud Praetóireach Guard stumbled through the wild jungle, fighting off dangerous animals, maneating plants and tropical diseases till they found an ancient temple. A ruinous relic of a bygone era, belonging to a species of reptillian folk long believed extinct in the world. It was inside this temple that the high elves discovered written records, knowledge and teachings carved into the stone walls. They made the temple their home and set to deciphering and studying the ancient writings. Their discovery revealed the name of the ancient race, Marduk-apla-usur, serptentine humanoid reptiles. Along with the discovery their name was the history of their ancient kingdom in the jungles. About it's rise, golden age and ultimate demise. However the most useful knowledge they garnered from the stone tablets was a style of martial combat called Seluku. Which blended using polearms, hand to hand fighting, toxins and powerful leaping attacks. Methods carefully constructed to mimic the deadly jungle snakes and how they hunt their prey. These high elf Praetóireach learned the secret techniques, throwing away their old lives and mantels they became the Domus Serpentium, the House of Snakes. An order of warriors dedicated to teaching this martial art that combined Seluku and the hard training of the Praetóireach. Over the generations the children of those first monks carried on the order, passing the teachings onto their children and so forth. Foregoing all relations with the Illamel and any other nation the Domus remain in seclusion, teaching their art and protecting the jungle which provides so much to them.
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