Summer Camp Pledge 2023

Wow I can't believe we've arrived to this wonderful time of the year!. I'm super excited for this Summer Camp!. And my exams won't be an obstacle to write articles and take part in one of WA's greatest events of the year!. Last year I achieved what I thought was impossible, the gold badge! and this year, although my objectives are more modest, I'll like to repeat that feat!.
What am I going to do this Summer Camp? you may wonder, well, pretty much what I've been doing all these challenges, and that is ... continue to expand the lore of Yeia!. As the first subject of this year's prompts would be power, I think that this would be a wonderful opportunity to keep writing about more of the realms of Yeia and also about government institutions.
And, of course here you've my certificate, I was going to write Bronze, but I think that Silver can be achievable if I'm consistent!.

Themes

Power

This is an interesting theme. I'm very interesting in powerful realms, court intrigues, politics, governments etc... . So, this theme could be useful for talking about other powerful realms in Yeia (such as the Kingdoms of Wesdaland, Witarfia, the Kingdom of the Green Elves, Adhel... and many more) or powerful organizations inside these realms! (Such as the guilds in some of them or powerful families fighting for power like the aristocracy in the Republic of Valia).
Power can also be referring to powerful figures, and Yeia is full of them. Powerful queens and kings, ministers, courtesans, generals, sages, wizards... I think there are a lot of characters to choose from!. For example you have a Desert Elf queen who became kind of kingmaker, an Ikarian general who started an imperial dynasty, or a group of wizards who briefly deposed the king of Steplia...

Frontiers

This is also a great theme for SC. Frontiers are great because they establish constrasts (for example the frontier between realms, where one percieves the other as inferior or barbarian) or a mountain chain that separates a fertile land from a desert. Geographical frontiers can also became political frontiers adding more to this contrast.
I think this SC with this theme would be a wonderful oportunity to talk about geographical, physical or magical frontiers, like the Albine Mountains, a great Mountain chain that separates many realms or the never ending storms in the Storm Sea that prevent sailors to go southwards. But also the frontiers of magic, for example the line that divides what is considered as "Light" Magic and Dark Magic. Another type of frontier that I can talk about that comes to my mind is the case of certain districts, quarter or colonies created by states such as the republic of Valia where they are physically separated from the rest of the population by a palisade or an stone wall, this valian outpost are often considered as the ultimate frontier of Blatian civilization surrounded by foreign or barbaric nations. Or the Nari colonies and the symbolism that they have of a duality between the territory of the settlement versus the wild regions surrounding it, populated by beasts and the forces of chaos (at least in their religious view).
But this geographical and political frontiers cannot be named or explain without a proper map to show them! (although I need to update it and add more marks)

Map of Yeia

Open full size

Map of Yeia (at least what the peoples of it consider to be "the known world") with the nations that have formed in the two continents, Teria in the west, and Karia in the East.

Relics

Oh Lord, bless this thy Holy Hand Granade, that with it,thou mayest blow thine enemies to tiny bits in thy mercy

— Prayer of the Holy Hand Grenade

Jokes aside (love that moment from Monty Python and the Holy Grail by the way XD) I didn't expect this theme to pop up and I love it!.I've talked about two religions in my world and I hope to be able to talk about many more. Relics of course play an important part in the religious live of many inhabitants of Yeia. Festivals, miracles, protection of settlements from enemy armies or disseases are related those relics, as well as awesome myths. This religious relics are also related to the one of the previous themes we've talked about; Power. With the control of these relics, many kings or rulers can assert their power.
We can also talk about relics from another time. The first idea that came to my mind were relics related to the old Ikarian Empire. The Ikarian Empire fell in 460 AP, that's 400 years before the "present time". But two realms considered themselves the continuation of the old Empire, I talked about one, The Blatian Empire and I could talk about the other "guardian" of the Ikarian civilization, the Kingdom, sometimes called the Empire of Cloudia.
Also related to the fall of the Ikarian Empire are the many relics related to the old Empire and I'm not talking about the aforementioned successor states. You see, during that fateful and sad day of 460 AP many statues of the gods, their relics and those of many saints, as well as the Imperia regalia (most importantly the Orb of th goddess Zerah that has the power of light within it) were taken, placed on board ships and sent to Blati alongside the heir to the throne, the Imperial Senate, and a considerable percentage of the population of the capital. So I think those relics could indeed have an interesting story.
Also many other dynasties and realms have risen and fallen across thousands of years, some of them could also produce very interesting relics and also imposing ruins to behold, admire and explore in order to find treasures!.

Communication

I think there are a lot of options for an article related to this theme and I've already a couple of ideas related to this theme such as the encrypted codes used by the diplomats of the Valian Republic, fire signals used by the Blatians to send messages to the capital about invading armies. There are also some international languages used for communication across Yeia, but I've talked about most of them. And also talking about languages and their isolation, I think this could be a great moment to talk about some elven dialects of Classical Elvish that, due to their isolation for the rest of the elven world became quite different from their mother tonge and as a result, non native speakers of these dialects would not be able to understand them. This is for example the case of the sun elf dialect and to some regard the dialect spoken by the Snow elves. Also some fellow cookies of the Cookies Cottage suggested me the "return of the Dwarves" from their underground settlements (an idea that I love btw), imagine the confusion and the limited communication between the dwarves and the elves and humans that haven't had contacts with them for thousands of years!!.