The Dread Lords
The Dread Lords are a confederation of different duchies in the southeast of the continent of Zalas. They are currently ruled by Grand Duke Andrei Albescu. They are a chaotic nation with most of the different duchies operating independently of each other except in time of great crisis. The nation is more in the middle in terms of age and its stability has always come into question by outside scholars although it has held together for around two hundred and fifty years now. They are not known to be major players on the global scale due to their geography isolating them from most of the other countries of the world. The confederation is known for its gigantic forest occupying the majority of the central part of the nation known as the Forest of Morn and its also known for impressive castles within its major cities.
Structure
The Dread Lords are a confederation of different duchies all led by a Grand Duke operating from the capital. Most of the duchies are semi-autonomous and have their own governments led by lesser dukes.
Culture
The mortal people of the Dead Lands are said to be quiet and cold to most people in fact even to each other they do not seem to let their guard down at all. Scholars speculate that this is due in part to the undead overlords that rule over them with reports of a dukes retinue showing up and just taking people seemingly at random although some speculate their is always a reason for who they take. Most people live their life trying to get by without offending anyone for risk of a neighbor running to the authorities to turn one in to them in order to get a reward. The people are known to be very dry in humor and wit and tend not to outwardly show emotion to those they don't know very well. The god Bruva and his worship occupy a major part of Deadlander culture as the vampires that rule the nation worship him and enforce his worship on their people.
History
The Dead Lands came about in the year 1250 AC after the Great Darkness befell the continent of Zalas. During this time of eternal night vampires came out of their lairs and feasted during the day eventually culminating in the vampires overthrowing the former government of the lands the Kingdom of Rumelia. After taking control of the kingdom the vampires set about making the nation into their new nation. Eventually however heavy infighting and squabbling led to the different vampires separating into different smaller and weaker nations. This fractured nature continued for sometime before eventually a vampire strong enough to subjugate all the different mini-states came along by the name of Andrei Albescu in the year 1287 AC. He was smart enough to realize though that if he tried to rule the nation like his ancestors had it would only fracture again and thus he set up the different duchies of the nation and titled himself grand duke of The Dread Lords. This new nation was assembled into a loose confederation of dukedoms all technically subservient to the grand duke in the capital but with a much greater degree of autonomy than they enjoyed previously. This new setup has appeared to work as the nation has not fractured in the just over two hundred years it has existed.
Demography and Population
The population of the Dead Lands is mostly centered within the cities and towns of the country although there is still a sizable rural population with the split between the two being somewhere around seventy/thirty in favor of the cities. The country is mostly populated by four main species those being Humans, Minotaurs, Tabaxi, Tieflings. Humans tend to be the most populous of the main four species although they are not overwhelming the majority with the population split being somewhere around twenty-four percent Human, twenty percent Tiefling, twenty percent Minotaur, and twenty percent Tabaxi. The remaining sixteen percent is made up of various other minority species.
Territories
The Dread Lords control all of the territory east of the edges of the Ashiri Jungle and south of the Southern Grey Mountains, Lake Asarai, and the Nashtar River. This encompasses the entirety of the southeastern part of the continent of Zalas including the gigantic Forest of Morn.
Religion
The Dread Lords officially worship the god Bruva due to his domain over the dead. This worship however is mostly by the upper class and nobles of the country those typically being undead themself. While worship over the god of death is still common amongst the lower classes especially due to it being mandated by the nobility worship of other gods tends to be much more frequent. Gods such as Ibris, Iasis and Ularsil are all commonly worshipped in different parts of the country.
Foreign Relations
The Dread Lords do not have very many official relations due to their far off and isolated nature of their geography. The Undying Desert to their north and the Ashiri Jungle to their west makes trade by land difficult, if not impossible. Typically trade almost exclusively comes in through their ports via the seas on their eastern and southern border.
Relations with the Ashiri Empire and the Abasid Caliphate are quite cold at the best of times even further complicating their trading status. Both of those nations tend to keep to their own areas of control and are isolationist and as such friendly relations have been hard to come by.
The Dread Lords do maintain a trading partnership with both the Free Cities and Tangir Sultanate. Even with the difficulty and distance, trade between the nations does prosper and they maintain a more friendly relationship than not.
The Dukes only nominally maintain a relationship with the Golden Khanate, Listuroni Sultanate, and Kingdom of Sildra-Tor. This is largely due to the vast distance between the nations and lack of a trade incentive.
Laws
The laws for the nation are complex due to the autonomous nature of the differing duchies. Each duchy can have slightly differing laws in place although the differences tend to be mostly minor ones and they tend to have the same laws for major crimes and offences. On a nationalistic level there aren't too many laws although, there are a few.
Worship of the god Bruva is mandatory. People can worship other gods in whichever preference they wish, but Bruva must come above any other god they choose to worship.
Always with Dread
Maps
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Dead Lands
Map of the Dead Lands as ruled by the Dread Lords.
Founding Date
1250 AC
Type
Geopolitical, Country
Alternative Names
The Duchies of Dread, The Dead Lands
Training Level
Semi-professional
Veterancy Level
Trained
Demonym
Deadlander
Leader Title
Government System
Monarchy, Absolute
Power Structure
Confederation
Economic System
Market economy
Gazetteer
Brno Gdansk Karkov Karlovy Kaunas Pecs Pilsen Plodiv Poznan Sibiu Varna Veliko
Currency
Kuna, in denominations of copper, silver, gold, and platinum.
Legislative Body
The laws of the land can vary slightly depending on which duchy you are in. Each duke has the responsibility to create the laws for his or her own duchy. The Grand Duke can also create laws for the entire nation state but they have to be agreed upon by the majority of duchies.
Judicial Body
Each Duke appoints a council of judges for their dukedom, almost exclusively populated by vampires in order to make sure the interpretations are in line with the dukes wishes.
Executive Body
Each duke has the responsibility to enforce the laws for his or her own dukedom. The enforcing is usually carried out by which ever town or cities guards' area of control one is in.
Official State Religion
Location
Related Ranks & Titles
Neighboring Nations
Related Ethnicities
Comments