Jackal Among Snakes

Epilogue 2.1: Preface

The Age of Reclamation was a period of great prosperity. The times after the Last Calamity represented the greatest period of opportunity that the wider populace would be granted for all time, ostensibly. Bolstered by lack of competition, solidarity after suffering, advances in healing arts, and exceptional government, the diminished population exploded toward previous levels.

By the end of this age, the general consensus is that the population had recovered from its losses—an astounding fact, though somewhat marred by the knowledge that much of this population were yet to reach the age of majority. The imperial court incentivized forming families, offering not only tax exemptions but subsidies and land settlement priority for those with children.

These policies, in tandem with the countless other benefits offered by the age, created a thriving generation of young men and women with intense national pride, many of whom reached their adulthood in 25AC or some few years before it. These children had grown up seeing the constant efforts of the government to erect a civilization from the dirt, alongside tremendous support for their parents in all their endeavors. The soil of the age was incredibly plentiful, and advances in farming made laborious fieldwork less necessary than ever. This freed these young men and women to pursue other lines of work.

Many men ended up joining the imperial army, holding tremendous loyalty toward the Blackgard Union, the emperor and empress, and the soil upon which they stood. As much was encouraged by the zeitgeist of the age. Galamon deemed women more important for the growth of the country than men, and thus restricted their enlistment outside of spellcasting roles. They were, however, increasingly welcomed to become skilled laborers or civil servants. The prominence of figures such as the empress or the prime minister eroded many biases of the previous age. Indeed, the civil service likely had more women than men at this point.

I describe this scene to the reader to set the stage for the beginning of the Age of Fury. Hot-blooded youths with pride in their hearts and love for their country far outnumbered those with scars from the calamity. Part of this had been deliberately fostered by the imperial court for the sake of stability, but much of it was the natural results of the magnificence of the Age of Reclamation.

Thus, the time that came to be known the Age of Fury unfolded.

Age of Fury, 26-37AC

The seed that sprouted into the inciting incident that would spark the Age of Fury had arguably been sown before the Last Calamity had ended. Argrave’s coup of the Great Chu led to its emperor being reestablished with little power. The majority of that power was turned over to him as its military commander—the Grand Commandant. Upon his departure from the Great Chu, the role of Grand Commandant had been turned over to his father-in-law, Patriarch Dras.

point whether or not Dras deliberately sacrificed human lives to preserve Veidimen. Regardless, the military force of the Great

nominal emperor, and Dras maintained his position

however, that Dras established as

of the robust imperial bureaucracy and the thriving network of canals connecting the cities. He endeavored to rebuild these institutions and infrastructures. Rather than employing the citizens of the Great Chu who were already well-accustomed to such apparatuses of the state,

point, Garm has

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he was doing was simple. The imperial bureaucracy had already shown entirely capable of subverting an emperor. Even a strong ruler like Ji Meng had been effectively puppeteered by their machinations. Dras hoped to avoid such a mistake by establishing loyalists to take the place of what had

administering your lives be Veidimen? The snow elves were a fair people, certainly. They took to the intricacies of the system very well, likely because their now-dead

to take additional spouses of Great Chu women, while Veidimen women were strongly discouraged from seeking Great Chu grooms. Veidimen were practically exempt from castration as a punishment, while every

it was undoubtedly terribly unfair. Year after year, it bred resentment like water slowly boiling. The Veidimen population expanded near as massively as the

concerned both my mother and father. They sent inquiries to Dras—polite protests, reminding him that what he was doing could have dire consequences. These requests did have some impact, curbing certain practices, but it was clear that greater action would need to be taken to fix things before they erupted. Already, violent incidents were sparking across

in the excesses of Dras’ regime. He considered himself perfect for the role, possessing our father’s dark hair, our mother’s amber eyes, and subtly elven

our parents relented. Enrico was appointed head diplomat, assigned a large guard of Knights of the Sun, and given leave to head overseas to help resolve the situation in the Great Chu before it turned into a civil war. He was welcomed with open arms into the imperial palace, where he was greeted by a banquet celebrating the eve of the twenty-sixth year after the end

The burgeoning violence worried him—though his people had prospered greatly, they were still greatly outnumbered and knew this terrain less than many of its natives. He

armed assailants supported by spellcasters stormed the imperial palace. It turned into a massacre in moments. Survivors claim every single Knight of the Sun perished in defense of Enrico. The entire diplomatic mission was wiped out